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SOME CRITICAL OPINIONS 



■William CuUen Bryant's 



Jfamilg yibrarj 



Poetry and Song, 




— S" 



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From the N. Y. Tribune. 
" It has taken rank as the most complete 
and satisfactory book of the kind ever is- 
sued. . . The work is enriched with an 
original memoir of Bryant, by James Grant 
Wilson, ... A collection of the most 
memorable productions in English verse for 
the delight of the family, the recreation of 
the student, the refreshment of the weary, 
and the solace and charm of all ages." 



From the Cincinnati Christian Standard. 
" It is highly fitting that Mr. Bryant, who 
presided over American poetry almost from 
its birth as well as from his own, should 
have left this collection as an evidence of 
his influence in forming the American taste 
to what is pure and noble. The directing 
hand of such a critical spirit is wanted at 
American firesides, in the formation of 
tastes averse to all meanness, and alive to 
all that is grand and true. With all Mr. 
Bryant's contributions to poetry and so- 
cial science, we doubt if he has done one 
service greater than the collection of this 
admirable book of poetry." 



From the Portland (Me.) Transcript, 
" A revised and enlarged edition of the 
work published in 1870, and very appro- 
priately contains a well-written memoir of 
Mr. Bryant, by Gen. Grant Wilson, a life- 
long personal friend." 



From the Richmond (Va.) Whig. 
"A monument of the editor's genius, 
taste, and industry." 



From the Louisville {Ky!) Argus. 
" ' Bryant's Library of Poetry and Song' 
promises to become, in its line, a classic, 
as already it is generally accepted as an 
authority. A word more : The spirit of 
this work is broad, untrammeled, catholic ! 
It recognizes, in the American depart- 
ment, both the sections of a now common 

• country, and endeavors to do justice to 
literary genius wherever exemplified. In 

I this, particular it is altogether unique." 



From the N. Y. Christian. Advocate. 

"All the poets of the English tongue are here 
brought to r, and we are taken through 

their illust. .ous ranks by one of their own 
honored company, and introduced to each 
as a special friend. Few men have ever 
lived who could guide us through this com- 
pany with greater skill than could Mr. 
Bryant. For three quarters of a century he 
had had the passport of a brother into their 
society. He had studied them as a labor of 
love and as a business. With the secret 
inspiration of kinship, .and the final author- 
ity of kingship, he knew exactly what to see 
and what to overlook. It will be a long time 
before we will find another such guide. 

" While Mr. Bryant has added no little 
to the richness of the world's treasures by 
the creations of his own thought, we cannot 
avoid the conviction that this library of se- 
lections is among his greatest services to the 
average reader. In this hurried life one 
cannot aiford to waste much time on in- 
ferior productions. It is half the battle to 
know what to read."' 



From the Boston Traveller. 
" A wealth of verses such as have been 
collected nowhere else in one volume, and 
which are chosen with the rare discrimina- 
tion and judgment the editor possesses." 

From the N. Y. yewish Advocate. 
" This book may, without hesitation, be 
called the choicest selection of poetiy ever 
fonned. With such rare judgment and dis- 
criminating taste have the selections been 
made, that there is scarcely anyone, even 
an extensive reader of poetry, who will not 
find his favorite pieces. The edition now 
before us of this great work of Bryant is 
issued as a tribute to his memory. To this 
end is appended a Biographical Memoir by 
his friend, Gen. J. G. Wilson, which will be 
found very valuable, and deeply interesting." 

From the Baltimore {Aid ) Sun. 
"A most attractive work to the lovers of 
poetry." 



y-- 



J 



The WorTc of a Master, 

" Here are the best productions of the 
best poets of the world selected by a poet 
of exquisite taste and culture. . . Save 
the ' Book of books ' and ' Webster's Un- 
abridged,' we think this boc ' Bryant's 
is destined to become the most popular ever 
published in this country."— CAristian Union. 



" In the character of the selections a broad 
catholicity has inspired the choice, while it 
has been guided by the scholarly judgment 
and human sympathy for which Bryant was 
known. Not the least valuable feature of 
the work is the review of English poetry 
and poets from Mr. Bryant's pen which 
forms the Introduction. Whether viewed 
as a specimen of English composition or as 
a critical essay, it is a piece of work such as 
only a Bryant could produce." — Springfield 
{Mass.) Union. 

" The venerable and distinguished edit- 
or's name and character will prepare every 
reader to approach this work with respect 
and confidence." — Richmond PVhig. 



" Every poem has passed the cultivated 
criticism of Mr. Bryant, who has written a 
lengthy and able introduction to the work." 
— Albany (^N. F.) Morning Press. 

" Mr. Bryant, to whom the whole realm 
of English poetry is as familiar as house- 
hold words, has gathered here all that is 
choicest and sweetest and best in that wide 
field." — St. Paul Pioneer Press. 



" Mr. Bryant's Introduction is a most 
beautiful and comprehensive critical essay 
on poets and poetry." — Albany Eveni7ig 
Journal. 

" The Introduction alone would make the 
book valuable. So short an essay contain- 
ing so much that is valuable for its quality 
would be hard to find elsewhere." — Machias 
iR'Ie.') Reptiblican. 



" The Introduction to the book is written 
with all the perspicuity and elegance which 
mark the prose writings of our illustrious 
bard." — Syracuse (JSf, F.) Standard. 



A. Library Indeed, 

" A book which bears out its comprehen- 
sive title most thoroughly." — N. Y. Evening 



Mail. 



" It is a garland of sweet and beautiful 
flowers culled from the whole garden of 
English poetry. " — Troy {JV. F.) Daily Whig. 

" It is well named, for it gives in one vol- 
ume all that is really valuable in a whole 
library of verse." — Chicago Evening Journal. 

"It is well called a ' Library' of Poetry 
and Song, with this advantage for most 
readers, that a master has made choice for 
them, bringing to them the rarest gems of 
our language." — Interior, Chicago, 111. 

" Here we find the choicest gems of the 
language. Its contents will never grow 
old. ' ' — New England Journal of Education. 

" The number of poets is so large that 
very few can afford to purchase their works. 
Indeed, private libi-aries contain the com- 
plete works of but a small number." — Troy 
{_N. F.) Whig. 

" It is the most complete collection of 
English verse we have ever used. We have 
called upon it for a great number of our 
favorites, and they have responded, both the 
companions of years and the newer friends 
of yesterday. A severer test has been tried. 
We have asked it for the authorship of stray, 
floating waifs of rhyme, and for the conclud- 
ing strains of tantalizing echoes of melody; 
and the answer has not failed to come." — 
Advance, Chicago, 111. 

" The Library of Poetry and Song was 
first published in 1870, and so popular was 
it that eighty thousand copies have been 
sold. The volume before us is designed as 
a memorial of the editor, and as such has 
been revised and improved in many ways. 
. . . All phases of human feeling are 
so fully represented that, the volume may 
well be called a library." — Northern Chris- 
tian Advocate. 



" It is rightly named a library, for that 
indeed it is." — The Voice {Organ of Vocal 
Culture), Albany, N. F. 



^ 



[& 



-Bi 



CRITICAL OPINIONS OF BRYANT'S LIBRARY OF POETRY AND SONG. 



A Mousehold Hook. 

" It has fairly earned a front rank among 
volumes of selections for the library and 
household. . . . The present edition 
contains a biographical memoir of Bryant 
by James Grant Wilson, who knew the great 
poet personally, if not intimately, and was 
with him at the time of his sudden fall on 
Mr. Wilson's own door-steps. It is as com- 
plete and satisfactoryasso brief a biographi- 
cal sketch well could be ; and is probably 
the best brief biography the public will get, 
and the best of any sort till the authorized 
one impliedly promised by the family ap- 
pears. Take it all in all it is valuable as a 
book and worthy as a memorial." — Christian 
Union, 



" From any point of view, it must prove 
an engaging companion, whose influence 
will be elevating and ennobling, and whose 
purity and freshness, and, in a literary sense, 
whose instructiveness, will never be found 
wanting." — Binghampton (JV. F.) Republi- 
can. 



" There has just come to our family circle, 
and we wish it was domesticated in every 
household in the land, ' Bryant's Library of 
Poetry and Song.' There is no question 
that such a work is indispensable in a grow- 
ing household where a taste for poetry must 
be developed and directed." — Chicago Ad- 
vance. 



' ' One of the most beautiful and valuable 
issues of this large and popular publishing 
house. It is a treasure of transcendent 
value to every household and every heart." 
— Atlanta (Ga.~) Sun. 



" It cannot be regarded in any other light 
than a charming visitor and a delightful 
resident in our family." — Rzttland {Vt.) In- 
dependent. 

" It is evidently destined to be the favor- 
ite of every family circle.'' — New Orleans 
Times. 



Best of Its Kind. 

"We know of no similar collection 
in the English language which, in copious- 
ness and felicity of selection and arrange- 
ment, can at all compare with it." — Alew 
York Times. 



" No other selection we know of is as 
varied and complete as this." — Albany Even- 
ing Journal. 

" We have no hesitation in recommend- 
ing it as the best compilation of the kind 
now extant." — Syracuse Standard. 



" It is unquestionably the choicest collec- 
tion of poetry ever made, and the mechani- 
cal execution of the book compares favor- 
ably with its contents." — Albany {N.Y.') 
Evening Times. 

" Certainly one of the best selections ever 
made. It is a delightful companion — a 
storehouse of sweets." — Harper's Weekly. 

" None that we have seen is equal to this in 
the variety and completeness of its contents, 
and the general excellence of its mechanical 
execution. " — yoiimal of Education. 

" Nothing has ever approached it in com- 
pleteness. From Shakespeare to the anony- 
mous poems, and those of little known 
authors of to-day, scarcely anything at all a 
favorite, or at all worthy of place here, is 
neglected. It is a book for every house- 
hold." — N. Y. Evening Mail. 



" It is preeminently a book for the house- 
hold." — Boston Globe. 



" We can scarcely take up a paper Mdthout 
seeing some favorable notice of the work. 
The critics manifest a singular unanimity 
in its praise." — Detroit Co?nmercial Bulletin. 

" This work must be placed side by side 
with the volumes from Brj'ant's own pen. 
Well did he understand the taste of the 
popular mind when he selected and ar- 
ranged the poems in this book. Already it 
has found its way into thousands of homes." 
— The Voice, Albatzy, N. Y. 

" Unquestionably destined to be the most 
popular poetic work ever offered to a read- 
ing public. It is a book for a life-time." — • 
Rutland ( Vt.') hidependeni. 



15-- 



--ff 







roPDS.JTOWABD *:HULBERr,N.Y. 



Memorial Edition, 



®fo Amilji 3ilJi*^t*| 



OF 



Poetry and Song. 



BEING 



ENGLISH, SCOTTISH, IRISH, AND AMERICAN; 

INCLUDING TRANSLATIONS FROM THE GERMAN, SPANISH, FRENCH, PORTUGUESE. 

PERSIAN, LATIN, GREEK, &=€. 

EDITED BY 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 

aJEttf) an lufrotiuctorg SCrcattse fig tfje iSCitar 

ON THE 

"POETS AND POETRY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE." 

» INCLUDING ALSO 

A Biographical Memoir of Bryant, 

By JAMES GRANT WILSON. 



Of Authors, and Titles of their Poems; of First Lines ; and of Famous Lines and Phrases, rendering 

the Work a Completely Classified 

DICTIONARY OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



ILLUSTRATED 

WITH A NEW STEEL PORTRAIT OF MR. BRYANT; FULL-PAGE ENGRAVINGS ON WOOD, ILLUSTRATIVE 
OF POEMS IN THE WORK; AND AUTOGRAPHIC FAC-SIMILES OF THE HANDWRITING 
OF CELEBRATED POETS. . 



'l¥ 



NEW YORK: 
FORDS, HOWARD, AND HULBERT. 






fl- 






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^ 



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Copyright, 

By J. B. Ford and Company, in 1870. 
By Fords, Howard, and Hulbert, in 1878 and 



B^ 



-^ 



[&- ■ a 



PREFACE. 



The flattering reception accorded to Mr. Bryant's Library of Poetry and Song 
is best shown in the fact that upwards of one hundred thousand copies ha^■e 
been sold since its pubhcation in 1870, while its popularit}^ seems in no way 
diminished. 

In 1876 the Publishers thought it worthy of a thorough revision, enlargement, 
and improvement. Accordingly^, with Mr. Br^-ant's active co-operation, the work 
underwent an entire reconstruction : selected parts of the early volume were 
eliminated, and a large amount of new matter added. This entailed upon Mr. 
Br^^ant much labor in revision of all the material, — cancelling, inserting, sug- 
gesting, even copying out with his own hand many poems not readil}' attainable 
except from his private library ; in short, giving the work the genuine influence 
of his fine poetic sense, his unquestioned taste, and his broad and scholai'h' 
acquaintance with literature. 

The work thus reconstructed was published in Numbers, printed on large 
paper, and with some eighty full-page illustrations, — steel portraits, wood en- 
gravings, etc., — having been completed just before Mr. Bryant's death in 1878. 
This forms a handsome work in two quarto volumes. 

The demand for the original, one-volume octavo form, however, has still con- 
tinued ; and now, in order to have it as complete as possible, it has been revised 
in the light of Mr. Bryant's later labor on the quarto edition. The making of 
entirely new electrotype plates has given opportunity to observe the suggestions 
of the critics, to correct errors (especially in the indexes, which have been brought 
down to the present year in the matter of the deaths of authors) , to complete 
many poems of which only portions had been given, and as far as practicable to 
transfer to this volume many of the improvements of the larger work."' 

The design of the book cannot be better set forth than in the words of its earl}^ 
Preface : — 

" It has been intended in this work to gather the largest practicable compilation of the 
best poems in our language, making it as nearly as possible the choicest and most complete 
general collection of poetry yet published. 

" The name ' Library ' which is given it indicates the principle upon which the book has 
been made, namely, that it might serve as a book of reference ; as a comprehensive exhibit 

* In view of this fact, it has been thought appropriate to introduce the extract from Mr. Bry- 
ant's Preface to the quarto edition, which follows, 

[0- ^ 



^ ^ 

2 PREFACE. 

of the history, growth, and condition of poetical literature ; and, more especially, as a com- 
panion, at the will of its possessor, for the varying moods of the mind. 

" Necessarily limited in extent, it yet contains one fifth more matter than any similar 
publication, presenting over fifteen hundred selections, from more than five himdred authors,* 
and it may be claimed that of the poetical writers whose works have caused their names to 
be held in general esteem or affection, none are unrepresented ; while scores of the produc- 
tions of unknown authors, verses of merit though not of fame, found in old books or caught 
out of the passing current of literature, have been here collated with those more notable. 
And the chief object of the collection — to present an array of good poetry so widely repre- 
sentative and so varied in its tone as to offer an answering chord to every mood and phase 
of human feeling — has been carefully kept in view, both in the selection and the arrange- 
ment of its contents. So that, in all senses, the realization of the significant title, ' Library,' 
has been an objective point. 

" In pursuance of this plan, the highest standard of literary criticism has not been made 
the only test of worth for selection, since many poems have been included which, though 
less perfect than others in form, have, by some power of touching the heart, gained and 
maintained a sure place in the popular esteem." 

The present edition embraces a new feature, namely, the addition to each of 
the departments into which the poems are divided (as "Childhood and Youth," 
" Love," " Nature," " Peace and War," etc.) of a number of briefer poetical quo- 
tations under the general head of "Fragments." These are in harmony with the 
character of the respective divisions, and are also grouped under more specific 
subject- titles. In the compilation of them there has been not only much careful 
searching in original poetical works, but also, for hints of what are commonl}^ 
accepted as famous or apt quotations, a consultation of various collections of such 
brief passages, — those of Addington, Mrs. Hale, Watson, Allibone, Bartlett, 
and others. By far the most helpful of these has been Mr, John Bartlett's 
Familiar Quotations : being an Attempt to trace to their Sources Passages and Phrases 
in Common Use, pubhshed by Messrs. Little, Brown, & Co., of Boston. This 
work covers not only the poetical but also the prose literature of the English lan- 
guage, besides the Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, and a mass of Proverbial 
Expressions of miscellaneous and curious origins. It is a work of such broad 
scope and rare accuracy of detail, and it has been so fruitful of suggestion and 
helpful in settling troublesome questions (for, as an authority, it holds probably 
the first place) , that an acknowledgment of the debt which this book owes to it is 
gladly offered. 

All of the poetical compilations of the day necessarily contain much of the 
same material, although the present one includes much not to be found in any 
other single one ; and in order to show — under the general classification of the 
work — the connection in which many well-known or striking " quotations" occur, 
an index has been made which refers the reader to the pages on which thej^ may 
be found, either as separated "fragments," or in the text of the poems wherein 
the}' took their origin. The volume thus becomes a Dictionary of Poetical Quota- 
tions, on a somewhat novel and interesting plan. 

* Now more than two thousand selections, representing more than six hundred authors. 

[&-.— _ ^ 



[&- 



ft 



PREFACE. 



The Publishers desire to return their cordial thanks for the courtesy freely 
extended to them, by which many copyrighted American poems have been allowed 
to appear in this collection. In regard to a large number of them, permission 
has been accorded by the authors themselves ; other poems, having been gathered 
as waifs and strays, have been necessarily used without especial authority ; and, 
where due credit is not given, or where the authorship may have been erroneously 
ascribed, future editions will afford opportunity for correction, which will be 
gladly made. Particular acknowledgments are offered to Messrs. D. Appleton 
& Co. for extracts from the works of Fitz-G-reene Halleck, and from the poems 
of William Cullen Br^^ant ; to Messrs. Harper and Brothers for poems of Charles 
G-. Halpine and Will Carleton ; to Messrs. J. B. Lippincott & Co. for quotations 
from the writings of T. Buchanan Read ; to Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons for 
extracts from Dr. J. G. Holland's poems ; and more especially to the house of 

Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin, & Co. — formerly Messrs. Fields, Osgood, & Co. 

for their courtesy in the liberal extracts granted from the writings of Aldrich, 
Emerson, Holmes, Longfellow, Lowell, Florence Percy, Saxe, Mrs. Stowe, Sted- 
man, Bayard Taylor, Bret Harte, Trowbridge, Mrs. Thaxter, Whittier, and 
others of their unequalled list of poetical writers. 

In addition to the above acknowledgments, readers will see in the "Index of 
Authors " references enabling them to find the publishers of the works of Ameri- 
can writers to whom their attention has been called by any fragment or poem 
printed in this volume. This "Library" contains specimens of man}^ styles, 
and it is believed that, so far from preventing the purchase of special authors, it 
serves to draw attention to their merits ; and the courtesy of their publishers in 
granting the use of some of their poems here will find a practical recognition. 

The death of Mr. Bryant made it seem especiall^^ appropriate that some recog- 
nition of his life and literary career should be embodied in this contribution of his 
to the literature of the household, — this "Family Librarj^," as he was wont to 
call it. A Memoir of him was therefore prepared by one who knew him long and 
well, — Geuo James Grant Wilson, of New York, — and is included in this 
volume, which will hereafter be known as the "Memorial Edition." 

With these explanations and acknowledgments, Bryant's Family Library of 
Poetry and Song is placed anew before the public. 

New York, November, 1880. 



^ 



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CONTENTS. 



Page 

Index of Authoes and Titles of the Poems 8 

Mr. Bryant's Introduction: Poets and Poetry of the English Language 31 

Memoir of Bryant 41 

Poems of Childhood and Youth 73 

Poems of the Affections. 

Friendship 109 

Compliment and Admiration. 123 

LoA^E 135 

Marriage 208 

Home 21G 

Parting 233 

Absence 241 

Disappointment and Estrangement 249 

Bereavebient and Death 272 

Poems of Sorrow and Adversity , 313 

Poems of Religion 349 

Poems of Nature 401 

Poems of Peace and War 497 

Poems of Temperance and Labor 543 

Poems of Patriotism and Freedom 561 

Poems of the Sea 605 

Poems of Adventure and Rural Sports 633 

Descriptive Poems 673 

Poems of Sentiment and Reflection 727 

Poems of Pancy ; 817 

Poems of Tragedy 871 

Personal Poems 901 

Humorous Poems 941 

Index of First Lines 1017 

Index of Famous Quotations 1029 

5 

[Q^ ^ ^ — ^ 



^ -Qi 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



STEEL ENGRAVING. 
Portrait of William Cullen Bryant Frontispiece. 

EAC-SIMILES OE AUTOGUAPH MANUSCRIPTS. 

William Wordsworth To front page 43 

William Cullen Br,yant (three-page MS. "The Poet") 70 

Edmund Clakence Stedman 74 

John Keats _. 74 

Edgar Allan Poe 74 

John Howard Payne 110 

"H. H." — Helen Hunt Jackson 110 

Thomas Hood 314 

William Gilmore Simms 314 

Leigh Hunt 350 

JosTAH Gilbert Holland 350 

Alfked Tennyson 350 

Julia Waed Howe 400 

Walt Whitman 402 

George H. Bokeb 498 

T. Buchanan Read 542 

Nathaniel Parker Willis 544 

John Greenleaf Whittier ". 544 

Francis Scott Key 560 

Oliver Wendell Holmes 562 

Fitz-Greene Halleck 562 

Bayard Taylor 606 

George Perkins Morris 60G ' 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning 634 

John Quincy Adams 634 

Jean Ingelow 674 

^ ^ ' _-^g 



^ -Q] 

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 7 



Geokge Gordon Noel, Lord Byron 728 

Henry Wadsworth Longt^ellow 818 

Richard Henry Dana 870 

Ralph Waldo Emerson 872 

Thomas Gray 903 

Harriet Beecheu Stowe 90-2 

Lydia Huntley Sigourney ' 902 

John G. Saxe 942 

Richard Henry Stoddard 94^2 

James Russell Lowell 942 

WOOD ENGRAVINGS. 

Mr. Bryant in his Library at Cedarmere 41 

Mr. Longfellow's Home, in Cambridge : 79 

The Old Oaken Bucket ■ 100 

Mr. Emerson's Home, in Concord 112 

Mr. Lowell's Home, in Cambridge 170 

Lo-ve-Letters in Elowers ; 195 

Mr. Whittier's Home, in Amesbury 375 

The Sanctuary : Dawn 363 

The Storm 430 

The Orient 451 

The Treasures of the Deep 620 

The Convent 676 

Eisher's Rock 691 

The Blind Milton and his Daughters 735 

Contentment 777 

Cedarmere: Mr. Bryant's Country Home at Roslyn 788 



S 



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ni 



INDEX OF AUTHOES AND TITLES. 



[& 



ADAMS, JOHN QUINCY. 

Quincy, Mass., 1767- 1848. Page 

The Wants of Man ...... 732 

ADAMS, SARAH FLOWER. 
England, 18051-1848. 

" Nearer, my God, to thee" .... 373 

ADDISON, JOSEPH. 

England, 1672-1719. 

Sempronius's Speech for War {Cato) . . 570 
Soliloquy: On Immortality (C«i?i') . . 759 
" The spacious firmament on high " {Spectator) 376 

From: — Campaign, The, 539 5 Cato, 310, 601, 
63 1 , 796, 799, 800, 802 ; Letter from Italy, 807 ; 
Spectator, The, 724. 

AKENSIDE, MARK. 

England, 1721-1770. 

Delights of Fancy {Pleasures o_f Imagination) Srg 

" The shape alone let others prize " . . 129 

Virtuoso, The . . . . . . . 946 

/'row : — Pleasures of the Imagination . . 814 

AKERMAN, LUCY EVELINA. 
America. 

" Nothing but leaves " 370 

ALDRICH, THOMAS BAILEY. 
Portsmouth, N. H., b. 1836. 

After the Rain 430 

Baby Bell 79 

Before the Rain 427 

Intaglio Head of Minerva, On an . . . 749 
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

ALEXANDER, CECIL FRANCES. 

England. 

Burial of Moses 383 

ALFORD, HENRY. 

England, b. 1810. 

" Rise, said the Master, come unto the feast ". 301 

ALGER, WILLIAM ROUNSEVILLE. 

Freetown. Mass.. b. 1S23. 

Parting Lovers, The (From the Chinese) . 236 
" To Heaven approached a Sufi Saint " {Fro7n 
the Persian of Dschellaleddin Rumi) . 365 

Publishers : Roberts Brothers, Boston. 

ALISON, RICHARD. 

England, b. I6th century. 

" There is a garden in her face " {An Houre^s 
Recreation in Musicke, 1606) . . . 123 

ALLEN, ELIZABETH AKERS {Florence Percy). 

Strong, Me., b. 1832. 

Left Behind 250 

My Ship 318 

Rock me to Sleep 222 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifllin, &• Co., Boston. 

ALLINGHAM, WILLIAM. 

Ballvshannrm, Ireland, b. 1828. Lives in London, Eng. 

Dirty Old Man, The 253 

Fairies, The 836 

Lovely Mary Donnelly ..... 198 

Touchstone, The ...... 735 

ALLSTON, WASHINGTON. 

Georgetown, S. C, 1779-1843. ""■ 

America to Great Britain . . . « , 588 

Boyhood 87 

Rosalie 317 



ALTENBURG, MICHAEL. 

Germany, 1583 - 1640. 

The Battle-Song of Gustavas Adolphus {Trans- 
lation) 519 

ANACREON. 

Greece, d. 476 B. C. 

Grasshopper, The {Cowley's Trafislatzon) . 484 
Spring (Moore's Translation) . . ■ 422 
ANDERSEN, HANS CHRISTIAN. 

Denmark, 1805 -1875. 

The Little Match-Girl {From the Danish) . 336 

ANDROS, R. S. S. 
Berkeley, Mass., d. 1859. 

Perseverance 477 

ANGELO, MICHAEL. 

See BuoNAROTTi, Michael Angelo. 

ANSTER, JOHN. 

Ireland, b, about 1798 ; d. 1867. 

The Fairy Child 840 

ARMSTRONG, JOHN. 

Scotland, 1709 - 1779. 

Building a Home {Art of Preservi7ig Health) 445 
From: — The Art of Preserving Health, 558, 809. 

ARNOLD, EDWIN. 
England, b. 1831. 

Almond Blossom 457 

Secret of Death, The ..... 29S 
From : — Woman's Voice ..... 795 

ARNOLD, GEORGE. 

New York, 1834-1865. 

Golden Fish, The 185 

Jolly Old Pedagogue 708 

September 433 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

ARNOLD, MATTHEW. 
England, b. 1822. 

Desire 359 

Dover Beach _. 611 

Forsaken Merman, The . . . . ' 826 

Heine's Grave 923 

Philomela 479 

ASKEWE, ANNE. 
England, T529-1546. 

'The Fight of Faith 366 

AUSTEN, SARAH. 

England, b. 1803. 

The Passage {From the German of Uhland) 291 
AVERILL, ANNA BOYNTON. 

The Birch Stream 692 

AYTON, SIR ROBERT. 

Scotland, 1570 -1638. 

On Love ....... 140 

Woman's Inconstancy ..... 267 

AYTOUN, WILLIAM EDMONSTOUNE. 

Scotland, 1813-1S65. 

Execution of Montrose, The . . . 877 

Heart of the Bruce, The 504 

BACON, FRANCIS, BARON VERULAM. 

England, 1561 - 1626. 

From : — Life 320, 792 

BAILEY, PHILIP JAMES. 

England, b. 1816. 

Aim of Life, The (Festus) .... 742 
Poet of Nature, The {Festtts) . , . 766 

From : — Festus ...... 204, 232 



^ 



BAILLIE, JOANNA. 

Scotland, 1762-1851. 

Heath-Cock, The . 

"Up! Quit thy bower" 
From : — Rayner 



BALL. JOHN. 

England, executed at Coventry, 1381. 

From : — Lines used in Wat Tyler's Rebellion 559 

BARBAULD, ANNA LETITIA. 
England. 1743 - 1S25. 

'■ Life ! I know not what thou art" . . 303 
Sabbath of the Soul, The .... 389 

Summer Evening's Meditation, A . . . 430 

To a Lady with some Pamted Flowers . 128 

From: — " Come here, fond Youth " . . . 800 

BARHAM, RICHARD HARRIS {Thomas In- 
goldsby, Fsq). 
England, 17)38-1845. 

City Bells . 716 

Jackdaw of Rheims, The 965 

Misadventures at Margate .... 966 

BARNARD, LADY ANNE. 

Scotland. J750-1825. 

Auld Robin Gray ...... 249 

BARNFIELD, RICHARD. 

England. 1574- 1606. 

Address to the Nightingale . . . ; 480 

BARON, ROBERT. 
England, b. about 1630. 

Fro7n : — M irza 312 

BARRETT, EATON STANNARD. 

England, 1785 -1820. 

From : — Woman : Her Character and Influence 795 
BARRY, MICHAEL JULAND. 

From : — " The Dublin Nation," Sept. 28, 1844 . 602 

BARTON, BERNARD. 
England. 1784-1849. 

Bruce and the Spider S73 

Caractacus ■ . 571 

" Not ours the vows" 213 

Sea, The 607 

BASSE, WILLIAM. 

England, 1613 -1648. 

From : — On Shakespeare .... 939 

BAXTER, RICHARD. 

England, 1615-1691. 

From : — ■ Love breathing Thanks and Praise . 395 
BAYLY, THOMAS HAYNES. 

England. 1797-1839. 

The Mistletoe Bough . . . . .891 
From: — Isle of Beauty, 248; The Pilot, 632; 

The Rose that all are praising, 205 ; Why 

don't the men propose? 214. 

BEATTIE, JAMES. 
Scotland. 1735 -1803. 

Hermit, The 737 

Morning ( 'ihe Minstrel ) . . . . 409 
From: — The Minstrel, 493, 559, 812. 
BEAUMONT, FRANCIS. 

England, 1586 - 1616. 

From: — Humorous Lieutenant, 310 ; Letter 
to Ben Jonson, 939. 
BEAUMONT, FRANCIS, and FLETCHER, JOHN. 

England, 1586- 1616. and 1576- 1625. 

Folding the Flocks ...... 469 

" Hence, all ye vain delights " {Nice Valour') 315 

Frotii : — A King and no King, 395; Chaucer, 
899; Faithful Shepherdess, 134; Four Plays 
hi One : The Triumph of Honor, 348 ; Knight 
of Malta, 204; Love's Cure, 107, 815; Wit 
without Money, loS. 

BEDDOES, THOMAS LOVELL. 
England. 1809-1849. 

" If thou wilt ease thine heart" . . . 303 
" To Sea ! " 630 

BEERS, MRS. ETHELIN ^I^IOT {Ethel Lynn). 

Goshen. N. Y., b. 1825. Died in Orange, N. J., 1879. 

The Picket-Guard 524 

Publishers : Porter & Coates, Philadelphia. 

BENNETT, HENRY. 
England, b. about 1785. 

St. Patrick was'a gentleman .... 1004 



BENNETT, WILLIAM COX. 

Greenwich. Eng., b. 1820. Lives in London. 

Baby May 

Baby's Shoes .... 

Invocation to Rain in Summer 
Worn Wedding-Ring, I'he . 

BENTON, MYRON B. 
Ohio. 

The Mowers ..... 



76 

82 

428 

221 



S52 



BERKELEY, GEORGE. 

England, 1684-1753. Bishop of Cloyne, Ireland. 

On the Prospect of planting Arts and Learning 
in America ,g_ 

BETHUNE, GEORGE WASHINGTON. 

New York, 1S05- 1862, 

Hymn to Night ^53 

BICKERSTAFF, ISAAC. 

England, about 1735- 1787. 

From : — Love in a Village, 559, Soo, 816. 

BLACKER, COLONEL. 
Ireland. 

Frovz : — Oliver's Advice .... 602 

BLAIR, ROBERT. 

England, 1699-1747. 

From: — The Grave, 107, 120, 310, 346, 396. 

BLAKE, WILLIAM. 
England, 1757 -1827. 

Piper, The 85 

Tiger, The 468 

BLAMIRE, SUSANNA. 
England, 1747-1794. 

The Siller Croun 155 

" What ails this heart o' mine? " . . 245 

BLANCHARD, LAMAN. 

England, 1803- 1845. 

The Mother's Hope 84 

BLAND, ROBERT, REV. 

England, 1779- 1S25. 

Home {From the Greek) .... 225 

BLOOMFIELD, ROBERT. 
England, 1766-1823. 

Farmer's Boy, The 553 

Lambs at Play 469 

Moonlight in Summer 432 

Soldier's Return, The 530 

BOKER, GEORGE HENRY. 

Philadelphia, Pa., b. 1824. 

Black Regiment, The 595 

Countess Laura ...... 886 

Dirge for a Soldier 531 

Prince Adeb 652 

Publishers: J. 13. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia. 

BOLTON, SARAH T. 

Newport, Ky.. b. 1820. 

Left on the Battle-Field 527 

BONAR, HORATIUS. 

Scotland, b. 1808. 

" Beyond the smiling and the weeping " . 296 
Master's Touch, The ..... 3S8 
BOOTH, BARTON. 

England. 1681 -1733. 

From : — Song 796 

BOTTA, ANNE CHARLOTTE LYNCH. 

Bennington. Vt.. b. about 1820. Lives in New York. 

On a Picture 247 

BOURDILLON, FRANCIS W. 

England, now living. 

Light 135 

BOWLES, CAROLINE ANNE. 

See SouTHEY, MRS. Caroline Bowles 

BOWLES, WILLIAM LISLE. 

England. 1762- 1850. 

" Come to these scenes of peace" . . 403 

Greenwood, The 454 

Rhine, On the . . ... 447 

BOWRING, SIR JOHN. 

England. 1792- 1872. 

" From the recesses of a lowly spirit " . . 375 
Nightingale, The {From the Portiizvese) . 479 
Nightingale, The {From ihe Dutch) , . 479 



•ff 



fl- 



10 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



-n 



BRADSTREET, ANNE. 

England, b, 1612. d. America, 1672. 

^?-o;«; ^ Contemplations (Pub. in 2d ed. of 
The Tenth Mtise, lately sprung up iii. A 7ner- 

ica. Boston : 1678) 493 

BRAINARD, JOHN GARDINER CALKINS. 
New London, Conn., 1796- 1828. 

" I saw two clouds at morning "... 137 

Niagara, The Fall of 449 

BRANCH, MARY L. BOLLES. 
Brooklyn. N. Y., b. 1841. 

The Petrified Fem 863 

BRENAN, JOSEPH. 

Ireland, b. 1829 ; d. in New Orleans, 1857. 

"Come to me, dearest " .... 247 

BRETON, NICHOLAS. 

England, 1555- 1624. _ _ 

" I would I were an excellent divine " . . 362 

PhilUda and Corydon 136 

Phillis the Fair 124 

BRISTOL, LORD 

See uiGBY, JOHN, Earl of Bristol. 

BROOKS, CHARLES TIMOTHY. 

Salem, Mass., b. 1813. Lives in Newport, R. I. 

Alpine Heights (Frotn the German of Krunt- 
niacher) ....... 445 

Fisher, The (^From the German of Goethe) • 825 
Good Night [From the German of K'drner) . 558 
Men and Boys {Frofft the Germa?i of K'drner) 583 
Nobleman and the Pensioner, The {Fro7n the 

German of Pfef^el ) 520 

Nurse's Watch {From the Germati) . . 78 
Sword Song, The (From the German, of 

K'drner) _ Si9 

Winter Song {From the Gerjnaii of Ltidwig 

Holty) 434 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

BROOKS, MARIA GOWEN {Maria del Occidente). 
Medford, Mass., 1795 -1845. 

"Day, in melting purple dying" . . _ . 245 
Disappointment {Zojihiel, or the Bride of 
Seven) .■•■.••• 261 
Publi.shers : Lee & Shepard, Boston. 

BROWN, FRANCES. 

Ireland, 1818-1864. 

Losses 333 

" O the pleasant days of old ! " . . . 699 

BROWNE, SIR THOMAS. 
England, 1605 - 1682. 

From: — Religio Medici .... 310 

BROWNE, WILLIAM. 
England, r59o-i64s. 

My Choice 140 

Siren's Song, The {Inner Temple Masque) . 825 

" Welcome, welcome, do I sing" . . . 126 

From : — ■ Britannia's Pastorals . . . 938 

BROWNELL, HENRY HOWARD. 

Providence, K. I., 1824- 1872. 

Lawyer's Invocation to Spring, The . . 992 
Publisliers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co,, Boston. 

BROWNING, ELIZABETH BARRETT. 

England, 1809- 1861. 

Court Lady, A 585 

George Sand, Sonnets To .... 923 

Lady's Yes, The ...... 144 

Lord Walter's Wife 217 

Mother and Poet . . ... 283 

Musical Instrument, A 865 

Parting Lovers (Sienna) 236 

Pet Name, The 89 

Portrait, A ....... 97 

Romance of the Swan's Nest, The . . . 102 

Sleep 762 

Sonnets from the Portuguese . . . 189 

View across the Roman Campagna, A . . 683 

Wordsworth, On a Portrait of . . . 914 
BROWNING, ROBERT. 

England, b. 1812. 

Evelyn Hope 284 

Flower's Name, The 147 

Herv^ Riel 617 

How they brought the Good News from Ghent 

to Aix 513 

In a Year 260 



Incident of the French Camp . . . Si3 

Meeting 170 

Pied Piper of Hamelin, The . . . 849 

The King is cold 884 

" The Moth's kiss, first ! " {In a Gondola) . i88 
From: — One Word more, 399; Paracelsus, 801, 
808. 

BRYANT, JOHN HOWARD. 
Cummington, Mass., b. 1807. 

Little Cloud, The 593 

Valley Brook, The 447 

Winter 438 

BRYANT, WILLIAM CULLEN. 
Cummington, Mass., 1794- 1878. 

America 587 

Battle-Field, The 534 

" Blessed are they that mourn " . . . 743 

Death of the Flowers, The .... 466 

Evening Wind, The ..... 411 

Fatima and Raduan {From the Spanish) . 166 

Flood of Years, The 750 

Forest Hymn, A 452 

Fringed Gentian, To the .... 465 

Future Life, The 275 

Hurricane, The 686 

June 425 

L.oys o( God, T\\& {Frofn the Provencal) . 38S 

Mosquito, To a ...... 487 

My Autumn Walk . _ . . . . 535 

" O, fairest of the rural maids" . . . 130 

Planting of the Apple-Tree, The . ._ . 457 

Poet, The {Manuscript facsimile) ... 78 

Robert of Lincoln ..... 476 

Snow-Shower, The ...... 440 

Song of Marion's Men .... 589 

Thanatopsis ....... 307 

To a Waterfowl ...... 481 

Washington's Birthday, Ode for . . . 62 
From: — Autumn Woods, 494; March, 492; 

Scene on the Banks of the Hudson, 309. 
Publishers : D. Appleton & Co., New York. 

BRYDGES, SIR SAMUEL EGERTON, 

England, 1762-1S37. 

Echo and Silence .... 
BUCHANAN, ROBERT. 

Scotland, b, 1S41. 

Fra Giacomo 

Little Milliner, The 



86s 



. 885 
i8i 



BUCKINGHAMSHIRE, JOHN SHEFFIELD, 
DUKE OF. 

England, 1649 - 1720. 

From : — Essay on Poetry .... 

BUNYAN, JOHN. 

England, 1628-1688, 

From : — Pilgrim's Progress . . 347, 

BUONAROTTL MICHAEL ANGELO. 

Italy, 1474-1563- 

" If it be true that any beauteous thing" {J. B. 

Taylor^s 'Translation) ..... 
" The miglit of one fair face " ( Taylor'' s Trans.) 
From : — Sonnet {Mrs. Henry Roscoe's Trans.) 
BURLEIGH, GEORGE S. 

America. 

A Prayer for Life 

BURLEIGH, WILLIAM H. 

Woodstock, Conn., b. 1812. 

Deborah Lee . . ., . . . . 1 

BURNS, ROBERT. 

Scotland, 1759 -1796. 

Ae fond kiss before we part . 

Afton Water .... 

Auld Lang Ss'ne . 

Banks o' Doon, The 

Bannockburn 

Bard's Epitaph, A . 

" Ca' the yowes to the knowes " 

Comin' through the Rye . 

Cotter's Saturday Night, The 

" Duncan Gray cam' here to woo 

Elegy on Captain Henderson 

" For a' that and a' that " 

" Green grow the rashes, O ! " 

I love my Jean 

"John Anderson, my Jo " . 



Sos 



13s 

135 



380 



233 

447 
118 
249 
573 
917 
'S3 
187 
38s 
tg6 
917 



m^ 



-& 



[& 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



11 



rOi 



John Barleycorn . . . . . . 944 

" Let not woman e'er complain " . . 194 

Louse, To a . 486 

Man was made to mourn .... 332 

Mary in Heaven, To 288 

Mary Morison 149 

Mountain Daisy, To a 462 

Mouse, To a 468 

My Heart 's in the Highlands .... 659 

" My wife 's a winsome wee thing" . . 216 

" O my luve 's like a red, red rose " . . 234 

"O, saw ye bonnie Lesley?" . . . 242 

Tam O'Shanter 847 

" The day returns, my bosom bums " . . 218 

Toothache, Address to the .... 952 

To the Unco Guid 784 

" Whistle and I '11 come to you, my lad " . 156 
From : — Despondency, 345 ; Epistle from Eso- 
pus to Maria, 346 ; Epistle to Davie, 348 ; 
Epistle to a Young Friend, 395, 396, 796 ; 
Epistle to James Smith, 108 ; Jessy, 134 : 
On Captain Grose's Peregrinations through 
Scotland, 805 ; Sensibility, 204 ; Vision, 
The, 309. 

BUTLER, SAMUEL. 
England, 1600 -1680. 

Hudibras' Sword and Dagger .... 506 
Hudibras, The Logic of ... . 945 
Hudibras, The Religion of ... . 387 
From: — Hudibras, 108, 205, 215, 309, 347, 395, 
396, 490, 540, 632, 671, 803, 804, 807, 808, 8og. 

BUTLER, WILLIAM ALLEN. 

Albany, N. Y., b. 1825. 

" Nothing to wear " 981 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

BYRON, JOHN. 

England, 1691 - 1763. 

A Pastoral 245 



BYRON, GEORGE GORDON NOEL, LORD. 

England, 1788 - 1824. 

" Adieu, adieu ! my native shore " . . . 238 

Augusta, To 223 

Coliseum by Moonlight (Man/red) . . 680 

CoX\se.\xm,'T\\&{Chtlde Harold) . . . 68r 

Daniel Boone (Don Juan) .... 926 
Destruction of Sennacherib, The {Hebrew 

Melodies) 501 

Dream, The 764 

Evening (Don Jua^i) 413 

" Farewell, if ever fondest prayer" . . 238 

Farewell to his Wife 238 

Filial Love (Childe Harold) . . . 222 

First Love (Don Jrian) 166 

Greece {The Giaour) 581 

Greece {Childe Harold) . . _ . . .581 

Greek Poet, Song of the (Don J'uan) . . 580 
Lake Leman, Calm and Storm on (Childe 

Harold) 685 

Latest Verses 250 

" Maid of Athens, ere we part " . . . 234 

M.viraX (Ode /rom the French) . . . 913 

T^apoleon (Childe Harold) . . . . 911 

Night 415 

Orient, The {Bride oy A fydos) . . . 451 

" O, snatched away in beauty's bloom " . . 288 

Pantheon {Childe Harold) .... 682 

Picture of Death, A ( The Giaour) , . . 303 

Foet's \mpu\st {Childe Harold) . . . 767 

Prisoner of Chillon, The ..... 703 

^hme, The (Childe Harold) . . . 446 

Rover, Song of the ( The Corsair) . . . 626 

.Sea, The (Childe Harold) . . . . 607 

" She walks in beauty " (Hebrew Melodies) . 130 

Swimming ( Two Foscari) .... 669 

'The kiss, dear maid " . . . . . 234 



Thomas Moore, To 
Transient Beauty ( The Giaour) 
Waterloo (Childe Harold) .... 
Frojn: — Beppo, 721, 795, 801, 814; Bride of 
Abydos, 134, 206, 231, 309, 541, 720; Childe 
Harold, 133, 134, 206, 241, 271, 396, 397, 490, 493, 
541, 720, 725, 726, 792, 796, 800, 812, 813, 867, 
869 ; Corsair, 348, 812, 938 : Death of Sheridan, 
940; Doge of Venice, 491 ; Don Juan, 107, 



203, 204, 205, 215, 3og, 310, 396, 490, 631, 632, 
671, 794, 796, 805, 808,809, 811 ; English Bards 
and Scotch Reviewers, 215, 397, 8co, 804, 805, 
806, 940 ; Giaour, The, 205, 207, 271, 312, 816 ; 
Island, The, 814; Lara, 346, 490; Letter, 793; 
Manfred, 107, 108, 493 ; Mazeppa, 899 ; Par- 
isina, 491, 899 ; Sardanapalus, 241, 794 ; Waltz, 
The, 814 ; " When we two parted," 241. 

CALDWELL, WILLIAM W. 
Newburyport, Mass., b. 1823. 

Rose-Bush, The (From the Germa7t) 
CALIDASA. 

India, ist Century B. C. 

Baby, The {Sir IVilliam Jones's Trans.) 
Woman {Horace H. IVilson's Trans. ) 

CALLANAN, JEREMIAH JOSEPH. 
Ireland, 1795- 1829. 

Gougaune Barra 

CALVERLEY, CHARLES L. 
England, b. 1831. 

Arab, The 

Cock and the Bull, The .... 

Disaster 

Lovers and a Reflection .... 

Motherhood 

To Tobacco 



78 
776 



lOIO 

1008 
991 

lOIO 

991 
990 



412 

578 
788 
513 
743 
185 
573 
338 
144 
616 
5S3 
741 
5=9 
629 



CAMOENS, LUIS DE. 

Portugal, 1524- 1579. 

Blighted 'Lose (L or d Strangford's Trans.) . 

CAMPBELL, THOMAS. 
Scotland, 1777 -1844. 

Evening Star, The 

Exile of Erin 

Hallowed Ground 

Hohenlinden 

Hope (Pleasures of Hope) .... 
Kiss, The First ...... 

Lochiel's Warning 

Lord Ullin's Daughter 

Maid's Remonstrance, The .... 
Napoleon and the British Sailor . 

Poland 

River of Life, The ..... 

Soldier's Dream, The 

"Ye mariners of England " 
From : — Drink ye to her, 205 ; Gertrude, 494 ; 
Pleasures of Hope, 204, 248, 310, 347, 395, 397. 
79s, 800, 802, 810 ; To the Rainbow, 494. 

CANNING, GEORGE. 

England, 1770-1S27. 

Epitaph on the Marquis of Anglesea's Leg . 953 
Friend of Humanity and the Knife-Grinder 952 

From: — New Morality, 121, 806; The Pilot that 
weathered the Storm, 632. 

CAREW, LADY ELIZABETH. 

England, pub. 1613. 

Revenge of Injuries (Mariam) . . . 789 

CAREW, THOMAS. 

England, 1^89-1639. 

Compliment, The ...... 126 

" Give me more love or more disdain " . 144 
" He that loves a rosy cheek "... 141 
" Sweetly breathing, vernal air " . . . 422 

Frotn : — Conquest by Flight, 205 ; On the Duke 
of Buckingham, 309 ; " Think not 'cause men 
flattering say," 203. 

CAREY, HENRY. 

England, 1663-1743. 

Maiden's Ideal of a Husband (Contrivafices) 142 
Sally in our Alley 19S 

From : — Choonon, 808 ; God save the King, 603. 

CARLETON, WILL M. 
Ohio, b. 1839. 

New Church Organ, The .... 995 

Over the Hill to the Poor- House . . 342 

Publishers : Harper & Bros., New York. 

GARY, ALICE. 

Near Cincinnati, O., 1820-1S71. 

Dying Hymn, A 391 

Make Believe 188 

Pictures of Memory . . . . .89 
Spinster's Stint, A 172 

Publishers, Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 



IB-- 



^ 



ifi 



12 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



GARY, HENRY FRANCIS. 

England, 1772-1844. 

"Tlie fairest thing in mortal eyes" (Frotn the 
Fre7ich of Charles-, Dzike of Orleans) . 300 

GARY, LUCIUS (Lord Falkland). 

England, 1610 -1643. 

Ben Jonson's Commonplace Book . . . 907 

GARY, PHCEBE. 

Near Cincinnati, O., 1824- 1871. 

Dreams and Realities 113 

Lovers, The i°oS 

Nearer Home 375 

Peace 533 

Publishers : Houghton, MifBin, & Co., New York. 

CASIMIR THE GREAT, KING OF POLAND. 

Poland. 1309 -1370. 

" It kindles all my soul " {From the Polish) 372 

GASWALL, EDWARD. 

England, b. 1814. 

" My God, I love thee" [From the Latm of 
St. Francis Xavier) 360 

GELANO, THOMAS A. 

Italy, about 1250. 

Dies Irs {jfohn A . Dix^s Translation) . . 353 

GHADWICK, JOHN WHITE. 

Marblehead, Mass., b. 1840. 

The Two Waitings 277 

GHALKHILL, JOHN (Probably Izaak Walton). 

The Angler 668 

GHAMBERLAYNE, WILLIAM. 
England, 1619- 1689. 

From: — Chastity 796 

GHANNING, WILLIAM ELLERY. 

Boston, Mass., b. 1818. 

Our Boat to the Waves ..... 630 
Publishers : American Unitarian Association, Boston. 

CHAPMAN, GEORGE. 

England, 1557-1634. 

Camp at Night, The {Iliad) .... 414 
" Muses that sing Love's sensual empirie " 135 

From : — Blind Beggar of Alexandria, 203 ; Re- 
venge, 120; Widows' Tears, 900. 

CHARLES, DUKE OF ORLEANS. 
France, 1391 - 1465. 

"The fairest thing in mortal eyes" {Henry F. 

Gary's Translatio?i ..... 300 
Spring 421 

GHATTERTON, THOMAS. 

England, 1752 1770. 

Minstrel's Song 289 

CHAUCER, GEOFFREY. 

England, 1328-1400. 

Canterbury Pilgrims, The {Canterbury Tales) 695 
Compleynte of Chaucer to his Purse . . 904 
T>3!isy,'Th&{LegeJid of Good IVotnen) . . 462 
Morning in May {Knighies Tale) . . 418 

Frojn : — Assembly of Foules, 489 ; Canterbury 
Tales : Prologue, 809 ; Clerkes Tale, 231 ; 
Frankleines Tale, 398 ; Knightes Tale, 490, 
492, 802; Manciples Tale, 398; Nonnes 
Preestes Tale, 900 ; Troilus and Greseide, 108. 

CHERRY, ANDREW. 
England, 1762-1812. 

The Bay of Biscay .... . . 628 

CHESTERFIELD, EARL OF. 

England, 1694-1773. 

From. : — Advice to a Lady in Autumn . . 491 

CHORLEY, HENRY FOTHERGILL. 

England, 1808 -1872. 

The Brave Old Oak -454 

CHURCHILL, CHARLES. 

England, 1731-1764. 

From : — Prophecy of Famine, S07 ; Rosciad 804 

GIBBER, COLLEY. 

England, 1671-1757. 

The Blind Boy ....... 343 

From: — Richard III., Altered 204, 492, 539, 541, 899 

CLARE, JOHN. 

England, 1793-1864. 

Laborer, The 557 

Summer Moods 427 



CLARKE, JAMES FREEMAN. 

Hanover, N. H., b. iSio. 

Cana 388 

The Caliph and Satan (Persian of Tholuck) 866 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

CLAUDIUS, MATTHIAS. 

Germany, 1743 -1815, 

The Hen ( Translation) 991 

GLELAND, WILLIAM 
England, about 1661 - 1689, 

Hallo, my Fancy 820 

CLEVELAND, JOHN. 
England, 1613-1659. 

To the Memory of Ben Jonson . . . 906 

CLOUGH, ARTHUR HUGH. 
England, 1819- 1861. 

Qua Cursum Ventus ..... 233 

COFFIN, ROBERT BARRY {Barry Gray). 

Ships at Sea 261 

COLERIDGE, HARTLEY. 

England, 1796- 1S49. 

Shakespeare . . . . . . . 906 

" She is not fair to outward view" . . 129 

COLERIDGE, SAMUEL TAYLOR. 
England, 1772 - 1S34. 

Answer to a Child's Question .... 474 

Epigrams . . . . . . . 954 

Exchange, The ...... 192 

Fancy in Nubibus 822 

Genevieve 162 

Good Great Man, The 739 

Hymn before Sunrise in the Vale of Chamouni 376 

Knight's Tomb, The 538 

Kubla Khan 834 

Metrical Feet ....... 1015 

Quarrel of Friends, The (C/ir/jjfrt^f/) . . 116 
Rime of the Ancient Mariner .... 854 

From: — Christabel, 30S, 721, 726; Christmas 
Carol, 492 ; Day Dream, 807 ; Death of Wallen- 
stein, 490, 800 ; Devil's Thoughts, 396 ; Epi- 
taph on an Infant, 107 ; Fears in Solitude, 395 ; 
Homeric Hexameter {From German of Schil- 
ler), 631 : Wallenstein, 207 ; Youth and Age, 
108, 120. 

COLES, ABRAHAM. 

Newark, N. J. 

Stabat Mater Dolorosa {From the Latiji of Fra 
Jacopone ....... 355 

COLLINS, ANNE. 

England, about 1627. 

" The winter being over " .... 420 

COLLINS, MORTIMER. 

England, 1827 -1878. 

Comfort . 974 

Darwin 991 

COLLINS, WILLIAM. 

England, 1720- 1756. 

" How sleep the brave " 563 

Passions, The 773 

From : — Ode on the Death of Thomson . . 940 

GOLMAN, GEORGE (The Younger). 
England, 1762 - 1836. 

G\vL%^\\.y-Qi\\.\%{TheMy7-tleandtheVitie) . 946 
Sir Marmaduke ...... 958 

Toby Tosspot 958 

From : — Lodgings for Single Gentlemen . 809 

CONGREVE, WILLIAM. 
England, 1670-1729. 

Silly Fair 713 

From : — Letter to Gobham, 793 ; Mourning 
Bride, 207, 398, 809 ; Old Bachelor, 214. 
COOK, ELIZA. 
England, b. 1817, 

Old Arm-Chair, The loi 

COOKE, PHILIP PENDLETON. 

Martinsburgh, Va., 1816-1850. 

Life in the Autumn Woods .... 663 

COOKE, ROSE TERRY. 

Hartford, Conn. 

Reve du Midi 410 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

COOLIDGE, SUSAN. 

See WooLSEY, Sarah Ghauncby. 



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a- 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



13 



rn 



COOPER, JAMES FENIMORE. 

Burlington, N. J., 1789-1851. 

My Brigantine {The IVaier IVitch) . . 626 

CORBET, RICHARD. 

England, 1582- 1635. 

Farewell to the Fairies 847 

CORNWALL, BARRY. 

See Procter, B. W. 
CORNWELL, HENRY SYLVESTER. 

The Sunset City 823 

COTTON, CHARLES. 

England, 1630 -1687. 

Contentation 734 

Retirement, The 737 

COTTON, NATHANIEL. 

England, 1721 - 1788. 

The Fireside 226 

COWLEY, ABRAHAM. 

England, 1618-1567. 

Chronicle, The 191 

Gr3.s%\\opX>e^r,Th.e {Greek of A nacreofi) . 484 

Hymn to Light, From the .... 407 
Invocation {Davideis) ..... 772 

Of Myself . _ . . . . . .73° 

From : — Anacreontiques, 494 ; Davideis, 793 ; 
For Hope, 800 ; Gold, 204 ; Motto, The, 8n ; 
On the Death of Crashaw, 39S ; Prophet, The, 
804; Waiting Maid, The, 795. 

COWPER, WILLIAM. 

England, 1731 - 1800. 

Boadicea 572 

Contradiction {Conversation") . . . 780 

Cricket, The . . ... . .485 

Diverting History of John Gilpin . . 959 

Duelling {Conziersaiion) ..... 7S0 

'K\\g\d.nei{The Task: Book I/.) . . . 575 

Freeman, The ( T'A^ Task: Book V.) . . 600 
Happy Man, The (r,^^ Task: Book VI.) . 735 

Humanity (/'A^ Task: Book VI.). . . 782 

My Mother's Picture 92 

Nightingale and Glow- Worm, The . . . 863 
Nose and the Eyes, The . . . . 951 

Rose, The 464 

Royal George, On the Loss of the . . 612 
S[a.v&rv{Tke. Task: Book II.) . . .593 
Sum of Life, The {The_ Task : Book VI.) . 790 

" Sweet stream, that winds " .... 106 
Verses supposed to be written by Alexander 

Selkirk 738 

Winter Morning (r.^^ Task: Book V.) . 435 

Winter Noon {The Task: Book VI.) . 437 

From: — Conversation, 558, 724, Exhortation to 
Prayer, 398 ; Fable, A, 394 ; Light shining 
out of Darkness, 632 ; Motto of Connoisseur 
No. III., 107; Mutual Forbearance, 215; 
Needless Alarm, 671, 793 ; On Friendship, 
121 ; Pairing-Time Anticipated, 215, 495 ; 
Progress of Error, 793 ; Retired Cat, 802 ; 
Retirement, 120, 396, 724, 815 ; Stanzas sub- 
joined to a Bill of Mortality, 308 ; Table Talk, 
601, 602 ; Task, The : Sofa, 493, 494, 672 ; 
Timepiece, 232, 806, 809, 814. 815 ; Winter 
Evening, 492, 495, 810 ; Winter Morning 
Walk, 394, 493, 539, 541 ; Tirocinium, 398 ; To 
an Afflicted Protestant Lady, 348 ; Transla- 
tion from the Greek, 271 ; Translation of 
Horace, 815 ; Truth, 397, 493. 

COZZENS, FREDERICK SWARTWOUT. 

New York, 1818-1869. 

An Experience and a Moral .... 253 
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

CRABBE, GEORGE. 

England, 1754- 1832. 

Approach of Age, The ( Tales of the Hall) . 323 
Quack Medicines { The Borough) . . 783 

From. : Birth of Flattery, 798 ; Parish Register, 



CRAIK, DINAH MARIA MULOCK. 
England, b. 1826. 

Alma River, By the .... 
■' Buried to-day " 
Dead Czar Nicholas, The 
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true 



516 
272 
929 



Fletcher Harper, To the Memory of . . 935 

Her Likeness ...... 130 

Lancashire Doxology, A 556 

Now and Afterwards 295 

Only a Woman 258 

Philip, my King ...... 75 

CRANCH, CHRISTOPHER PEARSE. 

Alexandria, D. C, b. 1813. 

Thought . 731 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., and Roberts Bros., 
Boston. 

CRASHAW, RICHARD. 

England, 1600 - 1650. 

Nightingale's Song [MtistVs Duel) . . . 774 

Supposed Mistress, Wishes to his . . 192 

Temperance, or the Cheap Physician . . . 546 

"Two men went up to the Temple to pray." 362 

Water turned into Wine ..... 362 

Widow's Mites, The ..... 362 

From : — In Praise of Lessius's Rule of Health . 724 

CRAWFORD, MRS. JULIA. 
Ireland. 

" We parted in silence " . . . . 240 

CROLY, REV. GEORGE, LL.D. 

Ireland, 1780- 1S60. 

Catiline to the Roman Army (Cai^z7zW) . . 501 

Genius of Death, The 744 

Leonidas, The Death of 564 

CROSS, MARIA EVANS LEWES (G^^r^^ Eliot). 
England, b. 1S20. ^ 

" Day is Dying" {Tlie Spanish Gipsy) . .411 
" O, may I join the choir invisible" . . 760 

CROWQUILL, ALFRED. 

See Forrester, Alfred A. 

CUNNINGHAM, ALLAN. 

Scotland. 1784 -1842. 

"Thou hast sworn by thy God, my Jeanie " . 208 
Poet's Bridal-Day Song, The . . . 219 

Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea, A . . . 626 

CUNNINGHAM, JOHN. 
Ireland, 1729- 1773. 

Morning 4°8 

CUTTER, GEORGE W. 

Massachusetts, b. i8oi. 

Song of the Lightning 864 

Song of Steam 555 

DANA, RICHARD HENRY. 

Cambridge, Mass., 1787- 1879. 

Beach Bird, The Little 482 

Husband and Wife's Grave, The . . 304 

\&\-A.\\i.,'\:\\e:{The Buccaiieer) . . . . 691 

Pleasure- Boat, The 666 

Soul, The 368 

Publishers : Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. 

DANIEL, SAMUEL. 
England, 1562 - 1619. 

To Delia 414 

Love is a Sickness 136 

From : — On the Earl of Southampton, 348 ; Son- 
net, 204 ; To the Countess of Cumberland, 808. 

DANTE. 

Italy, 1265-1321. 
From : — Inferno 34d> 39o- 

DARLEY, GEORGE. 

Ireland, 1785- 1846. 

Gambols of Children, The .... 85 
Song of the Summer Winds ... 425 

DARWIN, ERASMUS. 
England, 1731 - 1802. 

From : — Botanic Garden .... 802 

DAVIES, SIR JOHN. 

England, 1570 -1626. 

The Dancing of the Air 45' 

Front : — Contention betwixt a Wife, &c. . .231 
DAVIS, THOMAS. 

Ireland, i8i4-i84.=;. 

Sack of Baltimore, The . . . . . 8S0 
Welcome, The 152 

DEKKER, THOMAS. 

England, about 1574 - about 1641. 

The Happy Heart {Patient GrisselT) . . 55° 
From : — Honest Whore, The, 723 ; Old Fortuna- 
tus, 308. 



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14 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



^a 



DE LISLE, ROUGET. 

France. The Song written at Strasburg, in 1792. 

The Marseilles Hymn {Abbrev. Translaizoji) 584 

DENHAM, SIR JOHN. 
England, 16x5 - 1668. 

From : — Cooper's Hill, 720, 723 ; Elegy on 
Cowley, 939. 
DE VERE, AUBREY. 

Ireland, b. 1814. 

Early Friendship in 

" Sad is our youth, for it is ever going " . 316 

DIBDIN, CHARLES. 
England, 1745-1814. 

Heaving of the Lead, The .... 627 

Poor Jack . 615 

Tom Bowling 629 

DIBDIN, THOMAS. 

England, 1771- 1841. 

AW '%\ft\\ (The British Fieei) ... 627 
From : — The Tight Little Island . . .602 

DICKENS, CHARLES. 
England, 1812 - 1870. 

Ivy Green, The 465 

DICKINSON, CHARLES M. 
Lowville, N. Y., b. 1842. 

The Children 230 

DICKSON, DAVID. 

England, 1583- 1662. 

The New Jerusalem 358 

DIMOND, WILLIAM. 

England, 1800- 1837. 

The Mariner's Dream 614 

DIX, JOHN ADAMS. 

Boscawen, N. H., 1798 -1879. 

Dies Iras (Latin of Thomas a Celatio) . . 353 

DOBELL, SYDNEY. 
England, 1824-1875. 

Home, Wounded 325 

How's my Boy? ... ... 616 

Milkmaid's Song, The 168 

DOBSON, AUSTIN. 
England, b. about 1840. 

Before Sedan 529 

For a Copy of Theocritus (Essays iii old 

French Fonns 0/ Verse') .... 405 

Growing Gray 755 

On a Fan 749 

Romaunt of the Rose {Vigfieiies in Rhyme) . 266 

Sun Dial, The 184 

DODDRIDGE, PHILIP. 

England, 1702- 1751. 

" Amazing, beauteous change ! " . . . 377 
From : — Epigram on his Family Arms . . 794 
DODGE, MARY MAPES. 

The Two Mysteries 297 

DOLLIVER, CLARA G. 

America. 

No Baby in the House 80 

DONNE, DR. JOHN. 

England, 1573-1631. 

The Will . _ 791 

From : — Comparison, The, 795 ; Divine Poems : 
On the Sacrament, 39S ; Triple Fool, The, 798 ; 
Valediction forbidding Mourning, 248. 
DORR, JULIA C. R. 

Charleston, S. C, b. 1825. 

Outgrown 263 

Publishers : J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia. 

DORSET, CHARLES SACKVILLE, EARL OF. 

England, 1637-1709. 

The Fire of Love (Examen Miscellaiienm) . 202 
DOUGLAS, MARIAN. 

See Green, Annie D. 
DOUGLASS . 

Scotland. 

Annie Laurie. 155 

DOWLAND, JOHN. 
England, 1562- 1615. 

Sleep . 762 

DOYLE, SIR FRANCIS HASTINGS. 

England, b. 1810. 

The Private of the Buffs . . . '514 



DRAKE, JOSEPH RODMAN. 

New York City, 1795-1820. 

American Flag, The 592 

Culprit Fay, I'he 840 

DRAYTON, MICHAEL. 
England, 1563-1631. 

Ballad of Agincourt, The 502 

" Come, let us kisse and parte " . . . 239 
From: — To Henry Reynolds .... 93S 

DRUMMOND, WILLIAM. 

Scotland, 1585 - 1640. 

Nightingale, To a 479 

DRYDEN, JOHN. 
England, 1631-1700. 

Ah, how sweet ! ( Tyrannic Love) . . . 145 
Alexander's Feast ; or, the Power of Music. 771 
Character of the Earl of Shaftesbury (Absalom 

and A chitopheV) 908 

Portrait of John Milton, Lines written under 907 
Song for St. Cecilia's Day, A, 1687. . . 775 
Veni Creator Spiritus (From the Latin) . . 357 
Zimri (A bsaloni and A chitophel) • . 909 

From : — Absalom and Achitophel, 490, 601, 798 ; 
All for Love, 207 ; Amphictrion, 248 ; Aurung- 
Zebe, 793 ; Cock and the Fo.x, 489 ; Conquest 
of Grenada, 345, 798 ; Cynion and Iphigenia, 
204, 206, 671, 721 ; Don Sebastian, 813 ; Elegy 
on Mrs. Killigrew, 311 ; Epistle to Congreve, 
120 ; Hind and Panther, 398 ; Imitation of 
Horace, 792, 793, 806 ; Marriage a la Mode, 
203 ; QEdipus, 309 ; Oliver Cromwell, 939 ; On 
the Death of a very young Gentleman, 309 : 
Palamon and Arcite, 207 ; Tempest, 725 ; 
Threnodia Augustalis, 725 ; Trans. Ovid's 
Metamorphoses, 493 ; Tyrannic Love, 539. 

DSCHELLALEDDIN RUMI. 
Persia. 

" To heaven approached a Sufi saint" ( W. R. 
Alger's Translation) ..... 365 
DUFFERIN, LADY (Helen Selina Sheridan). 

Ireland, 1807-1867. 

Lament of the Irish Emigrant .... 292 
DUNLOP, JOHN. 
Scotland, 1755-1S20. 

" Dinna ask me " 161 

DWIGHT, JOHN SULLIVAN. 

Boston, Mass., b. 1813. 

Landlady's Daughter, The (From the German 

ofUhland) 142 

True Rest ....... 557 

DWIGHT, TIMOTHY. 

Northampton, Mass., 1752-1817. 

Columbia 588 

DYER, JOHN. 
Wales, 1700-1758. 

Grongar Hill 443 

From : — Ruins of Rome 725 

DYER, SIR EDWARD. 

England, about 1540 - 1607. 

" My minde to me a kingdom is " . . . 729 

EASTMAN, CHARLES GAMAGE. 

Burlington, Vt., 1816-1861. 

A Picture 229 

A Snow-Storm ...... 440 

EDWARDS, AMELIA BLANDFORD. 
England, b. 1831. 

" Give me three grains of corn, mother" . 338 
ELIOT, GEORGE. 

See Cross, Maria Evans Lewes. 
ELLIOT, EBENEZER (The Corn-Law Rhymer). 

England, 1781-1849. 

Burns 914 

Corn-Law Hymn, The 557 

Spring 421 

EMERSON, RALPH WALDO. 
Boston, Mass., b. 1803. 

Boston Hymn 597 

Brahma 746 

Concord Monument Hymn .... 589 

Each and All ...... 405 

Friendship 112 

Good By 744 

Humble-Bee, To the 484 

Letters 746 



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INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



15 



Problem, The 735 

Rhodora, The 461 

Sea, The 610 

Snow-Storm, The 439 

J^ram : — Good By 3") 397 

Publishers, Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

ERASMUS. 

Rotterdam, 1467- 1536. 

From : — Apothegms 540 

EVERETT, DAVID. 

Princeton, Masb., 1769- 1813. 
From : — Lines written for a School Declamation 107 

EVERETT, EDWARD. 
Dorchester, Mass., 1794-1865.^ 

Dirge of Alaric the Visigoth .... 903 

EYTINGE, MARGARET. 

Baby Louise 78 

FABER, FREDERICK WILLIAM. 
England, b. iSi4-x864. 

" O, how the thought of God attracts " . . 374 
The Right must Win 39° 

FALCONER, WILLIAM. 
Scotland, 1730- 1769. 

The Shipwreck 612 

FANSHAWE, CATHERINE. 
England. Latter part of i8th century. 

A Riddle. (The Letter H.) . . . .778 

FENNER, CORNELIUS GEORGE. 

Providence, R. 1., 1822-1847. 

Gulf-Weed 622 

FERGUSON, SIR SAMUEL. 

Ireland, 1S05. 

Forging of the Anchor, The .... 554 
Pretty Girl of Loch Dan, The . . . 105 

FIELDING, HENRY. 

England, 1707-1754. 

A hunting we will go . . . . 662 

Roast Beef of Old England, The . . . 575 
From : — Covent Garden Tragedy, 803 ; Tom 

Thumb the Great, 797. 

FIELDS, JAMES THOMAS. 
Portsmouth. N. H., b. 1S20. 

Nantucket Skipper, The 988 

Tempest, The ...... 627 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

FINCH, FRANCIS MILES. 
Ithaca, N. Y., b. 1827. 

The Blue and the Gray 533 

FINLEY, JOHN. 

Cincinnati, O. 

Bachelor's Hall ...... 1003 

FLAGG, WILSON. 

Beverly, Mass., b. 1805. 

The O'Lincoln Family ..... 47s 
Publishers, Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

FLETCHER, GILES. 
England, 1588-1623. 

" Drop, drop, slow tears " .... 360 

FLETCHER, JOHN. 

England, 1576-1625. 

Invocation to Sleep ( VaUntinian) . . . 761 
" Take, O, take those lips away " . . 263 

From : — Nice Valour, 206 ; Queen of Corinth, 
346; Upon an Honest Man's Fortune, 793, 797. 

FORD, JOHN. 

England, 1586 -about 1639. 

The Musical Duel (T/ie Lover's Melancholy) 694 

FORRESTER, ALFRED H. (^Alfred CrowgtdU). 
England, b. 1806. 

To my Nose 1015 

FOSDICK, WILLIAM WHITEMAN. 

Cincinnati, O., 1825-1S62. 

The Maize 458 

FOSTER, STEPHEN COLLINS. 

Pittsburg, Pa., 1826- 1864. 

My Old Kentucky Home .... 238 

FOX, WILLIAM JOHNSON. 

England, 1786-1864. 

The Martyr's Hymn {German 0/ Luther) . 365 

FRANKLIN, BENJAMIN. 
Boston, Mass., 1706 - 1790. 

Paper 975 



FREILIGRATH, FERDINAND. 

Germany, b. iSio. 

Lion's Ride, The (From the German) . . 467 

GALLAGHER, WILLIAM D. 
Philadelphia, Pa., b. 1808. 

Autumn, The 434 

GARRICK, DAVID. 

England, 1716-1779. 

Fro7n: — Hearts of Oak, 631; Prologue on 
quitting the Stage in 1776, 804. 

GARRISON, WILLIAM LLOYD. 

Newburyport, Mass., 1804-1879. 

Sonnet written in Prison ..... 593 

GARTH, SIR SAMUEL. 

England, 1670 -1719. 

From. : — The Dispensary . . . 309, 801 
GASCOIGNE, GEORGE. 

England, 15,37 -I577- 

The Vanity of the Beatitiful .... 712 
Frojn : — The Swiftness of Time . . . 791 

GAY, JOHN. 

England, 1688-1732. 

Black-eyed Susan 235 

From : — Beggar's Opera, 121, 134, 205, 493, 722, 
795; Dione,207 ; Hare and Many Friends, 121, 
133 ; Mother, Nurse, and Fairy, 232 ; My own 
Epitaph, 792 ; Painter who pleased Nobody 
and Everybody, 805, 810 ; Rural Sports, 671 ; 
Shepherd and Philosopher, 804 ; Sick Man and 
the Angel, 347, 794 ; Squire and his Cur, 121. 

GAYLORD, WILLIS. 

Lines written in an Album .... 1015 

GERHARDT, PAUL. 

Germany, 1607 - 1676. 

The Dying Saviour 373 

GIBBONS, THOMAS. 

England, 1720-17S5. 

Fro-m ; — When Jesus dwelt .... 797 
GIFFORD, RICHARD. 
England, 1725-1S07. 

Fro7n : — Contemplation .... 559 

GILBERT, WILLIAM SCHWENCK. 

England, b. 1836. 

Captain Reece 970 

To the Terrestrial Globe .... 1012 
Yarn of the " Nancy Bell," The (Bab Ballads) 968 
GILDER, RICHARD WATSON. 
Bordentown, N. J., b. 1844. 

Dawn 405 

Publishers : Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. 
GILMORE, JAMES R. {Edmimd Kirke). 
Boston, Mass., b. 1823. 

Three Days 751 

GLAZIER, WILLIAM BELCHER. 
Hallowell, Me., b. 1827. 

Cape-Cottage at Sunset 412 

GLUCK, . 

Germany. 

To Death (Translation) 295 

GOETHE, JOHANN WOLFGANG VON. 
Germany 1749- 1S33. 

Brothers, The { Translatio7i) .... 761 
Fisher, The(C. T. Brooks'" s Translation) . 825 
King of Thule, The (Bayard Taylor's Trans!) 862 
GOLDSMITH, OLIVER. 

Ireland. 1725- 1774- 

Deserted Village, The 686 

Hermit. The ( The Vicar of Wakefield) . 138 

Home (The Traveller) 229 

Madame Blaize, Elegy on ... . 949 
Mad Dog, Elegy on the Death of a . . 948 

On Woman ( Vicar of Wakefield) . . 336 

Frovt : — Art of Poetry on a New Plan, 540 ; Cap- 
tivity, The, 347, 348, 800 , Good-natured Man, 
813 ; Retaliation, 724 ; Traveller, 232, 248, 396, 
398, 603, 632, 809, 812 ; Vicar of Wakefield : 
On Woman, 271. 

GOULD, HANNAH FRANCES. 
Lancaster, Vt., 1789- 1865. 

The Frost 96 

GRAHAM, JAMES, MARQUESS OF MON- 
TROSE. 

Scotland, 1612-1650. 

" My dear and only love " . . . . 150 



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16 



INDT-.X OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



GRAHAM OF GARTMORE. 

Scotland. 

" If doughty deeds my lady please " . . 146 
GRAHAME, JAMES. 

Scotland, 1785- 1838. 

The Sabbath 378 

GRANT, SIR ROBERT. 

Scotland, 1785 -1838. 

Litany 358 

GRAY, DAVID. 

Scotland, 1838-1861. 

" Die down, O dismal day " .... 419 

Homesick 223 

" O winter, wilt thou never go ? " . . . 441 

GRAY, THOMAS. 

Eng"land, 1716-1771. 

Elegy written in a Country Churchyard . . 305 
Spring 421 

Frojn : — Bard, The, 108, 206, 868 ; Distant 
Prospect of Eton College, 108, 793, 899; Edu- 
cation and Government, 232, 397 ; Fatal Sis- 
ters, 540 ; Hymn to Adversity, 345 ; Ode on 
the Pleasure arising from Vicissitude, 232, 346, 
489, SS9 i Progress of Poesy, 205, 867, 939. 

GREEN, ANNIE D. (Mariatt Dcniglas). 
Bristol, N. H. 

Two Pictures 229 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

GREEN, MATTHEW. 

Engrland, 1696- 1737. 

Voyage of Life, The ( The Spleen) . . ■ 742 

GREENE, ALBERT GORTON. 

Providence, R. I., 1802-1868. 

Baron's Last Banquet, The .... 293 
" Old Grimes is dead" .... 976 

Publisher : S. S. Rider, Providence, R. I. 

G'REENE, ROBERT. 

England, 1560 - 1592. 

Content (Farewell to Follie) . . . .731 
Shepherd and the King, The . . . 136 

GREENWOOD, GRACE. 

See LiPPiNCOTT, Sara J. 

GREGORY THE GREAT, ST. 

Italy, 540-604. 

Darkness is thinning (y. M. Neale's Trans.). 360 
Veni Creator Spiritus {Dryden's Trans.) 357 

HABINGTON, WILLIAM. 

England, 1605- 1645. 

Frojn: — Castara . . . . . .311 

HALLECK, FITZ-GREENE. 
Guilford, Conn., 1790- 1867. 

Alnwick Castle 677 

Burns 915 

Fortune {Fanny) ...... yjy 

Joseph Rodman Drake .... 937 

Marco Bozzaris ...... 582 

Weehawken and the New York Bay {Funny) 685 

From : — Connecticut ...... 603 

Publishers : D. Appleton & Co., NewYorlc. 

HALPINE, CHARLES G. {Miles O'Reilly). 
Ireland, 1829 -1868. 

Quakerdom — The Formal Call . . . 159 
Publishers : Harper & Brothers, New York. 

HAMILTON, ELIZABETH. 

Scotland, 1758-1S16. 

My ain Fireside ...... 227 

HARRINGTON, SIR JOHN. 

England, 1561-1612. 

Lines on Isabella Markham .... 268 

Of a Certaine Man 945 

Warres m Ireland, 0{ the {E/izgrams) . . 503 

From: — Epigrams .... 801,805,812 

HARTE, FRANCIS BRET. 
Albany, N. Y., b. 1839. 

Dickens in Camp 926 

Dow's Flat gg6 

Her Letter 199 

Jim . 997 

Plain Language from Truthful James (Heathen 

Chinee) 985 

Pliocene Skull, To the 991 

Ramon 897 



Societv upon the Stanislaus, The . . . 988 
Publishers': Houghton, MitHin, & Co., Boston. 

HARTE, WALTER. 
Wales, 1700- 1774. 

A Soliloquy 484 

HARVEY, STEPHEN. 

England. 

Frofjt : — Translation of Juvenal's Satire IX. 8n 

HAY, JOHN. 

Salem, Ind., b. 1839. 

Banty Tim ....... 998 

Little Breeches ...... 999 

Woman's Love ...... 270 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

HAYNE, PAUL HAMILTON. 
Charleston, S. C, b. 1S32. 

Love scorns Degrees {Mou7itain of the 
Lovers) ....... 136 

Pre- existence ....... 760 

Publishers : E. J. Hale & Son, New York. 

HEBER, REGINALD. 

England, 1783- 1826. 

" If thou wert by my side, my love " . . 219 
From : — Epiphany, 397 ; Gulistan, 724 ; Lines 

written to a March, 491 ; Missionary Hymn, 395. 

HEDGE, FREDERIC HENRY. 

Cambridge. Mass., b. 1805. 

"A mighty fortress is our God" {From the 
German of Martin Luther) . . . 371 

HEGGE, ROBERT. 
England, 1599-1629. 

From : — On Love 204 

HEINE, HEINRICH. 

Germany, 1797 -1847. 

Fisher's Cottage, The {C G. Leland's Trans.) 691 
Lore-lei, The {Translation) .... 825 

HEMANS, FELICIA DOROTHEA. 

England, 1794- 1835. 

Casablanca ....... 614 

Homes of England, The .... 229 

Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers, The . . 5S7 
Meeting of the Ships, The .... 115 

Mignon's Song {German of Goethe) . . 789 
Treasures of the Deep, The . . . . 619 

From: — Graves of a Household, 311 ; Hour of 
Death, The, 308 ; Wordsworth, 940. 

HERBERT, GEORGE. 
Wales, 1593 - 1632. 

Church Porch, The 364 

Flower, The 768 

Gifts of God, The 778 

Life 741 

Praise 363 

"Said I not so? " ..... 366 

Virtue Immortal 301 

From.: — Answer, The, 121; Church Militant, 
395 ; Country Parson, 398 ; Devil's Progress, 
271 ; Man, 792 ; PuDey, The, 395. 

HERRICK, ROBERT. 
England, 1591-1674. 

Ben Jonson, Ode to . . . . . . 907 

Blossoms, To ...... 456 

Daffodils . 464 

Delight in Disorder 713 

Holy Spirit, The ...... 359 

Kiss, The 1S6 

Lent, A True 361 

" Sweet, be not proud " .... 133 

Violets 461 

Virgins, To the ...... 754 

" When as in silks ray Julia goes" . . .126 
From: — Cherry Ripe, 134; Love me little, 
love me long," 207 ; Night Piece to Julia, 134 ; 
Rock of Rulsies and Quarrie of Pearls, 134 ; 
Seek and find, 800 ; Upon her Feet, 721. 

HERVEY, THOMAS KIBBLE. 

England, 1804- 1S59. 

Love . . . . . . . . . 208 

The Devil at Home {The Devifs Progress) 951 

From: — The Devil's Progress . . . 271 

HEYWOOD, JOHN. 

England, d. 1565. 

From: "Be merry, friends" . . . 347 



15-^ 



fl- 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



17 



ra 



HEYWOOD, THOMAS. 
England, d. 1649. 

" Pack clouds away " 409 

Portrait, The ...... 127 

Frotn : — Apology for Actors .... 792 

HIGGINS, JOHN. 

England. Time of Queen Elizabeth. 

Books . . . . . . . . 76S 

HILL, AARON. 

England, 1685-1750. 

From : — Epilogue to Zara, 795 ; Verses writ- 
ten on a Window in Scotland, 800. 

HILL, THOMAS. 

New Brunswick. N. J., b. 1818. 

The Bobolink .... . . . 475 

HINDS, SAMUEL (Bishop of Norwich). 
England, 1793-1872. 

Baby Sleeps ....... 282 

HOBART, MRS. CHARLES. 

England. 

The Changed Cross ...... 374 

HOFFMAN, CHARLES FENNO. 

New York City, b. 1S06. 

Monterey ........ 523 

Publishers : Porter & Coates, Philadelphia. 

HOGG, JAMES. 
Scotland, 1772-1833. 

Jock Johnstone, the Tinkler .... 639 

Kilmeny (Queen's Wake) . . . . 837 

Skylark, The 473 

When the Kye comes Hame . . . 163 

Women Fo'k, The ...... 974 

HOLLAND, JOSIAH GILBERT. 

Belchertown, Mass., b. iSig. 

Cradle Song ( Bitter-Sweet) .... 75 
Publishers : Chas. Scribner's Sons, New York. 

HOLMES, OLIVER WENDELL. 
Cambridge, Mass., b. 1S09. 

Bill and Joe .112 

Boys, The 978 

Chambered Nautilus, The .... 625 
Contentment ...... 733 

Daniel Webster 928 

Height of the Ridiculous, The . . . 976 

Katydid 485 

Last Leaf, The 323 

Ode for a Social Meeting 1015 

Old Ironsides ...... 620 

Old Man Dreams, The 979 

One-Hoss Shay, The 977 

Ploughman, The . . . . . .551 

Rudolph the Headsman .... 978 

From : — • Urania 347, 803 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

HOLTY, LUDWIG, HEINRICH CHRISTOPH. 

Germany, 1748- 1776. 

Wmter Song (C/zarles T. Brooks's Trans.) . 434 

HOME, JOHN. 
Scotland, 1724-1808. 

Nerval (Doug^las) 650 

HOMER. 

Greece. IX. Century, B. C. 

The Camp at Night {Iliad: Chapman's Trans.) 414 
From : — Iliad {Pope's Trans. ), 120, 792, 794, 797 ; 
OAy%%e.y {P ope' s Trans.), 121, 489. 

HOOD, THOMAS. 
England, 1798-1845. 

Art of Bookkeeping 9S9 

Autumn ........ 433 

Bridge of Sighs, The 335 

Dream of Eugene Aram, The . . . .895 

Faithless Nelly Gray 964 

Faithless Sally Brown 953 

" Farewell, life ! " ..... 327 

Flowers 460 

Heir, The Lost ...... 94 

Infant Son, To my ...... 93 

" I remember, I remember "... 93 

Morning Meditations 963 

No 435 

Nocturnal Sketch 10 14 

Ruth 106 



Song of the Shirt, The 337 

" What can an old man do but die." . . 322 
From: — Miss Kilmansegg, 724, 802; Lady's 
Dream, 798. 

HOOPER, LUCY. 

Newburyport, Mass., 1816-1841. 

Three Loves ....... 142 

Publishers : J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia. 

HOPKINSON, JOSEPH. 
Philadelphia, Pa., 1770-1842. 

Fro7n : — Hail Columbia .... f 03 

HOPPIN, WILLIAM J. 

Charlie Machree 153 

HORACE [QUINTUS HORATIUS FLACCUSl. 

Italy. 65-8 B.C. 

From: — Book l, Ode s (Milton' s Trafis.) . 632 
HOUGHTON, LORD (Richard Monckton 

MiLNEs). 

England, b. 1809. 

Brookside, The, 149 

Good Night and Good Morning . . . 103 

London Churches 034 

Men of Old 740 

Fro7n : — Tragedy of the Lac de Gaube . . 4S9 

HOVEL, EDWARD. 

See Lord Thurlow. 

HOWARD, HENRY. 

See Surrey, Earl of. 
HOWARD, SIR ROBERT. 
England, 1626-1698. 

From : — The Blind Lady .... goo 

HOWE, JULIA WARD. 

New York City, b. 1819. 

Battle Hymn of the Republic .... 594 
Royal Guest, The . . . . . 116 

Publishers : Houghton, MifHin, & Co., Boston. 

HOWITT, MARY. 

England, b. about 1800 or 1804, 

Use of Flowers, The 466 

HOWITT, WILLIAM. 

England, 1795-1879. 

Departure of the Swallow, The . . . 478 
Summer Noon, A 4.10 

HOWLAND, MARY WOOLSEY. 
England, b. 1832 ; d. New York, 1864. 

First Spring Flowers 289 

Rest 29s 

Publishers : E. P. Dutton & Co., New York. 

HOYT, RALPH. 

New York, 1808-187S. 

Old . V 32 

Snow. — A Wmter Sketch .... 44^ 

HUGO, VICTOR. 

France, b. 1802. 

From. : — The Djinns {O'Stillivan's Trans.) . 868 

HUME, ALEXANDER. 
Scotland, 1711-1776. 

The Story of a Summer Day .... 426 

HUNT, SIR A. 
England. 

From : — Julian 63 1 

HUNT, LEIGH. 
England, 1784-1850. 

Abou I3en Adhem 768 

Child during Sickness, To a . . . 88 

Cupid Swallowed ...... 195 

¥3\r\es' SoYig {Latin of Thomas Randolph) . 835 

Glove and the Lions, The .... 652 

Grasshopper and Cricket, To the . . . 485 

Jaffar . 115 

" Jenny kissed me " ..... 98 

Love-Letters made in Flowers . . . 195 

Mahmoud 700 

Sneezing ....... 1015 

Trumpets of Doolkarnein, The . . . 6gg 
From : —Politics and Poetics, 489 ; The Story of 
Rimini, 493. 

HURDIS, JAMES. 

England, 1763-1801, 

ProjH : — The Village Curate , . , . 495 



fr-- 



^ 



fl- 



18 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



'-a 



INGELOW, JEAN. 

England, b. 1830. 

High-Tide on the Coast of Lincolnshire 

Like a Laverock in the Lift 

Maiden with a Milking-Pail, A . . , 

Seven Times One 

Seven Times Two 

Seven Times Three 

Seven Times Four 

Seven Times Six ..... 

INGOLDSBY, THOMAS. 
See Barham, R. H. 

JACKSON, HELEN HUNT. 

America, now living. 

My Legacy 

Publishers : Roberts Bros., Boston. 

JACKSON, HENRY R. 

Savannah, Ga., b. iSio. 

My Wife and Child 

JACOPONE, FRA. 

Italy, d. 1306. 

Stabat Mater Dolorosa {Coles's Translaiioii) 

JENKS, EDWARD A. 

Newport, N. H., b. 1835. 

Going and Coming 

JENNER, DR. EDWARD. 

England, 1749 - 1823. 

Signs of Rain 



286 
213 
167 
87 
101 
172 



JOHNSON, C. 

England. 

From : — Wife's Reick . 
JOHNSON, EDWARD, M.D. 

England. Pub. 1837. 

The Water-Drinker . 



JOHNSON, SAMUEL. 
England, 1709 - 1784. 

CVidir]es yill {Vaniiy oyi/uman Wishes) 

Shakespeare ...... 

To-morrow (/r(?«^) . _. . . . _ . 
i^riJ?« ." — Epitaph, 940 ; Epitaph on C. Philips, 

802 ; Lines added to Goldsmith's "Traveller," 

807; London, 345, 806; Rambler, The, 394; 

Vanity of Human Wishes, 794, 804 ; Verses 

on Robert Levet, 395. 
JONES, SIR WILLIAM. 

England, 1746- 1794. 

Baby, The (From the Satiskrit of Cdliddsa) . 
" What constitutes a State ? " 
Front : — A Persian Song of Hafiz 
JONSON, BEN. 

England, 1574 -1637. 

"Drink to me only with thine tyss'''' (From 

the Greek of Philostratns) 
Epitaph on Elizabeth L. H. 
Epitaph on the Countess of Pembroke 

Fame 

'Fa.nXcisy {Vision of Delight) . 
Freedom in Dress (Epicoejie) 
" How near to good is what fair " . 
Good Life, Long Life .... 
" O, do not wanton with those eyes" 
On the Portrait of Shakespeare . 
To the Memory of Shakespeare 
Vision of Beauty, A .... . 
From : — Cynthia's Revels, 120 ; Masques, 671 
Underwood, 121 ; Valpone, 809. 
JUDSON, EMILY CHUBBUCK. 

Eaton, N. Y., 1817-1854. 

Watching ........ 

JUVENAL, DECIMUS JULIUS. 
Italy, b. ist Cent., d. 2d Cent., A. D, 

From : — Satire IX. (S. Harvefs Trans. ) . 

KEATS, JOHN. 
England, 1796-1821. 

Eve of St. Agnes, The 

Fairy Song 

Fancy ........ 

Grasshopper and Cricket, The . 

Ode on a Grecian Urn 

Ode to a Nightingale 

Thing of Beauty is a Joy iorever (Endymion), 
From: — Hyperion, 494; Lamia, 205,808; On 

first looking into Chapman's Homer, S05. 



522 

355 
754 
427 

558 
545 



909 
905 
754 



78 
599 



125 
907 
907 
781 
819 
713 
711 
729 
184 
905 
905 
123 



763 



811 



176 
846 
819 
485 
718 
316 
67s 



fr- 



KEBLE, JOHN. 
England, 1790 -1866. 

Example . 739 

From : — Burial of the Dead, 120 ; The Christian 
Year, 309. 

KEMBLE-BUTLER, FRANCES ANNE. 
England, b. 1811. 

Absence . . . . • . ■ . . . 244 

Faith ........ 790 

KENNEDY, CRAMMOND. 

Scotland, b. 1841. 

Greenwood Cemetery 305 

KEPPEL, LADY CAROLINE. 

Scotland. 

Robin Adair 154 

KEY, FRANCIS SCOTT. 
Frederick Co., Md., 1779-1843. 

The Star-spangled Banner .... 592 

KING, HENRY. 
England, 1591-1669. 

Sic Vita 301 

KING, WILLIAM. 
England, 1663 -1712. 

From : — Upon a Giant's Angling . . . 672 

KINGSLEY, CHARLES. 
England, 1819-1875. 

Dolcino to Margaret 214 

Farewell, A 97 

Merry Lark, The 280 

Rough Rhyme on a Rough Matter, A . 331 

Sands o' Dee 621 

Song of the River 448 

Three Fishers, The 621 

KINNEY, COATES. 
Pen Yan, N. Y., b. 1826. 

Rain on the Roof 97 

KNOWLES, JAMES SHERIDAN. 

Ireland, 17S4-1862. 

Switzerland {WilliuTn Tell) .... 585 

KNOX, WILLIAM. 
Scotland, 1789-1825. 

" O, why should the spirit of mortal be proud ? " 302 

KORNER, CHARLES THEODORE. 

Germany. 1791-1813. 

Good Night (C. T. Brooks's Translaiioti) . 558 

Men and Boys " " " 583 

Sword Song, The " " 519 

KRUMMACHER, FRIEDERICH WILHELM. 

Germany, 1774- 1868. B 

Alpine Heights (C. T. Brooks's Translation) 445 
Moss Rose, The {Translation) . . . 464 

LAMB, CHARLES. 
England, 1775-1834. 

Childhood . 86 

Farewell to Tobacco, A . . . . 54S 

Hester 285 

Housekeeper, The 487 

Old Familiar Faces, The 274 

LAMB, MARY. 

England, 1765-1847. 

Choosing a Name 76 

LANDON, LETITIA ELIZABETH. 

England, 1802 -1838. 

Death and the Youth 270 

Female Convict, The 330 

LANDOR, WALTER SAVAGE. 

England, 1775 -1864. 

Iphigenia and Agamemnon .... 873 

Macaulay, To 923 

Maid's Lament, The 260 

One Gray Hair, The 755 

LANIER, SIDNEY. 
Charleston, S. C. 

From : — Centennial Meditation of Columbia 604 
Publishers : J. E. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia. 

LARCOM, LUCY. 

Lowell, Mass., b. 1826. 

By the Fireside 227 

Publishers: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

LEE, NATHANIEL. 

England, 1655-1692. 

From : — Alexander the Great . . 204, 541 ■ 

^ 



ioo6 



LEIGH, HENRY S. 
England. 

Only Seven 

LELAND, CHARLES G. 
Philadelphia, Pa., b. 1824. 

Fisher's Cottage, The {From German of 

Heinrich Heine) 691 

Hans Breitmann's Party .... 999 

Ritter Hugo 1000 

Publishers : T. B. Peterson & Bros., Philadelphia. 

LEONIDAS. 

Alexandria, 59 - 129. 

\i.QTae. {Robert Bland' s Tra7islation) . . 225 
On the Picture of an Infant(^. Rogers's Trans.) 81 

L'ESTRANGE, ROGER. 
England, 1616- 1704. 

In Prison 731 

From : — The Boys and the Frogs . . . 108 

LEVER, CHARLES JAMES. 
Ireland, 1806- 1872. 

Widow Malone 

LEWIS, MATTHEW GREGORY. 

England, 1775- 1818. 

Alonzo the Brave and the Fair Imogine 
The Maniac 



1003 



861 
339 



LEYDEN, JOHN. 
Scotland, 1775-1811. 

Daisy, The . 463 ! 

Noontide . 410 I 

Sabbath Morning, The 410 I 

LILLY, JOHN. 

England, 1553 -1600. 

From. : — Endymion 120 I 

LIPPINCOTT, SARA JANE {Grace Greenwood). \ 

Pompey, N. Y., b. 1823. 

Horseback Ride, The 665 

Poet of To-day, The 767 1 

Publishers : Jas. R. Osgood & Co., Boston. 

LOCKER, FREDERICK. 
England, b. 1824. 

On an Old Muff 972 

Widow's Mite, The 282 

LOCKHART, JOHN GIBSON. 

Scotland, 17^2-1854. 

Lord of Butrago, The {Fro7n the Spanish) . 507 
Zara's Ear-Rings {From ttie Spanish) . . 171 

LODGE, THOMAS. 
England, 1556- 1625. 

Rosalind's Complaint 194 



127 



471 



747 



Rosaline 
LOGAN, JOHN. 

Scotland, 1748- 1788. 

Cuckoo, To the 

" Thy braes were bonnj' " . 
LOGAU, FRIEDERICH VON. 

Germany. 

Retribution {Longfelloiv' s Translatzo7z) . 

LONGFELLOW, HENRY WADSWQRTH. 
Portland, Maine, b. 1807. 

Agassiz, Fiftieth Birthday of . . . . 935 

Carillon 716 

Children's Hour, The 98 

Daybreak ....... 408 

Divina Commedia 707 

Excelsior ....... 777 

Footsteps of Angels 273 

God's Acre . 305 

Household Sovereign, The {Hanging of the 

Crane) 79 

Hymn to the Night 416 

Maidenhood ....... 104 

Moonlight on the Prairie {Evangeli-ne) . 432 

Nuremberg 678 

Paul Revere's Ride 590 

Primeval Forest (£'z/a7i^^/z«f) . . . 453 

Psalm of Life, A 769 

Rain in Summer . . . . . .428 

Rainy Day, The 344 

Reaper and the Flowers, The . . .276 

Resignation ....... 272 

Retribution {German of F. von Logaji) . . 747 

Sea-Weed 622 

Snow-Flakes 440 

Village Blacksmith, The .... 550 



From: — Building of the Ship, 631 ; Endymion, 
345, 800 ; Evangeline, 492 ; Fire of Drift-wood, 
801 ; Flowers, 494 ; Goblet of Life, 345 ; Gold- 
en Legend, 794 ; Hawthorne, 940 ; Hyperion, 
348 ; Ladder of St. Augustine, 399 ; Li^ht of 
Stars, 348, 802 ; Midnight Mass, 494 ; Sunrise 
on the Hills, 490 ; Day is done, 490, 813, 816. 

Publishers, Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

LOVELACE, RICHARD. 
England, 1618-1658. 

Althea from Prison, To 

Lucasta, To 

Lucasta, on Going to the Wars, To 

LOVELL, MARIA. 

From : — Ingomar the Barbarian .... 

LOVER, SAMUEL. 
Ireland, 1797-1866. 

Angel's Whisper, The .... 
Birth of St. Patrick, The 
Father Land and Mother Tongue . 
Low-backed Car, The .... 

RoryO'More 

Widow Machree 



242 
23 s 



81 
1004 
778 
197 
196 
200 



LOVERIDGE, RICHARD. 

England, Eighteenth Century. 

Stanzas added to "The Roast Beef of Old 
England" 

LOWELL, JAMES RUSSELL. 

Cambridge, Mass., b- 1819. 

Abraham Lincoln ...... 

Auf Wiedersehen ! {From. Summer) 

Courtin', The 

First Snow-Fall, The 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, To 

June (T'/z^ Vision of Sir Law fal) . 

Sonnets 

Summer Storm 

Washington ....... 

What Mr. Robinson thinks {Biglow Papers) . 

William Lloyd Garrison .... 

Winter Pictures {The Visio7i of Sir Lau7ifaT) 

Winter Evening Hymn to my Fire 

Yussouf 

Fro77i : — Biglow Papers, 493, 539, 541, 55S ; 

Irenfe, 723 ; Love, 215 ; Ode to Freedom, 604 ; 

Rhcecus, S69 ; Sirens, The, 631 ; Sonnet, 796, 

807 ; To the Dandelion, 495. 
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

LOWELL, MARIA WHITE. 

W'atertown, Mass., 1821-1853. 

The Morning Glory 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

LOWELL, ROBERT T. S. 

Cambridge, Mass., b. 1816. 

The Relief of Lucknow 

Publishers : E. P. Dutton & Co., New York. 



930 
170 

993 

275 
937 
424 
216 
429 
927 
994 
932 
438 
228 
768 



515 



LUDLOW, FITZ HUGH. 

Poughkeepsie, N. Y., 1837-1875. 

Too Late 755 

LUTHER, MARTIN. 

Germany, 1483 -1546. 

"A mighty fortress is our God" (F. H. 

Hedge's Tra7islation) 371 

Martyrs' Hymn, The {iV. f. Fox's Tra7ts.) 365 

LYLY, JOHN. 

England, 1554-1600. 

Cupid and Campaspe 1S6 

Fro7n : — Alexander and Campaspe . . . 495 

LYTLE, WILLIAM HAINES. 

Cincinnati. O.. 1826-1863. 

Antony and Cleopatra 296 

LYTTLETON, GEORGE, LORD. 

England, 1708-1773. 

" Tell me, my heart, if this be love " _. . 137 

Fro7n: — Advice to a Lady, 214, 795; Epi.gram, 
204 ; Irregular Ode, 215 ; Prologue to Thom- 
son's " Coriolanus, " 806; Soliloquy on a 
Beauty in the Country, 133 ; Stanza for 
Thomson's "Castle of Indolence," 940. 

LYTTON, EDWARD BULWER, LORD. 

England, 1805 - 1873. 

FroTn : — Lady of Lyons, 203 ; New Timon, 
723, 813; Richelieu, 541, 802, 805. 



S^ 



^ 



e- 



20 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



-a 



LYTTON, ROBERT BULWER, LORD {Owen 
Meredith). 
England, b. 1831. 

Aux Italiens 264 

Chess-Board,'The . . ' . . . 160 

Portrait, The . . . . . . . 265 

Possession ....... 202 

From: — Lucile ....... 814 

MACAULAY, THOMAS BABINGTON, LORD 

England, 1800-1859. 

Horatius at the Bridge ..... 565 

Naseby ... .... 576 

Roman Father's Sacrifice, The {Virginia) . 873 

MAC-CARTHY, DENIS FLORENCE. 
Ireland, b. 1817. 

Ireland ........ 579 

Labor Song (Bell-founder) .... 556 

Love and Time 150 

Summer Longings ..... 419 

MACDONALD, GEORGE. 
England, b. 1S24. 

Baby, The 78 

Earl O' Quarterdeck 646 

MACE, FRANCIS LAUGHTON. 
America. 

" Only waiting " 368 

MACKAY, CHARLES. 
Scotland, b. 1814. 

Cleon and I 732 

Small Beginnings 779 

" Tell me, ye winged winds " . . . . 369 

Tubal Cain 537 

MAGINN, WILLIAM. 
Ireland, 1793-1842. 

Waiting for the Grapes igo 

MAHONY, FRANCIS {Father Frout). 
Ireland, 1805-1866. 

Bells of Shandon, The . . ... . 715 

Bonaparte, Popular Recollections of {From 
Beranger) . . . . . . . 913 

Flight into Egypt, The 382 

MALLET, DAVID. 

Scotland, 1700- 1765. 

From : — Mustapha 539 

MANGAN, JAMES CLARENCE. 

Ireland, 1803- 1849. 

The Sunken City {German of Mueller) . . 825 

MANNERS, JOHN, LORD. 

England, Pub. 1841. 
From: — England's Trust, and Other Poems . 812 

MARLOWE, CHRISTOPHER. 

England, 1564 - 1593. 

The Passionate Shepherd to his Love ,. . 157 
From: — Edward II., 899; Faustus, 134, 396; 
Hero and Leander, 203 ; Jew of Malta, 726. 

MARSDEN, WILLIAM. 
England, 1754- 1836, 

What is Time? ...... 748 

MARSTON, JOHN. 

England. Time of Queen Elizabeth and James X. 

Fro7n : — A Scholar and his Dog . . . 808 

MARVELL, ANDREW. 

England. 1620- 1678. 

Death of the White Fawn .... 259 

Drop of Dew, A . . . . . . 430 

Song of the Emigrants in Bermuda . . 625 

From : — An Horatian Ode : Upon Cromwell's 
Return from Ireland, 539; The Garden, 719, 
813 ; The Loyal Scot, 796. 

MARY. 

Queen of Hungary, d. 1558. 

Prayer 365 

MASSEY, GERALD. 
England, b. 1828. 

" O, lay thy hand In mine, dear" . . .221 
Our Wee White Rose 83 

MASSINGER, PHILIP. 

England, 1584-1640. 

From : — The Maid of Honor, 120, 900 ; A 
New Way to pay Old Debts . . .541 



MAY, THOMAS. 

England, about 1594 -1650. 

From: — Henry II., 248; Continuation of 
Lucan, 311. 

McMASTER, GUY HUMPHREY. 

Clyde, N. Y., b. 1829. 

Carmen Bellicosum .... 

MATURIN, CHARLES ROBERT. 

England, 17S2-1824. 
Fro7n : — Bertram, 632, 800. 

MEEK, ALEXANDER BEAUFORT. 
Columbia, S. C, 1814-1865. 

Balaklava 



516 



MEREDITH, OWEN. 

See LYTTON, ROBERT BULWER. 

MERIVALE, JOHN HERMAN. 

-England, 1779- 1844. 

The Vow {From the Greek) . 

MESSENGER, ROBERT HINCHLEY. 

Boston, Mass., b, 1S07. 

Give me the Old .... 



METASTASIO, PIERRE A. D. B. 

Italy, 1698-1782. 

Without and Within ( Translation) 

MICKLE, WILLIAM JULIUS. 
Scotland, 1734-1788. 

The Sailor's Wife ...... 

Froin : — Cumnor Hall . . ■ . 

MILLER, CINCINNATUS HEINE (Joaquin) 
Indiana, b. 1841. 

People's Song of Peace, The .... 

MILLER, HUGH. 

Scotland, 1802-1856. 

The Babie 

MILLER, WILLIAM. 
Scotland. * 

Willie Winkie 



MILMAN, HENRY HART. 
England, 1791-1869. 

Hebrew Wedding (Fall of yerusalem) . 
Jewish Hymn in Babylon 

MILNES, RICHARD MONCKTON. 

See HOUGHTON, LORD. 

MILTON, JOHN. 

England, 1608 - 1674 

Adam and Eve {Paradise Lost) 
Adam describing 'E.ve. {Paradise Lost) 
Adam's Morning Hymn in Paradise 

Adam to Eve 

Battle of the Angels {Paradise Lost) 
Blindness, On his ...... 

Blindness, On his own ( To Cyriack Skinner) 

Cromwell, To the Lord-General 

Epitaph on Shakespeare 

Evening in Paradise (Paradise Lost) 

Faithful Angel, The (Paradise Lost) . 

Haunt of the Sorcerer (Comtts) 

II Penseroso 

Invocation to Light {Paradise Lost) 

L'AUegro 

Lady lost in the Wood (Comus) 
May Morning ..... 
Nymph of the Severn (Comtis) . -. 
Samson on his Blindness (Samson Agonistes) 
Selections from " Paradise Lost " 

From: — Comus, 491, 558, 726, 796, 869; Ly- 
cidas, 203, 490, 494, 495, 812; On his Being 
Arrived to the Age of Twenty-three, 395 ; On 
the Detraction which Followed my Writing 
Certain Treatises, II., 601 ; Paradise Lost, 
121, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 215, 232, 310, 346, 
348, 394, 395, 396, 398, 3s9, 490, 491, 492, 494) 
496, 539) 540, 558, 6oi, 719, 722, 724, 725, 794, 
795. 7981 799. 801, 803, 807, 808, 812, 814, 815, 
816, 868, 899 ; Paradise Regained, 107, 490, 
720, Soo, 804, 811; Samson Agonistes, 631, 
794 ; To the Lady Margaret Ley, 939 ; To the 
Nightingale, 496 ; Translation of Horace, 632. 

MITCHELL, WALTER F. 
New Bedford. Mass. 

Tacking Ship off Shore 



246 

491 



598 
79 
83 



212 
372 



711 
209 
363 
216 
500 
366 

735 
909 
906 
413 
387 
830 
786 
407 
785 
829 
422 
830 
321 
321 



6ig 



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INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



21 



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MITFORD, MARY RUSSELL. 

England, 1786- 1S55. 

Rienzi to the Romans {Rienzi) . . . 725 

MOIR, DAVID MACBETH. 
Scotland. 1798-1851. 

Casa Wappy 279 

Rustic Lad's Lament in the Town, The . 243 

MONTAGU, LADY MARY WORTLEY. 

England, 1690 -1762. 

Fr07n : — Answer, The, 205 ; To the Imitator of 
the First Satire of Horace, 806. 

MONTGOMERY, JAMES. 
Scotland, 1771 - 1854 

Birds ( Pelican Island) 470 

Common Lot, The ..... 308 

Coral Reef, The {Pelican Isla?id) . . . 624 

Daisy, The 463 

Forever with the Lord 389 

" Make way for Liberty !" .... 584 

My Country 563 

Night 416 

Ocean, The 608 

Parted Friends . . . • . . 114 

Pelican, The [Pelican Island) . . . 480 

Sea Life {Pelican Island) .... 623 
Frojn : — Earth Full of God's Goodness, 399 ; 
Grave, The, 794 ; Issues of Life and Death, 
311, 399; Little Cloud, 801 ; Mother's Love, 
232 ; What is Prayer? 398. 

MONTREUIL, MATHIEU DE. 

France. r6ii - i5gr. 

To Madame de Sevigne 914 

MOORE, CLEMENT CLARKE. 

New York City, 1779-1852. 

St. Nicholas, A Visit from .... 96 
MOORE, EDWARD. 
England, 1712-1757. 

From : — Fables : Happy Marriage, The, 215 ; 

Spider and the Bee, The, 134, 795. 

MOORE, THOMAS. ^ 

Ireland, 1779-1852. 

" Alas ! how light a cause may move" . . 264 
"As by the shore, at break of day " . . 577 

"As slow our ship " 237 

" Believe me, if all those endearing young 

charms " 174 

Black and Blue Eyes 131 

Campbell, To 920 

Canadian Boat-Song, A . . . . . 665 

"Come, rest in this bosom " . . . 185 
" Farewell, but whenever " . . . . 240 

" Farewell to thee, Araby's daughter " {Fire- 
Worshippers) ...... 294 

" Fly to the desert, fly with me " [From Light 

of the Hare7n) 151 

Go where Glory waits thee .... 237 
" I knew by the smoke that so gracefully 

curled " 228 

'L\nda.Xo'ii?Li^d{Fire-lVorshippers) . . 251 

Love's Young Dream 262 

"Oft, in the stilly night" . . . . 318 
" O, breathe not his name " .... 921 

Orator Puff 962 

Origin of the Harp. The 865 

Spr'm^ {From the Greek of Attacreon) . 422 

Syr\^[ Paradise and the Peri) . . .451 
Temple to Friendship, A . . . . 120 
" The harp that once through Tara's halls " . 577 
"Those evening bells" .... 716 

" 'T is the last rose of summer" . . . 465 

Vale of Avoca, The 116 

Vale of Cashmere, The [Light of the Harem) 452 
Verses written in an Album .... 133 
From : All that 's bright must fade, 793 ; Blue 
Stocking, 816 ; "How shall I woo? "121; III 
Omens, 205; " I saw thy form," 248; Lalla 
Rookh : Fire- Worshippers, 348, — Light of the 
Harem, 203, — Paradise and the Peri, 396, — 
Veiled Prophet of Khorassan, 120, 397, 793 ; 
Lines on the Death of Sheridan, 940 ; My Heart 
and Lute, 795 ; " O, the sight entrancing," 539, 
602; "Rich and Rare," 721; Sacred Songs, 
348, 399; The Time I've lost, 203, 204; To 
— ; — ., 204; "While gazing on the Moon's 
Light," 491 ; Young May Moon, 205. 



14 



i6S 
164 



MORE, HANNAH. 

England, 1744 -1833. 

From: — Florio 812 

MORLAIX, BERNARD DE. 

France, )2th Century. Benedictine Monk.. 

The Celestial Country {yohn Mason NeaW s 

Translation) 751 

MORRIS, CHARLES. 

England, 1739- 1832. 

From. : — Town and Country. 

MORRIS, GEORGE PERKINS. 

Philadelphia, Pa., 1S02-1864. 

My Mother's Bible ..... 

The Retort 

" Woodman, spare that tree " . 

MORRIS, J. W. 

America. 

Collusion between a Alegaiter and a Water- 
Snaik . 

MORRIS, WILLIAM. 
England, b. 1S34. 

Atalanta Conquered ( The Earthly Paradise) 
Atalanta Victorious ■' >' n 

March 4__ 

Riding Together. 883 

MOSS, THOMAS. 

England, about 1740-1808. 

The Beggar 340 

MOTHERWELL, WILLIAM. 
Scotland, 1797-1S35. 

Jeanie Morrison ...... 242 

" My held is like to rend, Willie " . . 269 
"They come ! the merry summer months" . 423 
MOULTON, ELLEN LOUISE CHANDLER. 

Pomfret, Conn., b. 1S35. 

Late Spring, The 322 

MOULTRIE, JOHN. ..J) 
England. Pub. 1839. 

Forget thee 161 

The Three Sons ...... 90 

MUELLER, WILLIAM. 

Germany, 1794- 1827. 

The Sunken C\ty {James Clarence Matigan^s 

Translation) . . . . . .825 

MULOCK, DINAH MARIA. 

See Craik, Dinah Mulock. 

MUNBY, ARTHUR J. 
England. 

Apres 776 

NABB. 

From: — Microcosmos 34S 

NAIRNE, CAROLINA, BARONESS. 
Scotland, iT]^- 1845. 

Laird o' Cockpen, The 200 

Land o' the Lea], The 296 

NASH, THOMAS 
England, 1558-1600. 

" Spring, the sweet Spring " . . . . 422 

NEALE, JOHN MASON. 
England, 1818-1866. 

Art thou Weary? {From the Latin of St. 

Stephen the Sabaite) ..... 364 
Celestial Country, The {From the Latin of 

Ber7iard de Morlaix) .... 351 
" Darkness is thinning" {From, the Latin of 
St. Gregory the Great) . . . 360 

NEELE, HENRY. 

England, 1798- 1828. 

" Moan, moan, ye dying gales " . . . 315 

NEWELL, ROBERT HENRY [Orpheus C. Kerr). 

New York City, b. 1836. 

Poems received in Response to an Advertised 

Call for a National Anthem .... 1007 
Publishers ; Lee & Shepard, Boston. 

NEW ENGLAND PRIMER. 

Quotations ...... 107, 308, 397 

NEWMAN, JOHN HENRY. 
England, b. 1801. 

Flowers without Fruit 789 

The Pillar of the Cloud 364 

NICHOLS, MRS. REBECCA S. 
Greenwich, N. J. Pub. 1844, 

The Philosopher Toad 694 



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22 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



-a 



NICOLL, ROBERT. 

Scotland, 1814 -1837. 

We are Brethren a' . . . • . . 117 

NOEL, THOMAS. 
Eni;land. Pub. 1841. 

The Pauper's Drive 34i 

NORRIS, JOHN. 

Ensjland. 1657-171IJ 

My Little Saint 131 

Fro7!i : — The Parting 347 

NORTH, CHRISTOPHER. 

See Wilson, John. 

NORTON, CAROLINE ELIZABETH S., HON. 

England, 1808- 1876. 

Arab to his Favorite Steed, The . . . 664 

Bingen on the Rhine 521 

King of Denmark's Ride, The . . . -293 

Love Not 320 

Mother's Heart, The 83 

" We have been friends together" . . 116 

From: — The Dream 232 

O'BRIEN, FITZJAMES. 

Ireland, b. 1829 ; d. wounded, in Virginia, 1862. 

Kane 933 

O'KEEFE, JOHN. 

Ireland, 1747 ~ 1833. 

" I am a friar of orders gray " {Robin Hood) . 964 

OLDMIXON, JOHN. 

England, 1673 - 1742. 

From: — Governor of Cyprus . . . . 271 

OLIPHANT, THOMAS. 

England. 

" Where are the men?" {From the IVehh 0/ 
Talhaiarn) ....... 530 

O'REILLY, JOHN BOYLE. 

Ireland, b. 1844. 

My Native Land 579 

Publishers : Roberts Brothers, Boston. 

O'REILLY, MILES. 

See halpine, Charles G. 

ORRERY, CHARLES BOYLE, EARL OF. 

England, 1676- 1731. 

From: — Henry V. ..... 120 

OSGOOD, FRANCES SARGENT. 

Boston, Mass., 1812-1850. 

To Labor is to Pray 556 

OSGOOD, KATE PUTNAM. 

Fryeburg, Me., b. 1843. 

Driving Home the Cows ..... 531 
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

O'SULLIVAN, JOHN L. 
America. 

Frojii : — The Djinns (Frojn the French of 
Victor Hugo 868 

OTWAY, THOMAS. 

England, 1651-1685. 

Jaffier parting with Belvidera {Venice Pre- 
served ........ 239 

From : — Caius Marius, 725 : Don Carlos, 108 ; 

Orphan , The, 232, 795 ; Venice Preserved, 

133, 206. 

OVERBURY, SIR THOMAS. 

England, 1581-1613. 

From : — A Wife, 232, 796. 

OVID. [PuBLius OviDius Naso.] 
Italy, 43 B. C. -iS A. n. 

From : — Metamorphoses {DrydetCs Transla- 
tion), 493; Metamorplioses (TVz^^ and Stone- 
streei's Translation), 393. 

PAINE, THOMAS. 
England, 1736-1809. 

The Castle in the Air 823 

PALMER, JOHN WILLIAMSON. 

Baltimore, Md., b. 1825. 

" For Charlie's sake " 277 

Thread and Song . . . . , . 104 

Publishers : Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. 
PALMER, RAY. 

Rhode Island, b. 1808. 

"I saw thee" 393 

The Soul's Cry 394 

Publisher : A. D. F. Randolph, New York. 



PALMER, WILLIAM PITT. 

Stockbridge, Mass., b. 1805. 

The Smack in School 99 

PARKER, MARTYN. 

England, XVII. Century. 

From : — Ye Gentlemen of England . . 632 

PARKER, THEODORE. 

Lexington, Mass., iSio-1860. 

'•The Way, the Truth, and the Life" . . 389 
Publishers : D. Appleton & Co., New York. 

PARNELL, THOMAS. 

England, 1679-1717. 

" When your beauty appears "... 185 

From : — An Elegy to an Old Beauty, 134 ; Her- 
mit, The, 399, 490 ; Pervigilium Veneris, 207. 

PARSONS, THOMAS WILLIAM. 

Boston, Mass., b. 1819. 

On a Bust of Dante 908 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Boston. 

PATMORE, COVENTRY. 
England, b. 1823. 

Rose of the World, The 128 

Sly Thoughts . _ 186 

Sweet Meeting of Desires .... 170 

Tribute, The . . . . . . 126 

PAYNE, JOHN HOWARD. 

New York City, 1792 - 1S52. 

Home, Sweet Home {Clari, the Maid 0/ Milan) 225 
Brutus's Oration over the Body of Lucretia 
{Brjitus) ....... 87s 

Publisher : S. French & Son, New York. 

PEALE, REMBRANDT. 

Near Philadelphia, Pa., 1778 - i860. 

Faith and Hope 231 

PEELE, GEORGE. 
England, 1552- 1598. 

From : — The Arraignment of Paris : Cupid's 

Curse 207 

PERCIVAL, JAMES GATES. 

Berlin, Conn., 1795 -1856, 

May 423 

Coral Grove. The ..... 624 

Seneca Lake ....... 449 

From : — The Graves of the Patriots . . 601 
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

PERCY, FLORENCE. 

See ALLEN, ELIZABETH AKERS. 

PERCY, THOMAS BISHOP. 
England, 1728- i8ii. 

Friar of Orders Gray, The .... 137 

" O Nanny, wilt thou gang wi' me ? " . . 156 

From: — -Winifreda ...... 215 

PERRY, NORA. 
America; 

Love-Knot, The 190 

PETTEE, G. W. 
Canada. 

Sleigh Song 670 

PFEFFEL. 

Germany, 1736-1S09. 

The Nobleman and the Pensioner {Charles T. 
Brooks's Translation) ..... 520 

PHILIPS, JOHN. 

England, 1676- 170S. 

The Splendid Shilling 947 

PHILLIPS, AMBROSE. 

England, 1675 - 1749. 

" Blest as the immortal gods " {From the Greek) 184 

PHILOSTRATUS. 
Greece. 

" Drink to me only with thine eyes " ( Trans- 
lation of Ben Jonson) 125 

PIERPONT, JOHN. 

Litchfield, Conn., 1785- 1866. 

My Child 278 

Not on the Battle-Field .... 534 

Warren's Address 590 

Whittling . 979 

From : — A Word from a Petitioner . . . 604 

PINKNEY, EDWARD COATE. 
Annapolis, Md., 1802- 1828. 

A Health . . 129 



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INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



rn 



PITT, WILLIAM. 

Enjiland, d. 1840. 

The Sailor's Consolation .... 630 

POE, EDGAR ALLAN. 

Baltimore, Md., 1811-1849. 

Annabel Lee 285 

Annie, For 299 

Bells, The ' 714 

Raven, The] ' 852 

From: — To F. S. 796 

Publisher : W. J. Widdleton, New York. 

POLLOK, ROBERT. 

Scotland, 1799-1S27. 

"Byron (Co7crse of Time) ..... gi8 
Ocean " " .... 610 

Froin: — Course of Time .... 346)797 

POMFRET, JOHN. 

England, 1667- 1703. 

Front : — Verses to his Friend under Afflic- 
tion, 312, 347. 

POPE, ALEXANDER. 

England. 1688 -1744. 

Addison (Prologtte to The Satires) . . . gio 
Belinda ( T/ie Rape of the Lock) . . . 12S 
Dying Christian to his Soul, The . . . 365 
Fame {Essay on Man) . . . 780 

Greatness " " 781 

Happiness " " .... 736 

Nature's Chain {Essay on Man) . . . 405 

Ode to Solitude 225 

Poet's Friend, The (^Jiay wz J^«) . . 911 
Reason and Instinct " " . . 781 
Ruling Passion, The {Moral Essays) . . 779 
Scandal {Prologtce to the Satires) . , 781 
Sporus, — Lord Hervey " . . . . 909 
Toiht, The {Rajie of the Lock) ... 713 
Universal Prayer, The 370 

From : — Dunciad, The, 396, 724, 803, 807 ; Eloisa 
to Abelard, 215,248 ; Epigram from Boileau, 
810; Epilogue to Satires, 797 ; Epistle II., 107 ; 
Epistle to Mr. Addison, 120 ; Epistle to Dr. 
Arbuthnot, 107, 805, 815 ; Epistle to Robert, 
Earl of Oxford, 801 ; Epitaph on Gay, 724 ; 
Epitaph on Hon. S. Harcourt, 120 ; Essay on 
Criticism, 798, 799, 803, 805, 806, 807, 812 ; 
Essay on Man, 107, 394, 395, 397, 39S, 399- 489. 
496, 792, 793, 796, 799, 800, 801, 803, 807, 80S, 
812, 815, 938, 939 ; Imitations of Horace, 793, 
796, 803, 804, S06, 807, 811, 814; Martinus 
Scriblerus on the Art of Sinking in Poetry, 
205 ; Moral Essays, 215, 231, 232, 396, 723, 795, 
797) 798) 799) 803, 804, 805, 80S, 812, 814 ; Pro- 
logue to Addison's Cato, 602 ; Rape of the Lock, 
203, 799, 810, 811, 814, 815 ; Temple of Fame, 
811 ; To the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady, 
3ti, 312 ; Translation of Homer's Iliad, 120, 
792, 797 ; Translation of Homer's Odyssey, 121, 
207, 4S9 ; Wife of Bath : Prologue, 805 ; Wind- 
sor Forest, 671, 672, 815. 

PORTEUS, BEILBY. 

England, 1731-1S08. 

Fro7n : — Death, 311, 539, 541, 559, 794. 

PRAED, WINTHROP MACKWORTH. 

England, 1S02-1839. 

Belle of the Ball, The 971 

Camp-bell 920 

From: — "I remember, I remember," 108; 
School and Schoolfellows, 309. 

PRENTICE, GEORGE DENISON. 

Preston, Conn., 1802 -1870. 

The Closing Year ...... 732 

PRIEST, NANCY AMELIA WOODBURY. 

America, 1837 - 1870. 

Heaven 368 

Over the River 276 

PRINGLE, THOMAS. 

Scotland, 1789 -1834. 

" Afar in the desert " . . . . .319 



PRIOR, MATTHEW. 

England, 1664-1721. 

To the Honorable Charles Montague . . 730 

Front: — Henry and Emma, 721 ; Upon a Pas- 
sage in the Scaligerana, 803. 



t&^ 



PROCTER, ADELAIDE ANNE. 

England, 1826 -1864. 

Doubting Heart, A 318 

Judge Not 784 

Lost Chord, A 760 

Woman's Answer, A 143 

Woman's Question, A 143 

From: — Hearts 271 

PROCTER, BRYAN W. {Barry Cornwall). 
England, 1787-1874. 

Address to the Ocean 611 

Blood Horse, The 467 

Golden Girl, A 132 

History of a Life 741 

Owl, The . 483 

Poet's Song to his Wife, The . . . 219 

Sea, The ........ 625 

" Sit down, sad soul " . . . . . 369 

" Softly woo away her breath" . . . 296 

Song of Wood Nymphs .... 835 

Stormy Petrel, The 483 

White Squall, The 629 

PROUT, FATHER. See Mahony, Francis. 

PULTENEY, WILLIAM, EARL OF BATH. 
England, 1682- 1764. 

From.: — The Honest Jury .... 810 

PUNCH. 

Published in London. 

Bomba, King of Naples, Death-Bed of . . 922 
Collegian to his Bride, The .... 992 
Jones at the Barber's Shop .... loii 
Roasted Sucking Pig 1013 

QUARLES, FRANCIS. 

England, 1592-1644. 

Delight in God 360 

Vanity of the World, The .... 743 
From. : — Emblems, 214, 309, 489, 798 ; Divine 
Poems, 309. 

RALEIGH, SIR WALTER. 
England, 1552-1618. 

Lines found in his Bible 745 

Nymph's Reply, The 158 

Pilgrimage, The ...... 361 

Soul's Errand, The 745 

From : — The Silent Lover 204 

RAMSAY, ALLAN. 
Scotland, 1685- 175S. 

" At setting day and rising morn " , . . i6r 
Lochaber no more 237 

RANDOLPH, ANSON D. F. 
Woodbridge, N. J., b. 1820. 

Hopefully Waiting 391 

RANDOLPH, THOMAS. 

England, 1605-1634. 

Fairies' Song {Leigh Hzmfs Translatio7z) . 835 
To a Lady admiring herself in a Looking- 
glass 125 

RASCAS, BERNARD. 
Provence, France. 

The Love of God ( TV. C. Bryanfs Trans.) . 3S8 

RAY, WILLIAM. 

England, pub. 1752. 

From. : — History of the Rebellion . . . 540 

RAYMOND, ROSSITER W. 

Cincinnati, O. , b. 1840. 

Trooper's Death, The {From the German) . 518 

READ, THOMAS BUCHANAN. 

Chester, Pa., 1822-1872. 

Angler, The 669 

Brave at Home, The . . . . . 563 

Closing Scene, The 710 

Drifting 684 

Sheridan's Ride 594 

Publishers : J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia. 

REQUIER, AUGUSTUS JULIAN. 

Charleston, S. C, b. 1825. 

Baby Zulma's Christmas Carol ... 81 

RITTER, MARY LOUISE. 

New York City, b. 1837. 

Why? 148 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. ^ 

. . J] 



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24 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



"""Q] 



i 



ROBERT II. (Son o/KuGH Capet). 
France, 996-1031. 

Veni Sancte Spiritus (C IVinkworth's Trans.) 356 

ROBERTS, SARAH. 

Portsmouth, N. H. 

The Voice of the Grass . . . . . 465 
ROCHESTER, JOHN WILMOT, EARL OF. 

Enttland, 1648-1680. 

"Too late, alas, I must confess" . . . 160 
Frojn: — Song, 134 ; Written on the Bedchamber 

Door of Charles II. ..... 940 

RODGER, ALEXANDER. 

Scotland. 1784- 1846. 

" Behave yoursel' before folk "... 157 

ROGERS, SAMUEL. 

Eng-land, 1763-1855. 

Descent, The 446 

Ginevra ....... 890 

Italy 679 

Jorasse (Italy) 651 

Marriage (Human Life) ..... 212 

Naples (Italy) 683 

On the Picture of an Infant (Greek of Leon- 

idas) ........ 81 

Rome (Italy) . . ^ . . . . 680 

Sleeping Beauty, A . . . . . . 130 

Tear, A , . 789 

Venice (Italy) 679 

Wish, A ...... . 225 

Frojn : — Italy, 248, 493 ; Human Life, 311, Bog ; 

Jacqueline, 34S. 

RONSARD, PIERRE. 

France, 1542- 1585. 

Return of Spring ( T'rrtK.r&z'/i?;?) . . . 421 

ROSCOE, MRS. HENRY. 
Eng-land, Pub. 1868. 
From : — Sonnet (Italian of Michel A ngelo) . S09 

ROSCOMMON, WENTWORTH DILLON, EARL. 

Ireland, about 1633- 1684. 

From : — ■ Essay on Translated Verse, 805 ; 
Translation of Dies Irs, 394. 

ROSSETTI, CHRISTINA GEORGINA. 
England, b. 1830. 

■Milking-Maid, The 132 

Up-Hiil . 363 

ROSSETTI, DANTE GABRIEL. 

England, b. 1828. 

Blessed Damozel, The ..... 824 
Nevermore, The ...'.. 744 

ROWE, NICHOLAS. 

England, 1673-1718. 

From: — The Fair Penitent . . . 134,347 

ROYDEN, MATHEW. 

England, about 1586. 

Sir Philip Sidney 904 

From : — An Elegie on a Friend's Passion for his 

Astrophill 133 

RYAN, ABRAM J. 

Ireland. Lives in Mobile, .\Ia. 

Rosary of my Tears 742 

Sentinel Songs ...... 532 

The Cause of the South 596 

RYAN, RICHARD. 

England, 1796-1S49. 

" Oh, saw ye the lass " 149 

SANGSTER, CHARLES. 

Kingston, Canada, b. 1822. 

The Comet 863 

The Snows ....... 666 

Publisher : John Lovell, Montreal, Canada. 

SANGSTER, MRS. MARGARET E. M. 

New Rochclle, N. Y., b. 1838. 

" Are the children at home " . . . . 2S1 

SAPPHO. 

Island of Lesbos, 600 B. c. 

"Blest as the Immortal Gods" [Ambrose 
Phillips's Translation) . . , . 1S4 

SARGENT, EPES. 

Gloucester, Mass., b. 1814. 

A Life on the Ocean Wave .... 630 



SAVAGE, RICHARD. 

England, 1696 -1743. 

From: — 'I'he Bastard 812 

SAXE, JOHN GODFREY. 

Highgate, Vt, b. 1816. 

Echo 1014 

"My eyes! how I love you" .... 195 

Proud Miss McBride, The ... . ' . 985 

Railroad Rhyme . . . . . . 980 

Woman's Will . . ... 981 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

SCHILLER, FRIEDRICH. 

Wiirtemberg, 1759- 1805. 

From: — Homeric Hexameter (Coleridge'' s 

Tratislation) . . . . . .631 

SCOTT, SIR WALTER. 

Scotland. 1771-1832. 

"And said I tliat my limbs were old" (Lay 

of the Last Minstrel) ..... 202 

Beal' an Dhuine [Lady of the Lake) . . 510 

" Breathes there the man " (Last Minstrel) . 563 

Christmas in Olden Time (Marinion) . . 698 

Q\7iXi-h\Y>\\\&, 'Ssow^ oi (Lady of the Lake) . 519 

Coronach (Lady of the Lake) . . . 283 

County Guy [Qtientin Djirward) . . . 194 

Fitzjamesand Roderick Dhu (Lady of Lake) 655 

Flodden Field (Marmion) .... 507 

Helvellyn ....... 654 

James Fitz James and Ellen (Lady of Lake) . 648 

hoch'mvar [Marmion) ..... 175 

Marmion and Douglas (A^rwzz'(7«) . . . 64S 

Melrose Abbey [Lay of the Last Minstrel) 675 

Norham Castle (Afarmion) .... 676 

Pibroch of Donuil Dhu (Lady of the Lake). 518 

Rebecca's Hymn (Ivanhoe) .... 372 

Scotland (Lay of the Last Minstrel) . . 575 
"Soldier, rest! thy warfare o'er" (Lady of 

the Lake) . . . . . . . 530 

Stag Hunt, The [Lady of the Lake) . . 658 

" The heath this night " [Lady of the Lake) . 234 

" Waken, lords and ladies gay " . . . 658 
Fro7n: — Bridal of Triermain, 395 ; Lady of the 
Lake, 204, 308, 670, 671, 719, 721, 791, 813; 
Lay of the Last Minstrel, 491, 494, 540, 
811, 814; Lord of the Isles, 348, 539, 893; 
Marmion, 108, 248, 816, 899; Monastery, 
397 
SCUDDER, ELIZA. 

The Love of God 392 

SEARING, LAURA C. REDDEN (Howard 
Glyndon). 
Somerset Co., Md., b. about 1840. 

Mazzini 934 

SEDLEY, SIR CHARLES. 
England, 1631-1701. 

To a Very Yoimg Lady ..... 147 
" Phillis is my only joy " .... 124 

SEWALL, HARRIET WINSLOW. 

America, d. 1833. 

Why thus Longing? 392 

SHAKESPEARE, WILLIAM. 
England, 1564- 1616. 

Airy Nothings (TVwz/irii") .... 867 

Approach of Age (6"o««rf Jf//.) . . . 753 
Antony's Oration over the Body of Cjesar 

(Jiditis Ciesar) ...... 875 

"Blow, blow, thou winter wind" [As Von 

Like /^) ....... 316 

C\to'p3.Xx3.(Ant07iy and Cleopatra) . . 712 

Compliment to Queen }L\iza.heth (Midsnjnmer 

Night's Dream) S35 

Course of True Love, The [Midsutnmer 

Night's Dream) ...... 250 

Dagger of the Mind, A (Macbeth) . . 882 

Dover Cliff (King Lear) 445 

Fairies' Lullaby (Midsjimmer Night's Dream) 835 

"Farewell! thou art too dear " . . . 239 

" Fear no more the heat " (Cy^zfe/Zw?) . . 301 

Y x\eL\-\A&\\\^ (H amlet) iii 

Cr\ei[Hainlet) . 294 

" Hark, hark ! the lark " (Cymbeline) . 474 

Hotspur's Description of a Fop [Henry IV-) 506 
King to his Soldiers before Harfleur, The 

(Henry V.) 503 



tzf- 



■^ 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



25 



■a 



" Let me not to the marriage of true minds " . 20S 
Love {Merchant of Venice) ■ . • 125 

Love Dissembled (^ J K^?i: Zz/^e /^) . . 144 
Love's Memory {All's Well that Ends IVell) 242 
Martial Friendship {Corzo/a?w«) . . .114 
Murder, The {Macbeth) . . . . 8S2 

Music {3'Ierchant of Vettice) .... 775 
Old Age of Temperance {As Yov Like It.). 546 

0\\v\a. {Twelfth Nig-ht) 122 

"O mistress mine ! " [Twelfth Night) . 122 

Othello's Defence {Othello) . . . .145 
Othello's Remorse {Othello) . . . . 877 
'PorX.\?isV\ci.VLrit {Merchant of Venice) . . 122 
Qu&svL Mab {Romeo and Juliet) . . . 836 
Seven Ages of Man(^j You Like It) . . 711 
Shenherd's Life, A {Henry VI. Part III.) 225 
S\e.ip{Henry IV. Part /I.) . . . .762 
Soliloquy on Death {Hamlet) . . . 297 
" Take, O, take those lips zw^y "{Measure for 

Measure) 263 

"The forward violet" 123 

Unrequited Love {Twefth IVight) . . _. 251 
"When icicles hang by the wall" {Love's 

Labor Lost) 439 

" When in the chronicle " " _ . . . 12,2 
" When to the sessions of sweet silent thought " 115 
Wolsey's Fall(//^?z?3' r///.) ... 321 
Wolsey's Advice to Cromwell {Henry VIII.) 321 
From: — AWs Well that Ends \Vell, 312, 791, 

793j 7961 801, 813. 
Antony and Cleopatra, 206, 490, 722. 
As You Like It, 133, 134, 204, 214, 347, 348, 

394, 489, 496, 602, 722, 791, 795, 803, 810, 813. 
Comedy of Errors, 345, 722, 799, 868. 
Coriolanus, 493, 813. 
Cymbeline, 241, 798, 811, 816. 
Hamlet, 121, 133, 203, 205, 206, 207, 241, 248, 

271, 308, 309, 310, 311, 345, 346, 347, 395, 

3961 397; 399; 489, 49°, 49'! 495. 54°, 559, 

671, 721, 722, 723, 724, 725, 793, 797, 798, 

801, 803, 804, 808, 809, 811, 813, 814, 815, 

867, 868, 900. 

Julius Cassar, 120, 121, 206, 310, 492, 539, 670, 
671, 722, 793, 797, 799, 802, 810, 899, 900, 
938. 

King Henry IV. Pt. I, 108, 312, 397, 398, 670, 
671, 722, 793, 798, 807, 812, 815, 816. 

King Henry IV. Pt. II., 346, 395, 540, 724, 800. 

King Henry V., 395, 540, 559, 631, 632, 723, 

802, 811, 867. 

King Henry VI., Pt. I., 310, 795, 810. 
King Henry VI., Pt. II., 495, 724, 796, 799. 
King Henry VI., Pt. III., 541. 798, 802, 815, 

938. 
King Henry VIII., 311, 312, 345, 346, 347, 

601, 723, 811. 
King John, 107, 232, 309, 345, 346, 34S, 541, 

603, 722, 726, 798, 799, 801, 812, 815, 899. 
King Lear, 346, 347, 348, 494, 721, 723, 802. 
King Richard II., 308, 309, 310, 346, 541, 603, 

719, 722, 725, 792. 
King Richard III., 107,232, 310, 396^540, 541, 

721, 722, 796, 800, 802, 803, 804, 868, 899, 938. 
Love's Labor Lost, 133, 203, 723, 724, 795, 

804, 810. 
Lover's Complaint, 204. 
Macbeth, 232, 309, 311, 312, 345, 346, 347. 39^, 

49°. 491, 540. 541. 559, 720, 724, 725. 791, 

792, 793, 794, 797, 798, 800, 802, 810, 816, 

868, 900. 

Measure for Measure, 205, 232, 310, 347, 797, 

800, 8ri, 813. 
Merchant of Venice, 133, 203, 248, 312, 346, 

347, 348, 496, 632, 722, 723, 724, 797, 798, 

802, 803, 804, Sgg. 
Merry Wives of Windsor, 868, 869. 
Midsummer Night's Dream, 203, 494, 495, 722, 

806, 867, 869. 
Much Ado About Nothing, 121, 203, 204, 271, 

3'2, 345, 723,724, 799, 801. 
Othello, 207, 248, 347, 539, 721, 722, 723, 724, 

725, 811, 900. 
Passionate Pilgrim, 492. 
Romeo and Juliet, 134, 207, 241, 345, 346, 49°, 

492, 721, 723, 724, 809, 81S, 899. 
Sonnet XVIII., 134. 



Sonnet XXV., 540. 

Sonnet LXVL, 398. 

Sonnet LXX., 722. 

Sonnet XC, 271. 

Sonnet XCVIII., 492. 

Sonnet CXI., 722. 

Sonnet CXXXIL, 491. 

Taming of the Shrew, 121, 215, 725, 804. 

Tempest. 133, 205, 492, 672, 721, 797, 805, 869. 

Timon of Athens, 347, 489. 

Titus Andronicus, 311, 798. 

Troilus and Cressida, 121, 792, 811. 

Twelfth Night, 205, 215, 494, 495, 798, 808. 

Two Gentlemen of Verona, 133, 134, 203, 215, 

271. 345, 493, 723. 795- 
Venus and Adonis, 205, 803. 
Winter's Tale, 107, 134, 495, 631, 724, 802. 

SHANLY, CHARLES DAWSON. 
America. Pub. i865. 

Brierwood Pipe 525 

Civil War 525 

SHARPE, R. S. 
England. 1759 - 1835. 

The Minute-Gun 627 

SHEALE, RICHARD. 
England. 

Chevy-Chase 635 

SHELLEY. PERCY BYSSHE. 

England, 1792-1822. 

Cloud, The _ 822 

lanthe, Sleeping {Queen Mab) . . . 714 

" I arise from dreams of thee " ' . . 1S8 

" I fear thy kisses, gentle maiden " . . T31 

Lament, A 322 

Love's Pliilosopliy iS8 

" Music, when soft voices die "... 776 

Night {Queen Mab) 41S 

Night, To 414 

Ozymandias of Egypt 717 

Skylark, To the 473 

Sunset {Quee7t Mah) 412 

" The sun is warm, the sky is clear " . . 317 

View from the Euganean Hills . . . 441 

War 499 

" When the lamp is shattered" . . . 262 

From : — Cenci, The, 720 ; Julian and Maddalo, 
S06 ; Prometheus Unbound, 206. 

SHENSTONE, WILLIAM. 

England. 1714- 1763. 

Village Schoolmistress, The ( ScJioohnist'ress) 707 
From: — Pastoral, A, 241 ; Schoolmistress, Ihe, 

107 ; Written on the Window of an Inn, 121. 

SHEPHERD, N. G. 
America. 

" Only the clothes she wore " . . . . 299 

SHERIDAN, RICHARD BRINSLEY. 

Ireland, 1751 - 1816. 

\^ett\teTo?i%t^z.%i.{School for Scandal) . 131 

SHIRLEY, JAMES. 

England, 1594- 1666. 

Death, the Leveller 301 

From : — Cupid and Death .... 308 

SIBLEY, CHARLES. 
Scotland. 

The Plaidie 187 

SIDNEY, SIR PHILIP. 

England, 1554- 1586. 

Love's Silence i44 

" My true-love hath my heart" . . . 137 
S\eex){Astrophel and Stella) . . . .762 
"With how sad steps, O Moon " . . . 249 

SIGOURNEY, LYDIA HUNTLEY. 

Norwich, Conn., 1791-1S65. 

Coral Insect, The 623 

" Go to thy rest, fair child " . ... 282 
Man — Woman 77^ 

Publishers : Haniersley & Co., Hartford, Conn. 

SIMMONS, BARTHOLOMEW. 
Ireland, pub. 1843; d. 1850. 

To the Memory of Thomas Hood . . .922 



-^ 



[& 



26 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



--a 



SIMMS, WILLIAM GILMORE. 

Charleston, S. C. 1806-1870. 

Grape-Vine Swing, The 456 

Mother and Child 81 

Shaded Water 448 

Publishers : W. J. Widdleton & Co., New York. 

SKELTON, JOHN. 

Eng"land, about 1460 -1529. 

To Mistress Margaret Hussey . . . 122 

SMITH, ALEXANDER. 

Scotland. 1830 -1867. 

Lady Barbara 163 

Tlie Night before the Wedding . . . 210 
From : — A Life Drama .... 493, 807 
SMITH, CHARLOTTE. 

England, 1749 -1806. 

The Swallow 478 

SMITH, F. BURGE. 

America. 

Little Goldenhair 85 

SMITH, HORACE. 

Enj^land. 1779- 1849. 

Address to the Mummy at Belzoni's Exhibition 717 

Flowers, Hymn to the 459 

Moral Cosmetics ...... 545 

Tale of Drury Lane, A [Refected Addresses) 1006 

The Gouty Merchant and the Stranger . . 962 

From: — Rejected Addresses .... 808 

SMITH, JAMES. 

England, 1775- 1839. 

From : — Rejected Addresses .... 80S 
SMITH, SEBA. 

Turner, Me.. 1792 -1868. 

The Mother's Sacrifice . . . . .86 

SMITH, SYDNEY. 
Enj^land, 1771 - 1845. 

A Recipe for Salad 1013 

SMOLLETT, TOBIAS GEORGE. — 

Scotland, 1721-1771. 

From : — Roderick Random .... 203 

SOMERVILLE, WILLIAM. 
Entrland, 1677 -1742. 

Frotn : — The Chase 671 

SOUTHEY, MRS. CAROLINE BOWLES. 

England, 1787 - 1854. 

Cuckoo Clock, The {The Birthday) . . 717 

Greenwood Shrift, The ..... 383 

Pauper's Death-Bed, The .... 341 

Young Gray Head, The .... 891 

SOUTHEY, ROBERT. 
England. 1774 -1843. 

Blenheim, The Battle of 538 

Cataract of Lodore, The .... 449 

Devil's Walk, The 949 

Emmett's P'pitaph ..... 921 

God's Judgment on a Wicked Bishop . . 879 

Greenwood Shrift, The .... 383 

Holly-Tree, The 455 

Inchcape Rock, The ..... 620 

Old Man's Comforts, The .... 545 

Well of St. Keyne, The .... 955 
Froin : — Curse of Kehama, 206, 309, 816 ; Ma- 
doc, 271 ; Joan of Arc, 311 ; Thalaba the De- 
stroyer, 491 ; Occasional Pieces, XVIII., 806. 

SPENCER, CAROLINE S. 
Catskill, N. Y., 1850. 

Living Waters . 739 

SPENCER, WILLIAM ROBERT. 

England, 1770- 1834 

Beth Gelert 662 

" Too late I stayed" 117 

Wife, Children, and Friends .... 220 

SPENSER, EDMUND. 

Engl.ind, 1553- I599- 

Beauty {Hytnu in Honor of Beauty) . . 730 
Bower of Bliss, The {Faerie Queene') . . 829 
Bride, The { E pithalamion) . . . .212 
Cave oi S]eep, The {Faerie QteeeKe) . . 828 
Ministry of Angels " "... 373 

Una and the Lion "it _ _ g^g 

Una and the Red Crosse Knight {Faerie 

Queene) 827 

From: — Faerie Queene, 311, 395, 398, 492, 494, 
540, 670, 671; Fate of the Butterfly, 489; 



Hymn in Honor of Beauty, 206 ; Lines on his 
Promised Pension, 938 ; Mother Hubberd's 
Tale, 204. 

SPOFFORD, HARRIET PRESCOTT. 

Calais. Me., b. 1835. 

Vanity ........ 769 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

SPRAGUE, CHARLES. 

Boston, Mass., 1791 - 1S75. 

Winged Worshippers, The .... 478 
From.: — Curiosity, 804 ; To my Cigar . . 814 
Publishers ; Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

STANIFORD. 

Boston, Mass., Pub. 1803. 

FroTfi : — Art of Reading .... 398 

STEDMAN, EDMUND CLARENCE. 
Hartford, Conn,, b. 1S33. 

Betrothed Anew ...... 460 

Cav3.\ry Song [Alice 0/ Monmouth) . . 518 
Old Admiral, The ...... 932 

What the Winds bring 451 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

STEPHEN THE SABAITE, ST. 

Art thou weary ? [John Mason Neale^ s Trans. ) 364 

STERLING, JOHN. 
Scotland, 1806 -1844. 

Alfred the Harper 645 

Beautiful Day, On a . . , . . 406 
Spice-Tree, The 456 

STEVENS, GEORGE ALEXANDER. 

England, 1720 - 1784. 

The Storm 628 

STILL, JOHN. 

England, 1543 -1607. 

Good Ale 946 

STODDARD, RICHARD HENRY. 

Hingham, Mass., b. 1825. 

Brahma's Answer 746 

" It never comes again " .... 106 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

STODDART, THOMAS TOD. 

Scotland, b. 1810. 

The Anglers' Trysting-Tree .... 667 

STORY, ROBERT. 

Scotland, 1790- 1859. 

The Whistle 156 

STORY, WILLIAM WETMORE. 
Salem, Mass., b. 1819. 

Pan in Love 488 

Perseverance [From the Italian of Leonardo 

da Vinci) 781 

Violet, The 461 

Publishers : Little, Brown, & Co., Boston. 

STOWE, HARRIET BEECHER. 

Litchfield, Conn., b- 1812. 

A Day in the Pamfili Doria _ . . . . 682 
Lines to the Memory of Annie . . . 273 
" Only a year " ....'. 278 
Other World, The 387 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, &. Co., Boston. 

STRANGFORD, LORD. 

England. 1789- 1855. 

Blighted Love [From the Porticguese) . . 261 

STREET, ALFRED B. 
Poughkeepsie, N. Y., b. 1811. 

Nightfall 412 

Settler, The 709 

STRODE, WILLIAM. 
England, 1600-1644. 

"Kisses 186 

SUCKLING, SIR JOHN. 

England. 1609-1641, 

BnAe, The. [A Ballad 7ipon a Wedding) . 2ri 
Constancy . . . . . . . 124 

" I prythee send me back my heart " . . 146 
" Why so pale and wan ? " .... 263 

From: — Brennoralt, 134; Against Fruition . Soi 

SURREY, HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF. 
England, 1516-1547. 

" Give place, ye lovers" . . . . . 123 
Means to attain Happy Life, The . . 226 



^ 



^ 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



27 



ra 



SWAIN, CHARLES. 

Hntjiand. 1803 -1874. 

A Violet in her Hair 126 

" Smile and never heed me " . . . 156 

From : — The Mother's Hand .... 796 
SWIFT, JONATHAN. 

Ireland. 1667-1745, 

" Tonis ad resto mare " . . ... 993 
From: — Cadenus and Vanessa, 810 ; Imitation 
of Horace, 121; Poetry: a Rhapsody, 496. 
SWINBURNE, ALGERNON CHARLES. 

England, b. 1837. 

Disappointed Lover, The ( Trhanph of Time) 611 

Kissing her Hair 188 

Match, A . . . . . . . .148 

" When the hounds of spring" . . . 419 

SYLVESTER, JOSHUA. 

England, 1563-1618. 

Contentment 731 

" Were I as base as is the lowly plain " . 135 

TALFOURD, SIR THOMAS NOON. 

England, 1795- 1854. 

Sympathy [Ion) 770 

From : — I on . 794 

TALHAIARN OF WALES. 

" Where are the men ? " (Oliphanfs Trans.) 530 

TANNAHILL, ROBERT. 

Scotland, 1774- iSio. 

Flower o' Dumblane, The .... 148 
" The midges dance aboon the burn " . . 411 

TAYLOR, BAYARD. 

Kennett Square, Pa., 1825- 1878. 

Arab to the Palm, The 454 

Bedouin Love-Song ..... 186 

King of Tliule {From the Gervzan of Goethe) 862 

Possession ....... 218 

Rose, The {Hassan Ben Khaled) . . 464 

Song of the Camp 155 

From : — National Ode ..... 604 
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

TAYLOR, BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

LowviUe. N. Y,, b. 1822. 

Northern Lights, The 409 

TAYLOR, SIR HENRY. 

England, b. about 1800. 

Athulf and Ethilda 172 

'He^xt ^est( Philip van A rtevelde) . . 229 

Scholar, The {Edwin the Fair) . . . 766 

W\ie, A {Philip van Arievelde) . . . 213 

From: — Philip van Artevelde . . 348,812,867 

TAYLOR, JANE. 

England, 1783- 1824. 

Philosopher's Scales, The .... 862 
Toad's Journal, The 851 

TAYLOR, JOHN EDWARD. 

England, Pub. 1852. 

" If it be true that any beauteous thing " {Frotn 

the Italian of Michael A ngelo Bitotiarotti) 135 
" The might of one fair face " {From the 
Italian of Michael A7igelo Buonarotti) . 135 

TAYLOR, JEFFERYS. 

England, 1793-18^3. 

The Milkmaid 957 

TAYLOR, JEREMY. 

England, 1613 -1667. 

Heaven . . . ♦ 367 

TAYLOR, TOM. 
England, 1817-1680. 

Abraham Lincoln {Lotidoji Punch) . . 931 

TENNANT, WILLIAM. 
Scotland, 1784-1848. 

Ode to Peace 534 

TENNYSON, ALFRED. 

England, b. 1810. 

" Break, break, break" 315 

Bugle, The (Princess) ..... 449 

Charge of the Light Brigade .... 517 

" Come into the garden, Maud" . . . 152 

Dead Friend, The (/« Jl/^;«<?rz'«?7z) . . 113 

Death of the Old Year, The ... 753 

Eagle, The 483 

Enid's Song [Idyls of the King) . . . 777 

Foolish Virgins, The {Idyls of the Kififf) . 754 



Godiva 702 

Hero to Leander ...... 235 

"Home they brought her warrior dead" 

{Princess) . 292 

In Memoriam, Selections from . . ■ . 290 
Lady Clara Vere de Vere .... 267 

Locksley Hall 254 

Lullaby {Princess) 81 

May Queen, The 327 

Miller's Daughter, The {Afiller's Daughter) 183 

Mort d'Arthur 642 

New Year's Eve {In Memoriam) . . 752 
" O swallow, swallow, flying south" {Princess) 171 
"O, yet we trust that somehow good" {In 

Metnoriam) ....... 392 

Retrospection {Princess) . . . . 315 

Sleeping Beauty, The {The Daj/ Dream) . 174 
Song of the Brook ( The Brook: an Idyl) . 446 
Song of the Milkmaid {Quee?i Mary) . ' . 168 
Spring (In Memoriam) .... 418 

"Strong Son of God, immortal Love" {In 

Metnoriam) ....... 393 

Victor Hugo, To 926 

" What does little birdie say ? " (Sea Dreams) 80 
From: — Aylmer's Field, 810; Fatima, 205; In 
Memoriam, 309, 311, 345, 394, 397, 399, 797, 
803, 807 ; International Exhibition Ode, 541 ; 
Land of Lands, The, 603 ; Miller's Daughter, 
814; " Of old sat Freedom on the heights," 
602 ; On the Death of the Duke of Welling- 
ton, 940; Princess, The, 493, 721, S07 ; Sir 
Launcelot and Queen Guinevere, 721 ; i"o the 
Queen, 632. 

TENNYSON, FREDERICK. 
England. (Brother of the preceding.) 

Blackbird, The 693 

TERRETT, WILLIAM B. 

Platonic . . . . . . . .119 

THACKERAY, WILLIAM MAKEPEACE. 
England, 1811-1863. 

Age of Wisdom, The 202 

Church Gate, At the 132 

End of the Play, The 344 

Little Billee 971 

Mahogany Tree, The 117 

Mr. Molony's Account of the Ball . . 1002 

Sorrows of Werther ...... 972 

THAXTER, MRS. CELM. 

Isles of Shoals. 

The Sandpiper 482 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

THEOBALD, LEWIS. 

England, 1691 - 1744. 

From: — The Double Falsehood . . .812 

THOM, WILLIAM. 

Scotland, 1799-1850. 

The Mitherless Bairn . . . . .91 

THOMSON, JAMES. 

Scotland, 1700-1748. 

Angling ( The S^sons : Spring) , . . 669 
Bathing ( The Seasons : Slimmer) . . 669 
Castle of Indolence, The (From Canto I.) . 831 
Cow^nwhisX l-Me {The Seasons : Spring) . 214 
Domestic Birds ( The Seasons : Spri^tg) . . 470 

Hymn on the Seasons 417 

Plea for the Animals {The Seasons: Spring) 783 

Rule Britannia (Alfred) 576 

Songsters, The {The Seasons: Spring) . 469 
Stag Hunt, The ( The Seasojis: Atiimnn) . 659 
War for the Sake of Peace (Britannia) . 499 
Winter Scenes ('The Seasons : IVinier) . . 439 

From: — Britannia, 541; Castle of Indolence, 
4S9, 539, 814, S16; Coriolanus, 812; Seasons, 
The : Spring, 107, 489, 492, 672, 799,. — Sum- 
mer, 204, 490, 631, 719, — Autumn, 492, 795, — 
Winter, 310, 672, 806; Song, 205. 

THOREAU, HENRY DAVID. 

Concord, Mass., 1817-1862. 

Mist 691 

Smoke . 691 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Boston. 

THORNBURY, GEORGE WALTER. 

England, 1828-1877. 

The Jester's Sermon . . . . . 748 



-3 



a- 



28 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



THORPE, ROSE HARTWICK. 

Litchfield, Mich., b. 1840. 

Curfew must not ring to-night .... 180 

THRALE, HESTER LYNCH (Mrs. Piozzi). 
Wales, 1740-1821. 

The Three Warnings 756 

THURLOW, EDWARD HOVEL, LORD. 
England, 1781-1829. 

Beauty . 730 

Bird, To a 482 

TICKELL, THOMAS. 

England, 1686-1740. '. 

To a Lady before Marriage .... 209 
To Earl of Warwick on the Death of Addison gio 
From : — To a Lady, with a Present of Flowers, 
134 ; Colin and Lucy, 311. 

TIMROD, HENRY. 

Charleston, S. C, 1829 -1867. 

" Sleep sweetly in your humble graves " . 532 

Spring in Carolina 422 

Publishers : E. J. Hale & Son, New York. 

TOPLADY, AUGUSTUS. 

England, 1740-1778. 

" Love divine, all love excelling " . . . 392 

TOURNEUR, CYRIL. 

England, Time of James I. 

From: — The Revenger's Tragedy . . 558 

TRENCH, RICHARD CHENEVIX. 
Ireland, b. 1807. 

Different Minds 388 

Harniosan ...;... 769 

TROWBRIDGE, JOHN TOWNSEND. 

Ogden, N. Y., b. 1827. 

Dorothy in the Garret 251 

Vagabonds, The 547 

Publishers : Harper & Brothers, New York. 
TRUMBULL, J. 

Woodbury, Conn., 1750 -1831. 

Fro7n: — McFingal, 671, 793. 

TUCKERMAN, HENRY THEODORE. 

Boston, Mass., 1813-1871. 

Newport Beach ...... 692 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

TUPPER, MARTIN FARQUHAR. 

England, b. 1810. 

Cruelty to Animals, Of (Prov. Philosophy') . 782 
From: — Of Education, 107; Of Immortality 394 

TURNER, CHARLES TENNYSON. 

England, 1808 - 1879. Brother of Alfred Tennyson. 

The Ocean 631 

TUSSER. THOMAS. 
England, 1523-1580. 

From : — Farmer's Daily Diet, 232 ; Good 
Husbandry Lessons, 347, 394, 672, 802 ; 
Winds, The, 802 ; Wiving and Thriving, 214. 
TYCHBORN, CHIDIOCK. 

England. 

Lines written by One in the Tower . . 745 

UDALL, NICHOLAS. 

England, 1506-1S64. 

From : — Translations from Erasmus, 540. 
UHLAND, LUDVVIG. 

Germany. 1787-1862. 

Landlady's Daughter, Th& {Dwig/it^ s Trans.) 142 
'P?i5&2i%&,Th^ (Sarah Ansien' s Trajislation) . 291 
UPTON, JAMES. 

England, 1670-1749. 

The Lass of Richmond Hill .... 149 

VAUGHAN, HENRY. 
England, 1621-1695. 

They are all gone 274 

VENABLE, W. H. 
America. 

Welcome to " Boz," A 925 

VERY, JONES. 

Salem, Mass., b. 1813. 

Latter Rain, The 433 

Nature 403 

Spirit Land, The 368 

VICENTE, GIL. 

Portugal, 1482- 1537. 

The Nightingale (Sirjohji Bowring's Trans.) 479 



VINCI, LEONARDO DA. 

Italy, 1452- 1519. 

Perseverance (IV. W. Story's Translation) . 781 

VISSCHER, MARIA TESSELSCHADE. 

Holland, 1594-1649. 

The Nightingale (Sir John Bowring's Trans.) 479 

WALLER, EDMUND. 
England, 1665 - 1687. 

Girdle, On a 125 

Go, Lovely Rose ! . . . . . 125 

Old Age and Death ( Upon his Divine Poesy) 755 
From : — Divine Love, 399 ; On the King's Re- 
turn, 798 ; To a Lady singing a Song of his 
Composing, 134 ; Upon Roscommon's Trans- 
lation of Horace's De Arte Poetica, 806; Verses 
upon his Divine Poesy, 794; " While I listen 
to thy voice," 399. 

WALLER, JOHN FRANCIS. 
Ireland, b. 1810. 

" Dance light " 174 

The Spinning- Wheel Song . . . . 173 

WALSH, WILLIAM. 
England, 1663-1707. 

Rivalry in Love 147 

WALTON, IZAAK. (See also John Chalkhill.) 

England, 1593-1683. 

The Angler's Wish 668 

WARTON, THOMAS. 
England, 1728-1790. 

Retirement ....... 406 

WASSON, DAVID A. 

Love against Love . • • • • 790 

WASTELL, SIMON. 
England, d. 1623. 

Man's Mortality 302 

WATSON, JAMES W. 

America. 

Beautiful Snow 334 

Wounded to Death 526 

WATTS, ISAAC. 
England, 1674-1749. 

Cradle Hymn, A 76 

Insignificant Existence 751 

Summer Evening, A 431 

From: — Divine Songs, 395, 398; Funeral 
Thought, 308, 310; Glory to the Father and 
Son, 394 ; Horje LyricEe, 807 ; Hymns and 
Spiritual Songs, 794, 799 ; Sluggard, The, 
81s; Song XVI., 108; Song XX., 108. 

WAUGH, EDWIN. 

England, 1817. (Called " The Lancashire Poet.") 

'' The dule 's i' this bonnet o' mine " . . 196 

WEBSTER. DANIEL. 

Salisbury, N. H., 1782-1852. 

The Memory of the Heart . . . .112 
From : — Address before the Sons of New 

Hampshire 939 

WEBSTER, JOHN. 

England, about 1600. 

From: — Duchess of Malfy, 121, 232; The 

White Devil, 495 
WEIR, HARRISON. 

England. Pub. 1865. 

The English Robin . , 47s 

WELBY, AMELIA B. COPPUCK. 
St. Michaels, Md., 1821-1852. 

Old Maid, The 790 

Twilight at Sea 610 

WESLEY, CHARLES. 

England, 1708-1788. 

Wrestling Jacob 371 

WESLEY, JOHN. 
England. 1703-1791. 

The Love of God Supreme .... 390 

WESTWOOD, THOMAS. 
England, b. 1814. 

Little Bell _ 88 

" Under my window " 85 

WHEWELL, WILLIAM. 
England, 1795 - 1866. 

Physics 992 



B- 



tf 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



29 



rfi 



WHITCHER, FRANCES MIRIAM. 

VVhitesboro', N. Y., 1812-1852. 

Widow Bedott to Elder Sniffles . . . 995 

WHITE, JOSEPH BLANCO. 

Spain, b. 1775, d. England, 1841. 

Night 415 

WHITE, HENRY KIRKE. 

Engiand. 1785- 1806. 

Early Primrose, To the 461 

Harvest Moon, To the . . . . 550 

WHITMAN, SARAH HELEN. 
Providence. R. I., b. 1803. 

A Still Day in Autumn ..... 692 

WHITMAN, WALT. 

•West Hills. N. Y., b. 1819. 

The Mocking-Bird (" Otii of the cradle end- 
lessly rocking") ...... 470 

Publisher : Chas. P. Somerby, New York. 

WHITNEY, ADELINE D. TRAIN. 

Boston, b. 1824. 

Jack Horner {Mother Goose /or Grown Folks) 973 
Publishers : Roberts Bros. 

WHITTIER, JOHN GREENLEAF. 

Haverhill, Mass., b. 1807. 

Absent Sailor, To \\&r{The Tent on the Beach) -2.1,-1 

Agassiz. Prayer of ..... . 936 

Angel of Patience, The .... 275 

Barbara Frietchie 596 

Barclay of Ury 536 

Barefoot Boy, The 99 

Benedicite in 

Brown of Ossawatomie 599 

Burns ........ 914 

Fremont, John C 935 

Halleck, Fitz-Greene 937 

Hampton Beach 609 

Ichabod 929 

Laus Deo ! .....>. 597 

Maud Mullen 158 

Meeting, The ....... 378 

New England in Winter (6"«07«-5£;2.;«i^) . 436 

Palm-Tree, The 455 

Pumpkin, The ...... 459 

Reformer, The 600 

Thy Will be Done 375 

From: — Centennial Hymn, 604 ; Democracy, 813 ; 
Eve of Election. 603, 719 ; Snow-Bound, 807. 

Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston. 

WILCOX, CARLOS. 

Newport, N. H., 1794-1827. 

God everywhere in Nature .... 488 

WILDE, RICHARD HENRY. 

Ireland, b. 17S9 ; d. New Orleans, La., 1847. 

Life ..." 743 

WILLIS, NATHANIEL PARKER. 

Portland, Me., 1807-1867. 

Belfry Pigeon, The 472 

Leper, The 7°' 

Parrhasius 881 

Women, Two 333 

Publishers : Clark & Maynard, New York. 

WILLSON, ARABELLA M. 
Canaiidaigua, N. Y. 

To the " Sextant " looi 

WILLSON, BYRON FORCEYTHE. 

America, 1837 -1867. 

In State 5^3 

WILMOT, JOHN. 

See Rochester, Earl of. 

WILSON, HORACE HAYMAN. 

England, r786- i860. 

''Namaxi(Frofn Safzskrit o/Calidhsa) . 776 

WILSON, JOHN {Kit ox Christopher North). 
Scotland, 1785-1854. 

Evening Cloud, The 692 

Rose and the Gauntlet, The ... 884 

WINKWORTH, CATHARINE. 

Scotland, b, 1829. 

Veni Sancte Spiritus (From the Lathi) . . 356 

WITHER, GEORGE. 

England, 1588- 1667. 

" Lord ! when those glorious lights I see " . 376 
Shepherd's Resolution, The . . . 193 
Upon a Stolen Kiss 186 



From: — Christmas, 816 ; The Shepherd's Hunt- 
ing, 803. 

WOLCOTT, OR WOLCOT, JOHN {Peter Pindar). 
England, 1738- 1819. 

Chloe, To 192 

Pilgrims and the Peas, The .... 953 

Razor-Seller, The 954 

Sleep 761 

WOLFE, CHARLES. 

■Ireland, 1791 - 1823. 

Burial of Sir John Moore . . . . 920 

WOODWORTH, SAMUEL. 

Scituate, Mass., 1785 - 1842. 

The Old Oaken Bucket 100 

WOOLSEY, SARAH C\^h^^Q.'EX {Susan Coolidge). 
New Haven, Conn. Now living. 

In the Mist 823 

When? 381 

Publishers : Roberts Brothers, Boston. 

WORDSWORTH, WILLIAM. 

England, 1770- 1850. 

Cuckoo, To the 472 

Daffodils 464 

Hart-leap Well 660 

Highland Girl at Inversneyde, To a . . 105 
Inner Vision, The ...... 767 

Lucy . 104 

Milton, To 907 

Rainbow, The . . . . . . 432 

" She was a phantom of delight " . . • . 128 

Skylark, To the 474 

Sleeplessness . . .... 763 

Sonnet composed upon Westminster Bridge 678 

Sonnet, The 907 

"There was a time " 757 

" The world is too much with us " . . 403 

" Three years she grew " . . . . . 103 
Tintern Abbey ...... 4°3 

To a Child 89 

Toussaint rOuverture, To . . . . ' 921 
Unknown Poets {Excursioti) .... 766 
Walton's Book of Lives {Eccles. Sonnets) . 90S 
We are Seven ....... 87 

From : — Character of the Happy Warrior, 540; 
Dion, 868 ; Early Spring, 492, 495 ; Ecclesias- 
tical Sonnets, 809, 939; Ellen Irwin, 311 ; Ex- 
cursion, The, 309, 396, 397, 398, 399, 494, 631, 
793, 798, 801, 806, 808, 867 ; Expostulation and 
Reply, 397 ; Extempore Effusion on the Death 
of James Hogg, 309 ; Influence of Natural Ob- 
jects, 672; "1 wandered lonely," S13 ; Lao- 
damia, 203, 206, 399 ; Lines added to " The 
Ancient Mariner," 108 ; Lines written in Ear- 
ly Spring, 492, 495 ; Miscellaneous Sonnets, 
489 ; " My heart leaps up," 107 : Nutting, 490 ; 
Ode to Duty, 797 ; Old Cumberland Beggar, 
489 ; On the Subjugation of Switzerland, 493 ; 
Personal Talk, 805 ; Peter Bell, 490, 495 ; 
Poems dedicated to National Independence, 
602 ; Poems in Summer of 1833, 4Q5 ; Poet's 
Epitaph, 205 ; Prelude, The, 490 ; Resolution 
and Independence, 807 ; Sky Prospect, 491 ; 

Sonnet composed at Castle, 494 ; Sonnet 

XXXV., 398; Sparrow's Nest, The, 231; 
Tables turned, The, 494 ; Thoughts suggested 

on the Banks of Nith, 398 ; To , 206 ; To 

a Butterfly, 108 ; To the Daisy, 495 ; To Sir 
G. H. B., 348 ; To a Young Lady, 311, 723 ; 
Triad, The, 721 ; Written in London, Septem- 
ber, 1802, S14; Yarrow Unvisited, 493. 

WOTTON, SIR HENRY. 
England, 1568- 1639. 

Character of a Happy Life, The . ... 736 

In Praise of Angling 667 

To his Mistress 124 

From : — The Death of Sir Albert Morton's Wife 312 

WROTHER, MISS. 

From : — The Universal Songster . • . 271 

WYATT, SIR THOMAS. 
England, 1503-1542. 

Earnest Suit, An 240 

XAVIER, ST. FRANCIS. 

France, 1506-1552. 

" My God, I love thee " {Caswall's Trans.) . 360 



^ 



a- 



30 



INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES. 



YALDEN, or YOULDING, THOMAS. 

England. 1669-70-1736. 

Frotn.: — Against Enjoyment . . . 801 

YOUNG, DR. EDWARD. 

England, 1684 -1765. 

Man (Night Thoughts) 776 

Narcissa • 106 

Procrastination {Night Thoughts) . . ■ 748 

Time {Night Thoughts) .... 747 

From : — Epistle to Mr. Pope, 347, 7^8 ; Last 
Day, The, 398 ; Love of Fame, 215, 347, 541, 
793, 804, 810, 815; Night Thoughts, 120, 232, 
308, 309, 310, 312, 345, 348, 395. 398, 399. 489. 
491, 492, 792, 794, 798, 799, 801, 816. 

YOUNG, SIR J. 

Epitaph on Ben Jonson 939 

ANONYMOUS. 

Anne Hathaway 904 

A Voice and Nothing Else .... 923 

Bellagcholly Days 1016 

Books {Kaleder of Sheperdes) . . • 767 

Constancy 713 

Cooking and Courting 201 

Cosmic Egg, The 991 

Cradle Song ....... 77 

"Dreamer, The (Poems By a Seamstress) . 33c 

Drummer-Boy's Burial, The .... 528 

Duty 557 

Echo and the Lover 1014 

Edwin and Paulinas (Cotiversion of North- 

umbria) ....... 389 

Eggs and the Horses, The . . . 955 

Faithful Lovers, The ..... 201 

Fetching Water from the Well . . . 169 

Fine Old English Gentleman . . . 959 
Flotsam and Jetsam . . . . .621 

George Washington 928 

Girlhood . . 711 

" Go, feel what I have felt " ... 546 

Good By . 233 

Grief for the Dead ..... 272 

Indian Summer 434 

Inscription on Melrose Abbey . . . 307 

King John and the Abbot of Canterbury . 943 

Kissing 's no Sin 187 



Kitty of Coleraine 187 

Lady Ann Bothwell's Lament . . • 269 

Lament of the Border Widow .... 638 

Life's Love, A ..... . 972 

Little Feet 77 

Love lightens Labor ..... 220 

Loveliness of Love, The ..... 141 

" Love me little, love me long" . . . 141 

" Love not me for comely grace" . . . 141 

Modern House that Jack built, The . . ion 

My Love ........ 1012 

My sweet Sweeting {From a MS. temp. 

Henry VI 11.) . . . . . . 123 

Not one to spare ...... 230 

Nursery Rhymes 993 

Old-School Punishment gg 

Origin of the Opal 865 

Parting Lovers, The ( H^. R. A Igers Trans. ) 236 

Passage in the Life of St. Augustine . . 362 

Praxiteles (From the Greek) . . . 903 

Remonstrance with the Snails .... 486 

Robin Hood and Allan-a-Dale . . . 638 

" Rock of Ages " 367 

Sea Fight, The 612 

Seaside Well, The . .... 739 

Siege of Belgrade 1013 

Skater Belle, Our 670 

Skeleton, To a 761 

Somebody 170 

Sorr\ehody's Darlirig (Sotith Songs) . . 531 

Stormy Petrel, Lines to the .... 483 

Summer Days ...... 160 

Swell's Soliloquy 1001 

Tell-tale, The 476 

" They are dear fish to me" .... 282 

Unsatisfactory 194 

Useful Plough, The 551 

Vicar of Bray, The 945 

"Waly, waly, but love be bonny " . . . 26S 

" When I think on the happy days " . . 247 

" When shall we all meet again ? " . . . 322 

" Where are you going, my pretty maid ? " . 958 

White Rose, The 123 

"Why, lovely ch3.rmer" (The Hive) . . 146 

Wife to her Husband, The .... 244 

Woman ........ 975 

Frofn : — Battle of the Boyne, The, 602 ; Epigram 
on Matrimony, 232 ; On Tobacco, 814. 



[0-^ 



^ 



fr ^ 



EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION. 



So large a collection of poems as this demands of its compiler an extensive 
familiarity with the poetic literature of our language, both of the early and 
the later time, and withal so liberal a taste as not to exclude any variety of 
poetic merit. At the request of the Publishers I undertook to write an Intro- 
duction to the present work, and in pursuance of this design I find that I 
have come into a somewhat closer personal relation with the book. In its 
progress it has passed entirely under my revision, and, although not absolutely 
responsible for the compilation or its arrangement, I have, as requested, exer- 
cised a free hand both in excluding and in adding matter according to my 
judgment of what was best adapted to the purposes of the enterprise. Such, 
however, is the wide range of English verse, and such the abundance of the 
materials, that a compilation of this kind must be like a bouquet gathered 
from the fields in June, when hundreds of flowers will be left in unvisited 
spots as beautiful as those which have been taken. It may happen, there- 
fore, that many who have learned to delight in some particular poem will 
turn these pages, as they might those of other collections, without finding their 
favorite. Nor should it be matter of surprise, considering the multitude of 
authors from whom the compilation is made, if it be found that some are 
overlooked, especially the more recent, of equal merit with many whose poems 
appear in these pages. It may happen, also, that the compiler, in consequence 
of some particular association, has been sensible of a beauty and a power of 
awakening emotions and recalling images in certain poems which other readers 
will fail to perceive. It should be considered, moreover, that in poetry, as in 
painting, different artists have different modes of presenting their conceptions, 
each of which may possess its peculiar merit, yet those whose taste is formed 
by contemplating the productions of one class take little pleasure in any other. 
Crabb Eobinson relates that Wordsworth once admitted to him that he did not 
much admire contemporary poetry, not because of its want of poetic merit, 
but because he had been accustomed to poetry of a different sort, and added 
that but for this he might have read it with pleasure. I quote from memory. 

Ig- ^ 



[B- ■ — ^ — -a 

^^ 32 INTRODUCTION. '— ^ 

It is to be hoped that every reader of- this collection, however he may have 
been trained, will find in the great variety of its contents something conform- 
able to his taste. 

I suppose it is not necessary to give a reason for adding another to the 
collections of this nature, already in print. They abound in every language, 
for the simple reason that there is a demand for them. German literature, 
prolific as it is in verse, has many of them, and some pf them compiled by 
distinguished authors. The parlor table and the winter fireside require a book 
which, when one is in the humor for reading poetry, and knows not what 
author to take up, will supply exactly what he wants. 

I have known persons who frankly said that they took no pleasure in read- 
ing poetry, and perhaps the number of those who make this admission would 
be greater were it not for the fear of appearing singular. But to the great 
mass of mankind poetry is really a delight and a refreshment. To many, 
perhaps to most, it is not requisite that it should be of the highest degree 
of merit. Nor, although it be true that the poems which are most famous and 
most highly prized are works of considerable length, can it be said that the 
pleasure they give is in any degree proportionate to the extent of their plan. 
It seems to me that it is only poems of a moderate length, or else portions of 
the greater works to which I refer, that produce the efiect upon the mind and 
heart which make the charm of this kind of writing. The proper office of 
poetry, in filling the mind with delightful images and awakening the gentler 
emotions, is not accomplished on a first and rapid perusal, but requires that 
the words should be dwelt upon until they become in a certain sense our own, 
and are adopted as the utterance of our own minds. A collection such as 
this is intended to be furnishes for this purpose portions of the best English 
verse suited to any of the varying moods of its readers. 

Such a work also, if sufiiciently extensive, gives the reader an opportunity 
of comparing the poetic literature of one period with that of another; of 
noting the fluctuations of taste, and how the poetic forms which are in fashion 
during one age are laid aside in the next ; of observing the changes which 
take place in our language, and the sentiments wdiich at different periods 
challenge the public approbation. Specimens of the poetry of different cen- 
turies, presented in this way, show how the great stream of human thought in 
its poetic form eddies now to the right and now to the left, wearing away its 
banks first on one side and then on the other. Some author of more than 
common faculties and more than common boldness catches the public atten- 
tion, and immediately he has a crowd of followers who form their taste on his 
and seek to divide with him the praise. Thus Cowley, with his undeniable 
genius, was the head of a numerous class who made poetry consist in far- 
fetched conceits, ideas oddly brought together, and quaint turns of thought. 
Pope, following close upon Dryden, and learning much from him, was the 

^ ^ ^ 



^ —a 

INTRODUCTION. 33 

founder of a school of longer duration, which found its models in Boileau and 
other poets of the reign of Louis XIV., — a school in which the Avit predomi- 
nated over the poetry, — a school marked by striking oppositions of thought, 
frequent happinesses of expression, and a carefully balanced modulation, — 
numbers pleasing at first, but in the end fatiguing. As this school degener- 
ated, the wit almost disappeared ; but there was no new infusion of poetry in 
its place. When Scott gave the public the Lai/ of the Last Minstrel, and 
other poems, which certainly, considered as mere narratives, are the best we 
have, carrying the reader forward without weariness and with an interest 
which the author never allows to subside, a crowd of imitators pressed after 
him, the greater part of whom are no longer read. Wordsworth had, and still 
has, his school ; the stamp of his example is visible on the writings of all the 
poets of- tlie present day. Even Byron showed himself, in the third canto of 
Childe Harold, to be one of his disciples, though he fiercely resented being 
called so. The same poet did not disdain to learn of Scott in composing his 
narrative poems, such as the Bride of Abydos and the Giaour, though he could 
never tell a story in verse without occasional tediousness. In our day the 
style of writing adopted by eminent living poets is often seen reflected in the 
verses of their younger contemporaries, — sometimes with an effect like that 
of a face beheld in a tarnished mirror. Thus it is that poets are. formed by 
their influence on one another ; the greatest of them are more or less indebted 
for what they are to their predecessors and their contemporaries. 

While speaking of these changes in the public taste, I am tempted to cau- 
tion the reader against the mistake often made of estimating the merit of one 
poet by the too easy process of comparing him with another. The varieties of 
poetic excellence are as great as the varieties of beauty in flowers or in the 
female face. There is :ao poet, indeed no author in any department of litera- 
ture, who can be taken as a standard in judging of others ; the true standard 
is an ideal one, and even this is not the same in all men's minds. One 
delights in grace, another in strengtli ; one in a fiery vehemence and enthusi- 
asm on the surface, another in majestic repose and the expression of feeling 
too deep to be noisy ; one loves simple and obvious images strikingly em- 
ployed, or familiar thoughts placed in a new light ; another is satisfied only 
with novelties of thought and expression, with uncommon illustrations and 
images far sought. It is certain that each of these modes of treating a subject 
may have its peculiar merit, and that it is absurd to require of those whose 
genius inclines them to one that they should adopt its opposite, or to set one 
down as inferior to another because he is not of the same class. As well, in 
looking through an astronomer's telescope at that beautiful phenomenon, a 
double star, in which the twin flames are one of a roseate and the other of a 
golden tint, might we quarrel with either of them because it is not colored like 
its fellow. Some of the comparisons made by critics between one poet and 

g ^ 1 j& 



[&-• ^ 

^""^ 34 INTRODUCTION. ^^ 

another are scarcely less preposterous than would be a comparison between a 
river and a mountain. 

The compiler of this collection has gone as far back as to the author who 
may properly be called the father of English poetry, and who wrote while our 
language was like the lion in Milton's account of the creation, when rising 
from the earth at the Divine command and 

.... pawing to get free 
His hinder parts," - 

for it was still clogged by the unassimilated portions of the French tongue, to 
which in part it owed its origin. These were to be thrown aside in after years.. 
The versification had also one characteristic of French verse, which was soon 
after Chaucer's time laid aside, — the mute or final e had in his lines the value 
of a syllable by itself, especially when the next word began with a consonant. 
But though these peculiarities somewhat embarrass the reader, he still finds in 
the writings of the old poet a fund of the good old English of the Saxon fire- 
side, which makes them worthy to be studied, were it only to strengthen our 
hold on our language. He delighted in describing natural objects which still 
retained their Saxon names, and this he did with great beauty and sweetness. 
In the sentiments also the critics ascribe to him a degree of delicacy which 
one could scarcely have looked for in the age in which he wrote, though at 
other times he avails himself of the license then allowed. There is no majesty, 
no stately march of numbers, in his poetry, still less is there of fire, rapidity, 
or conciseness ; the French and Italian narrative poets from whom he learned 
his art wrote as if the people of their time had nothing to do but to attend to 
long stories ; and Chaucer, who translated from the French the Romaunt of the 
Rose, though a greater poet than any of those whom he took for his models, 
made small improvement upon them in this respect. His Troylus and Cry- 
seycle, with but little action and incident, is as long as either of the epics of 
Homer. The Canterhury Tales, Chaucer's best things, have less of this defect ; 
but even there the narrative is over-minute, and the personages, as Taine, the 
French critic, remarks, although they talk well, talk too much. The taste for 
this prolixity in narratives and conversations had a long duration in English 
poetry, since we find the same tediousness, to call it by its true name, in 
Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis and his Lucrece, written more than two hun- 
dred years later. Yet in the mean time the old popular ballads of England 
and Scotland had been composed, in which the incidents follow each other in 
quick succession, and the briefest possible speeches are uttered by the person-, 
ages. The scholars and court poets doubtless disdained to learn anything of 
these poets of the people ; and the Davideis of Cowley, who lived three hun- 
dred years after Chaucer, is as remarkable for the sluggish progress of the 
story and the tediousness of the harangues as for any other characteristics. 



h 



[H- ^ 

^^ INTRODUCTION. 35 *— ^ 

Between the time of Chaucer and that of Sidney and Spenser we find little 
in the poetic literature of our language to detain our attention. That age 
produced many obscure versifiers, and metrical romances continued to be 
written after the fashion of the French and Italian poets, whom Chaucer 
acknowledged as his masters. During this period appeared Skelton, the poet 
and jester, whose special talent was facility in rhyming, who rhymed as if he 
could not help it, — as if he had only to put pen to paper, and the words 
leaped of their own accord into regular measure with an inevitable jingle at 
the endings. Meantime our language was undergoing a process which gradu- 
ally separated the nobler parts from the dross, rejecting the French additions 
for which there was no occasion, or which could not easily be made to take 
upon themselves the familiar forms of our tongue. The prosody of English 
became also fixed in that period ; the final e, which so perplexes the modern 
reader in Chaucer's verse, was no longer permitted to figure as a distinct syl- 
lable. The poets, however, still allowed themselves the liberty of sometimes 
making, after the French manner, two syllables of the terminations tion and 
ion, so that nation became a word of three syllables and opinion a word of 
four. The Sonnets of Sidney, written on the Italian model, have all the grace 
and ingenuity of those of Petrarch. In the Faerie Queene of Spenser it seems 
to me that we find the English language, so far as the purposes of poetry 
require, in a degree of perfection beyond which it has not been since carried, 
and I suppose never will be. A vast assemblage of poetic endowments con- 
tributed to the composition of the poem, yet I think it would not be easy to 
name one of the same length, and the work of a genius equally great, in any 
language, which more fatigues the reader in a steady perusal from beginning 
to end. In it we have an invention ever awake, active, and apparently inex- 
haustible ; an affluence of imagery grand, beautiful, or magnificent, as the 
subject may require ; wise observations on human life steeped in a poetic color- 
ing, and not without touches of pathos ; a wonderful mastery of versification, 
and the aptest forms of expression. We read at first with admiration, yet to 
this erelong succeeds a sense of satiety, and we lay down the book, not unwill- 
ing, however, after an interval, to take it up with renewed admiration. I once 
heard an eminent poet say that he thought the second part of the Faerie Queene 
inferior to the first ; yet I am inclined to ascribe the remark rather to a falling 
off in the attention of the reader than in the merit of the work. A poet, how- 
ever, would be more likely to persevere to the end than any other reader, since 
in every stanza he would meet with some lesson in his art. 

In that fortunate age of English literature arose a greater than Spenser. 
Let me only say of Shakespeare, that in his dramas, amid certain faults im- 
putable to the taste of the English public, there is to be found every conceivable 
kind of poetic excellence. At the same time and immediately after him 
flourished a group of dramatic poets who drew their inspiration from nature 

ta-^ ^ 



[g-^ ^ -Q] 

36 INTRODUCTION. 

and wrote with manly vigor. One would naturally suppose that their example, 
along with the more illustrious ones of Spenser and Shakespeare, would inilu- 
ence and form the taste of the succeeding age ; but almost before they had 
ceased to claim the attention of the public, and while the eminent divines, 
Barrow, Jeremy Taylor, and others, wrote nobly in prose with a geiniine 
eloquence and a fervor scarcely less than poetic, appeared the school of writers 
in verse whom Johnson, by a phrase the propriety of which has been disputed, 
calls the metaphysical poets, — a class of wits whose whole aim was to extort 
admiration by ingenious conceits, thoughts of such unexpectedness and singu- 
larity that one wondered how they could ever come into the mind of the author. 
For what they regarded as poetic effect they depended, not upon the sense of 
beauty or grandeur, not upon depth or earnestness of feeling, but simply upon 
surprise at quaint and strange resemblances, contrasts, and combinations of 
ideas. These were delivered for the most part in rugged diction, and in num- 
bers so harsh as to be almost unmanageable by the reader. Cowley, a man of 
real genius, and of a more musical versification than his fellows, was the most 
distinguished example of this school. Milton, born a little before Cowley, and 
like him an eminent poet in his teens, is almost the only instance of escape 
from the infection of this vicious style ; his genius was of too robust a mould 
for such petty employments, and he would have made, if he had condescended 
to them, as ill a figure as his own Samson on the stage of a mountebank. 
Dryden himself, in some of his earlier poems, appears as a pupil of this school ; 
but he soon outgrew — in great part, at least — the false taste of the time, and 
set an example of a nobler treatment of poetic subjects. 

Yet though the genius of Dryden reacted against this perversion of the art 
of verse, it had not the power to raise the poetry of our language to the height 
which it occupied in the Elizabethan age. Within a limited range he was a 
true poet ; his imagination was far from fertile, nor had he much skill in 
awakening emotion, but he could treat certain subjects magnificently in verse, 
and often where his imagination fails him he is sustained by the vigor of his 
understanding and the largeness of his knowledge. He gave an example of 
versification in the heroic couplet, which has commanded the admiration of 
succeeding poets down to our time, — a versification manly, majestic, and 
of varied modulation, of which Pope took only a certain part as the model of 
his own, and, contracting its range and reducing it to more regular pauses, 
made it at first appear more musical to the reader, but in the end fatigued him 
by its monotony. Dryden drew scarcely a single image from his own obser- 
vation of external nature, and Pope, though less insensible than he to natural 
beauty, was still merely the poet of the drawing-room. Yet he is the author 
of more happy lines, which have passed into the common speech and are 
quoted as proverbial sayings, than any author we have save Shakespeare ; 
and, whatever may be said in his dispraise, he is likely to be quoted as long 

t^. ^ 



^ ' — r-Q] 

^^ INTRODUCTION. 37 ^-^ 

as the English is a living language. The footprints of Pope are not those of 
a giant, but he has left them scattered all over the field of our literature, 
although the fashion of writing like him has wholly passed away. 

Certain faculties of the poetic mind seem to have slumbered from the time 
of Milton to that of Thomson, who showed the literary world of Great Britain, 
to its astonishment, what a profusion of materials for poetry Nature offers 
to him who directly consults her instead of taking his images at second-hand. 
Thomson's blank verse, however, is often swollen and bladdery to a painful 
degree. He seems to have imagined, like many other writers of his time, that 
blank verse could not support itself without the aid of a stilted phraseology ; 
for that fine poem of his, in the Spenserian stanza, the Castle of Indolence, 
.shows that when he wrote in rhyme he did not think it necessary to depart 
from a natural style. 

Wordsworth is generally spoken of as one who gave to our literature that 
impulse which brought the poets back from the capricious forms of expression 
in vogue before his time to a certain fearless simplicity ; for it must be 
acknowledged that until he arose there was scarce any English poet who did 
not seem in some degree to labor under the apprehension of becoming too 
simple and natural, — to imagine that a certain pomp of words is necessary 
to elevate the style and make that grand and noble which in its direct ex- 
pression would be homely and trivial. Yet the poetry of Wordsworth was 
but the consummation of a tendency already existing and active. Cowper 
had already felt it in writing his Task, and in his longer rhymed poems had 
not only attempted a freer versification than that of Pope, but had clothed 
his thoughts in the manly English of the better age of our poetry. Percy's 
Reliques had accustomed English readers to perceive the extreme beauty of 
the old ballads in their absolute simplicity, and shown how much superior 
these were to such productions as Percy's own Hermit of Warlavorth and 
Goldsmith's Edioin and Angelina, in their feeble elegance. Burns's inimitable 
Scottish poems — his English verses are tumid and wordy — had taught the 
same lesson. We may infer that the genius of Wordsworth was in a great 
degree influenced by these, just as he in his turn contributed to form the taste 
of those who wrote after him. It was lonff, however, before he reached the 
eminence which he now holds in the estimation of the literary world. His 
Lyrical Ballads, published about the close of the last century, were at first 
little read, and of those who liked them there were few who were not afraid 
to express their admiration. Yet his fame has slowly climbed from stage to 
stage until now his influence is perceived in all the English poetry of the day. 
If this were the place to criticise his poetry, I should say, of his more stately 
poems in blank verse, that they often lack compression, — that the thought 
suffers by too great expansion. Wordsworth was unnecessarily afraid of being 
epigrammatic. He abhorred what is called a point as much as Dennis is said 

\^ ^ ^ ___ ^ 



ff=H ^ ^ •^fll 

■-^ 38 INTRODUCTION. ^—^ 

to have abhorred a pun. Yet I must own that even his most diffuse amplifi- 
cations have in them a certain grandeur that fills the mind. 

At a somewhat later period arose the poet Keats, who wrote in a manner 
which carried the reader back to the time when those charming passages of 
lyrical enthusiasm were produced which we occasionally find in the plays 
of Shakespeare, in those of Beaumont and Fletcher, and in Milton's Comus. 
The verses of Keats are occasionally disfigured, especially in his Endymion, 
by a flatness almost childish, but in the finer passages they clothe the thought 
in the richest imagery and in words each of which is a poem. Lowell has 
justly called Keats " over-langnaged," but there is scarce a word that we should 
be willing to part with in his Ode to the Nightingale, and that on a Grecian 
Urn, and the same thing may be said of the greater part of his Hyperion. 
His poems were ridiculed in the Edinburgh Eeview, but they survived the 
ridicule, and now, fifty years after their first publication, the poetry of the 
present day, by certain resemblances of manner, testifies to the admiration 
with which he is still read. 

The genius of Byron was of a more vigorous mould than that of Keats ; 
but notwithstanding his great popularity and the number of his imitators at 
one time, he made a less permanent impression on the character of English 
poetry. His misanthropy and gloom, his scoffing vein, and the fierceness of 
his animosities, after the first glow of admiration was over, had a repellent 
effect upon readers, and made them turn to more cheerful strains. Moore had 
in his time many imitators, but all his gayety, his brilliant fancy, his somewhat 
feminine graces, and the elaborate music of his numbers, have not saved him 
from the fate of being imitated no more. Coleridge and South ey were of the 
same school with Wordsworth, and only added to the effect of his example 
upon our literature. Coleridge is the author of the two most perfect poetical 
translations which our language in his day could boast, those of Schiller's 
Fiecolomini and Death of Wallenstein, in which the English verse falls in no 
respect short of the original German. Southey divides with Scott the honor 
of writing the first long narrative poems in our language which can be read 
without occasional weariness. 

Of the later poets, educated in part by the generation of authors which 
produced Wordsworth and Byron and in part by each other, yet possessing 
their individual peculiarities, I should perhaps speak with more reserve. The 
number of those who are attempting to win a name in this walk of literature 
is great, and several of them have already gained, and through many years 
held, the public favor. To some of them will be assigned an enduring station 
among the eminent of their class. 

There are two tendencies by which the seekers after poetic fame in our day 
are apt to be misled, through both the example of others and the applause of 
critics. One of these is the desire to extort admiration by striking novelties 

[Q-. ^ ^ ^ 



r f~[ * — -^— p^ 

'-^ INTRODUCTION. 39 ■— 1-* 

of expression ; and the other, the ambition to distinguish themselves by 
subtleties of thought, remote from the common apprehension. 

With regard to the first of these I have only to say what has been often 
said before, that, however favorable may be the idea which this luxuriance of 
poetic imagery and of epithet at first gives us of the author's talent, our 
admiration soon exhausts itself We feel that the thought moves heavily 
under its load of garments, some of which perhaps strike us as tawdry and 
others as ill-fitting, and we lay down the book to take it up no more. 

The other mistake, if I may so call it, deserves more attention, since we 
find able critics speaking with high praise of passages in the poetry of the 
day to which the general reader is puzzled to attach a meaning. This is often 
the case when the words themselves seem simple enough, and keep within the 
range of the Saxon or household element of our language. The obscurity 
lies sometimes in the phrase itself, and sometimes in the recondite or remote 
allusion. I will not say that certain minds are not affected by this, as others 
are by verses in plainer English. To the few it may be genuine poetry, although 
it may be a riddle to the mass of readers. I remember reading somewhere of 
a mathematician who was affected with a sense of sublimity by the happy 
solution of an algebraical or geometrical problem, and I have been assured by 
one who devoted himself to the science of mathematics that the phenomenon 
is no uncommon one. Let us beware, therefore, of assigning too narrow limits 
to the causes which produce the poetic exaltation of mind. The genius of 
those who write in this manner may be freely acknowledged, but they do not 
write for mankind at large. 

To me it seems that one of the most important requisites for a great poet 
is a luminous style. The elements of poetry lie in natural objects, in the 
vicissitudes of human life, in the emotions of the human heart, and the rela- 
tions of man to man. He who can present them in combinations and lights 
which at once affect the mind with a deep sense of their truth and beauty is 
the poet for his own age and the ages that succeed it. It is no disparagement 
either to his skill or his power that he finds them near at hand ; the nearer 
they lie to the common track of the human intelligence, the more certain is 
he of the sympathy of his own generation, and of those which shall come after 
him. The metaphysician, the subtile thinker, the dealer in abstruse specula- 
tions, whatever his skill in versification, misapplies it when he abandons the 
more convenient form of prose and perplexes himself with the attempt to 
express his ideas in poetic numbers. 

Let me say for the poets of the present day that in one important respect 
they have profited by the example of their immediate predecessors ; they have 
learned to go directly to nature for their imagery, instead of taking it from 
what had once been regarded as the common stock of the guild of poets. I 
have often had occasion to verify this remark with no less delight than surprise 

^ ^ 



^ ^ --g^ 

^-^ 40 INTRODUCTION. ^^ 

^ ^1 

on meeting in recent verse new images in their untarnished lustre, like coinS) 
fresh from the mint, unworn and unsoiled by passing from pocket to pocket. It[ 
is curious, also, to observe how a certain set of hackneyed phrases, which Leigh: 
Hunt, I believe, was the first to ridicule, and which were once used for the con-l 
venience of rounding out a line or supplying a rhyme, have disappeared from^ 
our poetry, and how our blank verse in the hands of the most popular writers 
has dropped its stiff Latinisms and all the awkward distortions resorted to by 
those who thought that by putting a sentence out of its proper shape they 
were writing like Milton. 

I have now brought this brief survey of the progress of our poetry down 
to the present time, and refer the reader, for samples of it in the different stages 
of its existence, to those which are set before him in this volume. 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 




-3 



[&^ 



a 




MEMOIR OF 



WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 



By James Grant Wilson. 




n> 



[&-- 



^ 



fl-^ -Rj 



" Blessings be with them, and eternal praise, 

Who gave us nobler loves, and nobler cares, — 
The Poets ! avIio on earth have made us heirs 
Of truth and pure delight by heavenly lays ! " 

Personal Talk. 



[g ^ ^ 



ifl-^ ^ 



M E M I R 



WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 



By JAMES GEANT WILSON. 



CHAPTEE I. 

"The gravity and stillness of your youth 
Tlie world liath noted, and your name is great 
In mouths of wisest censure." 

Shakespeare. 

" He had the wisdom of age in his youth, and the fire of youtli in his age. " 

Mark Hopkins. 

Ancestors — Birth — Childhood — School and College Days — Legal Studies — ■ 
Marriage — Publication of Poems. 

Sir Walter Scott relates that, when some one was mentioned as a " tine old man " to 
Dean Swift, he exclaimed with violence that there was ho such thing. " If the man you 
speak of had either a mind or a body worth a farthing, they would have worn him out long 
ago." Beranger and Brougham, Goethe and Guizot, Humboldt and Sir Henry Holland, 
Lyndhurst and Palmerston, Earl Russell and Field-Marshal Moltke, and among Americans, 
J. Q. Adams and Taney, Professors Henry and Hodge, Horace Binney and Richard Henry 
Dana, who died shortly after reaching the age of ninety-one — the age at which Titian said 
that genius never grows old — may be cited among tlie men of the nineteenth century in 
refutation of this theory, which it may be presumed has nothing to do with thews or stature. 
But if we wanted a bright and shining example of faculties, and faculties of a high order, 
remaining unimpaired in mind and body till long pas': thj graud climacteric, we might 
name William Cullen Bryant, the beloved patriarch of American poetry, and " the most ac- 
complished, the most distinguished, and the most universally honored citizen of the United 
States," who, having lived under every President of our country, completed his fourscore 
years and three, cheerful and full of conversation, and continued until the last week of 
May, 1878, to heartily enjoy what Dr. Johnson happily calls "the sunshine of lii'e." 

No name in our contemporaneous literature, either in England or America, is crowned 
with more successful honors than that of William Cullen Bryant. Born among the granite 
hills of Massachusetts, at a period when our colonial literature, like our people, was but 
recently imder the dominion of Great Britain, he lived to see that literature expand from 
its infancy and take a proud place in the republic of letters, and he survived to see the 
Republic itself, starting from its revolutionary birth, spring up to a giant power, after pass- 
ing most triumphantly through a giant rebellion. Surrounded by such historic and heroic 
associations, men like Bryant, who survive, embody in their lives the annals of a people, 
and represent in their individuality the hi.story of a nation. 

Pursuing beyond the age of fourscoi-e an energetic literary career, the poet was also an 



[p-r — ^ 

^^ 44 WILLIAM CULLEx\ BUYA^'T. ^"^ 



iictive co-laborer in all worthy movements to promote the advancement of the arts and liter- 
ature. A liberal patron of art himself, he was always the judicious and eloquent advocate 
of the claims of artists. On the completion of the beautiful Venetian temple to art erected 
by the New York Academy of Design, Mr. Bryant delivered the address inaugurating the 
building and consecrating it to its uses. Foremost in the literary circles of his adopted city, 
he was i'or many years the president of that time-honored institution of New York, the 
Century Club, which has always embraced among its members men of letters, prominent 
artists, and leading gentlemen of the liberal professions. The poet's predecessors in that 
office were Gulian C. Verplanck and George Bancroft. Philanthropic in his nature, Bryant 
was ever the consistent promoter of all subjects having for their tendency the elevation of 
the race and the furtherance of the interests of humanitj^ Connected with the leading 
evening metropolitan journal, and one of the oldest in the United States, he was enabled to 
bring the powerful influence of the press to bear with his own great literary renown and 
personal weight upon whatever measure he supported in the cause of philanthropy, letters, 
and the promotion of art. 

William Cullen Bryant was born in a log-house at Cummington, Hampshire County, 
Massachusetts, November 3, 1794.* He was a descendant of the English and Scotch fami- 
lies of Alden, Ames, Harris, Hayward, Howard, Keith, Mitchell, Packard, Snell, and 
Washburn, and through them from several of the Pilgrims who landed from the Mayflower 
at Plymouth, on the 22d of December, 1620, — not a bad genealogy for an American citizen, 
nor unlike that of his brother-poet Halleck, who was descended from the Pilgrim Fathers, 
including John Eliot, the apostle to the Indians. Bryant also had a worthy clerical ances- 
tor in the person of James Keith, the first minister of Bridgewater, Massachusetts, who, 
after having preached from the same pulpit fifty-six years, died in that town in 1719. 

Stephen Bryant, the first of the poet's American ancestors of his own name, who is 
known to have been at Plymouth, Massachusetts, as early as 1632, and who some time before 
1650 married Abigail Shaw, had several children, one of whom was also named Stephen. 
He was the father of Ichabod Bryant, who moved from Kaynham to West Bridgewater in 
1745, bringing with him a certificate of dismission from the church at Eaynham, and a 
recommendation to that of his new place of residence. Philip, the eldest of his five sons, 
studied medicine, and settled in North Bridgewater, now Brockton, where his house is still 
standing. Dr. Philip Bryant married Silence Howard, daughter of Dr. Abiel Howard, ■\^dth 
whom he studied medicine. One of their nine children, a son called Peter, born in the year 
1767, studied his father's profession, and succeeded to his practice. At that time there lived 
in the same town a revolutionary veteran, " stern and severe," named Ebenezer Snell, of 
whom a small boy of the period, still living, informs the writer that " all the boys of 
Bridgewater were dreadfully afraid," so austere and authoritative were his manners. The 
old soldier had a pretty daughter, who won the susceptible young doctor's aff'ections, so that 
when Squire Snell removed with his family to Cummington, and built what is now known 
as the " Bryant Homestead," Peter Bryant followed, establishing himself there as a physician 
and surgeon, and in 1792 was married to "sweet Sarah Snell," as she is called in one of the 

* A general misapprehension exists as to Mr. Bryant's birtliplace. He was bom, as he told the 
writer, not in what is now known as the " Bryant Homestead," but in a small house constructed of 
square logs, and long since removed. This fact is further conlirmed by the following note from 
the poet to a friend, dated December 5, 1876: "Your uncle Eliphalet Packard was quite right in 
designating my birthplace. As the tradition of my family goes, I was born in a house which then 
stood at the northwest corner of a road leading north of the burying-ground on the hill, and 
directly opposite to the burying-ground. The house was afterwards removed and placed near that 
occupied then by Daniel Dawes. I suppo.se there is nothing left of it now." 

^Q^— ^ 



iTr '~Q} 

^-^ ^VILLIA.A[ CULLEN BRYANT. 45 "-f 

youthful doctor's poetic efl'usions. Five sons and two daughters were tlie fruit of this happy 
marriage, their second son being the subject of this sketch. Of these seven chiklren biit 
t\vo sons survive, Arthur and John Howard Bryant of Illinois, who were present at the 
poet's funeral. 

Dr. Peter Bryant's bearing, I am told hj an aged man who remembers him, was the very 
revex-se of that of his gruff father-in-law. Although reserved, he was gentle in manner, 
with a low^^, soft voice, and always attired with scrupulous neatness. While not above the 
heio'ht of his gifted son, he was broad-shouldered, and would sometimes exhibit his great 
strength by lifting a barrel of cider from the ground over the wheel into a wagon. Accord- 
ing to the account of another who knew him, he Avas " possessed of extensive literary arid 
scientific acquirements, an unusually vigorous and well-disciplined mind, and an elegant and 
refined taste." He was for his son William an able and skilful instructor, who chastened, 
improved, and encouraged the first rude efforts of his boyish genius. A personal friend of 
the poet wrote of him in 1840 : " His father, his guide in the first attempts at versification, 
taught him the value of correctness and compression, and enabled him to distinguish 
between true poetic enthusiasm and fustian." 

The son in after-life commemorated the teachings and trainings of the father in a poem 
entitled Hy7mi to Death, published in 1825, which has often been quoted for its beauty 
and pathos : — 

" For he is in his grave who taught my youth 
The art of verse, and in the end of life 
Offered me the Muses. 0, cut off 
Untimely ! when the reason in its strength, 
Kipened by years of toil and studious search, 
And watch of nature's silent lessons, taught 
Thy hand to practise best the lenient ait 
To which thou gavest thy laborious days 
And lost thy life." 

The poet's great-grandfather, Dr. Abiel Howard, a graduate of Harvard College of the 
class of 1729, had an extensive library for those times, and in his youth wrote verses. 
Some of these were in Mr. Bryant's possession, and, to quote his own words, " shoAV no 
small power of poetic expression." The inclination to express themselves in poetic form 
reappeared in Dr. Howard's grandchildren. Dr. Bryant wrote many songs and love stanzas 
in his younger days, and some satirical political poems in middle age. His sister Rutli Bry- 
ant, who died young, left behind several meritorious poems Avhich her nephew had read in 
manuscript. When Mr. Bryant was studying laAV, the late Judge Daniel Howard asked him 
from whom he inherited his poetic gift ; he promptly replied, from his great-grandfather, 
Dr. Howard. One of the poet's surviving brothers recently said to the Avriter, " We were 
all addicted, more or less, to the unprofitable business of rhyming." 

It was the dream of Dr. Bryant's life to educate a child for his own and his father's loved 
profession, and so it came to pass that his second son was named after one of the great Scot- 
tish medical lights of that era, William Cullen, an eminent Edinburgh physician. The 
child was frail, and his head was deemed too large for his body, which fact so disturbed the 
worthy doctor that, unable to find in the books any remedy for excessive cerebral develop- 
ment, he decided upon a remedy of his own, and directed that the child should be daily 
ducked in an adjoining spring of clear cold water. Two of Dr. Bryant's students Avei^e 
deputed to carry the child irom his bed each morning and to immerse him and his immense 
head. The tradition is that the embryo-poet fought stoutly against this singular proceed- 
ing, of which the young mother did not approve, but wliich, notwithstanding, was continued 



y- 



a 



\Fr ~^ 

T"^ 46 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. ^ 

till the discrepancy of proportion between the head and the body disappeared, and the father 
no longer deemed its continuance necessary. 

As a child, Bryant exhibited extraordinary precocity. He received instruction at home 
from his mother, whose school education, like that of most American women of her day, 
was limited to the ordinary English branches. He also was instructed by his father and an 
uncle, who taught him 

"A little Latine and less Greeke." 

Bryant has happily told the story of his boyhood * in better and more entertaining style 
than it can by any possibility be narrated by another. It forms a charming chapter in an 
autobiography to which the veneraVde poet devoted an occasional hour during the closing 
years of his long career. Says Mr. Bryant: — 

"The boys of the generation to which I belonged -r- that is to say, who were born in the last 
years of the last century or tlie earliest oi' this — were brought up under a system of discipline 
which put a far greater distance between parents and their children than now exists. The parents 
seemed to think this necessary in order to secure obedience. They were believers in the old maxim 
that familiarity breeds contempt. My own parents lived in the house with my grandfather and 
grandmother on the mother's side. My grandfather was a disciplinarian of the stricter sort, and I can 
liardly find words to express the awe in which I stood of him — an awe so great as almost to pre- 
vent anything like aftection on my part, although he was in the main kind, and certainly never 
thought of being severe beyond what was necessary to maintain a proper degree of order in the 
family. 

" The other boys in that part of the country, my schoolmates and playfellows, were educated 
on the same system. Yet there were at that time some indications that this very severe disci- 
liline was beginning to relax. With my father and mother I was on much easier terras than 
with my grandfather. If a favor was to be asked of ray grandfather, it was asked with fear and 
trembling; the request was postponed to the last moment, and then made with hesitation and 
blushes and a confused utterance. 

"One of the means of keeping the boys of that generation in order was a little bundle of 
birchen rods, bound together by a small cord, and generally suspended on a nail against the wall 
iu tlie kitchen. This was esteemed as much a part of the necessary furniture as the crane that 
hung in the kitchen fireplace, or the shovel and tongs. It sometimes happened that the boy 
suffered a fate similar to that of the eagle in the fable, wounded by an arrow fledged with a 
feather from his own wing ; in other words, the boy was made to gather the twigs intended for 
las own castigation. 

"The awe in which the boys of that time held their parents extended to all elderly per- 
sons, toward whom our behavior was more than merely respectful, for we all observed a hushed 
and subdued demeanor in their presence. Toward the ministers of the Gospel this behavior was 
])articularly marked. At that time every township in Massachusetts, the State in which I lived, 
]i;id its minister, who was settled there for life, and when he once came among his people was 
understood to have entered into a connection with them scarcely less lasting than the marriage-tie. 
The community in which he lived regarded him with great veneration, and the visits which from 
time to time he made to the district schools seemed to the boys important occasions, for which 
special preparation was made. When he came to visit the school wliicli I attended, we all had 
on our Sunday clothes, and were ready for him with a few answers to the questions in the 
Westminster Catechism. He heard us recite our lessons, examined us in the catechism, and 
then began a little address, which I remember was the same on every occasion. He told us how 
uiuch greater were the advantages of education which we. enjoj'ed than those which had fallen to 
the lot of our parents, and exhorted us to make the best possible use of them, both for our own 



jHi-J — t = — — — — — h—o-i 

^ WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 47 ^ 

sakes and that of our parents, who were ready to make any sacrifice for us, even so far as to take 
the bread out of their own mouths to give us. I reniemher being disgusted witli tliis illustration 
of parental kindness, whicli I was obliged to listen to twice at least in every year. 

' ' The good man had, perhaps, le§s reason than he supposed to magnify the advantages of 
education enjoyed in the common schools at that time. Keading, spelling, writing, and arith- 
metic, with a little grammar and a little geography, were all that was taught, and these by persons 
much less qualified, for the most part, than those who now give instruction. Those, however, 
who wished to proceed further took lessons from graduates of the colleges, who were then much 
more nimierous in proportion to the population than they now are. 

"One of the entertainments of the boys of my time was what were called the 'raisings,' 
meaning the erection of the timber-frames of houses or bams, to which the boards were to be 
afterward nailed. Here the minister made a point of being present, and hither the able-bodied 
men of the neighborhood, the young men especially, were summoned, and took part in the work 
^^ ith great alacrity. It was a spectacle for us next to that of a performer on the tight-rope to see 
the young men walk steadily on the narrow footing of the beams at a great height from the 
giound, or as they staod to catch in their hands the wooden pins and the braces flung to them from 
below. They vied with each other in the dexterity and daring with which they ^^■ent through 
with the work, and when the skeleton of the building was put together, some one among them 
generally capped the climax of fearless activity by standing on the ridge-pole with his head down- 
ward and his heels in the air. At that time even the presence of the minister was no restraint 
upon the flow of milk-jmnch and grog, which, in some cases, was taken to excess. The practice 
of calling the neighbors to tliese ' raisings ' is now discontinued in the rural neighborhoods ; the 
carpenters provide tlieir own workmen for the business of adjusting the timbers of the new 
building to each other, and there is no consumption of grog. 

"Another of the entertainments of rustic life in the region of which I am speaking was the 
making of maple sugar. This was a favorite frolic of tlie boys. 

" In autumn, the task of stripping the husks from the ears of Indian corn was made the occa- 
sion of social meetings, in which the boys took a special part. A farmer woxrld appoint what was 
called 'a husking,' to which he invited his neiglibors. The ears of maize in the husk, sometimes 
along with part of the stalk, were heaped on the barn floor. In the evening lanterns were brought, 
and, seated on piles of dry husks, the men and boys stripped the ears of their covering, and, 
breaking them from the stem with a sudden jerk, threw them into baskets placed for the purpose. 
It was often a merry time : the gossip of the neighborhood was talked over, stories were told, 
jests went round, and at the proper hour the assembly adjourneil to the dwelling-house, and were 
treated to pumpkin-pie and cider, which in that season had not been so long from the press as to 
have parted with its sw(;etness. 

"Quite as cheerful were the 'apple-parings,' which on autumn evenings brought together 
tlie young people of both sexes in little circles. The fruit of the orchards was pared and quar- 
tered and the core extracted, and a supply of apples in this state provided for making what 
was called ' apple-sauce,' a kind of preserve of which every family laid in a large quantity 
every j'ear. 

"The cider-making season in autumn was, at the time of which I am speaking, somewhat cor- 
respondent to the vintage in the wine countries of Europe. Large tracts of land in New England 
were overshadowed by rows of apple-trees, and in the month of May a journey through that region 
was a journey through a wilderness of bloom. In tlie month of October the whole population 
was busy gathering apples render the trees, from which they fell in heavy showers as the bi-anches 
were shaken by the strong arms of the farmers. The creak of the cider-mill, turned by a horse 
jnoving in a circle, was heard in every neighborhood as one of the most common of rural sounds. 
Tlie i'reshly pressed juice of the apples was most agreeable to boyish tastes, and the whole ]irocess 
of gathering the fruit and making the cider came in among the more laborious rural occupations 
in a way which diversified them pleasantly, and which made it seem a pastime. The time that was 



ifl--^ ^ -g] 

^~^ 48 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. ^ 

given to making cider, and the number of barrels made and stored in the cellars of the farm-houses, 
would now seem incredible. A hiindred barrels to a single farm was no uncommon proportion, 
and the quantity swallowed by the men of that day led to the habits of intemperance which at 
length alarmed the more thoughtful part of the community, and gave occasion to the formation 
of temperance societies and the introduction of better habits. 

"The streams which bickered through the narrow glens of the region in which I lived were 
much better stocked with trout in those days than now, for the country had been newly opened 
to settlement. The boys all were anglers. 1 confess to having felt a strong interest in that 'sport,' 
as I no longer call it. I have long since been weaned from the propensity of which I speak ; but 
I have no doubt that the instinct which inclines so many to it, and some of them our gi-a\e 
divines, is a remnant of the original wild nature of man. 

"I have not mentioned other sports and games of the boys of that day ; that is to say, of 
seventy or eighty years since — such as wrestling, running, leaping, base-ball, and the like, for 
in these there was nothing to distinguish them from the same pastimes at the present day. There 
were no public lectures at that time on subjects of general interest ; the jirofession of public 
lecturer was then unknown, and eminent men were not solicited, as they now are, to appear before 
audiences in distant parts of the country, and gratify the curiosity of strangers by letting them 
hear the sound of their voices. But the men of those days were far more given to attendance 
on public worship than those who now occupy their place, and of course they took their boys 
with them. 

" Every parish had its tithing-men, two in number generally, whose business it was to maintain 
order in the church during divine service, and who sat with a stem countenance through the ser- 
mon, keeping a vigilant eye on the boys ia the distant pews and in the galleries. Sometimes, 
when he detected two of them communicating with each other, he went to one of them, took him 
by the button, and, leading him away, seated him beside himself. His power extended to other 
delinquencies. He was directed by law to see that the Sabbath was not profaned by people wan- 
dering in the fields and angling in the brooks. At that time a law, no longer in force, directed 
that any person who absented himself unnecessarily from public worship for a certain length of 
time should pay a fine into the treasury of the county. I remember several persons of whom it 
Avas said that they had been compelled to pay this fine, but I do not remember any of them who 
went to church afterward." 

Bryant's education, was continued under his uncle the Eev. Thomas Snell,* of Brookfield, 
in whose family lie lived and studied for one yeai" and by the Rev. Moses Hallock, of 
Plainfield, he was prepared for college. One of his surviving brothers renieml)ers that when 
the young poet came home on visits from his uncle Snell's or " Parson Hallock's," he was 
in the habit of playing at games with them, and of amusing them in various Avays; that he 
excelled as a runner and had many successful running contests with his college classmates; 
also that he was accustomed on his home A'isits to declaim, for the entertainment of the 
family circle, some of his own compositions, both in prose and verse. He was, when study- 
ing with the pastor, a small, delicate, and handsome youth, very shy and reserved, and a 
great reader, devouring every volume that he could meet with, and resembling the hero of 
Waverley in " driving through a sea of books like a vessel without pilot or rudder." He 
was, I am also told by one who studied Avith liim at that time, — noAv nearly seventy years 
ago, — a natural scholar like his father, and although but fifteen, he had already accumulated 
a vast stock of information. In a letter to the Eev. H. Seymour, of Northampton, Massa- 
chusetts, published since Mr. Bryant's death, he speaks as follows of his early studies of 

* Dr. Snell was pastor of the Xorth Parish of Brookfield for sixty-four years. 

^ ^ ^ ■ Efi 



rn^ ___ — ' [> ! 

'-^ WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 49 

Greek. " I began with the Greek alphabet, passed to the declensions and conjugations, 
which I committed to memory, and Avas put into the Gospel of St. John. In two calendar 
months from the time of beginning with the powers of the Greek alphabet I had read 
every book in the New Testament. I supposed, at the time, that I had made pretty good 
progress, but do not even now know whether that was very extraordinary." He found more 
pleasure in books, and in silent rambles among the hills and valleys, than in the usual 
sports and pastimes of youth of that age. 

In October, 1810, when in his sixteenth year, he entered the Sophomore Class of Wil- 
liams College. He continued his studies there during one winter with the same ardor as 
before, but not with the same enthusiasm or pleasure. He did not like his college life, 
some features of which were distasteful to his shy and sensitive nature, and so with his 
father's permission he obtained an honorable dismissal in May, 1811, and in due time he 
received the degree as a member of the class of 1813, of which there are now [July, 1878] 
but two survivors, the Eev. Elisha D. Barrstt, of Missouri, and the Hon. Charles F. Sedg- 
wick, of Connecticut. Dr. Calvin Durfee, the historian of Williams College, writes to me 
that Mr. Bryant " did not graduate in a regular course with his class; still, years ago, by vote 
of the trustees of the college, he was restored to his place in the class, and has been enrolled 
among the alumni." 

Judge Sedgwick, luider date Sharon, July 3, 1878, writes: — 

"I have j'our favor asking me to give yon some of my recollections of the college life of my 
classmate W. C. Bryant. It gives me great pleasure to comply with your request, so far as I am 
able; but the short time daring which he remained a member of the college could not be produc- 
tive of many events of very great interest. Since his decease, many incorrect statements in rela- 
tion to this portion of his history have gone forth, most of tlieni intimating that he was a member 
of the college for two years. The truth is that, having entered the Sophomore Class in October, 
1810, and then having continued his membership for two terms, he took a dismission in May, 1811, 
intending to complete his collegiate education at Yale College. As stated above, he entered our 
class at the commencement of the Sophomore year. His room-mate was John Avery, of Conway, 
Massachusetts, who was some eight years his senior in age. Bryant had not then attained to the 
physical dimensions which he afterwards reached, but his bodily structure was remarkably regular 
and systematic. He had a prolific growth of dark brown hair, and I do not remember ever to have 
known a person in wliom the progress of years made so great a difference in personal appearance as 
it did in tlie case of Mr. Bryant. 1 met him tAvice near the close of his life at Williams College 
Commencements, and if I had not seen pictures of him as he appeared in old age, I would hardly 
have been persuaded of his identity with the Bryant I knew in early life. 

" When he entered college, it was known that lie was the re]nited author of two or three short 
poems which had recently been published, and which indicated decidedly promising talent on the 
part of their author. When spoken to in relation to these poetical effusions, he was reticent and 
modest, and in fact his modesty in everything was a peculiar trait of his character. It was very 
difficult to obtain from him any specimens of his talent as a poet. One exercise demanded of the 
students was the occasional writing of a composition, to be read to the tutor in presence of the class, 
and once Bryant, in fulfilling this requirement, read a short poem which received thedecided approval 
of the tutor, and once he translated one of the Odes of Horace which he showed to a few personal 
friends. Those v-'ere the only examples of his poetry that I now remember of his furnishing during 
his college life. It may be stated here that the tutor who instructed Mr. Bryant in college was 
tli(; llev. Orange Lyman, who was afterwards the Presbyterian clergyman at Vernon, Oneida 
County, New York. 

" Bryant, during all his college experience, was remarkably quiet, pleasant, and unobtrusive in 
his manners, and studious in the literary course. His lessons were all well mastered, and not a 
single event occurred during his residence which received the least disapproval of the faculty. 

i^ — ■■■ _ ■■:■■■ _:_^ 



p 



■ — • Qj 

50 WILLIAM CULLEiN BRYANT. 

"Your letter reminds me of the fact that there are but very few persons left who knew 
Mr. Bryant in college. ' The Flood of Years ' has swept them all away except the Eev. Herman 
Halsey, of the class of 1811, who yet survives in Western New York, and my classmate the Rev. 
E. D. Barrett, of Missouri, and myself. If I live to see the first day of September, I shall have 
completed eighty-three years of life." 

The Rev. E. D. Barrett, under date Sedalia, Missouri, July 9, 1878, writes: — 

"I well remember Bryant's first appearance at college in my Sophomore year. Many of the 
class were assembled in one of our rooms when he presented himself. A friendly greeting passed 
round the circle, and all seemed to enjoy the arrival of the young stranger and poet. News of Mr. 
Bryant's precocious intellect, his poetical genius, and his literary taste had preceded his arrival. 
He was looked up to with great respect, and regarded as an honor to the class of which he had 
become a member, and to the college which had now received him as his alma mater. 1 was the 
poet's senior by more than four years, having been born in January, 1790, and am, with the single 
exception of Cliarles F. Sedgwick, the sole survivor of the Williams College class of 1813." 

No American poet has equalled Bryant in early poetic development. In that particular 
he surpassed Pope and Cowdey and Byron. At the age of nine we find him composing 
tolerably clever verses, and four years later writing The Embargo, a political as well as a 
])oetical satire upon the JeflPersonian party of that day. The poem is also remarkable as 
liaving manifested at that early age a political order of mind which continued to develop in an 
I'qual ratio with his poetical nature through life. That mind, indeed, taking higher range, 
was not active in the turmoils and schemes of politicians; but it investigated the great ques- 
tions of political economy, and grappled with principles of the gravest moment to society 
and humanity. 

The Embargo; or. Sketch of the Times, a Satire, we could easily imagine had been 
written in 1878, instead of seventy-one years ago, when, our fathers tell us, demagogism was 

unkno\vn. 

" E'en while I sing, see Faction urge her claim, 
Mislead with falsehood, and with zeal inflame; 
Lift her black banner, sjiread her empire wide, 
And stalk triumphant with a Fury's stride! 
She blows her brazen trump, and at the sound 
A motley throng obedient flock around: 
A mist of changing hue around she flings. 
And darkness perches on her dragon wings." 

This poem, printed in Boston, attracted the public attention, and the edition was soon 
sold. To the second edition, containing The Spanish Revolution and several other juve- 
nile pieces, was prefixed this curious advertisement, dated February, 1809: — 

" A doubt having been intimated in the Montlily Anthology of June last, whether a youth of 
thirteen years could have been the author of this poem, in justice to his merits, the friends of the 
writer feel obliged to certify the fact from their personal knowledge of himself and his family, as 
well as his literary improvement and extraordinary talents. They would premis:^ that they do not 
i!ome uncalled before the public to bear this testimony: they would prefer that he should be judged 
by his works without favor or affection. As the doubt has been suggested, they deem it merely an 
act of justice to remove it ; after which the}' leave him a candidate for fuvor in comm':'n with other 
literary adventurers. They therefore assure the public that Sir. Bryant, the author, is a native of 
Cummington, in the county of Hampshire, and in the month of November last arrived at the age 
of fourteen years. The facts can be authenticated by many of the inhabitants of that place, as 
well as by several of his friends who give this notice. And if it be deemed worthy of further 
inquiry, the piinter is enabled to disclose their names and places of residence." 



©^ 



- — ^ 

WILLIAM CULLEN BUVA.NT. Oi 

In September, 1817, appeared in the North American Revieio the poem entitled Thana- 
topsis, which Professor Wilson said " was alone sufficient to establish the author's claims to 
the honors of genius." It was written in a few weeks, in his eighteenth year, and but 
slio-htly retouched during the time that elapsed between its composition and its tirst appear- 
ance in print. The poem created a marked sensation at the time of its appearance, not 
unlike that caused by the publication of Halleck's Marco Bozzaris, a few years later. 
Richard H. Dana was then a member of the committee which conducted the lievieiv, and 
received the manuscript poems Thanatopsis and the Inscriiotion for the Entrance to a 
irood. The former was understood to have been written by Dr. Bryant, and the latter by 
his son. When Daua learned the name, and heard that the author of Thanatoiisi?. was a 
member of the State legislature, he proceeded to the Senate-chamber to oljserve the new 
poet. He saw there a man of dark complexion, with iron-gray hair, thick eyebrows, well- 
developed forehead, with an intellectual expression, in which, however, he failed to find 

"The vision and the faculty divine." 

lie went away puzzled and mortified at his lack of discernment. Wheii Bryant in 1821 
delivered at Harvard University his didactic poem entitled T/ie ylg-es, — a comprehensive 
poetical essay reviewing the world's progress in a panoramic view of the ages, and glowing 
vv'itli a prophetic vision of the future of America, — Dana alluded in complimentary terms 
to Dr. Bryant's Thanatopsis, and then learned for the first time that the son was the 
author of both poems. 

It is related that when the father showed a copy of Thanatopsis in manuscript, before 
its publication, to a lady well qualified to judge of its merits, simply saying, " Here are 
some lines that our Willie has been writing," she read the poem, raised her eyes to the 
father's face, and burst into tears, in which Dr. Bryant, a somewhat reserved and silent 
man, was not ashamed to join. "And no wonder," continues the writer; "it must have 
seemed a mystery that in the bosom of eighteen had grown up thoughts that even in boy- 
hood shaped themselves into solemn harmonies, majestic as the diapason of ocean, fit fur a 
temple-service beneath the vault of heaven." 

Mr. Bryant continued his classical and mathematical studies nt home with a view to 
entering Yale College ; but, abandoning this purpose, he became a law student in the office 
of .Indge Howe, of Worthington, afterwards completing his course of legal study with 
William Baylies, of West Bridgewater. He was admitted to the l)ar at Plymouth in 1815, 
and began practice at Plainfield, where he remained one year, and then removed to Great 
Barrington (all these towns being in the State of Massachusetts). At Great Barrington 
he made the acquaintance of the author Catherine M. Sedgwick, who afterwards dedicated 
to him her novel, Rabrood, and of Miss Frances Fairchild. The lovely qualities of this 
Litter lady the young lawyer celebrated in verses which, for simple purity and delicate 
imagery, are most characteristic of our poet's genius. They are elsewhere given in the 
Library (on page 130), and it will be of interest to read them in connection with the 
incidents of their origin. They are entitled Fairest of the Ritral Maids. 

Miss Fairchild became ^Ir. Bryant's wife in 1821, and for more than twoscore years was 
tlie "good angel of his life.'' She is mentioned in many of the poet's stanzas. The 
Future Life (see page 275) is addressed to her. "It was written," says Mr. Bryant in a 
note to me, " during the lifetime of my wife, and some twenty years after our marriage, — 
that is to say, about 1840, or possibly two or three years after." 

A few months after the young poet's marriage a small volume of forty-four dingy pages 
was published by Hilliard & Metcalf, of Cambridge, Massachusetts, entitled Poems bij 
Jniliam Gullen Bryant. A copy is now lying before me. It contains The Ages, To a 
Waterfowl, Translation of a Fragment of Simonides, Inscri])tion for the Euirance to a Wood, 

^ _ ^ 



[0- ■ ~ — -— ^ 

52 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 

The Yellovj Violet, Song, Green River, and Thanatopsis. In this rare little volume the first 
and last paragraphs of the latter poem appear as they noAV stand, the version originally 
published in the North American Review having commenced with the lines, 

"Yet a few days, and thee 
The all-beholding sun shall see no more 
In all his course ;" 
and ended with the words, 

"And make their bed with thee." 

Last winter I met Mr. Bryant in a Broadway bookstore, and showed him a copy of this 
early edition of his poetical writings, which the dealer in literary wares had just sold 
for ten dollars. He laughingly remarked, " Well, that 's more than I received for its 
contents." 



CHAPTEE II. 

"This little life-boat of an earth, with its noisy crew of a mankind, and their troubled history, will one 
day have vanished; faded like a cloud-speck from the azure of the all! What, then, is man? He endures but 
for an hour, and is crushed before the moth. Yet, in the being and in the working of a faithful man is there 
already (as all faith, from the beginning, gives assurance) a S07nething that pertains not to this wild death-element 
of time ; that triumphs over time, and is, will be, when time shall be no more. " — Thomas Carlyle. 

LiTERxVRT Career — Author, Editor, and Poet — Foreign Travels — Seventieth 
Birthday Festival — Country Houses — Eightieth Birthday — Poetical and 
Prose Writings — Public Addresses. 

In the year 1824 Mr. Bryant's picturesque poem, A Forest Hymn, The Old Man's 
Funeral, The Murdered Traveller, and other poetical compositions appeared in the United 
States Literary Gazette, a weeklj'' journal issued in Boston. The same year, at the sug- 
gestion of the Sedgwick family, he made his first visit to New York City, where, through 
their influence, he was introduced to many of the leading literary men of the metropolis. 
From the first, Bryant was averse to the dull and distasteful routine of his profession, — 

" Forced to drudge for the dregs of men 
And scrawl strange words with a barbarous pen." 

He could not like it, and his aversion for it daily increased. With Slender he could say, 
" If there be no great love in the beginning, yet heaven may decrease it upon better 
acquaintance."- His visit to New York decided his destiny. Abandoning the law, in 
which he had met with a fair measure of success, having enjoyed for nine years a reasonable 
share of the local practice of Great Barrington, he determined upon pursuing the career of a 
man of letters, so well described by Carlyle, the "Censor of the Age," as "an anarchic, 
nomadic, and entirely aerial and ill-conditioned profession," and he accordingly, in 1825, 
removed to New York, which continued to be his place of residence for more than half a 
century. Here he lived from earnest youth to venerable age — from thirty-one to eighty- 
four — in one unbroken path of honor and success. 

i-(i — |— « • — • . , . . « — — ((J 



^ ^ ^^ 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 53 

Establishing himself as a literary man in New York, the poet entered upon the editor- 
ship of a monthly magazine, to which he contributed The Death of the Flowers and 
many other popular poems, as well as numerous articles on art and kindred subjects. This 
position soon introduced Bryant into a very charming circle, composed of Chancellor Kent ; 
Cooper, just achieving popularity by his American novels ; the young poets Halleck, Hill- 
house, and Percival; the painters Dunlap, Durand, Inman, and Morse; the scholars Charles 
King and Verplanck ; and many other choice spirits, all long since passed away. 

A few days after the poet's arrival in New York he met Cooper, to whom he had been 
previously introduced, who said : — 

" Come and dine with me to-morrow ; I live at No. 345 Greenwich Street." 

"Please put that down for me," said Bryant, "or I shall forget the place." 

" Can't you remember three-four-five '?" replied Cooper, bluntly. 

Bryant did " remember three-four-five " not only for the day, but ever afterward. He 
dined with the novelist according to appointment, the additional guest, besides Cooper's 
immediate family, being Fitz-Greene Halleck. The warm friendship of these three gifted 
men was severed only by death. 

It was chiefly through the influence of the brothers Robert and Henry D. Sedgwick that 
Mr. Bryant was induced to abandon the uncongenial pursuit of the law ; and it was through 
the influence of the same gentlemen that, during the year 1826, he became connected with 
the Evening Post. Mr. H. D. Sedgwick, who was among the first to appreciate the genius 
of young Bryant, was a brother of Miss Sedgwick, the author, and at the time of his death, 
in 1831, he was among the most prominent lawyers and political writers of that day. To 
the Evening Post Mr. Bryant brought a varied experience of literary taste and learning, and 
even at that time a literary reputation. Halleck at that period rendered in the Recorder a 
richly deserved compliment to his brother bard, when he wrote : — 

" Bryant, whose songs are thoughts that bless 
' The heart — its teachers and its joy — 
As mothers blend with their caress 
Lessons of truth and gentleness 

And virtue for the listening boy. 
Spring's lovelier flowers for many a day 
Have blossomed on his wandering way ; 

Beings of beauty and decay, 

They slumber in their autumn tomb ; 
,, But those that graced his own Green River 

And wreathed the lattice of his home, 

Charmed by his song from mortal doom, 
Bloom on, and will bloom on forever." 

The Evening Post was founded by William Coleman, a lawyer of Massachusetts, its first 
number being issued on the 16th of November, 1801. Mr. Coleman dying in 1826, the 
well-remembered William Leggett became its assistant editor, in which capacity he con- 
tinued for ten years. Mr. Bryant soon after his return from Europe in 1836, upon the 
retirement of Mr. Leggett, assumed the sole editorial charge of the paper, performing those 
duties, with intervals of absence, till the 29th day of May, 1878, when he sat at his desk for 
the last time. To the Post, originally a Federal journal, Mr. Bryant early gave a strongly 
Democratic tone, taking decided ground against all class legislation, and strongly advo- 
cating freedom of trade : when his party at a later day passed under the j'-oke of slavery, 
the poet followed his principles out of the party, becoming before the war a strong Repub- 
lican. In its management he was for a long time assisted by his son-in-law, Parke Godwin, 



t& 



-! IM 



fi- 



ts 



54 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 

and John Bigelow, late United States minister to France. Besides these able coadjutors, 
the Post has had the benefit of many eminent writers of prose and verse. To its columns 
Drake and Halleck contributed those sprightly and sparkling jeux cVesprit, The Croakers, 
which, after nearly sixty years, are still read with pleasure. At the exjDiration of the Posfs 
first half-century, Mr. Bryant prepared a history of the veteran journal, in which his A'er- 
satile pen and well-stored mind had ample range and material, in men and incidents, to do 
justice to the very interesting and eventful period through which the paper had passed. 

The following terse and just characterization of Mr. Bryant as a political journalist, taken 
from an article which appeared in the editorial column of the Post since his death, gives an 
admirable summary of the man's life and work : — 

"Mr. Bryant's political life was so closely associated with his journalistic life that they must 
necessarily be considered together. He never sought public office ; lie repeatedly refused to hold 
it. He made no effort either to secure or to use influence in politics except through his newspaper 
and by his silent, individual vote at the polls. The same metliods marked his political and his 
journalistic life. He could be a stout party man upon occasion, but only when the party promoted 
what he believed to be riglit principles. When the party with which he was accustomed to act did 
what according to his judgment was wrong, he would denounce and oppose it as readily and as 
heartily as he would the other party 

" He used the newspaper conscientiously to advocate views of political and social subjects which 
he believed to be correct. He set before himself principles whose prevalence he regarded as beneficial 
to the country or to the world, and his constant purpose was to promote their prevalence. He 
looked upon the journal which he conducted as a conscientious statesman looks upon the official 
trust which has been committed to him, or the work which he has undertaken — not with a view 
to do what is to be done to-day in the easiest or most brilliant way, but so to do it that it may 
tell upon what is to be done to-morrow, and all other days, until the worthiest object of ambition 
is achieved. This is the most useful journalism ; and, first and last, it is the most effective and 
influential." 

The lines with which Dr. Johnson concluded a memoir of James Thomson may with 
equal truth be applied to the writings of William Cullen Bryant : " The highest praise 
which he has received ought not to be suppressed : it is said by Lord Lyttleton, in the Pro- 
logue to his posthumous play, that his works contained 

' No line which, dying, he could wish to blot.' " 

Though actively and constantly connected with a daily paper, the poet found ample time 
to devote to verse and other literary pursuits. 

In 1827 and the two folio wang years Mr. Bryant was associated with Verplanck and 
Robert C. Sands in an annual publication called The Talisman, consisting of miscellanies 
in prose and verse written almost exclusively by the trio of literary partners, in Sands's 
library at Hoboken. Verplanck had a curious habit of balancing himself on the back legs 
of a chair with his feet placed on two others, and occupjdng this novel position he dictated 
his portion of the three volumes to Bryant and Sands, who alternately acted as his amanu- 
ensis. In 1832 Bryant was again associated with Sands in a brace of volumes entitled 
Tales of the Glauber Spa, to which Paulding, Leggett, and Miss Sedgwick were also con- 
tributors. In 1839 Mr. Bryant made a most admirable selection ' from the American poets, 
which was published by the Harpers in two volumes during the following year. At the same 
time they brought out a similar collection from the British poets, edited by Halleck. 

So far back as 1827, Washington Irving writes from Spain to his friend Henry Brevoort 
of the growing fame of Bryant and Halleck. He says : " I have been charmed with what 
I have seen of the writings of Bryant and Halleck. Are you acquainted with them ? I 
should like to know something of them personally. Their vein of thinking is quite above 



WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 55 ' — ' 



that of ordinary men and ordinary poets, and they are masters of the magic of poetical lan- 
gixage." Four years later, Mr. Bryant, in a letter to Irving, informs him of the publication, 
in New York, of a volume comprising all^ his poems which he thought worth printing, and 
expresses a desire for their republication by a respectable English house. In order to antici- 
pate their reproduction by any other, he requested Mr. Irving's kind aid in securing their 
publication. They appeared, with an introduction by Irving, in London in 1832. Professor 
Wilson said, in a periodical distinguished for its contempt of mediocrity : " Bryant's poetry 
overflows with natural religion — with what Wordsworth calls 'the religion of the gods.' 
The reverential awe of the irresistible pervades the verses entitled -Thanatoims and Forest 
Hymyi, imparting to them a sweet solemnity, which must ali'ect all thinking hearts." 
Another British periodical, very chary of its praise of anything American, remarked : 
" The verses of Mr. Bryant come as assuredly from the ' well of English undefiled ' as the 
finer compositions of Wordsworth ; indeed, the resemblance between the tAvo living authors 
might justify a much, more invidious comparison." 

Irving left behind him the following picture of the poetry of this distinguished American 
whom his own country delighted to honor : " Bryant's writings transport us into the depths 
of the solenm primeval forest, to the shore of the lovely lake, the banks of the wild nameless 
stream, or the brow of the rocky upland, rising like a promontory from amidst a wide ocean 
of foliage, while they shed around us the glories of a climate fierce in its extremes but splendid 
in all its vicissitudes." Dana has expressed his opinion of Bryant's poetry in equally ad- 
miring terms, and Halleck said to the writer, after repeating the whole of one of Bryant's 
later poems, The Planting of the Afple-Tree* " His genius is almost the only instance 
of a high order of thought becoming popular ; not that the people do not prize literary 
worth, but because they are unable to comprehend obscure poetry. Bryant's pieces seem to 
be fragments of one and the same poem, and require only a common plot to constitute a 
unique epic." (For the poem see p. 457.) 

Since the appearance of the first English edition of Bryant's poems, many others, mostly 
unauthorized, have been published in Great Britain, with but slight, if any, pecuniary 
advantage to their author. With one of these, which I bought at an English railway-stand 
for a shilling of their currency, and brought back with me to present to the poet in Octol)er, 
1855, he appeared m.uch amused, as it contained a villanous portrait of himself, wbich looked, 
he said, " more like Jack Ketch than a respectable poet." Many American editions of his 
poetical writings have appeared, from which Mr. Bryant derived a considerable amount of 
copyright, notwithstanding the remark he once made to the writer : " I should have starved 
if I had been obliged to depend upon my poetry for a living." Of one of these editions, known 
-as the Red-line, there were five thousand copies sold in 1870, the year in which it appeared; 
and of another beautiful illustrated edition issued in 1877, the entire edition was exhausted 
in the course of a few months. 

Intensely American in his feelings, the love of home and of his native land being among 
his most cherished sentiments, Mr. Bryant, like all truly cultivated and liberal minds, pos- 
sessed an enlarged appreciation of the poetical associations of other lands. Tlie inspirations 
of the East, the glowing imagery and romantic history of Spain, the balmy breezes and sun- 
shine of the island of Cuba, — all had an enchantment and charm for his most appreciative 
genius. The range of his poetic gift embraced with comprehensive sympathy the progress 

* "I was most agreeably surprised, as well as flattered, the other day to receive from General 
Wilson, who has collected the poetical writings of Halleck, and is engaged in preparing his Life 
and Letters for the pi-ess, a copy in the poet's handwriting of some verses of mine entitled Tlie 
PlantAvg of the Ap-ple-Trcr, which he had taken the pains to transcribe, and which General Wilson 
had heard him rei)eat from memory in his own fine manner." — BrijanCs Address on IlaUcel; 1869. 

[^_ , _I_ ^EP 



fl-" ' — ^ ^-Q] 

'-^ 5j WILLIAAI CILLEN HKYANT. ^ 

and struggles of humanity, seeking its vindication in a iiniversal and enlightened liberty, in the 
beauties and harmonies of nature in her many forms, and the inspirations of art in its truth- 
fulness to nature ; and all these find their legitimate expression in productions of his muse. 

Between the years 1834 and 1867, inclusive, Mr. Bryant made six visits to the Old 
World. In 1872 still another long journey was undertaken by him, — a second voyage to 
Cuba, his tour being extended to the city of Mexico. Bryant was fond of travel, and seemed 
as unwilling as that ancient worthy, Ulysses, whose wanderings he not long ago put in such 
pleasing English verse, to let his faculties rest in idleness. His letters to the Evening Post, 
embracing his observations and opinions of Cuba and the Old World, were collected and 
published after his third visit to Europe in 1849, and were entitled llie Letters of a Trav- 
eller. A few years later, after recrossing the Atlantic for the fifth time, he put forth in 
book form his letters from Spain and the East. These charming volumes, " born from his 
travelling thigh," as Ben Jonson quaintly expressed it, are written in a style of English prose 
distinguished for its purity and directness. The genial love of nature and the lurking ten- 
dency to humor which they everywhere betraj' prevent their severe simplicity from running 
into hardness, and give them a freshness and occasional glow in spite of their prevailing pro- 
priety and reserve. The reception which Mr. Bryant always met among literary men of 
distinction, especially in Great Britain, was a direct testimony to his own fine qualities. The 
poets Wordsworth and Kogers particularly extended to him most cordial and intimately 
friendly attention. 

Bryant's sympathy for the kindred arts was reciprocated by its votaries — though hajipily 
not in a posthumous form — in a novel and most beautiful manner, by a tribute paid to the 
poet on the anniversary of his seventieth birthday. I allude to the offering of paintings and 
poems made to Mr. Bryant on the evening of November 5, 1864 — which was selected for 
the festival — by the painters and poets of America, who cherished a love and veneration 
for one standing as a high-priest at the altar of nature, singing its praises in most harmonious 
numbers, and encouraging art in all its glowing beauties. An appropriate place for the 
oflfering Avas the Century Club of New York, of which but five of the one hundred founders 
are now living. On the occasion of the festival — a memorable one not only in the annals 
of the society itself, but in the history of American art and letters — Bancroft delivered the 
congratulatory address in most touching and eloquent words, and was followed by Kalph 
Waldo Emerson, Kichard H. Dana, Jr., and William M. Evarts, in equally felicitous addresses. 
Miss Sedgwick, Mrs. Sherwood, the elder Dana, Edward Everett, Halleck, Longfellow, Lowell, 
Whittier, Willis, and others who were unable to be present, sent poems and epistles of affection- 
ate greeting. Mr. Everett wrote : " I congratulate the Century Club on the opportunity of 
paying this richly earned tribute of respect and admiration to their veteran, and him on the 
well-deserved honor. Happy the community that has the discernment to appreciate its gifted 
sons ; happy the poet, the aitist, the scholar, who is permitted to enjoy, in this way, a foretaste 
of posthumous commemoration and fame ! " Halleck, from a sick-chamber, sent these 
words : " Though far off in body, I shall be near him in spirit, repeating the homage which 
with heart, voice, and pen I have, during more than forty years of his threescore and ten, 
delighted to pay him." Longfellow in his letter said : " I assure you, nothing would give 
me greater pleasure than to do honor to Bryant at all times andin all ways, both as a poet 
and a man. He has written noble verse and led a noble life, and we are all proud of him." 
Whittier, in felicitous stanzas, written, be it remembered, in the third year of the war. 



exclaims : — 



" I praise not here the poet's art, 
The rounded fitness of his song : 
Who weighs him from his life apart 
Must do his nobler nature wrong. 



t^-. : — : — : — : — : ^ 



eB"^ ■ -Qj 

"WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 57 

" When Freedom hath her own again, 
Let happy lips his songs rehearse ; 
His life is now his noblest strain, 
His manhood better than his verse. 

" Thank God ! his hand on nature's keys 
Its cnnning keeps at life's full span ; 
But dimmed and dwarfed, in times like these, 
The poet seems beside the Man." 

Other poetical tributes were addressed to Mr. Bryant by Boker, Buchanan Read, Mrs. 
Howe, Mrs. Sigourney, Holmes, Street, Tuckerman, and Bayard Taylor ; but the feature of 
the festival was the presentation to the venerable poet, in an eloquent address by the Presi- 
dent of the National Academy, of upward of twoscore oil-paintings, — gifts of the artist- 
members of the Century Club, including Church, Darley, Durand, Gilford, Huntington, 
Eastman Johnson, and others. 

Shelley, in his Defence of Poetry, asserts that " no living poet ever arrived at the 
fulness of his fame : the jury which sits in judgment upon a poet, belonging, as he does, to 
all time, must be composed of Ms peers, — it must be impanelled by Time from the select- 
est of the wise of many generations." Does not the continual sale of the beloved Bryant's 
poems, on which criticism and panegyric are alike unneeded, and on which the American 
world has pronounced a judgment of nnanimous admiration, prove him to be an exception 
to the rule laid down by the dictum of the gifted Shelley 1 

As promised in his Inscri2o(.ion for the Entrance to a Wood, to him who should enter 
and " view the haunts of Nature," " the calm shade shall bring a kindred calm," so did he 
truly seem to have received a quietude of spirit, a purity and elevation of thought, a " vari- 
ous language " of expression, which held him at once in subtle sympathy with nature and 
in ready communion with the minds of men. George William Curtis writes in his editorial 
Easy Chair of Harper's Magazine concerning Bryant : " What Nature said to him was plainly 
spoken and clearly heard and perfectly repeated. His art was exquisite. It was absolutely 
unsi;spected ; but it served its truest pui'pose, for it removed every obstruction to full and 
complete delivery of his message." 

In December, 1867, Mr. Bryant responded in a beautiful letter to an invitation of the 
alumni of Williams College to read a poem at their next meeting. The brief letter of decli- 
nation is poetical in its sympathy, and expresses, with pathos, not the decline of the powers 
of a mind yet vigorous, hiii a conscientious distrust of reaching that degree of excellence 
which his admirers might expect from his previous poems : — 

" You ask me for a few lines of verse to he read at your annual festival of the alumni of Wil- 
liams College. I am ever ill at occasional verses. Such as it is, my vein is not of that sort. I 
find it difficult to satisfy myself. Besides, it is the December of life with me ; I try to keep a few 
flowers in pots, — mere remembrances of a more genial season which is now with the things of the 
past. If I have a carnation or two for Christmas, I think myself fortunate. You write as if I had 
nothing to do, in fulfilling your request, but to go out and gather under the hedges and by the 
brooks a boiupiet of flowers that spring spontaneously, and throw upon your table. If I am to 
try, what would you say if it proved to be only a little bundle of devil-stalks and withered leaves, 
which my dim sight had mistaken for fresh, green sprays and blossoms ? So I must excuse mj^self 
as well as I can, and content myself with wishing a very pleasant evening to the foster-children of 
old 'Williams' who meet on New Year's Day, and all manner of prosperity and honor to the 
excellent institution of learning in which they were nurtured." 

ig^ -^^ 



ijD • ^ 

^^ 68 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. ^^ 

On the evening of the 17th of May, 1870, Mr. Bryant delivered an address before the 
Xew Yorlv Historical Society, his subject being the " Life and Writings of Gulian C. Ver- 
phmck." The venerable poet spoke of his friend, as in previous years he had spoken of 
their contemporaries, Thomas Cole, the painter, and the authors Fenimore Cooper, Wash- 
ington Irving, and Fitz-Greene Halleck. These charming orations, together with various 
addresses, including those made at the unveiling of the Shakespeare, Scott, and Morse 
statiies in the Central Park, were published in 1872 in a volume worthy of being possessed 
by all Bryant's admirers. 

The literary life which began more than sixty years ago was crowned by his translations 
of Homer. He was more than threescore and ten Avhen he set himself to the formidable 
task of adding another to the many translations of the Iliad and Odyssey. The 
Ibrnier occupied most of his leisure hours for three years, and the latter about two ; 
being completed when Mr. Bryant was well advanced in his seventy- seventh year. The 
opinion has been pronounced by competent critics that these will hold their own with 
the translations of Pope, Chapman, Newman, or the late Earl Derby, of Avhich latter 
Halleck said to the writer that " it was an admirable translation of the Iliad with the 
poetry omitted ! " * 

To the breakfast-table at Roslyn I remember that Mr. Bryant one day brought some 
pages in manuscript, being his morning's work on Homer ; for, like Scott, he Avas always an 
early riser, and by that excellent habit he gained some hours each day. That Bryant, Bayard 
Taylor, and Longfellow should have, during the past decade, simultaneously appeared as 
translators of Homer, Goethe, and Dante, and that their work should compare favorably 
with any prcAdous renderings into English of Faust, the Divina Commedia, and of the 
Iliad and Odyssey, is certainly a striking illustration of advancing literary culture in the 
New World. 

In 1873 Mr. Bryant's name appeared as the editor of Picturesque America, a hand- 
some illustrated quarto published by the Appletons ; and the latest prose work with Avhich 
he Avas associated is a History of the United States, noAV in course of publication by 
the Scribners, the second volume having been completed shortly before Mr. Bryant's 
death, the residue of the Avork remaining in the hands of its associate author, Sidney 
Howard Gay. 

To the readers of this memoir a topic of especial interest Avill be Mr. Bryant's connection 
Avith the volume which encloses it, — .4 Library of Poetry and Song. This began in 1870, 
Avith the origination of the book in its octavo form, and continued Avith constant interest, 
through the reconstruction and enlargement of the Avork in its more elaborate quarto form, until_ 
its completion in 1878. His oAvn Avords best shoAV hoAv it happened that Mr. Bryant became 
the sponsor of this book, Avhich, in its various editions, has already taken his name into 
nearly a hundred thousand American homes. " At the request of the publishers," he says, 
" I undertook to Avrite an Introduction to the present work, and, in pursuance of this design, 
I find that I have come into a someAvhat closer personal relation with the book. In its prog- 
ress it has passed entirely under my revision I have, as requested, exercised a free 

hand both in excluding and in adding matter according to my judgment of Avhat Avas best 

* Of Mr. Bryant's translations of the Iliad and the Odyssey, the Athenamm remarks : " Those 
translations are Avitli Mr. Bi-yant, as with Lord Derby, the Avork of the ripened scliolarshii) and 
honorable leisure of age, and the impulse is natural to compare the products of the two minds. 
Mr. Bryant's translations seem less laboriously rounded and ornate, but perhaps even more forceful 
and vigorous, than Lord Derby's;" while the London rm(?s expresses the judgment that "Ins 
performance fell flat on the ears of an educated audience, after the efforts of Lord Derby and others 
in the same direction." T 

I^_ ^ -ff 



0_ . ^ _g^ 

^-^ WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 59 ^ 

adapted to the purposes of the enterprise." Every poem took its place after passing under 
his clear eye. Many were dropped out by him ; more were suggested, found, often copied 
out by hhn for addition. In the little notes accompanying his frequent forwarding of mat- 
ter to the publishers, he casually included many interesting points and hints of criticism or 
opinion : " I send also some extracts from an American poet who is one of our best, — 
Richard H. Dana." " I would request that more of the poems of Jones Very be inserted. 
I think them quite remarkable." " Do not, I pray you, forget Thomson's Castle of Indo- 
lence, the first canto of which is one of the most magnificent things in the language, and 
altogether free from the faults of style which deform his blank verse." " The lines are 
pretty enough, though there is a bad rhyme — toes and clothes ; but I have seen a similar 
one in Dryden — cZo^/ies pronounced as does — and I think I have seen the same thing in 
Whittier." 

He was not a man given to humorous turns, yet he was not deficient in the sense of the 
comical. In forwarding some correction for an indexed name, he writes : " It is dithcult 

always to get the names of authors right. Please read the enclosed, and see that Mrs. 

be not put into a pair of breeches." 

In specifying some additional poems of Stedmau's for insertion, he says : " I think 

Alectrijon a very beautiful poem. It is rather long llie Old Admiral should go 

in, — under the head of ' Patriotism,' I think ; or, better, under that of ' Personal.' The 
Boor-Step is a poem of ' Love ' ; but it is pretty enough for anywhere," etc. " I do not 
exactly like the poem To a, Girl in her Thirteenth Year, on account of the bad rhymes ; 
nor am I quite pleased with Praed's I remember, I remember, printed just after Hood's, — 
it seems to me a little flippant, which is Praed's fault." The scrupulous care which Mr. 
Bryant exercised in keeping the compilation clean and pure was exemplified in his habitual 
name for it in correspondence and conversation, — " The Family Book," " The Family 
Library." He writes : " I have made more suggestions for the omission of poems in the 
humorous department than in any other ; several of them being deficient in the requisite 
literary merit. As to the convivial poems, the more I think of it the more I am inclined 
to advise their total omission." 

When the book appeared in 1S70, it met with an instant and remarkable popular wel- 
come, selling more than twenty thousand copies during the first six months, which, for a 
book costing five dollars in its least expensive style, was certainly unusual. In 1876 it was 
determined to give the work a thorough revision, although it had been from time to time 
benefiting by the amendments sent by Mr. Bryant or suggested by use. Mr. Bryant took a 
keen interest in this enlargement and reconstruction, and, as stated in the Publisher's Pref- 
ace to the quarto edition, it "entailed upon him much labor, in conscientious and thorough 
revision of all the material, — cancelling, inserting, suggesting, even copying out with his 
own hand many poems not attainable save from his private library ; in short, giving the 
work not only the sanction of his widely honored name, but also the genuine influence of 
his fine poetic sense, his unquestioned taste, his broad and scholarly acquaintance with liter- 
ature.'' Both the octavo and the quarto editions now contain his much-admired Introduc- 
tion, in the form of an essay on " The Poets and Poetry of the English Language." Of this, 
Edmund Clarence Stedman, in an admirable paper on Bryant as " The Man of Letters," 
contributed to the Evening Post since the poet's death, says : " This is a model of expres- 
sive English prose, as simple as that of the Spectator essayists and far more to the purpose. 
Like all his productions, it ends when the writer's proper work is done. The essay, it may 
be added, contains, in succinct language, the poet's own views of the scope and method of 
song, a reflection of the instinct governing his entire poetical career." 

Bryant's prose has always received high conmiendation. A little collection of extracts 
from his Avritings has been compiled for use in scliools, as a model of style. The secret oi 



cR- ■■ -Qj 

^"^ 60 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 

it, so far as genius can communicate its secrets, may be found in a letter addressed by Mr. 
Bryant to one of the editors of the Christian Intelligencer, in reply to some questions, and 
published in the issue of that journal, July 11, 1878 : — 

" RosLYN, Long Island, July 6, 1863. 

"It seems to "me that in style we ought first, and above all things, to aim at clearness of ex- 
pression. An obscure style is, of course, a bad style. In writing we should always consider not 
only whether we have expressed the thought in a manner which meets our own comprehension, but 
whether it will be understood by readers in general. 

"The quality of style next in importance is attractiveness. It should invite and agreeably 
detain the reader. To acquire such a style, I know of no other way than to contemplate good mod- 
els and consider tlie observations of able critics. The Latin and Greek classics of which you speak 
are certaiuly important helps in forming a taste in respect to style, but to attain a good English 
style something more is necessary, — the diligent study of good English authors. I would recur 
for this purpose to the elder worthies of our literature — to such writers as Jeremy Taylor and Bar- 
row and Thomas Fuller - — whose works are perfect treasTires of the riches of our language. Many 
modern writers have great excellences of style, but few are without some deficiency 

" I have but one more counsel to give in regard to the formation of a style in composition, and 
that is to read the jjoets, — the nobler and grander ones of our language. In this way warmth and 
energy is communicated to the diction and a musical flow to the sentences. 

"1 have here treated the subject very briefly and meagrely, but I have given you my own 
method and the rules by which I have been guided through many years mostly passed in literary 
labors and studies." 

On Mr. Bryant's eightieth birthday he received a congratulatory letter with its thousands 
of signatures, sent from every State and Territory of his native land, followed soon after by 
the presentation, in Chickering Hall, New York, in the presence of a large and appreciative 
audience, of a superb silver vase, the gift of many hundred admirers in various portions of 
the country. This exquisite and valuable specimen of American silver work is now in the 
possession of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Standing before it, the spectator may fitly 
recall those noble lines of Keats upon a Grecian urn : — 

" When old age shall this generation waste 
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe 
Than ours, a friend to men : to whom thou sayest, 
' Beauty is truth, truth beauty; that is all 
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.'" 

A few months later, the venerable poet presented to the citizens of Roslyn a new hall 
and public reading-room, having previously given one to his native town. It was the wish 
of his fellow-citizens that the handsome hall should be named in honor of Mr. Bryant; but 
as be proposed that it should be known simply as " The Hall," that title was bestowed upon 
it by popular acclamation. 

The Centennial Ode, written by Bryant for the opening of the International Exposition 
at Philadelphia, is worthy of the great fame of its author. Another of his recent compo- 
sitions, and one of his noblest, elicited from a prominent foreign journal the following- 
mention: "The venerable American poet, who was born before Keats, and who has seen so 
many tides of influence sweep over the literature of his own country and of England, pre- 
sents us here with a short but very noble and characteristic poem, which carries a singular 
weight Avith it as embodying the reflection of a very old man of genius on. the mutability 
of all things, and the hurrying tide of years that cover the past as with a flood of waters. 
In a vein that reminds us of Thanatopsis, the grand symphonic blank verse of which was 

fg-^ ^ 



\£r ^ 

^~^ WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 61 ^"^ 

published no less than sixty-one years ago, Mr. Bryant reviews the mortal life of man as 
the ridge of a wave ever hurrying to oblivion the forms that appear on its surface for a 
moment." In this worthy companion to Thanatopsis, written in his eighty-second year, 
the poet strikes the old familiar key-note that he took so successfully in his greatest poem 
in 1812, in The Ages in 1821, and again in Among the Trees in 1874. It is called The Flood 
of Years. A gentleman recently bereaved was so struck by the unquestioning faith in 
immortality expressed in the concluding lines of this poem that he wrote to the poet, 
asking if they represented his own belief. Mr. Bryant answered him in the following note, 
dated Cummington, August 10, 1876: " Certainly I believe all that is said in the lines you 
have quoted. If I had not, I could not have written them. I believe in the everlasting 
life of the soul; and it seems to me that immortality would be but an imperfect gift without 
the recognition in the life to come of those who are dear to us here." 

If the harmony of the poet's career was sustained in his writings and his love of art, it 
was further manifested in the taste and affection which governed him in the selection of his 
homes. Like the historian Prescott, Bryant had three residences, — a town-house and two 
country homes. One of these is near the picturesque village of Roslyn, Long Island, and 
commands a view which in its varied aspect takes in a mingled scene of outspreading land 
and water. The mansion, embosomed in trees and vines, an ample dwelling-place situated 
at the top of the hills, was built by Richard Kirk in 1781. Mr. Bryant, who was ever 
mindful of the injunction given by the dying Scotch laird to his son, " Be aye sticking in 
a tree, Jock: it will be growing while ye are sleeping," alternated recreations of tree plant- 
ing and pruning and other rural occupations with his literary labor. 

This country-seat at Roslyn, called " Cedarmere," has been the resort of many distin- 
guished men of art and literature, of travellers and statesmen, gone thither to pay their re- 
spects to the sage, philosopher, and author. They were always welcomed, and enjoyed the 
purity of taste and simplicity of manner which presided over the mansion. Here the ven- 
erable host continued to the last to enjoy the society of his friends; and here much of his 
best literary work had been done since his purchase of the place in 1845. He was accus- 
tomed to spend most of the time there from May to the end of November of each year, 
excepting the months of August and September, which were given to the old Homestead 
at Cummington. Not extensive, but excellent in wide and judicious selections, was his 
Cedarmere library of several thousand volumes. The poet's knowledge of ancient and 
living languages enabled him to add with advantage to his collection of books the works 
of the best French, German, Italian, and Spanish authors. Among his poems may be 
found admirable translations from these various languages as well as from the Greek and 
Latin. 

Cedai'mere is an extensive estate, and rich in a great variety of trees. As I was walking 
on a sunny October afternoon with the poet through his loved domain, he pointed out a 
Spanish chestnut -tree laden with fruit, and, springing lithely on a fence, despite his seventy- 
six summers, caught an open burr hanging from one of the lower branches, opened it, and, 
jumping down with the agility of a youth, handed to his city guest the contents, consisting 
of two as large chestnuts as I ever saw in Spain. The Madeira and Pecan nuts were also 
successfully cultivated by him at Cedarmere. During another walk, Mr. Bryant gave a 
jump and caught the branch of a tree with his hands, and, after swinging backward 
and forward several times with his feet raised, he swung himself over a fence without 
touching it. 

About a quarter of a mile from the mansion, he pointed out a Ijlack-walnut tree, which 
was planted bj^ Adam Smith, and first made its appearance al)ove ground in 1713. It had 
attained a girth of twenty-five feet and an immense breadth of branches. It was the com- 

^ ' =1 ^ 



[g- ~ — ' ^-g] 

•^-^ 62 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. '-+-' 

fortable home of a small army of squirrels, and every year strewed the ground around its 
gigantic stem with an abundance of " heavy fruit." The tree is alluded to in one of Mr. 
Bryant's poerns : — 

*' On my cornice linger the ripe black grapes ungathered ; 
Children fill the groves with the echoes of their glee, 
Gathering tawny chestnuts, and shouting when beside them 
Drops the heavy fruit of the tall black-walnut tree." 

The taste displayed by the poet in the selection and adornment of his residence at Eoslyn 
•was more than equalled by the affection and veneration which fourteen years ago prompted 
him to purchase the old Bryant Homestead and estate at Cummington, which had some 
thirty years previous passed out of the family into other hands. The mansion is situated 
among the Hampshire hills, and is a spot that nature has surrounded with scenes calcuhited 
to awaken the early dreams of the poet, and to fill his soul with purest inspiration. In the 
midst of such scenes the young singer received his earliest impressions, and descriptive of 
them he has embodied some of his most cherished and home-endearing poetry. To a friend 
who requested information about the home of his boyhood, Mr. Bryant in 1872 wrote as 
follows: — 

"I am afraid that I cannot say much that will interest you or anybody else. A hundred 
years since this broad highland region lying between the Housatonic and the Connecticut was prin- 
cipally forest, and bore the name of Pontoosuc. In a few places settlers had cleared away wood- 
lands and cultivated the cleared spots. Bears, catamounts, and deer were not uncommon here. 
Wolves were sometimes seen, and the woods were dense and dark, without any natural openings or 
meadows. My grandfather on the mother's side came up from Plymouth County, in Massachu- 
setts, when a young man, in the year 1773, and chose a farm on a commanding site overlooking an 
extensive prospect, cut down the trees on a part of it, and built a house of square logs with a 
chimney as large as some kitchens, within which I remember to have sat on a bench in my child- 
hood. About ten years afterward he purchased, of an original settler, the contiguous farm, now 
called the Bryant Homestead, and having built beside a little brook, not very far from a spring 
from which water was to be drawn in pipes, the house which is now mine, he removed to it with 
his family. The soil of this region was then exceedingly fertile, all the settlers prospered, and my 
grandfather among the rest. My father, a physician and surgeon, married his daughter, and after 
a while came to live with him on the homestead. He made some enlargements of the house, in 
one part of which he had his office, and in this, during my boyhood, were generally two or three 
students of medicine, who sometimes accompanied my father in his visits to his patients, always 
on horseback, which was the mode of travelling at that time. To this place my father brought me 
in my early childhood, and 1 have scarce an early recollection which does not relate to it. 

"On the farm beside the little brook, and at a short distance from the house, stood the district 
school-house, of which nothing now remains but a little hollow where was once a cellar. Here I 
received my earliest lessons in learning, except such as were given me by my mother, and here, 
when ten years old, I declaimed a copy of verses composed by me as a description of a district 
school. The little brook which runs by the house, on the site of the old district school-house, M'as 
in after years made the subject of a little poem entitled The Pdvulct. To the south of the house 
is a wood of tall trees clothing a declivity, and touching with its outermost boughs the grass of a 
moist meadow at the foot of the hill, which suggested the poem entitled An InscrijMon for the 
Entrance to a Wood. 

" In the year 1835 the place passed out of the family; and at the end of thirty years I repur- 
chased it, and made various repairs of the house and additions to its size. A part of the building 
which my father liad added, and which contained his office, had, in the mean time, been detached 
from it, and moved off down a steep hill to the side of the Westfield River. I supplied its place 
by a new wing with the same external form, though of less size, in which is now my library. 

tB-^- ^ 



^ -Q] 

^^ WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 63 

" The site of the house is uncommonly beautiful. Before it, to the east, the ground descends, 
first gradually, and then rapidly, to the Wcstfield liiver, flowing in a deep and narrow valley, from 
which is heard, after a copious rain, the roar of its swollen current, itself unseen. In the spring- 
time, when the frost-bound waters are loosened by a warm rain, the roar and crash are remarkably 
loud as the icy crust of the stream is broken, and the masses of ice are swept along by the Hood 
over the stones with which the bed of the river is paved. Beyond the narrow valley of the West- 
field the surface of the country rises again gradually, carrying the eye over a region of vast extent, 
interspersed with farm-houses, pasture-grounds, and wooded heights, where on a showery day you 
sometimes see two or three different showers, each watering its own separate district; and in winter- 
time two or three different snow-storms dimly moving from place to place, 

" The soil of the whole of this highland region' is disintegrated mica slate, for the most part. 
It has its peculiar growth of trees, shrubs, and wild-flowers, differing considerably from those of 
the eastern part of the State. In autumn the woods are peculiarly beautiful with their brightness 
and variety of hues. The higher farms of this region lie nearly two thousand feet above tide-water. 
The air is pure and healthful : the summer temperature is most agreeable, but the spring is coy in 
her approaches, and winter often comes before he is bidden. No venomous reptile inhabits any 
part of this region, as I think there is no tradition of a rattlesnake or copperhead having been 
seen here." 

The serenity and dignity so manifest in Bryant's writings were notable also in his person. 
The poet was often depicted with pencil and pen. The phrenologists exhausted their skill 
upon his noble head, and the painters and engravers their art upon his face. The former 
believed him to approach the ideal of Spurzheim in his phrenological developments, and 
the latter deemed him to possess the fine artistic features of Titian and the Greek poet whom 
he translated. It is a consolation to age, when protected by a wise and orderly regulated 
life, that its inherent dignity supplies the want, if not the place, of youth, and that the 
veneration and serenity which surround it more than compensate for the passions which 
turbulence renders dangerous. To such an honored age as this Bryant attained; calm, cir- 
cumspect, and sedate, he passed the perilous portals of Parnassus with his crown of laurel 
untarnished and nnwithered by the baser breath that sometimes lurks like a poison within 
its leaves. To my conception, he more resembled Dante in the calm dignity of his nature, 
though happily not in the violent and oppressive affliction of his life, than any other poet in 
history. 

Having passed, by more than three winters, what the Psalmist calls "the days of our 
years," and escaped the " labor and sorrow " that are foreboded to the strength that attains 
fourscore, Biyant continued to perform his daily editorial duties, to pursue his studies, and 
to give the world his much prized utterances, without exhibiting any evidences of physical 
or mental decay, although for a good part of half a century he was rmder whip and spur, 
Avith the daily press forever, as Scott expressed it, " clattering and thundering at his heels." 
On the evening of January 31, 1878, he walked out on the wildest night of the wiutei-, 
when a blinding snow-storm kept many younger men at home, to address a meeting of the 
American Geographical Society, and to take part in the cordial welcome extended to the 
Earl of Dufferin, the accomplished Governor-General of Canada. When the president of 
the society sent for a carriage and urged the aged poet, at the close of the meeting, to nuxke 
use of it, he sturdily refused, saying that he preferred to walk home. 

Among Mr. Bryant's latest utterances was the following noble ode, written, for Washing- 
ton's last birthday, February 22, 1878, for the Sunday School Times : — 

"Pale is the February sky. 

And brief the mid-day's sunny hours; 
The wind-swept forest seems to sigh 

For the sweet time of leaves and flowers. 



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64 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT 



"Yet even when the summer broods 
O'er meadows in their fresh array, 
Or autumn tints her glowing woods, 
No month can boast a prouder daj'. 

" For this chill season now again 

Brings, in its annual round, the morn 
When, greatest of the sons of men, 
Our glorious Washington was born. 

"Lo, where, beneath an icy shield. 
Calmly the mighty Hudson flows, 
By snow-clad fell and frozen field 
Broadening the lordly river goes. 

*' The wildest storm that sweeps through space, 
And rends the oak with sudden force, 
Can raise no ripple on his face 
Or slacken his majestic course. 

"Thus, mid the wi-eck of thrones, shall live 
Unmarred, undimmed, our hero's fame, 
And years succeeding years shall give 
Increase of honors to his name." 

Still later (May 15, 1878) Mr. Bryant wrote at Eoslyn the following characteristic senti- 
ment contributed to a Decoration Day number of the Recorder : — 

"In expressing my regard for the memory of those who fell in the late civil war, I cannot 
omit to say that, for one result of what they did and endured — namely, the extinction of slavery 
in this great republic — they desei-ve the imperishable gratitude of mankind. Their memory will 
survive many thousands of the generations of spring flowers which men will gather to-day on their 
graves. Nay, they will not be forgotten while the Avorld has a written history." 



I&-. _ ^ ^ 



, fl » ' [~^ \ 

— ' WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 65 ^^ 



CHAPTER III. 

" Of no distemper, of no blast lie died. 
But fell like autumn fruit that mellowed long : 
Even wondered at because he dropt no sooner. 
Fate seemed to wind him up for fourscore years ; 
Yet freshly ran he on three winters more , 
Till, like a clock worn out with eating time, 
The wheels of weary life at last stood still. " 

John Dryden. 

Mazzini Addeess — Last Words — Accident — Sickness — Death — Burial at 
RosLYN — Tributes to his Memory. 

In accordance with the expressed wishes of many personal friends of the patriarch of 
American poetry, who was so recently laid in his grave with many tears, and also remem- 
bering that posterity likes details in regard to the latest actions and utterances of eminent 
men, I have recorded, to the best of my recollection, some particulars of his conversation 
during the afternoon of Wednesday, May 29th, his last hours of consciousness. He was 
appointed to deliver an oration on the occasion of unveiling a bronze bust of Mazzini, the 
Italian revolutionist and statesman, in the Central Park. I met Mr. Bryant in the Park 
about half an hour before the commencement of the ceremonies, conversing with him during 
that time, and again for a similar period after those ceremonials were concluded. While I 
was walking with Mr. Bryant for the last time, he quoted an aphorism from his friend 
Sainte-Beuve, that " To know another man well, especially if he be a noted and illustrious 
character, is a great thing not to be despised." It was my good fortune to have enjoyed for 
nearly or quite a quarter of a century the privilege and pleasure of Mr. Bryant's acquaint- 
ance, and in "all that time I never met him in a more cheerful and conversational mood than 
on the above-mentioned afternoon, and never saw him exhibit an equal depth and tender- 
ness of feeling, either in his public utterances or in his private talk. 

At the proper time Mr. Bryant took his seat on the platform — for he had been standing 
or seated under the welcome shade of adjoining elms — and presently he proceeded with 
the delivery of the last of a long series of scholarly addresses delivered in New York during 
the last thirty years. As I gazed on the majestic man, with his snow-white hair and 
flowing beard, his small, keen but gentle blue eye, his light but firm lithe figure, standing 
so erect and apparently with undiminished vigor, enunciating with such distinctness, I 
thought of what Napoleon said of another great singer who, like our American poet, reached 
an advanced age to which but few attain, and which was equally true of Bryant: " Behold 
a man ! " 

The delivery of the oration, which affords most interesting evidence of the enthusiasm 
and mental energy of its aged author, it is to be feared drew too heavily on the poet's failing 
powers. It was uttered with an unusual depth of feeling, and for the first time in his pub- 
lic addresses, so far as I am aware, he hesitated and showed some difficulty in finding his 
place in the printed slip which was spread before him, and in proceeding with his remarks. 
During the delivery of his speech he was but slightly exposed to the hot sun, an umbrella 

being held over his 

" Good gray head, which all men knew," 

till he reached his peroration, when he stepped from under its shelter, and, looking up at the 
bust, delivered with poAver and great emphasis, while exposed to the sun, the concluding 
paragraph of his address : — --►-, 

\^ _ ^-gi 



66 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. - 

" Image of the illustrious champion of civil and religious liberty, cast in enduring bronze to 
tj'pify the imperishable renown of thy original ! Remain for ages yet to come where we place thee, 
in this resort of millions ; remain till the day shall dawn — far distant though it may be — when 
the rights and duties of human brotherhood shall be acknowledged by all the races of mankind ! " 

At the conclusion Mr. Bryant was loudly applauded, and, resuming his seat again on the 
platform, he remained an interested listener to the address in Italian which followed his. 
At the close of the ceremonies, and when the poet was left almost alone on the platform, he 
took my offered arm to accompany me to my home, saying that he was perfectly able to 
walk there, or indeed to his own house in Sixteenth Street. Before proceeding, I again 
proposed that we should take a carriage, when the poet said, in a determined manner, " I am 
not tired, and prefer to walk." As we set off, I raised my umbrella to protect him from the 
sun, when he said, in a most decided tone, " Don't hold that umbrella up on my account ; 
I like the warmth of the sunshine." He was much interested in the fine flock of sheep, 
together with the shepherd and his intelligent Scotch collie, that he observed as we passed 
across the green. 

Mr. Bryant alluded to the death of Lord John Russell the day before, and asked if I had 
ever met him or heard him speak in public, adding : "For a statesman, he devoted a good 
deal of time to literature, and he appears to have been a man of respectable talents. How 
old was he 1 " " Eighty-six." " Why, he was older than I am ; but I expect to beat that 
and to live as long as my friend Dana, who is ninety-one." " Have you any theory as to 
the cause of your good health ? " " O, yes," he answered ; " it is all summed up in one 
word, — moderation. As you know, I am a moderate eater and drinker, moderate in my 
work, as well as in my pleasures, and I believe the best way to preserve the mental and 
physical faculties is to keep them employed. Don't allow them to rust." " But surely," 
I added, " there is no moderation in a man of eighty -three, after walking more than two 
miles, mounting eight or nine pairs of stairs to his office." " O," he merrily replied, " I 
confess to the two or three miles down-town, but I do not often mount the stairs ; and if 
I do sometimes, when the elevator is not there, I do not see that it does me any harm. I can 
walk and work as well as ever, and have been at the office to-day, as usual." 

Some mention having been made of Lord Houghton's and Tupper's recent travels in this 
country, the poet asked : " Did I ever tell you of Lord Houghton's visit to Roslyn a few 
years ago ? He was accompanied by his valet, who announced in my kitchen that his 
'master was the greatest poet in England,' when one of my servants, not to be outdone, 
thereupon said, ' Our man is the greatest poet in America.' " The use of the words 
"master" and "man," I may remark, is worthy of notice, and appeared to amuse the 
poet when relating the incident. 

Passing the Halleck statue, Mr. Bryant paused to speak of it, of other statues in similar 
sitting posture, and of Halleck himself and his genius, for several minutes. 

Still continuing to lean on my arm, he asked my little daughter, whose hand he had held 
and continued to hold during our walk, if she knew the names of the robins and sparrows 
that attracted his attention, and also the names of some flowering shrubs that we passed. 
Her correct answers pleased him, and he then inquired if she had ever heard some little 
verses about the bobolink. She answered yes, and that she also knew the poet who wrote 
them. This caused him much amusement, and he said, " I think I shall have to write 
them out for you. Mary, do you know the name of that tree with the pretty blue flowers ? " 
he asked, and as she did not know, he told her that it was " called the Pauloumia im2)crialis^ 
— a hard name for a little girl to remember ; it was named in honor of a princess, and was 
brought from Japan." 

Arriving at the Morse statue at the Seventy-second Street gate, we stopped, and he said: 

IS-, : ^ ^ 



^ -a 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 67 

" This recalls to my mind a curious circumstance. You remember Launt Thompson's bust 
which the Commissioners refused to admit in the Park, on the ground that 1 was living ? 
Well, soon after, this statue of Morse was placed here, although he was alive, and [laugh- 
ingly] I was asked to deliver the address on the occasion of its unveiling, which I did." 
" Do you like your bust 1 " " Yes, I think it is a good work of art, and the likeness is 
pleasing and satisfactory, I believe, to my friends." "Which do you think your best por- 
trait 1 " " Unlike Irving, I prefer the portraits made of me in old age. Of the earlier 
pictures, I presume the best are In man's and my friend Durand's,* which you perhaps 
remember hangs in the parlor at Roslyn." 

As we approached my house, about four o'clock, Mr. Bryant was recalling the scenes of 
the previous year on the occasion of President Hayes's first visit to New York, and he was 
still, I think, cheerfuUj'' conversing on that subject as we walked up arm in arm, and all 
entered the vestibule. Disengaging my arm, I took a step in advance to open the inner 
door, and during those few seconds, without the slightest warning of any kind, the venerable 
poet, while my back was turned, dropped my daughter's hand and fell suddenly backward 
through the open outer door, striking his head on the steps. I turned just in time to see 
the silvered head striking the stone, and, springing to his side, hastily raised him up. He 
was unconscious, and I supposed that he was dead. Ice-water was immediately applied to 
his head, and, with the assistance of a neighbor's son and the servants, he was carried into 
the parlor and laid unconscious at full length on the sofa. He soon moved, became restless, 
and in a few minutes sat up and drank the contents of a goblet filled with iced sherry, which 
partially restored him, and he asked, with a bewildered look, " Where am I ? I do not feel 
at all well. 0, my head ! my poor head ! " accompanying the words by raising his right 
hand to his forehead. After a little, at his earnest request, I accompanied him to his own 
house, and, leaving him in charge of his niece, went for his family physician, Dr. John F. Gray. 
The following is a portion of the statement made by Dr. Gray after the poet's death : — 

"I sent for Dr. Carnoclian, tlie surgeon. He could find no injury to the skull, and therefore 
thought there was a chance of recovery. Mr. Bryant, during the first few days, would get up and 
walk about the library or sit in his favorite chair. He would occasionally say something about 
diet and air. When his daughter arrived from Atlantic City, where she had been for her health, 
she thought her father recognized her. It is luicertain how far lie recognized her or any of his 
friends. The family were hopeful and made the most out of every sign of consciousness or recog- 
nition. 

"On the eighth day after the fall, hemorrhage took place in the brain, resulting in paralysis, 
technically called hemiplegia, and extending down the right side of the body. After this he was 
most of the time comatose. He ceased to recognize his friends in any way, and lay much of the 
time asleep. He was unable to speak, and when he attempted to swallow his food lodged in his 
larynx and choked him. He was greatly troubled with phlegm, and could not clear his throat. 
There was only that one attack of hemorrhage of the brain, and that was due to what is called trau- 
matic inHammation. After the fourteenth day he died. 

"He was a man who made little demonstration of affection or emotion, but he had a pro- 
foundly sympathetic feeling for the life and mission of Mazzini, and on the day when he delivered 

* The most important portraits of the poet, mentioned as nearly as possible in the order in 
which they were painted, are by Henry Inman (1835) ; Prof. S. F. B. Morse (1836); Henry Peters, 
Gray, S. W. Cheney, Charles Martin (1851); Charles L. Elliott, A. B. Durand (1854); Samuel 
Lawrence (1856) ; Paul Duggan, C. G. Thompson, A. H. Wenzler (1861) ; Thonuis Hicks (1863) ; 
and Charles Fisher (1875). Of these I have engravings on steel now before me from lunian's, 
Martin's, EUiott's, Durand's, and Lawrence's portraits, as well as several taken from recent 
photographs. The portrait of Mr, Bryant which appears in this work is engraved from an admi- 
rable photograj:)!! taken by Sarony. 

-^ J31 



k 



(Pr ^ ^ 

^""^ 68 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. ^^ 

the address he exhibited considerable emotion. That and the walk afterwards certainly exhaiisted 
him, and led to the swoon. He overtaxed his strength dnring the winter, in attending evening 
entertainments and in public speaking. He had few intimate acquaintances, and was so extremely 
modest in expressing approbation or liking that one could scarcely tell the extent of his friendly 
feeling. Though I had attended him for many years, and often visited him at Roslyn, and also at 
his old homestead in Massachusetts, I never noticed an expression of more than ordinary friendship 
till I was prostrated by sickness. He made an impression ordinarily of coldness, but his poems 
show that he had plenty of feeling, and great sympathy for mankind. 

" Once M'hen at Roslyn we visited the grave of his wife in the village cemetery, and we saw the 
jilace by her side reserved for him. He freijuently requested that his funeral should be simple and 
without ostentation. He has had fulfilled his wish to die in June. 

" Mr. Bryant owed his long life to an exceedingly tenacious and tough constitution and very pru- 
dent living. I always found him an early riser. Although he was slight of body and limb, he 
seemed to me unconscious of fatigue, and he would walk many a stronger man off his legs. He 
did not walk rapidly, but seemed as wiry as an Indian." 

In April, 1867, Mr. Bryant expressed to the writer a wish that he might not survive the 
loss of his mental faculties, like Southey, Scott, Wilsoa, Lockhart, and the Ettrick Shep- 
herd, who all suffered from softening of the brain, and mentioned his hope that he should 
be permitted to complete his translation of Homer before death or mental imbecility, with a 
failure of physical strength, should overtake him. On another occasion he said, " If I am 
worthy, I would wish for sudden death, with no interregnum between I cease to exercise rea- 
son and I cease to exists In these wishes he was happily gratified, as well as in the time of 
his being laid away to his final rest, as expressed in his beautiful and characteristic lines to 
June : — 

" I gazed upon the glorious sky, 

And the green mountains round. 
And thought that when 1 canie to lie 

At rest within the ground, 
'T were pleasant that in Howery June, 
When brooks send up a cheerful tune, 

And groves a cheerful sound. 
The sexton's hand, mj"- grave to make. 
The rich, green mountain turf should break." * 

It was indeed a glorious day, and the daisies were dancing and glimmering over the 
fields as the poet's family, a few old friends, and the villagers saw him laid in his last resting- 
place at Roslyn, after a few words fitly spoken by his pastor, and beheld his coffin covered 
with roses and other summer flowers by a little band of country children, who gently dropped 
them as they circled round the poet's grave. This act completed, we left the aged min- 
strel amid the melody dearest of all to him in life, — the music of the gentle June breezes 
murmuring through the tree-tops, from whence also came the songs of summer birds. 

The following, from the pen of Paul H. Hayne, of South Carolina, is one of the many 
tributes to Mr. Bryant's character and genius, that have appeared since the poet's death, from 
the pens of Curtis, Holland, Osgood, Powers, Stedman, Stoddard, Street, Symington (a 
Scottish singer), and many others : — 

" Lo ! there he lies, our Patriarch Poet, dead ! 
The solemn angel of eternal peace 
Has waved a wand of mystery o'er his head, 

Touched his strong heart, and bade his pulses cease. 

* The entire poem may be found on page 42.5. 

d ■ ^ 



Eg- ^ ' D j 

^^ WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. C9 

" Beliold, in marble quietude he lies ! 

Pallid and cold, divorced from earthly breath, 
With tranquil brow, lax hands, and dreamless eyes ; — 
Yet the closed lips would seem to smile at death. 

" Well may they smile ; for death, to such as he, 

Brings purer freedom, loftier thought and aim ; 
And, in grand truce with immortality. 

Lifts to song's fadeless heaven his star-like fame ! " 

I cannot forbear adding to this expression of appreciative affection a few words from the 
funeral address uttered by Ms pastor, the Eev. Dr. Bellows, at the commemorative ceremonj^ 
held in New York, on the 14th of June, at All Souls' Church, of which Mr. Bryant was 
for the last fifteen years of his life an active and honored member. Dr. Bellows said : — 

" jSTever, perhaps, was there an instance of such precocity in point of wisdom and maturity as 
that which marked ThanatoiJsis, written at eighteen, or of such persistency in judgment, force, 
and melody as that exhibited in his last public ode, written at eighty-three, on occasion of Wash- 
ington's last birthday. Between these two bounds lies one even path, high, finished, faultless, in 
which comes a succession of poems, always meditative, always steeped in the love and knowledge 
of nature, always pure and melodious, always stamped with his sign manual of faultless taste and 
gem-like purity 

" A devoted lover of religious liberty, he was an equal lover of religion itself — not in any pre- 
cise dogmatic form, but in its righteousness, reverence, and charitj' 

" It is the glorjr of this man, that his character outshone even his great talent and his large 
fame. Distinguished equally for his native gifts and his consummate culture, his poetic inspira- 
tion and his exquisite art, he is honored and loved to-day even more for his stainless purity of life, 
his unswerving rectitude of will, his devotion to the higher interests of his race, his unfeigned 

patriotism, and his broad humanity 

" The increasing sweetness and beneficence of his character, meanwhile, must have struck his 
familiar friends. His last years were his devontest and most humane years. He became benefi- 
cent as he grew able to be so, and his hand was open to all just needs and to many unreasonable 
claimants." 

No more appropriate concluding paragraph can be added to this memorial paper, which 
I could wish worthier of the good and gifted Bryant — Integer vitce scelerisque purus — than 
his own beautiful words, applied to his contemporary, Washington Irving. " If it were 
becoming," said the poet, " to address our departed friend as if in his immediate presence, 
I would say, ' Farewell, thou who hast entered into the rest prepared from the foundation 
of the world for serene and gentle spirits like thine. Farewell, happy in thy life, happy 
in thy death, hap^^ier in the reward to which that death is the assured passage ; fortunate 
in attracting the admiration of the world to thy beautiful writings ; still more fortunate in 
having written nothing which did not tend to promote the reign of magnanimous forbear- 
ance and generous sympathies among thy fellow-men. The brightness of that enduring fame 
which thou hast won on earth is but a shadowy symbol of the glory to which thou art ad- 
mitted in the world beyond the grave. Thy errand on earth was an errand of peace and 
good-will to men, and thou art now in a region where hatred and strife never enter, and 
where the harmonious activity of those who inhabit it acknowledges no impulse less noble 
or less pure than love." 

JAMES GRANT WILSON. 

New York, July, 1878. 

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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



PHILIP, MY KING. 

" Who bears upon his baby brow tlie round 
And top of sovereignty. ' 

Look, at me with thy large brown eyes, 

Philqi, my king ! 
Round whom the enshadowing purple lies 
Of babyhood's royal dignities. 
Lay on my neck thy tiny hand 

With Love's invisible seeptre laden ; 
I am thine Esther, to command 

Till thou shalt find a (lucen-handmaiden, 
Philip, my king ! 

0, the day when thou goest a-wooing, 

Philip, my king ! 
When those beautiful lips 'gin suing, 
And, some gentle lieart's bars undoing. 
Thou dost enter, love-crowned, and there 

Sittest love-glorilied ! — Rule kindly, 
Tenderly over thy kingdom fair ; 

For we that love, ah ! we love so blindly, 
Philip, my king ! 

Up fi'om thy sweet mouth up to thy brow, 

Philip, my king ! 
The spirit that there lies sleeping now 
May rise like a giant, and make men bow 
As to one Heaven-chosen among his peers. 

My Saul, than thy brethren taller and fairer, 
Let me behold thee in future years ! 
Yet thy head needeth a circlet rarer, 
Philip, my king ; — • 

A wi-eath, not of gold, but palm. One day, 

Philip, my king ! 
Thou too must tread, as we trod, a way 
Thorny, and cruel, and cold, and gray; 
Rebels within thee and foes without 

Will snatch at thy crown. But march on, 
glorious, 
Martyr, yet monarch ! tiU angels shout. 
As thou sitt'st at the feet of God victorious, 
" Philip, the king ! " 

Dinah Maria Mulock Craik. 



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CRADLE SONG. 

FROM "BITTER-SWEET." 

WuAT is the little one thinking about ? 
Very wonderful tilings, no doubt ; 
Unwritten history ! 
Unfathomed mystery ! 
Yet he chuckles, and crows, and nods, and winks, 
As if his head were as full of kinks 
xVnd curious riddles as any sphinx ! 
Warped by colic, and wet by tears, 
Punctured by pins, and tortured by fears, 
Our little nepliew will lose two years ; 
And he '11 never know 
Where the summers go ; 
He need not laugh, for he '11 find it so. 

Who can tell what a baby thinks ? 
Who can follow the gossamer links 

By which the manikin feels his way 
Out from the shore of tlie great unknown, 
Blind, and wailing, and alone. 

Into tlie light of day ? 
Out from the shore of the unknown sea, 
Tossing in pitiful agony ; 
Of the unknown sea that reels and rolls, 
Specked with the barks of little souls, — 
Barks that were launched on the other side. 
And slipped from heaven on an ebbing tide ! 

What does he think of his mother's eyes ? 
What does lie think of his mother's hair ? 

What of the cradle-roof, that flies 
Forward and backward through the air ? 

What does he think of his mother's breast, 
Bare and beautiful, smooth and white, 
Seeking it ever with fresh delight, 

(Jup of his life, and couch of his rest ? 
Wliat does he think when her quick embrace 
Presses his hand and buries his face 
Deep where the heart-throbs sink and swell, 
With a tenderness she can never tell. 

Though she murmur the words 

Of all the birds, — 
Words she has learned to murmur well ? 

Now he thinks he '11 go to sleep ! 

I can see the shadow creep 



^ 



fl-r 



76 



POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



■a 



Over his eyes in soft eclipse, 
Over his brow and over his lips, 
Out to his little finger-tips ! 
Softly sinking, down he goes ! 
Down he goes ! down he goes ! 
See ! he 's hushed in sweet repose. 

josiAii Gilbert Holland. 



CHOOSING A NAME. 

I HAVE got a new-Loin sister ; 

I was nigh the hrst that kissed her. 

When the nursing- woman brought her 

To papa, his infant daughter. 

How papa's dear eyes did glisten ! — 

She will shortly be to christen ; 

And papa has made the offer, 

I shall have the naming of her. 

Now I wonder what would please her, — 

Charlotte, Julia, or Louisa ? 

Ann and Mary, they 're too connnon ; 

Joan 's too formal for a woman ; 

Jane 's a prettier name beside ; 

But we had a Jane that died. 

They would say, if 't was Kebecea, 

That she was a little Quaker. 

Edith 's pretty, but that looks 

Better in old English books ; 

Ellen 's left off long ago ; 

Blanche is out of fashion now. 

None that I have named as yet 

Are so good as Margaret. 

Emily is neat and fine ; 

"What do you think of Caroline ? 

How I 'ni puzzled and perplexed 

What to choose or think of next ! 

I am in a little fever 

Lest the nanre that I should give her 

Should disgrace her or defame her ; — 

I will leave papa to name her. 

Mary LAiME. 



k 



BABY MAY. 

Cheeks as soft as July peaches ; 
Lips whose dewy scarlet teaches 
Poppies paleness ; round large eyes 
Ever great with new surprise ; 
Minutes filled with shadeless gladness ; 
Minutes just as brimmed with sadness ; 
Happy smiles and wailing cries ; 
Crows, and laughs, and tearful eyes ; 
Lights and shadows, swifter born 
Than on wind-swept autumn corn ; 
Ever some new tiny notion, 
Making every limb all motion ; 



Catchings up of legs and arms ; 
Throwings back and small alarms ; 
Clutching fingers ; straightening jerks ; 
Twining feet whose eacli toe works ; 
Kickings np and straining risings ; 
JMother's ever new surprisings ; 
Hands all wants and looks all wonder 
At all things the heavens under ; 
Tiny scorns of smiled reprovings 
That have more of love than lovings ; 
Mischiefs done with such a winning 
Archness that we prize such sinning ; 
Breakings dire of plates and glasses ; 
Graspings small at all that passes ; 
PuUings off of all that 's able 
To be caught from tray or table ; 
Silences, — small meditations 
Deep as thoughts of cares for nations ; 
Breaking into wisest speeches 
In a tongue that nothing teaches ; 
All the thoughts of whose possessing 
Must be wooed to light by guessing ; 
Slumbers, — such sweet an gel- seem in gs 
That we 'd ever have such dreamings ; 
Till from sleep we see tliee breaking, 
And we 'd always have thee waking ; 
Wealth for which M^e know no measure ; 
Pleasure high above all pleasure ; 
Gladness brimmiiig over gladness ; 
Joy in care ; delight in sadness ; 
Loveliness beyond completeness ; 
Sweetness distancing all sweetness ; 
Beauty all tliat beauty may be ; — 
That 's May Bennett ; that 's my baby. 

William Cox beiNineit. 



A CRADLE HYMN. 

ABBREVIATED FROM THE ORIGINAL. 

Hush ! my dear, lie still, and slumber. 
Holy angels guard thy bed ! 

Heavenly blessings without number 
Gently falling on thy head. 

Sleep, my babe ; thy food and raiment, 
House and home, thy friends provide 

All without thy care or payment. 
All thy wants are well supplied. 

How much better thou 'rt attended 
Than the Son of God could be, 

When from heaven he descended, 
And became a child like thee. 

Soft and easy is thy cradle : 

Coarse and hard thy Saviour lay : 

When his birthplace was a stable, 
And his softest bed was hay. 



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INFANCY. 



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See the kinder shepherds round him, 

Telling wonders from the sky ! 
There they sought him, there they found him, 

With his virgin mother by. 

See the lovely Babe a-dressing ; 

-Lovely Infant, how he smiled ! 
When he wept, the mother's blessing 

Soothed and hushed the holy Child. 

Lo, he slumbers in his manger, 

Where the horned oxen feed ; 
Peace, my darling, here 's no danger, 

Here 's no ox anear thy bed. 

Mayst thou live to know and fear him, 
Trust and love him all thy days ; 

Then go dwell forever near him. 
See his face and sing his praise ! 

I could give thee thousand kisses, 

Hoping what I most desire ; 
Not a mother's fondest wishes 

Can to greater joys aspire. 

ISAAC Watts. 



©■ 



LITTLE FEET. 

Two little feet, so small that both may nestle 

In one caressing hand, — 
Two tender feet upon the untried border 

Of life's mysterious land. 

Dimpled, and soft, and pink as peach-tree blos- 
soms. 

In April's fragrant days. 
How can they walk among the briery tangles. 

Edging the world's rough ways ? 

These rose-white feet, along the doubtful future, 

Miist bear a mother's load ; 
Alas ! since Woman has the heaviest burden, 

And walks the harder road. 

Love, for a while, will make the path before them 
AH dainty, smooth, and fair, — 

Will cull away the brambles, letting only 
The roses blossom there. 

But when the mother's watchful eyes are shrouded 

Away from sight of men. 
And these dear feet are left without her guiding, 

Who shall direct them then ? 

How will they be allured, betrayed, deluded. 

Poor little untaught feet ! 
Into what dreary mazes will they wander. 

What dangers Avill they meet ? 



Will they go stuml.iling blindly in the darkness 
Of Sorrow's tearful shades ? 

Or find the iipland slopes of Peace and Beauty, 
Whose sunlight never fades ? 

Will they go toiling up Ambition's summit, 

The common world above ? 
Or in some nameless vale, securely sheltered, 

Walk side by side with Love ? 

Some feet there be which walk Life's track un- 
wounded, 

Which find but pleasant ways : 
Some hearts there be to wliich this life is only 

A round of happy ilays. 

But these are few. Far more there are who 
wander 

Without a hope or friend, — 
Who find their journey full of pains and losses. 

And long to reach the end. 

How shall it be with her, the tender stranger, 

Faii'-faced and gentle-eyed. 
Before whose unstained feet the world's rude 
highway 

Stretches so fair and wide ? 

Ah ! who may read the future ? For our darling 

We crave all blessings sweet. 

And pray that He who feeds the crying ravens 

Will guide the baby's feet. 

Anonymous. 



CRADLE SONG. 

Sleep, little baby of mine, 
Night and tlio darkness are near, 
But Jesus looks down 
Through the shadows that frown. 
And baby has nothing to fear. 

Shut, little sleepy blue eyes ; 

Dear little head, be at rest ; ^ 

Jesus, like you. 

Was a baby once, too, 

And slept on his own mother's breast. 

Sleep, little baby of mine, 

Soft on your pillow so white ; 

Jesus is here 

To watch over you, dear. 

And nothing can harm you to-night. 

0, little darling of mine. 

What can you know of the bliss, 

The comfort I keep. 

Awake and asleep. 

Because I am certain of this ? 

ANONYMOUS. 



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POEMS 07 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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THE BABY. 

Where did you come from, baby dear ? 
Out of the- everyivhere into the here. 

Where did you get your eyes so blue ? 
Out of the sky as I came through. 

What makes the light in them sparkle and spin ? 
So'iiie of the starry spikes left in. 

Where did you get that little tear ? 
I found it luaiting -when I got here. 

What makes your forehead so smooth and high ? 
A soft hand stroked it as I icent by. 

What makes your cheek like a warm white rose ? 
Something better than any one knows. 

Whence that three-cornered smile of bliss ! 
Three angels gave me at once a kiss. 

Where did you get that pearly ear ? 
God spoke, and it came out to hear. 

Where did yon get those arms and hands ? 

Love made itself into hooks ccnd bands. 

Feet, whence did you come, you darling things ? 
From the same box as the cherubs wings. 

How did they all just come to be you ? 
God thought about one, and so I grew. 

But how did you come to us, you dear ? 
God thought of you, and so I am here. 

GEORGE MACDONALD. 



THE BABY. 

On parents' knees, a naked, new-born child, 
Weeping thlKl sat'st when all around thee smiled : 
So live, that, sinking in thy last long sleep, 
Thou then mayst smile while all around thee 
weep. 

From the Sanscrit of CAHDASA, by 
SIR WILLIAM JONES. 



a 



NUESE'S WATCH. 

FROM THE GERMAN. 

The moon it shines. 

My darling whines ; 
The clock strikes twelve : — God cheer 
The sick, both far and near. 



God knoweth all ; '*' 

Mousy nibbles in the wall ; / 
The clock strikes one : — like day, 
Dreams o'er thy pillow play. 

The matin-bell 

Wakes the nun in convent cell ; 
The clock strikes two : — they go 
To choir in a row. 

The wind it blows. 

The cock he crows ; 
The clock strikes three : — the wagoner 
In his straw bed begins to stir. 

The steed he paws the floor, 

Creaks the stable-door ; 
The clock strikes four : — 't is plain, 
The coachman sifts his grain. 

The swallow's laugh the still air shakes, 

The sun awakes ; 
The clock strikes five : — the traveller must be 

gone. 
He puts his stockings on. 

The hen is clacking, 

The ducks are quacking ; 
The clock stiikes six : — awake, arise, 
Thou lazy hag ; come, ope thy eyes. 

Quick to the baker's run ; 

The rolls are done ; 
The clock strikes seven : — 
"T is time the milk were in the oven. 

Put in some butter, do. 

And some fine sugar too ; 
The clock strikes eight : — 
Now bring my baby's porridge straight. 

Translation of CHARLES T. BROOKS. 



BABY LOUISE. 

I 'm in love with yoir. Baby Louise ! 
With your silken hair, and your soft blue eyes. 
And the dreamy wisdom that in them lies. 
And the faint, sweet smile you brought from the 
skies, — 

God's sunshine. Baby Louise. 

When you fold your hands. Baby Louise, 
Your hands, like a fairy's, so tiny and fair, 
With a prett}'', innocent, saint-like air. 
Are you trying to think of some angel-taught 
prayer 

You learned above, Baby Louise ? 



a 



.>.W'''?-.'''l'"« 








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* * ^.i^v^ , X ^ -v 




LONGFELLOW'S HOME AT CAMBRIDGE. 

" Somewhat back from the village street 
Stands the old-Jashio>ied cozintry seat." 



^^ Once — ah! once — ■within these halls 
One who7n memory oft recalls. 

The Father of his Coietttry, dwelt." 



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INFANCY. 



79 



m-l 



I 'ni in love with you, Baby Louise ! 
Why ! you never raise your beautiful head ! 
Some day, little one, your cheek will grow red 
AYith a flush of delight, to hear the word said, 

" I love you," Baby Louise. 

Do you hear me. Baby Louise ? 

I have sung your praises for nearly an hour. 

And your lashes keep drooping lower and lower. 

And — you 've gone to sleep, like a weary flower, 

Ungrateful Baby Louise ! 

Margaret Eytinge. 



THE BABIE. 

Nae shoon to hide her tiny taes, 

Nae stockings on her feet ; 
Her supple ankles white as snow 

Of early blossoms sweet. 

Her simple dress of spiinkled pink. 

Her double, dimpled chin ; 
Her puckered lip and bonny niou', 

"With nae ane tooth between. 

Her een sae like her mither's een, 

Twa gentle, liquid things ; 
Her face is like an angel's face — 

We 're glad she has nae wings. 

HUGH Miller. 



THE HOUSEHOLD SOVEREIGN. 

FROM " THE HANGING OP THE CRANE." 

Seated I see the two again, 
But not alone; they entertain 
A little angel unaware, 
With face as round as is the moon ; 
A royal guest with flaxen hair, 
Wlio, throned upon his lofty chair, 
Drums on the table with his spoon, 
Then drops it careless on the floor, 
To grasp at things unseen before. 
Are these celestial manners ? these 
The ways that win, the arts that please ? 
Ah, yes ; consider well the guest. 
And whatsoe'er he does seems beat ; 
He ruleth by the right divine 
Of helplessness, so lately born 
In purple chambers of the morn, 
As sovereign over thee and thine. 
He speaketh not, and yet there lies 
A conversation in his eyes ; 
The golden silence of the Greek, 
The gravest wisdom of the wise, 
Not spoken in language, but in looks 
More legible than printed books, 



As if he could but would not speak. 
And now, monarch absolute. 
Thy power is put to proof ; for lo ! 
Resistless, fathomless, and slow, 
The nurse comes rustling like the sea. 
And pushes back thy chair and thee. 
And so good night to King Canute. 

he.nry .wausworth Longfellow. 



BABY BELL. 

Have you not heard the poets tell 
How came tlie dainty Baby Bell 

Into this world of ours ? 
The gates of heaven were left ajar : 
Witli folded hands and dreamj'' eyes. 
Wandering out of Paradise, . 

She saw this planet, like a star. 

Hung in the glistening depths of even, — 
Its bridges, running to and fro. 
O'er which the white-winged angels go. 

Bearing the holy dead to heaven. 
She touched a bridge of flowers, — tho.se feet. 
So light they did not bend the bells 
Of tlie celestial asphodels. 
They fell like dew upon the flowers : 
Thou all the air grew strangely sweet ! 
And thus came dainty Baby Bell 

Into this world of ours. 

She came, aud brought delicious Ma}'. 

The swallows built beneath the eaves ; 

Like sunlight, in and out the leavcs 
The robins went the livelong day ; 
The lily swung its noiseless bell ; 

And o'er the porch the trembling vine 

Seemed burstmg with its veins of wine. 
How sweetly, softly, twilight fell! 
O, earth was full of singing-birds 
Aud opening spring-tide flowers, 
Wlien the dainty Baby Bell 

Came to this world of ours ! 

O, Baby, dainty Baby Bell, 
How fair slie grew from day to day ! 
What woman-nature filled her eyes, 
What poetrj' within them lay ! 
Those deep and tender twilight eyes, 

So full of meaning, pure and bright 

As if she yet stood in the light 
Of those oped gates of Paradise. 
And so we loved her more and more : 
Ah, never in our hearts before 

Was love so lovely born : 
We felt we had a link between 
This real world and that unseen — 

The land beyond the morn ; 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AxND YOUTH. 



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And for the love of those clear eyes, 
For love of her whom God led forth 
(The mother's being ceased on earth 
When Baby came from Paradise), — 
For love of Him who smote onr lives, 

And woke the chords of joy and pain, 
We said, Z^cfM' Christ ! — our hearts bent down 

Like violets after rain. 



And now the orchards, which were white 
And red with blossoms when she came. 
Were rich in autumn's mellow prime ; 
The clustered apples burnt like flame. 
The soft-cheeked peaches blushed and fell, 
The ivory chestnut burst its shell, 
The' grapes hung purpling in the grange ; 
And time wrought just as rich a change 

In little Baby Bell. 
Her lissome form more perfect grew, 
And in her features we could trace, 
In softened curves, her mother's face. 
Her angel-nature ripened too : 
We thought her lovely when she came, 
But she was holy, saintly now : — 
Around her pale angelic brow 
AVe saw a slender ring of flame ! 



God's hand had taken away the seal 

That held the portals of her speech ; 

And oft she said a few strange words 

Whose meaning lay beyond our reach. 

She never was a child to us. 

We never held her being's key ; 

Wc could not teach her holy things : 
She was Christ's self in purity. 

It came upon ns by degrees, 

We saw its shadow ere it fell, — 

The knowledge that our God had sent 

His messenger for Baby Bell. 

We sliuddered with unlanguaged pain. 

And all our hopes were changed to fears, 

And all our thoughts ran into tears 

Like sunshine into rain. 
We cried aloud in our belief, 
" 0, smite us gently, gently, God ! 
Teach us to bend and kiss the rod, 
And perfect grow through grief." 
Ah, how we loved her, God can tell ; 
Her heart was folded deep in ours. 

Our hearts are broken, Baby Bell ! 

At last he came, the messenger, 

The messenger from unseen lands : 
And what did dainty Baby Bell ? 
• She only crossed her little hands. 



She only looked more meek and fair ! 
We parted back her silken hair. 
We wove the roses round her brow, — 
White buds, the summer's drifted snow, — 
Wrapt her from head to foot in flowers ! 
And thus went dainty Baby Bell 
Out of this world of ours ! 

Thomas Bailey Aldrich. 



NO BABY IN THE HOUSE. 

No baby in the house, I know, 

'T is far too nice and clean. 
No toys, by careless Angers strewn, 

Upon the floors are seen. 
No finger-marks are on the panes, 

No scratches on the chairs ; 
No wooden men set up in rows, 

Or marshalled off' in pairs ; 
No little stockings to be darned. 

All ragged at the toes ; 
No pile of mending to be done, 

Made up of baby-clothes ; 
No little troubles to be soothed ; 

No little hands to fold ; 
No grimy fingers to be washed ; 

No stories to be told ; 
No tender kisses to be given ; 

No nicknames, " Dove " and " Mouse ; ' 
No merry frolics after tea, — 

No baby in the house ! 

Clara G. Dolliver. 



WHAT DOES LITTLE BIRDIE SAY? 

FROM " SEA DREAMS.'" 

What does little birdie say 
In her nest at peep of day ? 
Let me fly, says little birdie, 
Mother, let me fly away. 
Birdie, rest a little longer, 
Till the little wings are stronger. 
So she rests a little longer. 
Then she flies away. 

What does little baby say, 
In her bed at i)cep of day ? 
Baby says, like little birdie. 
Let me rise and fly away. 
Baby sleep, a little longer, 
Till the little limbs are stronger. 
If she sleeps a little longer. 
Baby too shall fly away. 

ALFRED Tennyson. 



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INFANCY. 



81 



a 



ON THE PICTURE OF AN INFANT 

PLAYING NEAR A PRECIPICE. 

While on tlie cliff with calm delight she kneels, 
And the blue vales a thousand joys recall, 

See, to the last, last verge her infant steals ! 
0, Hy — yet stir not, speak not, lest it fall. — 

Far better taught, she lays her bosom bare. 

And the fond boy springs back to nestle there. 

LEONIDAS of Alexandria (Greek). Translation 
of SAMUEL ROGERS. 



LULLABY. 



FROM " THE PRINCESS." 



Sweet and low, sweet and low, 

Wind of the western sea, 
Low, low, breathe and blow, 

Wind of the western sea ! 
Over the rolling waters go, 
Come from the dying moon, and blow, 

Blow him again to me ; 
While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps. 

Sleep and rest, sleep and rest, 

Father will come to thee soon ; 
Rest, rest, on mother's breast. 

Father will come to thee soon ; 
Father will come to his babe in the nest. 
Silver sails all out of the west 
Under the silver moon : 
Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty one, sleep. 
Alfred Tennyson. 



I& 



THE ANGEL'S WHISPER. 

In Ireland tliey have a pretty fancy, that, when a child smiles in 
its sleep, it is " talking with angels." 

A BABY was sleeping ; 

Its mother was weeping ; 
For her husband was far on the wild raging sea ; 

And the tempest was swelling 

Round the fisherman's dwelling ; 
And she cried, " Dermot, darling ! come back 
to me ! " 

Her beads while she numbered 

The baby still slumbered, 
And smiled in her face as she bended her knee : 

" 0, blessed be that warning. 

My child, thy sleep adorning, — 
For I know that the angels are wliisj)ering with 
thee. 

" And while they are keeping 
Bright watch o'er thy sleeping. 



0, pray to them softly, my baby, with me, — 
And say thou wouldst ratlier 
They 'd watch o'er thy father ! 

For I know that the angels are whispering to 
thee." 

The dawn of the morning 
Saw Dermot returning, 
And the wife wept with joy her babe's father to 
see ; 
And closely caressing 
Her child with a blessing, 
Said, " I knew that the angels were whispering 
with thee." 

SAMUEL I.OVER. 



MOTHER AND CHILD. 

The wind blew wide the casement, and within — 
It was the loveliest picture ! — a sweet child 
Lay in its mother's arms, and drew its life. 
In pauses, from the fountain, — the white round 
Part shaded by loose tresses, soft and dark. 
Concealing, but still showing, the fair realm 
Of so much rapture, as green shadowing trees 
With beauty shroud the brooklet. Tlie red lips 
Were parted, and the cheek upon the breast 
Lay close, and, like the young leaf of the flower, 
Wore the same color, rich and warm and fresh : — 
And such alone are beautiful. Its eye, 
A full blue gem, most exquisitely set. 
Looked archly on its world, • — the little imp, 
As if it knew even then that such a wreath 
Were not for all ; and with its playful hands 
It drew aside the robe that hid its realm. 
And peeped and laughed aloud, and so it laid 
Its head upon tlie shrine of such pure joys, 
And, laughing, slept. And while it slept, the tears 
Of the sweet mother fell upon its cheek, — 
Tears such as fall from April skies, and bring 
The sunlight after. They were tears of joy ; 
And the true heart of that young mother then 
Grew lighter, and she sang unconsciously 
The silliest ballad-song that ever yet 
Subdued the nursery's voices, and brought sleep 
To fold her sabbath wings above its couch. 

William Gilmore Simms. 



BABY ZULMA'S CHRISTMAS CAROL. 

A LIGHTER scarf of richer fold 

The morning flushed upon our sight. 

And Evening trimmed her lamps of gold 
From deeper springs of purer light ; 

And softer drips bedewed the lea, 

And whiter blossoms veiled the tree, 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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And bluer waves danced on the sea 
When baby Zulma came to be ! 

The day before, a bird had sung 

Strange greetings on the roof and flown 

And Night's immaculate priestess flung 
A diamond from her parted zone 

Upon the crib beside the bed, 

Whereunto, as the doctor said, 

A king or queen would soon be led 

Bj^ some sweet Ariel overhead. 

Ere yet the sun had crossed the line 

When we, at Aries' double bars. 
Behold him, tempest-beaten, shine 

In stormy Libra's triple stars : 
What time the hillsides shake with corn 
And boughs of fruitage laugh unshorn 
And cheery echoes wake the morn 
To gales of fragrance harvest-born. 

In storied spots of vernal flame 

And breezy realnVs of tossing shade. 
The tripping elves tumultuous came 

To join the fairy cavalcade : 
From blushing chambers of the rose, 
And bowers the lily's buds enclose, 
And nooks and dells of deep repose, 
Where Iiuman sandal never goes. 

The rabble poured its motley tide : 

Some iipon airy chariots rode. 
By eupids showered from side to side, 
And some the dragon-fly bestrode ; 
While troops of vii-gins, left and right. 
Like microscopic trails of light. 
The sweeping pageant made as bright 
As beams a rainbow in its flight ! 

It passed : the bloom of purple plums 

Was rippled by trumpets rallying long 
O'er beds of pinks ; and dwarfish drums 

Struck all the insect world to song : 
The milkmaid caught the low refrain, 
The ploughman answered to her strain. 
And every warbler of the plain 
The ringing chorus chirped again ! 

Beneath the sunset's faded arch. 

It formed and filed within our porch. 
With not a ray to guide its march 

Except the twilight's silver torch : 
And thus she came from clouds above, 
With spirits of the glen and grove, 
A flower of grace, a cooing dove, 
A shrine of prayer and star of love ! 

A queen of hearts ! — her mighty chains 
Are beads of coral round her strung, 



And, ribbon-diademed, she reigns. 

Commanding in an unknown tongue : 
The kitten spies her cunning ways, 
The patient cur romps in her plays, 
And glimpses of her eailier days 
Are seen in picture-books of fays. 

To fondle all things doth she choose, 

And when she gets, what some one sends. 

A trifling gift of tiny shoes. 

She kisses both as loving friends ; 

For in her eyes this orb of care, 

Whose hopes are heaps of frosted hair, 

Is but a garland, trim and fair, 

Of cherubs twining in the air. 

0, from a soul suffused with tears 

Of trust thou mayst be spared the thorn 

Which it has felt in other years, — 
Across the morn our Lord was born, 

I waft thee blessings ! At thy side 

May his invisible seraphs glide ; 

And tell thee still, whate'er betide. 

For thee, for thine, for all. He died ! 

AUGUSTUS JULIAN REQUIER. 



BABY'S SHOES. 

0, THOSE little, those little blue shoes ! 

Those shoes that no little feet use. 
the price were high 
That those shoes would buy, 

Those little blue imused shoes ! 

For they hold the small shape of feet 
That no more their mother's eyes meet, 

That, by God's good will. 

Years since, grew still. 
And ceased from their totter so sweet. 

And 0, since that baby slept. 

So hushed, how the mother has kept, 

With a tearful pleasure. 

That little dear treasure. 
And o'er them thought and wept ! 

For they mind her forevermore 
Of a patter along the floor ; 

And blue eyes she sees 

Look up from her knees 
With the look that in life they wore. 

As they lie before her there. 
There babbles from chau- to chair 

A little sweet face 

That 's a gleam in the place, 
With its little gold curls of hah-. 



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INFANCY. 






80 
O 



Then wonder not that her heart 
From all else would rather part 

Than those tiny blue shoes 

That no little feet use, 
And whose sight makes such fond tears start ! 
William Cox Bennett. 



t& 



OUR WEE WHITE ROSE. 

All in our .marriage garden 

Grew, smiling up to God, 
A bonnier flower tlian ever 

Suckt the green warmth of the sod ; 
0, Leaiitiful unfathomably 

Its little life unfurled ; 
And crown of all things was our wee 

White Rose of all the world. 

From out a balmy bosom 

Our bud of beauty grew ; 
It fed on smiles for sunshine, 

On tears for daintier dew : 
Aye nestling warm and tenderly, 

Our leaves of love were curled 
So close and close about our wee 

White Rose of all the world. 

With mystical faint fragrance 

Our house of life she filled ; 
Revealed each hour some fairy tower 

Where winged hopes might build ! 
We saw — though none like us might see — 

Such precious promise pearled 
Upon the petals of our wee 

White Rose of all the world. 

But evermore the halo 

Of angel- light increased, 
Like the mystery of moonlight 

That folds some fairy feast. 
Snow-white, snow-soft, snow-silently 

Our darling bud upcurled. 
And dropt i' the grave — God's lap — our wee 

White Rose of all the world. 

Our Rose was but in blossom, 

Our life was but in spring, 
When down the solemn midnight 

We heard the spirits sing, 
"Another bud of infancy 

With holy dews impearled ! " 
And in their hands they bore our wee 

White Rose of all the world. 

You scarce could think so small a thing 

Could leave a loss so large ; 
Her little light such shadow fling 

From dawn to sunset's marsre. 



In other springs our life may be 
In bannered bloom unfurled. 

But never, never match our wee 
White Rose of all the world. 

Gerald massey. 



WILLIE WINKIE. 

Wee Willie Winkie rins through the town. 
Up stairs and doon stairs, in his nicht-govvn, 
Tiilin' at the window, cryin' at the lock, 
"Are the weans in their bed ? — for it's now ten 
o'clock." 

Hey, Willie Winkie ! are ye comin' ben ? 

The cat 's singin' gay thrums to the sleepin' hen. 

The doug 's speldered on the floor, and disna gie 

a cheep ; 
But here 's a waukrife laddie, that winna fa' 

asleep. 

Ony thing but sleep, ye rogue: — glow'rin' like 

the moon, 
Rattlin' in an airn jug wi' an airn spoon, 
Rumblin', tumblin' roun' about, crawin' like a 

cock, 
Skiiiin' like a kenna-what — wauknin' sleepin' 

folk ! 

Hey, Willie Winkie ! the wean '3 in a creel ! 
Waumblin' aff" a bodie's knee like a vera eel, 
Ruggin' at the cat's lug, and ravcllin' a' her 

thrums : 
Hey, Willie Winkie ! — See, there he comes ! 

Wearie is the mither that has a storie wean, 

A wee stumpie stoussie, that canna rin his lane. 

That has a battle aye wi' sleep, before he '11 close 

an ee ; 

But a kiss frae aff his rosy lips gies strength 

anew to me. 

William Miller. 



THE MOTHER'S HEART. 

When first thou camest, gentle, shy, and fond. 
My eldest born, first hope, and dearest treasure. 

My heart received thee with a joy beyond 
All that it yet had felt of earthly pleasure ; 

Nor thought that any love again might be 

So deep and strong as that I felt for thee. 

Faithful and true, with sense beyond thy years. 
And natural piety that leaned to heaven ; 

Wrung by a harsh word suddenly to tears. 
Yet patient to rebuke when justly given ; 

Obedient, easy to be reconciled. 

And meekly cheerful ; such wert thou, my 
child ! 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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JSTot willing to be left — still by my side, 

Haunting my walks, while summer-day was 
dying ; 
Nor leaving in thy turn, but pleased to glide 
Through the dark room where I was sadly 
lying ; 
Or by the couch of pain, a sitter meek, 
Watch the dim eye, and kiss the fevered cheek. 

boy ! of such as thou are oftenest made 
Earth's fragile idols ; like a tender flower, 

No strength in all thy freshness, prone to fade, 
And bending weakly to the thunder-shower ; 

Still, round the loved, thy heart found force to 
bind, 

And clung, like woodbine shaken in the wind ! 

Then thou, my merry love, — bold in thy glee, 
Under the bough, or by the firelight dancing, 

With thy sweet temper, and thy spirit free, — 
Didst come, as restless as a bird's wing glan- 
cing. 

Full of a Avild and irrepressible mirth, 

Like a young sunbeam to the gladdened earth ! 

Thine was the shout, the song, the burst of joy. 
Which sweet from childhood's rosy lip re- 
soundeth ; 
Thine was the eager spirit naught could cloy, 
And the glad heart from which all grief re- 
bovmdeth ; 
And many a mirthful jest and mock reply 
Lurked in the laughter of thy dark-blue eye. 

And thine was many an art to win and bless, 
The cold and stern to joy and fondness warm- 
ing ; 
The coaxing smile, the frequent soft caress. 
The earnest, tearful prayer all wrath disarm- 
ing ! 
Again my heart a new affection found. 
But thoiight that love with thee had reached its 
bound. 

At length thou camest, — thou, the last and 
least. 
Nicknamed " the Emperor " by thy laughing 
brothers, 
Because a haughty spirit swelled thy breast. 
And thou didst seek to rule and sway the 
others. 
Mingling with every playful infant wile 
A mimic majesty that made us smile. 

And 0, most like a regal child Avert thou ! 

An eye of resolute and successful scheming ! 
Fair shoulders, curling lips, and dauntless brow. 

Fit for the world's strife, not for poet's dream- 
ing : 



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And proud the lifting of thy stately head. 
And the firm bearing of thy conscious tread. 

Different from both ! yet each succeeding claim 
I, that all other love had been forswearing. 

Forthwith admitted, equal and the same ; 
Nor injured either by this love's comparing. 

Nor stole a fraction for the newer call, — 

But in the mother's heart found room for all ! 
Caroline E. Norton. 



THE MOTHER'S HOPE. 

Is there, when the winds are singing 
In the happy summer time, — 

When the raptured air is ringing 

With Earth's music heavenward springing, 
Forest chirp, and village chime, — 

Is there, of the sounds that float 

Unsighingly, a single note 

Half so sweet and clear and wild 

As the laughter of a child ? 

Listen ! and be now delighted : 

Morn hath touched her golden strings ; 

Earth and Sky their vows have plighted ; 

Life and Light are reunited 
Amid countless caroUings ; 

Yet, delicious as they are, 

There 's a sound that 's sweeter far, — ■ 

One that makes the heart rejoice 

More than all, — the human voice ! 

Organ finer, deeper, clearer, 

Though it be a stranger's tone, — 

Than the winds or waters dearer, 

More enchanting to the hearer. 
For it answereth to his own. 

But, of all its witching words, 

Sweeter than the song of birds, 

Those are sweetest, bubbling wild 

Through the laughter of a child. 

Harmonies from time-touched towers, 

Haunted strains from rivulets. 
Hum of bees among the flowers, 
Rustling leaves, and silver showers, — 

These, erelong, the ear forgets ; 
But in mine there is a sound 
Ringing on the whole year round, — 
Heart-deep laughter that I heard 
Ere my child could speak a word. 

Ah ! 't was heard by ear far purer, 

Fondlier formed to catch the strain, — 

Ear of one whose love is surer, — 

Hers, the mother, the endurer 
Of the deepest share of pain ; 



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CHILDHOOD. 



85 



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Hers the deepest bliss to treasure 
Memories of that cry of pleasure 
Hers to hoard, a lifetime after, 
Echoes of that infant laughter. 

'T is a mother's large affection 

Hears with a mysterious sense, — 
Breathings that evade detection. 
Whisper faint, and tine inflection, 

Thrill in her with power intense. 
Childhood's honeyed words untaught 
Hivetli she in loving thought, — 
Tones that never thence depart ; 
For she listens — with her heart. 

LAMAN BLANCHARD. 



THE PIPER. 

Piping down the valleys wild, 
Piping songs of pleasant glee. 
On a cloud I saw a child. 
And he laughing said to me : — 

" Pipe a song about a lamb : " 
So 1 piped with merry cheer. 
"Piper, pipe that song again :" 
So I piped ; he wept to liear. 

" Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe, 
Sing thy songs of happy cheer : " 
So I sung the same again. 
While he wept with joy to hear. 

" Piper, sit thee down and write 
In a book that all may read — " 
So he vanished from my sight ; 
And I plucked a hollow reed. 

And I made a rural pen, 
And I stained tlie water clear. 
And I wrote my happy songs 
Every child may joy to hear. 

WILLIAM BLAKE. 



LITTLE GOLDENHAIR. 

GoLDENHAiR climbed up on grandpapa's knee ; 
Dear little Goldenhair ! tired was she, 
All the day busy as busy could be. 

Up in the morning as soon as 't was light. 
Out with the birds and butterflies bright, 
Skipping about till the coming of night. 

Grandpapa toyed with the curls on her head. 

" What has my baby been doing," he said, 

" Since she arose, with the sun, from her bed ? ' 



" Pitty much," answered the sweet little one ; 
" I cannot tell so much things I have done, — 
Played with my dolly and feeded my Bun. 

" And I have jumped with my little jump-rope. 
And 1 made out of some water and soap 
Buiitle worlds ! mamma's castles of Hope. 

" And I have readed in my picture-book, 

And little Bella and I went to look 

For some smooth stones by the side of the brool^. 

"Then 1 corned home and I eated my tea. 
And 1 climbed up to my grandpapa's knee. 
I jes as tired as tired can be." 

Lower and lower the little head pressed. 
Until it drooped upon grandpapa's breast ; 
Dear little Goldenhair ! sweet be thy rest ! 

We are but children ; the things that we do 
Are as sports of a babe to the Infinite view 
That sees all our weakness, and pities it too. 

God grant that when night overshadows our way. 
And we shall be called to account for our day. 
He shall find us as guileless as Goldenhair's play ! 

And 0, when aweary, may we be so blest 
As to sink like the innocent child to our rest. 
And feel ourselves clasped to the Infinite breast ! 

F. BURGE SlIITH. 



THE GAMBOLS OF CHILDREN. 

Down the dimpled greensward dancing, 
Bursts a flaxen-headed bevy, — 

Bud-lipt boys and girls advancing, 
Love's irregular little levy. 

Rows of liquid eyes in laughter. 

How they glimmer, how they quiver ! 

Sparkling one another after. 
Like bright ripples on a river. 

Tipsy band of rubious faces. 

Flushed witli Joy's ethereal spirit, 

Make your mocks and sly grimaces 
At Love's self, and do not fear it. 

George Darley. 



UNDER MY WINDOW. 

Under my window, under my window. 
All in the Midsummer weather. 

Three little girls with fluttering curls 
Flit to and fro together : — 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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There 's Bell with her bonnet of satin sheen, 
And Maud with her mantle of silver-green, 
And Kate with her scarlet feather. 

Under my window, under my window. 

Leaning stealthily over, 
Merry and clear, the voice I hear. 

Of each glad-hearted rover. 
Ah ! sly little Kate, she steals my roses ; 
And Maud and Bell twine wreaths and posies, 

As merry as bees in clover. 

Under my window, under my window, 
In the blue Midsummer weather, 

Stealing slow, on a hushed tiptoe, 
I catch them all together : — 

Bell with her bonnet of .satin sheen, 

And Maud with her mantle of silver-green, 
And Kate with the scarlet feather. 

Under my window, under my window. 
And off through the orchard clo.ses; 

While Maud she flouts, and Bell she pouts. 
They scamper and drop their posies ; 

But dear little Kate takes naught amiss, 

And leaps in my arms with a loving kiss. 

And I give her all my roses. 

Thomas Westwood, 



CHILDHOOD. 

In my poor mind it is most sweet to muse 

Upon the days gone by ; to act in thought 

Past seasons o'er, and be again a child ; 

To sit in fancy on the turf-clad slope, 

Down which the child would roll ; to pluck gay 

flowers. 
Make posies in the sun, which the child's hand 
(Childhood offended soon, soon reconciled). 
Would throw away, and straight take up again, 
Then fling them to the winds, and o'er the lawn 
Bound with so playful and so light a foot, 
That the pressed daisy scarce declined her head. 

CHARLES Lamb. 



THE MOTHER'S SACPJFICE. 

The cold winds swept the mountain's height. 

And pathless was the dreary wild. 
And mid the cheerless houi's of night 

A mother wandered with her child : 
As through the drifting snow she pressed. 
The babe was sleeping on her breast. 

And colder still the winds did blow, 
And darker hours of night came on, 

And deeper grew the drifting snow : 

Her limbs were chilled, her strength was gone. 



" God !" she cried in accents wild, 
"If I must perish, save my child ! " 

She stripped her mantle from her breast. 
And bared her bosom to the storm. 

And round the child she wrapped the vest. 
And smiled to think her babe was warm. 

With one cold kiss, one tear she shed. 

And sunk upon her snowy bed. 

At dawn a traveller passed by, 
And saw her 'neath a snowy veil ; 

The frost of death was in her eye. 

Her cheek was cold and hard and pale. 

He moved the robe from off the child, — 

The babe looked up and sweetly smiled ! 

Seba Smith. 



SEVEN TIMES FOUR. 

MATERNITY. 

Heioh-ho ! daisies and buttercups, 

Fair yellow daffodils, stately and tall ! 
When the wind wakes, how they rock in the 
grasses, 
And dance with the cuckoo-buds slender and 
small ! 
Here's two bonny boys, and here's mother's 
own lasses. 
Eager to gather them all. 

Heigh-ho ! daisies and buttercups ! 

Mother shall thread them a daisy chain ; 
Sing them a song of the pretty hedge-sparrow, 
That loved her brown little ones, loved them 
full fain ; 
Sing, " Heart, thou art wide, though the house 
be but narrow," — 
Sing once, and sing it again. 

Heigh-ho ! daisies and buttercups, 

Sweet wagging cowslips, they bend and they 
bow ; 
A ship sails afar over warm ocean waters. 

And haply one musing doth stand at her prow. 
bonny brown sons, and sweet little daugh- 
ters, 
Maybe he thinks on you now ! 

Heigh-ho ! daisies and buttercups. 

Fair yellow daffodils, stately and tall — 
A sunshiny world full of laughter and leisure. 
And fresh hearts unconscious of sorrow and 
thrall ! 
Send down on their pleasure smiles passing its 
measure, 
God that is over us all ! 

Jean Ingelow. 



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INFANCY. 



87 



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BOYHOOD. 

Ah, then how sweetly closed those crowded days ! 
The minutes parting one by one, like rays 

That fade upon a summer's eve. 
But 0, what charm or magic numbers 
Can give me back the gentle slumbers 

Those weary, happy days did leave ? 
When by my bed I saw my mother kneel, 

And with her blessing took her nightly kiss ; 

Whatever time destroys, he cannot this ; — 
E'en now that nameless kiss I feel. 

WASHINGTON ALLSTON. 

— « — 
SEVEN TIMES ONE. 

There 's no dew left on the daisies and clover. 

There 's no rain left in heaven. 
I 've said my "seven times" over and over, — 

Seven times one are seven. 

I am old, — so old I can write a letter ; 

My birthday lessons are done. 
The lambs play always, — they know no better ; 

They are only one times one, 

Moon ! in the night I have seen you sailing 

And shining so round and low. 
You were bright — ah, bright — but your light 
is failing ; 
You are nothing now but a bow. 

You Moon ! have you done something wrong in 
heaven. 
That God has hidden your face ? 

1 hope, if you have, you will soon be forgiven, 

And shine again in your place. 

velvet Bee ! you 're a dusty fellow, — 
You 've powdered your legs with gold. 

brave marsh Mary-buds, rich and yellow. 
Give me your money to hold ! 

Columbine ! open your folded wrapper, 
Where two twin turtle-doves dwell ! 

Cuckoo-pint ! toll me the purple clapper 

That hangs in your clear green bell ! 

And show me your nest, with the young ones in 
it, — 
I will not steal them away ; 

1 am old ! you may trust me, linnet, linnet ! 

I am seven times one to-day. 

Jean Ingelow. 



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WE ARE SEVEN. 

A SIMPLE child. 
That lightly draws its breath, 
And feels its life in every limb, 
What should it know of death ? 



I met a little cottage girl : 

She was eight years old, she said ; 

Her hair was thick with many a curl 
That clustered round her head. 

She had a riistic, woodland air, 

And she was wildly clad ; 
Her eyes were fair, and very fair ; — 

Her beauty made me glad, 

" Sisters and brothers, little maid, 

How many may you be ? " 
" How many ? Seven in all," she said, 

And wondering looked at me. 

" And where are they ? I pray you tell." 

She answered, " Seven are we ; 
And two of us at Conway dwell, 

And two are gone to sea ; 

" Two of us in the churchyard lie, 

My sister and my brother ; 
And, in the churchyard cottage, I 

Dwell near them with my mother," 

" You say that two at Conway dwell. 

And two are gone to sea. 
Yet ye are seven ! I pray you tell, 

Sweet maid, how this may be." 

Then did the little maid reply, 

" Seven boys and girls are we ; 
Two of us in the churchyard lie 

Beneath the churchyard tree." 

" You run about, my little maid ; 

Your limbs they are alive ; 
If two are in the churchyard laid. 

Then ye are only five." 

"Their graves are gi-een, they may be seen," 

The little maid replied : 
" Twelve steps or more from my mother's door, 

And they are side by side. 

" My stockings there I often knit. 

My kerchief there I hem ; 
And there upon the ground I sit, 

And sing a song to them. 

" And often after sunset, sir. 

When it is light and fair, 
I take my little porringer. 

And eat my supper there. 

" The first that died was Sister Jane ; 

In bed she moaning lay. 
Till God released her of her pain ; 

And then she went away. 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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" So in the churchyard she was laid ; 

And, when the grass was dry, 
Together round her grave we played, 

My brother John and I. 

"And when the ground was white with snow. 

And I could run and slide, 
My brother John was forced to go, 

And he lies by her side." 

" How many are you, then," said I, 

" If they two are in heaven ? " 
Quick was the little maid's reply ! 

"0 Master ! we are seven." 

" But they are dead ; those two are dead ! 

Their spirits ar& in heaven ! " 
'T was throwing words away ; for still 
The little maid would have her will, 

And said, "Nay, we are seven." 

William Wordsworth. 



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TO A CHILD DURING SICKNESS. 

Sleep breathes at last from out thee, 

My little patient boy ; 
And balmy rest about thee 
Smooths off the day's annoy. 
I sit me down, and think 
Of all thy winning ways ; 
Yet almost wish, with sudden shrink, 
That I had less to praise. 

Thy sidelong pillowed meekness ; 

Thy thanks to all that aid ; 
Thy heart, in pain and weakness, 
Of fancied faults afraid ; 

The little trembling hand 
That wipes thy quiet tears, — 
These, these are things that may demand 
Dread memories for years. 

Sorrows I 've had, severe ones, 

I will not think of now ; 
And calmly, midst my dear ones, 
Have wasted with dry brow ; 
But when thy fingers press 
And pat my stooping head, 
I cannot bear the gentleness, — 
The tears are in their bed. 

Ah, first-born of thy mother, 

When life and hope were new ; 
Kind playmate of thy brother, 
Thy sister, father too ; 

My light, -where'er I go ; 
My bird, when prison-bound ; 
My hand-in-hand companion — No, 
My prayers shall hold thee round. 



To say, " He has departed " — 

" His voice " — " his face " — is gone, 
To feel impatient-hearted, 
Yet feel we must bear on, — 

Ah, I could not endure 
To whisper of such woe. 
Unless I felt this sleep insuz'e 
That it will not be so. 

Yes, still he 's fixed, and sleeping ! 

This silence too the while, — 
Its very hush and creeping 
Seem whispering us a smile ; 
Something divine and dim 
Seems going by one's ear, 
Like parting wings of cherubim, 

Who say, "We 've finished here." 

Leigh Hunt. 



LITTLE BELL. 

Piped the Blackbird, on the beechwood spray, 
" Pretty maid, slow wandering this way, 

What 's your name ? " quoth he, — 
" What 's your name ? 0, stop and straight un- 
fold, 
Pretty maid with showery curls of gold." — 

" Little Bell," said she. 

Little Bell sat down beiieath the rocks, 
Tossed aside her gleaming golden locks, — 

" Bonny bird," quoth she, 
" Sing me your best song before I go." 
" Here 's the very finest song I know, 

Little Bell," said he. 

And the Blackbird piped ; you never heard 
Half so gay a song from any bird, — 

Full of quips and wiles. 
Now so round and rich, now soft and slow, 
All for love of that sweet face below, 

Dimpled o'er with smiles. 

And the while that bonny bird did pour 
His full heart out, freely o'er and o'er 

'Neath the morning skies. 
In the little childish heart below 
All the sweetness seemed to grow and grow, 
And shine forth in happy overflow 

From the brown, bright eyes. 

Down the dell she tripped, and through the glade ; 
Peeped the squirrel from the hazel shade, 

And from out the tree 
Swung and leaped and frolicked, void of fear ; 
While bold Blackbird piped, that all might 
hear, — 

" Little Bell !" piped he. 



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INFANCY. 



rfli 



Little Bell sat down amid the fern : 
"Squirrel, Squirrel, to your task return ; 

Bring me nuts," quoth she. 
Up, away ! the frisky Squirrel hies, — 
Golden wood-lights glancing in his eyes, — 

And adown the tree 
Great ripe nuts, kissed brown by July sun. 
In, the little lap drop one by one. 
Hark, how Blackbird pipes to see the fun ! 

'^ Haiopij Bell ! " pi^jes he. 

^Little Bell looked up and down the glade: 
"S(|uirrel, Squirrel, from the nut-tree shade, 
Bonny Blackbird, if you 're not afraid, 

Come and share with me ! " 
Down came Squirrel, eager for his fare, 
Down came bonny Blackbird, I declare ; 
Little Bell gave each his honest share, — 
All ! the merry three ! 

And the while those frolic playmates twain 
Piped and frisked from bough to bough again, 

'Neath the morning skies. 
In the little childish heart below 
All the sweetness seemed to grow and grow. 
And shine out in happy overflow 

From her brown, bright eyes. 

By her snow-white cot, at close of day. 
Knelt sweet Bell, with folded palms, to j)ray ; 

Very calm and clear 
Rose the praying voice to where, unseen. 
In blue heaven, an angel-shape serene 

Paused awhile to hear. 

" What good child is this," the angel said, 
" Tliat with happy heart beside her bed 

Prays so lovingly ? " 
Low and soft, 0, very low and soft, 
Crooned the Blackbird in the orchard croft, 

'•' Bell, dear Bell ! " crooned he. 

" Whom God's creatures love," the angel fair 
Murmured, "God doth bless with angels' care ; 

Child, thy bed shall be 
Folded safe from harm. Love, deep and kind. 
Shall watch around and leave good gifts behind. 

Little Bell, for thee ! " 

Thomas westwood. 



TO A CHILD. 

WRITTEN IN HER ALBUM. 

Small service is true service while it lasts : 

Of humblest friends, bright creature ! scorn not 

one : 
The daisy, by the shadow that it casts. 
Protects the lingering dewdrop from the sun. 
William Wordsworth. 



PICTURES OF MEMORY. 

Among the beautiful pictures 

That hang on Memory's wall 
Is one of a dim old forest. 

That seemeth best of all ; 
Not for its gnarled oaks olden. 

Dark with the mistletoe ; 
Not for the violets golden 

That sprinkle the vale below ; 
Not for the milk-white lilies 

That lean from the fragrant ledge. 
Coquetting all day with the sunbeams, 

And stealing their golden edge ; 
Not for the vines on the upland, 

Where the bright red berries rest. 
Nor the pinks, nor the pale sweet cowslip, 

It seemeth to me the best. 

I once had a little brother. 

With eyes that were dark and deep ; 
In the lap of that old dim forest 

He lieth in peace asleep : 
Light as the down of the thistle. 

Free as the winds that blow, 
We roved there the beautiful summers, 

The summers of long ago ; 
But his feet on the hills grew weary, 

And, one of the autumn eves, 
I made for my little brother 

A bed of the yellow leaves. 
Sweetly his pale arms folded 

My neck in a meek embrace. 
As the light of immortal beauty 

Silently covered his face ; 
And when the arrows of sunset 

Lodged in the tree-tops bright. 
He fell, in his saint-like beautyj 

Asleep by the gates of light. 
Therefore, of all the pictures 

That hang on Memory's wall. 
The one of the dim old forest 

Seemeth the best of all. 

A.LICE CARY. 



THE PET NAME. 



Wliich from THEIR lips seemed a caress." 

MISS MITFORD'S Dramatic Scenes. 

I HAVE a name, a little name, 

Uncadenced for the ear, 
Unhonored by ancestral claim, 
Unsanctified by prayer and psalm 

The solemn font anear. 



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It never did, to pages wove 

For gay romance, belong. 
It never dedicate did move 
As "Sacharissa," unto love, — 

" Orinda," unto song. 

Though I wi-ite books, it will be read 

Upon the leaves of none, 
And afterward, when I am dead, 
Will ne'er be graved for sight or tread. 

Across my funeral-stone. 

This name, whoever chance to call 

Perhaps your smile may win. 
Nay, do not smile ! mine eyelids fall 
Over mine eyes, and feel withal 
The sudden tears within. 

Is there a leaf that gi'eenly grows 

Where summer meadows bloom, 
But gathereth the winter snows, 
And changeth to the hue of those, 
If lasting till they come ? 

Is there a word, or jest, or game. 

But time encrusteth round 
With sad associate thoughts the same ? 
And so to me my very name 

Assumes a mournful sound. 

My brother gave that name to me 
When we were children twain, — 

When names acquired baptismally 

Were hard to utter, as to see 
That life had any pain. 

No shade was on us then, save one 

Of chestnuts from the hill, — 
And through the word our laugh did run 
As part thereof; The mirth being done, 
He calls me by it still. 

Nay, do not smile ! I hear in it 

What none of yoii can hear, — 
The talk upon the willow seat, 
The bird and wind that did repeat 
Around, our human cheer. 

I hear the birthday's noisy bliss. 

My sisters' woodland glee, — 
My father's praise I did not miss, 
'When, stooping down, he cared to kiss 
The poet at his knee, — 

.And voices which, to name me, aye 

Their tenderest tones were keeping, — 
' To some I nevermore can say 
.An answer, till God wipes away 
In, heaven these drops of weeping. 



My name to me a sadness wears ; 

No murmurs cross my mind. 
Now God be thanked for these thick tears, 
Which show, of those departed years. 

Sweet memories left behind. 

Now God be thanked for years en^vrought 

With love which softens yet. 
Now God be thanked for every thought 
Which is so tender it has caught 

Earth's guerdon of regi'et. 

Earth saddens, never shall remove, 

Affections purely given ; 
And e'en that mortal grief shall prove 
The immortality of love, 

And heighten it Avith Heaven. 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 



THE THREE SONS. 

I HAVE a son, a little son, a boy just five years 

old. 
With eyes of thoughtful earnestness, and mind 

of gentle mould. 
They tell me that unusual grace in all his ways 

appears. 
That my child is grave and wise of heart beyond 

his childish years. 
I cannot say how this may be ; I know his face 

is fair, — 
And yet his chiefest comeliness is his sweet and 

serious air ; 
I know his heart is kind and fond ; I know he 

loveth me ; 
But loveth yet his mother more with grateful 

fervency. 
But that which others most admire, is the thought 

which fills his mind, 
The food for grave inquiring speech he every- 
where doth find. 
Strange questions doth he ask of me, when we 

together walk ; 
He scarcely thinks as children think, or talks as 

children talk. 
Nor cares he much for childish sports, dotes not 

on bat or ball, 
But looks on manhood's ways and works, and 

aptly mimics all. 

His little heart is busy still, and oftentimes per- 

plext 
With thoughts about this world of ours, and 

thoughts about the next. 
He kneels at his dear mother's knee ; she teacheth 

him to pray ; 
And strauge and sweet and solemn then are the 

words which he will say. 



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0, should my gentle child be spared to man- 
hood's years like me, 

A holier and a wiser man I trust that he will be ; 

And when I look into his eyes, and stroke his 
thoughtful brow, 

I dare not think what I should feel, were I to 
lose him now. 

I have a son, a second son, a simple child of 

three ; 
I '11 not declare how bright and fair his little 

features be, 
How silver sweet those tones of his when he 

prattles on my knee ; 
I do not think his light-blue eye is, like his 

brother's, keen. 
Nor his brow so full of childish thought as his 

hath ever been ; 
But his little heart's a fountain pure of kind and 

tender feeling ; 
And his every look's a gleam of light, rich 

depths of love revealing. 
When he walks with me, the country folk, who 

pass us in the street. 
Will shout for joy, and bless my boy, he looks 

so mild and sweet. 
A playfellow is he td all ; and yet, with cheerful 

tone. 
Will sing his little song of love, when left to 

sport alone. 
His presence is like sunshine sent to gladden 

home and hearth. 
To comfort us in all our griefs, and sweeten all 

our mirth. 
Should he grow up to riper years, God grant his 

heart may prove 
As sweet a home for heavenly gi'ace as now for 

earthly love ; 
And if, beside his grave, the tears our aching 

eyes must dim, 
God comfort us for all the love which we shall 

lose in him. 

I have a son, a third sweet son ; his age I cannot 

tell. 
For they reckon not by years and months where 

he has gone to dwell. 
To us, for fourteen anxious months, his infant 

smiles were given ; 
And then he bade farewell to earth, and went to 

live in heaven. 
I cannot tell what form is his, what looks he 

weareth now. 
Nor guess how bright a glory crowns his shining 

seraph brow. 
The thoughts that fill his sinless soul, the bliss 

which he doth feel. 
Are numbered with the secret things which God 

will not reveal. 



But I know (for God hath told me this) that he 

is now at rest, 
Where other blessed infants be, on their Saviour's 

loving breast. 
I know his spirit feels no more this weary load 

of flesh. 
But his sleep is blessed with endless dreams of 

joy forever fresh. 
I know the angels fold him close beneath their 

glittering wings. 
And soothe him with a song that breathes of 

Heaven's divinest things. 
I know that we shall meet our babe (his mother 

dear and 1 ) 
Where God for aye shall wipe away all tears from 

every eye. 
Whate'er befalls his brethren twain, his bliss can 

never cease ; 
Their lot may here be grief and fear, but his is 

certain peace. 
It may be that the tempter's wiles their souls 

from bliss may sever ; 
But, if our own poor faith fail not, he must be 

ours forever. 
When we think of what our darling is, and what 

we still must be, — 
When we muse on that world's perfect bliss, and 

this world's misery, — 
When we groan beneath this load of sin, and feel 

this grief and pain, — 

Oh ! we 'd rather lose our other tvvo, than have 

him here again. 

John Moultrie. 



THE MITHERLESS BAIRN. 

An Inverary correspondent writes : "Thorn g"ave me tlie fol- 
lowing narrative as to the origin of ' The Mitherless Bairn ' : I 
quote his own words. ' When I was livin' in Aberdeen, I was 
limping roun' the house to my garret, when I heard the greetin' o' 
a wean. A lassie was thumpin' a bairn, when out cam a big dame, 
bellowin", " Ye hussie, will ye lick a mitherless bairn I" I hobled 
up the stair and wrote the sang afore sleepin'.' " 

When a' ither bairnies are hushed to their ha me 
By aunty, or cousin, or frecky grand-dame, 
Wha stands last and lanely, an' naebody carin' ? 
'T is the puir doited loonie, — the mitherless 
bairn ! 

The mitherless bairn gangs to his lane bed ; 
Nane covers his cauld back, or haps his bare 

head; 
His wee hackit heelies are hard as the airn. 
An' litheless the lair o' the mitherless bairn. 



Aneath his cauld brow siccan dreams hover there, 
0' hands that wont kindly to kame his dark hair ; 
But momin' brings clutches, a' reckless an' stern, 
That lo'e nae the locks o' the mitherless bairn ! 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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Yon sister that sang o'er liis saftly rocked bed 
Now rests in the niools where her manimie is 

laid ; 
The fatlier toils sair their wee bannock to earn, 
An' kens na the wrangs o' his mitherless bairn. 

Her spirit, that passed in yon hour o' his birth, 
Still watches his wearisome wanderings on earth ; 
Recording in heaven the blessings they earn 
Wha couthilie deal wi' the mitherless bairn ! 

0, speak him na harshly, — he trembles the 

while. 
He bends to your bidding, and blesses your smile; 
In their dark hour o' anguish the heartless shall 

learn 
That God deals the blow, for the mitherless bairn! 

William Thom. 



MY MOTHER'S PICTURE. 

OUT OF NORFOLK, THE GIFT OF MY COUSIN, ANN BODHAM. 

THAT those lips had language ! Life has passed 
With me but roughly since I heard thee last. 
Those lips are thine, — thy own sweet smile I see. 
The same that oft in childhood solaced me ; 
Voice only fails, else how distinct they say, 
"Grieve not, my child; chase all thy fears 

away ! " 
The meek intelligence of tliose dear eyes 
(Blest be the art that can immortalize, — 
The art that baffles time's tyrannic claim 
To quench it !) here shines on me still the same. 
Faithful remembrancer of one so dear ! 

welcome guest, though unexpected here ! 
Who bid'st me honor with an artless song. 
Affectionate, a mother lost so long. 

1 will obey, — not willingly alone. 

But gladly, as the precept were her own ; 
And, while that face renews my filial grief, 
Fancy shall weave a charm for my relief, — • 
Shall steep me in Elysian reverj^, 
A momentary dream that thou art she. 

My mother ! when I learned that thou wast 
dead, 
Say, wast thou conscious of the tears I shed ? 
Hovered thy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son, — 
Wretch even then, life's journey just begun ? 
Perhaps thou gavest me, though unfelt, a kiss ; 
Perhaps a tear, if souls can Aveep in bliss — ■ 
Ah, that maternal smile ! it answers — Yes. 
I heard the bell tolled on thy burial day ; 
I saw the hearse that bore thee slow away; 
And, turning from my nursery window, drew 
A long, long sigh, and wept a last adieu ! 
But was it such ? — It was. — Where thou art gone 
Adieus and farewells are a sound unknown : 



May I but meet thee on that peaceful shore, 
The parting word shall pass my lips no more. 
Thy maidens, grieved themselves at my concern. 
Oft gave me j^romise of thy quick return ; 
What ardently I wished I long believed, 
And, disappointed still, was still deceived, — 
By expectation every day beguiled, 
Dupe of to-morrow even from a child. 
Thus many a sad to-morrow came and went. 
Till, all my stock of infant sorrows spent, 
I learned at last submission to my lot ; 
But, though I less deplored thee, ne'er forgot. 
Where once we dwelt our name is heard no 
more ; 
Children not thine have trod my nursery floor ; 
And where the gardener Robin, day by day, 
Drew me to school along the public way, — 
Delighted with my bawble coach, and wrapped 
In scarlet mantle warm and velvet cap, — 
'Tis now become a history little known 
That once we called the pastoral house our own. 
Short-lived possession ! but the record fair. 
That memory keeps of all thy kindness there, 
Still outlives many a storm that has eff'aced 
A thousand other themes, less deeply traced : 
Thy nightly visits to my chamber made, 
That thou mightst know me safe and warmly laid ; 
Thy morning bounties ere I left my home, — 
The biscuit, or confectionery plum ; 
The fragrant waters on my cheeks bestowed 
By thy own hand, till fresh they shone and 

glowed, — 
All this, and, more endearing still than all, 
Thy constant flow of love, that knew no fall, — 
Ne'er roughened by those cataracts and breaks 
That humor interposed too often makes ; 
All this, still legible in memory's jiage, 
And still to be so to my latest age. 
Adds joy to duty, makes me glad to pay 
Such honors to thee as my numbers may, — 
Peiiiaps a frail memorial, but sincere, — 
Not scorned in heaven, though little noticed here. 
Could time, his flight reversed, restore the 
hours 
When, playing with thy vesture's tissued flow- 
ers, — 
The violet, the pink, the jessamine, — 
I pricked them into paper with a pin, 
(And thou wast happier than myself the while — 
Wouldst softly speak, and stroke my head and 

smile, ) — 
Could those few pleasant days again appear, 
IMight one wish bring them, wo\ild I wish them 

here ? 
I would not trust my heart, — the dear delight 
Seems so to be desired, perhaps I might. 
But no, — what here we call our life is such, 
So little to be loved, and thou so much, 



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CHILDHOOD. 



93 



Tliat I should ill requite thee to constrain 
Thy unbound spirit into bonds again. 

Thou — as a gallant bark, from Albion's coast, 
(The storms all weathered and the ocean crossed, ) 
Shoots into port at some well-havened isle. 
Where spices breathe and brighter seasons smile ; 
There sits quiescent on the floods, that show 
Her beauteous form reflected clear below. 
While airs impregnated with incense play 
Around her, fanning light her streamers gay, — 
So thou, with sails how swift ! hast reached the 

shore 
"Where tempests never beat nor billows roar," 
And thy loved consort on the dangerous tide 
Of life long since has anchored by thy side. 
But me, scarce hoping to attain that rest. 
Always from port withheld, always distressed, — 
Me howling blasts drive devious, tempest-tossed. 
Sails ripped, seams opening wide, and compass 

lost; 
And day by day some current's thwarting force 
Sets me more distant from a prosperous course. 
Yet 0, the thought that thou art safe, and he ! — 
That thought is joy, arrive what may to me. 
My boast is not that I deduce my birth 
From loins enthroned, and rulers of the earth ; 
B^it higher far my proud pretensions rise, — 
The son of parents passed into the skies. 
And now, farewell ! — Time, unrevoked, has run 
His wonted course ; yet what I wished is done. 
By contemplation's help, not sought in vain, 
I seem to have lived my childhood o'er again, — 
To have renewed the joys that once were mine. 
Without the sin of violating thine ; 
And, while the wings of fancy still are free, 
And I can view this mimic show of thee. 
Time has but half succeeded in his theft, — 
Thyself removed, thy power to soothe me left. 
William Cowper. 



43- 



I REMEMBER, I REMEMBER. 

I TtEMEMBER, I remember 

The house where I was born. 
The little window where the sun 

Came peeping in at morn. 
He never came a wink too soon. 

Nor brought too long a day ; 
But now I often wish the night 

Had borne my breath away ! 

I remember, I remember 
The roses, red and white, 

The violets, and the lily-cups, — 
Those flowers made of light ! 

The lilacs whei-e the robin built. 
And where my brother set 



Tlie laburnum on his birthday, — 
The tree is living yet ! 

I remember, I remember 

Where I was used to swing. 
And thought the air must rush as fresh 

To swallows on the wing ; 
My spirit flew in feathers then. 

That is so heavy now. 
And summer pools could hardly cool 

The fever on my brow ! 

I remember, I remember 

The fir-trees dark and high ; 
I used to think their slender tops 

Were close against the sky. 
It was a childish ignorance, 

But now 't is little joy 
To know I 'in farther off' from heaven 

Than when I was a boy. 

Thomas Hood. 



TO MY INFANT SON. 

Thou happy, happy elf ! 
(But stop, first let me kiss away that tear,) 

Thou tiny image of myself ! 
( My love, he 's poking peas into his ear, ) 
Thou merry, laughing sprite. 
With spirits, feather light. 
Untouched by sorrow, and unsoiled by sin ; 
(My dear, the child is swallowing a pin !) 

Thou little tricksy Puck ! 

With antic toys so funnily bestuck. 

Light as the singing bird that rings the air, — 

(The door! the door! he'll tumble down the 

stair !) 
Til on darling of thy sire ! 
(Why, Jane, he'll set his pinafore afire !) 

Thou imp of mirth and joy ! 
In love's dear chain so bright a link. 

Thou idol of thy parents ; — ( Drat the boy ! 
There goes my ink.) 

Thou cherub, but of earth ; 
Fit playfellow for fairies, by moonlight pale. 

In harmless sport and mirth, 
(That dog will bite him, if he pulls his tail !) 

Thou human humming-bee, extracting honey 
From every blossom in the world that blows. 

Singing in youth's Elysium ever sunny, — 
(Another tumble I That 's his precious nose !) 
Thy father's pride and liope ! 
(He'll break that mirror with that skipping- 
rope !) 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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With pure heart newly stamped from nature's 

mint, 
(Where did he learn that squint ?) 

Thou young domestic dove ! 

(He '11 have that ring off with another shove,) 

Dear nursling of the hymeneal nest ! 

(Are these torn clothes his best ?) 

Little epitome of man ! 

(He '11 climb upon the table, that's his plan,) 

Touched with the beauteous tints of dawning life, 

(He 'sgot a knife !) 

Thou enviable being ! 

No storms, no clouds, in thy blue sky foreseeing, 

Play on, play on, 

My elfin John ! 
Toss the light ball, bestride the stick, — 
( 1 knew so many cakes would make him sick !) 

With fancies buoyant as the thistle-down, 
Prompting the face grotesque, and antic brisk, 
With many a lamb-like frisk ! 

(He's got the scissors, snipping at your gown ! ) 
Thou pretty opening rose ! 

(Go to your mother, child, and wipe your nose !) 
Balmy and breathing music like the south, 
( He really brings my heart into my mouth !) 
Bold as the hawk, yet gentle as the dove ; 
( I '11 tell j^ou what, my love, 
1 cannot write unless he 's sent above. ) 

THOMAS HOOD. 



THE LOST HEIR. 

" O where, and O where 
Is my boniiie laddie gone? " — OLD SONG. 

One day, as I was going by 

That part of Holborn christened High, 

I heard a loud and sudden cry 

That chilled my very blood ; 
And lo ! from out a dirty alley. 
Where pigs and Irish wont to rally, 
I saw a crazy woman sally, 

Bedaubed with grease and mud. 
She turned her East, she turned her West, 
Staring like Pythoness possest. 
With streaming hair and heaving breast, 

As one stark mad with grief. 
This way and that she wildly ran. 
Jostling with woman and with man, — 
Her right hand held a frying-pan, 

The left a lump of beef. 
At last her frenzy seemed to reach 
A point just capable of speech. 
And with a tone almost a screech, 

As wild as ocean birds. 
Or female ranter moved to preach, 
She gave her "sorrow words." 



" Lord ! dear, my heart will break, I slmll 

go stick stark staring wild ! 
Has ever a one seen anything about the streets 

like a crying lost-looking child ? 
Lawk help me, I don't know where to look, or 

to run, if I only knew which way — 
A Child as is lost about London streets, and es- 
pecially Seven Dials, is a needle in a bottle 

of hay. 
1 am all in a quiver — get out of my sight, do, 

you wretch, you little Kitty M'Nab ! 
You promised to have half an eye to him, you 

know you did, you dirty deceitful young 

drab. 
The last time as ever I see him, poor thing, was 

with my own blessed Motherly eyes. 
Sitting as good as gold in the gutter, a playing 

at inaking little dirt-pies. 
I wonder he left the court, where he was better 

off than all the other young boys. 
With two bricks, an old shoe, nine oyster-shells, 

and a dead kitten by way of toys. 
When his father comes home, and he always 

comes home as sure as ever the clock 

strikes one, 
He '11 be rampant, he will, at his child being 

lost ; and the beef and the inguns not 

done ! 
La bless you, good folks, mind your own con- 
cerns, aird don't be making a mob in the 

street ; 
Sergeant M'Farlane ! you have not come across 

my poor little boy, have you, in your beat ? 
Do, good people, move on ! don't stand staring 

at me like a parcel of stupid stuck pigs ; 
Saints forbid ! but he 's p'r'aps been inviggled 

away up a court for the sake of his clothes 

by the priggs ; 
He 'd a very good jacket, for certain, for I bought 

it myself for a shilling one day in Rag 

Fair ; 
And his trousers considering not very much 

patched, and red plush, they was once his 

Father's best pair. 
His shirt, it 's very lucky I 'd got washing in 

the tub, or that might have gone with the 

rest ; 
But he 'd got on a very good pinafore with only 

two slits and a burn on the breast. 
He 'd a goodish sort of hat, if the crown was 

sewed in, and not quite so much jagged 

at the brim. 
With one shoe on, and the other shoe is a boot, 

and not a fit, and you '11 know by that if 

it 's him. 
Except being so well di-essed, my mind would 

misgive, some old beggar woman, in want 

of an orphan. 



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CHILDHOOD. 



95 



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Had borrowed the child to go a-begging with, 

but I 'd rather see him laid out in his 

coffin ! 
Do, good people, move on , such a rabble of boys ! 

I '11 break every bone of 'em I come near. 
Go home — you 're spilling the porter — go home 

— Tommy Jones, go along home with 

your beer. 
This day is the sorrowfullest day of my life, ever 

since my name was Betty Morgan, 
Them vile Savoyards ! they lost him once before 

all along of following a monkey and an 

organ : 
my Billy — my head will turn right round — 

if he 's got kiddynapped with them Ital- 
ians, 
They '11 make him a plaster parish image boy, 

they will, the outlandish tatterdemalions. 
Billy — where are you, Billy ? — I 'm as hoarse 

as a crow, with screaming for ye, you 

young sorrow ! 
And sha'n't have half a voice, no more I sha'n't, 

for crying fresh herrings to-morrow. 

Billy, you 're bursting my heart in two, and 

my life won't be of no more vally, 
If I 'm to see other folks' darlin's, and none 

of mine, playing like angels in our 

alley. 
And what shall I do but cry out my eyes, when 

I looks at the old three-legged chair 
As Billy used to make coach and horses of, and 

there a'n't no Billy there ! 

1 would run all the wide world over to find him, 

if I only knowed where to run. 
Little Murphy, now 1 remember, was once lost 

for a month through stealing a penny 

bun, — 
The Lord forbid of any child of mine ! I think 

it would kill me rally, 
To find my Bill holdin' up his little innocent 

hand at the Old Bailey. 
For though I say it as ought n't, yet I will say, 

you may search for miles and mileses 
And not find one better brought up, and more 

pretty behaved, from one end to t' other 

of St. Giles's. 
And if I called him a beauty, it 's no lie, but 

only as a mother ought to speak ; 
You never set eyes on a more handsomer face, 

only it has n't been washed for a week ; 
As for hair, though it 's red, it 's the most nicest 

hair when I 've time to just show it the 

comb ; 
I '11 owe 'em five pounds, and a blessing besides, 

as will only bring him safe and sound 

home. 
He 's blue eyes, and not to be called a squint, 

though a little cast he 's certainly got ; 



And his nose is still a good un, though the 

bridge is broke, by his falling on a pewter 

pint pot ; 
He 's got the most elegant wide mouth in the 

world, and very large teeth for his age ; 
And quite as fit as Mrs. Murdockson's child to 

play Cupid on the Drury Lane stage. 
And then he has got such dear winning ways" — 

but 0, I never, never shall see him no 
- more ! 

dear ! to think of losing him just after nuss- 

ing him back from death's door ! 
Only the very last month when the windfalls, 

hang 'em, was at twenty a penny ! 
And the threepence he 'd got by grottoing was 

spent in plums, and sixty for a child is 

too many. 
And the Cholera man came and whitewashed us 

all , and, drat him ! made a seize of our 

hog. — 
It 's no use to send the Crier to cry him about, 

he 's such a blunderin' drunken old dog ; 
The last time he was fetched to find a lost child 

he was guzzling with his bell at the 

Crown, 
And went and cried a boy instead of a girl, for 

a distracted Mother and Father about 

Town. 
Billy — where are you, Billy, I say ? come, Billy, 

come home, to your best of Mothers ! 

1 'm scared when I think of them Cabroleys, 

they drive so, they 'd run over their own 

Sisters and Brothers. 
Or maybe he 's stole by some chimbly-sweeping 

wretch, to stick fast in narrow flues and 

what not, 
And be poked up behind with a picked pointed 

pole, when the soot has ketched, and the 

chimbly 's red hot. 
0, I 'd give the whole wide world, if the world 

was mine, to clap my two longin' eyes on 

his face. 
For he 's my darlin' of darlin's, and if he don't 

soon come back, you '11 see me drop stone 

dead on the place. 
I only wish I 'd got him safe in these two Moth- 
erly arms, and would n't I hug him and 

kiss him ! 
Lawk ! I never knew what a precious he was — 

but a child don't not feel like a child till 

you miss him. 
Why, there he is ! Punch and Judy hunting, the 

young wretch, it 's that Billy as sartin as 

sin ! 
But let me get him home, with a good grip of 

his hair, and I 'm blest if he shall have a 

whole bone in his skin ! 

Thomas Hood. 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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A VISIT FROM ST. NICHOLAS. 

'T WAS the night before Christmas, when all 

through the house 
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse ; 
The stockings were hung by the chimney with 

care, 
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there; 
The children were nestled all snug in their beds. 
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their 

heads ; 
And mamma in her kerchief, and I in my cap. 
Had just settled our brains for a long winter's 

nap, — 
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter, 
I sprang from my bed to see what was the mat- 
ter. 
Away to the window I flew like a flash. 
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash. 
The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow 
Gave a lustre of midday to objects below ; 
When what to my wondering eyes should ap- 
pear, 
But a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer, 
With a little old driver, so lively and quick 
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick. 
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came, 
And he whistled and shouted, and called them 

by name: 
" Now, Dasher ! now. Dancer ! now, Prancer and 

Vixen ! 
On, Comet ! on, Cupid ! on, Donder and Blitzen ! 
To the top of the porch, to the top of the wall ! 
■N"ow dash away, dash away, dash away all ! " 
As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly. 
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the 

sky, 

So up to the house-top the coursers they flew. 
With the sleigh full of toys, — and St. Nicholas 

too. 
And then in a twinkling I heard on the roof 
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof. 
As I drew in my head, and was turning around, 
Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a 

bound. 
He was dressed all in fur from his head to his 

foot. 
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes 

and soot ; 
A bundle of toys he had flung on his back. 
And he looked like a pedler just opening his 

pack. 
His eyes how they twinkled ! his dimples how 

merry ! 
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry ; 
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow. 
And the beard on his chin was as white as the 

snow. 



The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth. 

And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath. 

He had a broad face and a little round belly 

That shook, when he laughed, like a bowl full of 
jelly. 

He was chubby and plump, — a right jolly old 
elf; 

And I laughed, when I saw him, in spite of my- 
self. 

A wink o£ his eye and a twist of his head 

Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread. 

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his 
work. 

And filled all the stockings ; then turned with a 
jerk, 

And laying his finger aside of his nose. 

And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose. 

He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a 
whistle. 

And away they all flew like the down of a this- 
tle ; 

But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of 
sight, 

" Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good- 
night ! " 

Clement C. Moore. 



THE FROST. 

The Frost looked forth, one still, clear night, 
And he said, " Now I shall be out of sight ; 
So through the valley and over the height 

In silence I 'U take my way. 
I will not go like that blustering train. 
The wind and the snow, the hail and the rain. 
Who make so much bustle and noise in vain. 

But I '11 be as busy as they ! " 

Then he went to the mountain, and powdered its 

crest. 
He climbed up the trees, and their boughs he 

dressed 
With diamonds and pearls, and over the breast 

Of the quivering lake he spread 
A coat of mail, that it need not fear 
The downward point of many a spear 
That he hung on its margin, far and near, 
Where a rock could rear its head. 

He went to the windows of those who slept. 
And over each pane like a fairy crept : 
Wherever he breathed, wherever he stepped, 

By the light of the moon were seen 
Most beautiful things. There were flowers and 

trees. 
There were bevies of birds and swarms of bees. 



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CHILDHOOD. 



97 



a 



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There were cities, thrones, temples, and towers, 
and these 
All pictured in silver sheen ! 

But he did one thing that was hardly fair, — 
He peeped in the cupboard, and, finding there 
That all had forgotten for him to prepare, — 

" Now, just to set them a thinking, 
I '11 bite this basket of fruit," said he ; 
" This costly pitcher I '11 burst in three, 
And the glass of water they 've left for me 

Shall ' tcMck ! ' to tell them I 'm drinking." 

HANNAH FRANCES GOULD. 



EAIN ON THE ROOF. 

When the humid shadows hover 

Over all the starry spheres. 
And the melancholy darkness 

Gently weeps in rainy tears. 
What a bliss to press the pillow 

Of a cottage-chamber bed. 
And to listen to the patter 

Of the soft rain overhead ! 

Every tinkle on the shingles 

Has an echo in the heart ; 
And a thousand dreamy fancies 

Into busy being start, 
And a thousand recollections 

Weave their air-threads into woof, 
As I listen to the patter 

Of the rain upon the roof. 

Now in memory comes my mother, 

As she used, in years agone, 
To regard the darling dreamers 

Ere she left them till the dawn: 
So I see her leaning o'er me. 

As I list to this refrain 
Which is played upon the shingles 

By the patter of the rain. 

Then my little seraph sister. 

With the wings and wg,ving hair. 

And her star-eyed cherub brother — 
• A serene angelic pair — 

Glide around my wakeful pillow, 
With their praise or mild reproof. 

As I listen to the murmur 
Of the soft rain on the roof. 

And another comes, to thrill me 
With her eyes' delicious blue ; 

And I mind not, musing on her. 
That her heart was all untrue : 

I remember but to love her 
With a passion kin to pain, 



And my heart's quick pulses vibrate 
To the patter of the rain. 

Art hath naught of tone or cadence 

That can work with such a spell 
In the soul's mysterious fountains, 

Whence the tears of rapture well, 
As that melody of nature. 

That subdued, subduing strain 
Which is played upon the shingles 

By the patter of the rain. 

Coaxes Kinney. 



A FAREWELL. 

My fairest child, I have no song to give you ; 

No lark could pipe to skies so dull and gray ; 
Yet, ere we part, one lesson I can leave you 
For every day. 

Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever ; 
Do noble things, not dream them, all day long : 
And so make life, death, and that vast forever 
One grand, sweet song. 

CHARLES KLNGSLEV. 



A PORTRAIT. 

" One name is Elizabeth."— BEN JONSON. 

I WILL paint her as I see her. 
Ten times have the lilies blown 
Since she looked upon the sun. 

And her face is lily-clear, 

Lily-shaped, and dropped in duty 
To the law of its own beauty. 

Oval cheeks encolored faintly. 
Which a trail of golden hair 
Keeps from fading off to air ; 

And a forehead fair and saintly. 
Which two blue eyes undershine. 
Like meek prayers before a shrine. 

Face and figure of a child, — 

Though too calm, you think, and tender. 
For the childhood you would lend her. 

Yet child-simple, undefiled, 

Frank, obedient, — waiting still 
On the turnings of your will. 

Moving light, as all your things, 
As young birds, or early wheat, 
When the wind blows over it. 



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98 



POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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Only, free from flutterings 

Of loud mirth that scorneth measure, - 
Taking love for her chief pleasure. 

Choosing pleasures, for the rest, 
Which come softlj', — just as she. 
When she nestles at your knee. 

Quiet talk she liketh best, 
In a bower of gentle looks, — 
Watering flowers, or reading books. 

And her voice, it murmurs lowly, 
As a silver stream may run, 
Which yet feels, you feel, the sun. 

And her smile, it seems half holy. 
As if drawn from thoughts more far 
Than our common jestings are. 

And if any poet knew her, 

He would sing of her with falls 

Used in lovely madrigals. 

I 

And if any painter drew her, 
He would paint her unaware 
With a halo round the hair. 

And if reader read the poem. 
He would whisper, " You have done a 
Consecrated little Una." 

And a dreamer (did you show him 
That same picture) would exclaim, 
" 'T is my angel, with a name ! " 

And a stranger, when he sees her 
In the street even, smileth stilly, 
Just as you would at a lily. 

And all voices that address her 
Soften, sleeken every word. 
As if speaking to a bird. 

And all fancies yearn to cover 

The hard earth whereon she passes, 
With the thymy-scented grasses. 

And all hearts do pray, "God love her ! " - 
Ay, and always, in good sooth, 
We may all be sure He doth. 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 



B- 



THE CHILDKEN'S HOUR. 

Betvi^een the dark and the daylight. 
When night is beginning to lower. 

Comes a pause in the day's occupations, 
That is known as the children's hour. 



I hear in the chamber above me 

The patter of little feet, 
The sound of a door that is opened. 

And voices soft and sweet. 

From my study I see in the lamplight, 
Descending the broad hall stair. 

Grave Alice and laughing Allegra, 
And Edith with golden hair. 

A whisper and then a silence. 
Yet I know by their merry eyes 

They are plotting and planning together 
To take me by surprise. 

A sudden rush from the stairway, 

A sudden raid from the hall. 
By three doors left unguarded. 

They enter my castle wall. 

They climb up into my turret. 

O'er the arms and back of my chair ; 

If I try to escape, they surround me : 
They seem to be everywhere. 

They almost devour me with kisses, 
Their arms about me intwine, 

Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen 
In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine. 

Do you think, blue-eyed banditti. 
Because you have scaled the wall, 

Such an old mustache as I am 
Is not a match for you all ? 

I have you fast in my fortress, 

And will not let you depart, 
But put you into the dungeon 

In the round-tower of my heart. 

And there will I keep you forever, 

Yes, forever and a day. 
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin, 

And moulder in dust away. 

Henry wadswokth Longfellow. 



JENNY KISSED ME. 

Jenny kissed me when we met. 

Jumping from the chair she sat in. 
Time, you thief ! who love to get 

Sweets into your list, put that in. 
Say I 'm weary, say I 'm sad ; 

Say that health and wealth have missed me 
Say I 'm gi-owing old, but add — 

Jenny kissed me ! 
Leigh 



Hunt. t 

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CHILDHOOD. 



99 



Q I 1 



THE SMACK IN SCHOOL. 

A niSTRiCT school, not far away, 

Mid Berkshire hills, one winter's day. 

Was humming with its wonted noise 

Of threescore mingled girls and boys ; 

Some few upon their tasks intent. 

But more on furtive mischief bent. 

The while the master's downward look 

Was fastened on a copy-book ; 

When suddenly, behind his back, 

Eose sharp and clear a rousing smack ! 

As 't were a battery of bliss 

Let off in one tremendous kiss ! 

" What 's that ? " the startled master cries ; 

" That, thir," a little imp replies, 

" Wath William Willith, if you jjleathe, — 

I thaw him kith Thuthanna Peathe ! " 

With frown to make a statue thrill, 

The master thundered, " Hither, Will ! " 

Like wretch o'ertaken in his track, 

With stolen chattels on his back. 

Will hung his head in fear and shame. 

And to the awful presence came, — 

A great, green, bashful simpleton. 

The butt of all good-natured fun. 

With smile suppressed, and birch upraised, 

The threatener faltered, — " I'm amazed 

That you, my biggest pupil, should 

Be guilty of an act so rude ! 

Before the whole set school to boot - 

What evil genius put you to 't ? " 

" ' T was she herself, sir," sobbed the lad, 

" I did not mean to be so bad ; 

But when Susannah shook her curls. 

And whispered, 1 was 'fraid of girls 

And dursn't kiss a baby's doll, 

I could n't stand it, sir, at all, 

But up and kissed her on the spot ! 

I know — boo-hoo — I ought to not, 

But, somehow, from her looks — boo-hoo — 

I thought she kind o' wished me to ! " 

William Pitt Palmer. 



OLD-SCHOOL PUNISHMENT. 

Old Master Brown brought his ferule down, 

And his face looked angry and red. 
"Go, seat you there, now, Anthony Blair, 

Along with the girls," he said. 
Then Anthony Blair, with a mortified air, 

With his head down on his breast. 
Took his penitent seat by the maiden sweet 

That he loved, of all, the best. 
And Anthony Blair seemed whimpering there, 

But the rogue only made believe ; 
For he peeped at the girls with the beautiful curls, 

And ogled them over his sleeve, 

ANONYMOUS. 



THE BAREFOOT BOY. 

Blessings on thee, little man, 
Barefoot boy, with cheek of tan ! 
With thy turned-up pantaloons, 
And thy merry whistled tunes ; 
With thy red lip, redder still 
Kissed by strawberries on the hill ; 
A¥ith the sunshine on thy face. 
Through thy torn brim's jaunty grace ; 
From my heart I give thee joy, — 
I was once a barefoot boy ! 
Prince thou art, — the grown-up man 
Only is republican. 
Let the million-dollared ride ! 
Barefoot, trudging at his side, 
Thou hast more than he can buy 
In the reach of ear and eye, — 
Outward sunshine, inward joy : 
Blessings on thee, barefoot boy ! 

for boyhood's painless play, 
Sleep that wakes in laughing day. 
Health that mocks the doctor's rules. 
Knowledge never learned of schools, 
Of the wild bee's morning chase, 
Of the wild-flower's time and place. 
Flight of fowl and habitude 
Of the tenants of the wood ; 
How the tortoise bears his shell. 
How the woodchuck digs his cell, 
And the ground-mole sinks his well ; 
How the robin feeds her young, 
How the oriole's nest is hung ; 
Where the whitest lilies blow, 
Where the freshest berries grow. 
Where the ground-nut trails its vine. 
Where the wood-gi'ape's clusters shine ; 
Of the black wasp's cunning way, 
Mason of his walls of clay. 
And the architectural plans 
Of gray hornet artisans ! — 
For, eschewing books and tasks, 
Nature answers all he asks ; 
Hand in hand with her he walks, 
Face to face with her he talks. 
Part and parcel of her joy, — 
Blessings on the barefoot boy ! 

for boyhood's time of June, 
Crowding years in one brief moon, 
When all things I heard or saw. 
Me, their master, waited for. 
I was rich in flowers and trees, 
Humming-birds and honey-bees ; 
For my sport the squirrel played. 
Plied the snouted mole his spade ; 
For my taste the blackberry cone 
Purpled over hedge and stone ; 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



Laughed the brook for my delight 
Through the day and through the uight, 
Whispering at the garden M^all, 
Talked with me from fall to fall ; 
Mine the sand -rimmed pickerel pond, 
Mine the walnut slopes beyond, 
Mine, on bending orchard trees, 
Apples of Hesperides ! 
Still as my horizon grew, 
Larger grew my riches too ; 
All the world I saw or knew 
Seemed a complex Chinese toy, 
Fashioned for a barefoot boy ! 

for festal dainties spread, 
Like my bowl of milk and bread, — 
Pewter spoon and bowl of wood, 
On the door-stone, gray and rude ! 
O'er me, like a regal tent. 
Cloudy-ribbed, the sunset bent. 
Purple-curtained, fringed with gold. 
Looped in many a wind-swung fold ; 
While for music came the play 
Of the pied frogs' orchestra ; 
And, to light the noisy choir. 
Lit the fly his lamp of fire. 
I was monarch : pomp and joy 
Waited on the barefoot boy'l 

Cheerly, then, my little man. 
Live and laugh, as boyhood can ! 
Though the flinty slopes be hard. 
Stubble-speared the new-mown sward. 
Every morn shall lead thee through 
Fresh baptisms of the dew ; 
Every evening from tliy feet 
Shall the cool wind kiss the heat . 

All too soon these feet must hide 

In the prison cells of pride. 

Lose the freedom of the sod, 

Like a colt's for work be shod. 

Made to tread the mills of toil, 

Up and down in ceaseless moil : 

Happy if their track be found 

Never on forbidden ground ; 

Happy if they sink not in 

Quick and treacherous sands of sin. 

Ah !^ that thou couldst know thy joj-, 

Ere it passes, barefoot boy ! 

John Greenleaf Whittier. 




MY MOTHER'S BIBLE. 

Tjhs book is all that's left me now, — 
Tears will unbidden start, 

With faltering lip and throbbing brow 
I press it to my heart. 



For many generations jmst 

Here is our family tree ; 
My mother's hands this Bible clasped. 

She, dying, gave it me. 

Ah ! well do I remember those 

Whose names these records bear ; 
Who round the hearthstone used to close, 

After the evening prayer. 
And speak of what these pages said 

In tones my heart would thrill ! 
Though they are with the silent dead, 

Here are they living still ! 

My father read this holy book 

To brothers, sisters, dear ; 
How calm was my poor mother's look, 

Who loved God's word to hear ! 
Pier angel face, — I see it yet ! 

What thronging memories come ! 
Again that little group is met 

Within the halls of home ! 

Thou truest friend man ever knew, 

Thy constaney I 've tried ; 
Wlien all were false, I found thee true, 

My counsellor and guide. 
The mines of earth no treasures give 

That could this volume buy ; 
In teaching me the way to live, 

It tauglit me how to die ! 

George Perkins Morris, 

THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET. 

How dear to this heart are the scenes of my 
childhood, 
^Vlien fond recollection presents them to view ! 
The orchard, the meadow, the deep-tangled wild- 
wood. 
And every loved spot which my infancy knew ; 
The wide-spreading pond, and the mill which 
stood by it. 

The bridge, and the rock where the cataract 
fell; 
The cot of my father, the dairy-house nigh it. 
And e'en the rude bucket which hung in the 
well, — 
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket, 
The moss-covered bucket which hung in the M*ell. 

I That moss-covered vessel I hail as a treasure ; 

For often, at noon , when returned from the field, 
I found it the source of an exquisite pleasure, 

The purest and sweetest that nature can yield. 
How ardent I seized it, with hands that were 
glowing ! 

And quick to the white-pebbled bottom it 
fell; 



YOUTH. 



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Then soon, with the emblem of trutli overflow- 
ing, 
And dripping with coolness, it rose from the 
well ; — 
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket, 
The moss-covered backet, arose from the well. 

How sweet from the green mossy brim to receive 
it, 
As, poised on the curb, it inclined to my lips ! 
Not a full blushing goblet could tempt me to 
leave it. 
Though filled with the nectar that Jupiter sips. 
And now, far removed from the loved situation. 

The tear of regret will intrusively swell, 
As fancy reverts to my father's plantation. 

And sighs for the bucket which hangs in the 
well ; — 
Tlie old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket. 
The moss-covered bucket which hangs in the well. 
Samuel woodworth. 



THE OLD ARM-CHAIR. 

I LOVE it, I love it ! and who shall dare 

To chide me for loving that old arm-eliair ? 

I 've treasured it long as a sainted prize, 

I 've bedewed it with tears, I 've embalmed it with 

sighs. 
'T is bound bj^ a thousand bands to my heart ; 
Not a tie will break, not a link will start ; 
"Would you know the spell ? — a mother sat there ! 
And a sacred thing is that old arm-chair. 

In childhood's hour I lingered near 
Tlie hallowed seat with listening ear ; 
And gentle words that mother would give 
To ht me to die, and teach me to live. 
She told me that shame would never betide 
"With Truth for my creed, and God for my guide ; 
She taught me to lisp my earliest prayer. 
As I knelt beside that old arm-chair. 

I sat, and watched her many a day, 

"When her eye grew dim, and her locks were 

gray ; 
And I almost worshipped her when she smiled, 
And turned from her Bible to bless her child. 
Years rolled on, but the last one sped, — 
My idol was shattered, my earth-star fled ! 
I learnt how much the heart can bear, 
"When I saw her die in her old arm-chair. 

'T is pnst, 'tis past ! but I gaze on it now, 
"With (^[uivering breath and throbbing brow : 
'T was there she nursed me, 'twas there she died, 
And memory flows with lava tide. 



Say it is folly, and deem me weak, 
"Whilst scalding drops start down my cheek 
But I love it, 1 love it, and cannot tear 
My soul from a mother's old arm-chair. 



Eliza Cook 



WOODMAN, SPARE THAT TREE. 

"Woodman, spare that tree ! 

Touch not a single bough ! 
In youth it sheltered me, 

And I '11 protect it now. 
'T was my forefather's hand 

That placed it near his cot ; 
There, woodman, let it stand, 

Thy axe shall harm it not ! 

That old familiar tree, 

"Whose glory and renown 
Are spread o'er land and sea. 

And wouldst thou hew it down ? 
"Woodman, forbear thy stroke ! 

Cut not its earth-bouird ties ; 
0, spare that aged oak. 

Now towering to the skies ! 

When but an idle boy 

I sought its grateful shade ; 
In all their gushing joy 

Here too my sisters played. 
My mother kissed me here ; 

Mjr father pressed my hand — 
Forgive this foolish tear. 

But let that old oak stand ! 

My heart-strings round thee cling. 

Close as thy bark, old friend ! 
Here shall the wild-bird sing. 

And still th}' branches bend. 
Old tree ! the storm still brave ! 

And, woodman, leave the sp)ot ; 
While I 've a hand to save. 

Thy axe shall hurt it not. 

GEORGE PERKINS MORRIS, 



SEVEN TIMES TWO. 

ROMANCE. 

You bells in the steeple, ring, ring out your 
changes. 
How many soever they be. 
And let the brown meadow-lark's note as he 
ranges 
Come over, come over to me. 

Yet birds' clearest carol by fall or by swelling 

No magical sense conveys. 
And bells have forgotten their old art of telling 

The fortune of future days. 



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102 



POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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"Turn again, turn again," once tliey rang cheerily 

While a boy listened alone : 
Made his heart yearn again, nnising so wearily 

All by himself on a stone. 

Poor bells ! I forgive you ; your good daj^s are 
over, 
And mine, they are yet to be ; 
No listening, no longing, shall aught, aught 
discover : 
You leave the story to me. 

The foxglove shoots out of tire green matted 
heather. 

Preparing her hoods of snow ; 
She was idle, and slept till the sunshiny weather : 

0, children take long to grow. 

I wish, and I wish that the spring would go 
faster, 

Nor long summer bide so late ; 
And I could grow on like the foxglove and aster. 

For some things are ill to wait. 

I wait for the day when dear hearts shall discover, 
While dear hands are laid on my head ; 

■ " The child is a woman, the book may close over. 
For all the lessons are said." 

I wait for my story — the birds cannot sing it, 

Not one, as he sits on the tree ; 
The bells cannot ring it, but long years, 0, bring 
. it ! 

Such as I wish it to be. 

Jean Ingelow. 



^ 



THE ROMANCE OF THE SWAN'S NEST. 

Little Ellie sits alone 
Mid the beeches of a meadow, 

By a stream-side on the grass, 

And the trees are showering down 
Doubles of their leaves in shadow, 

On her shining hair and face. 

She has thrown her bonnet by. 
And her feet she has been dipping 

In the shallow water's flow. 

Now she holds them nakedly 
In her hands all sleek and dripping, 
/ While she rocketh to and fro. 

Little Ellie sits alone, 
And the smile she softly uses 

Fills the silence like a speech. 

While she thinks what shall be done, — 
And the sweetest pleasure chooses 

For her future within reach. 



Little Ellie in her smile 
Chooses . . . "I will have a lover, 

Riding on a steed of steeds ! 

He shall love me without guile, 
And to him I will discover 

The swan's nest among the reeds. 

"And the steed shall be red-roan, 
And the lover shall be noble, 

With an eye that takes the breath. 

And the lute he plays upon 
Shall strike ladies into trouble, 

As his sword strikes men to death. 

' ' And the steed it shall be shod 
All in silver, housed in azure. 

And the mane shall swim the wind ; 

And the hoofs along the sod 
Shall flash onward and keep measure. 

Till the shepherds look behind. 

" But my lover will not prize 
All the glory that he rides in, 

When he gazes in my face. 

He will say, ' Love, thine eyes 
Build the shrine my soul abides in, 

And I kneel here for thy grace.' 

"Then, ay then — he shall kneel low. 
With the red-roan steed anear him, 

Which shall seem to understand — 

Till I answer, ' Rise and go ! 
For the world must love and fear him 

W^hom I gift with heart and hand.' 

" Then he will arise so pale, 
I shall feel my own lips tremble 

With a yes I must not say ; 

Nathless maiden-brave, ' Farewell ' 
I will utter, and dissemble ; — 

' Light to-morrow with to-day.' 

" Then he '11 ride among the hills 
To the wide world past the river, 

There to put awaj' all wrong ; 

To make straight distorted wills, 
And to emptj' the broad quiver 

Which the wicked bear along. 

"Three times shall a young foot-page 
Swim the stream and climb the mountain 

And kneel down beside my feet ; — 

' Lo, my master sends this gage, 
Lady, for thy pity's counting ! 

What wilt thou exchange for it ?' 

"And the first time, I will send 

A white rosebud for a guerdon, — - 

And the second time, a glove ; 



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YOUTH. 



10 



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But the third time, I may bend 
From my pride, and answer, ' Pardon, 
If he comes to take my love.' 

" Then the yoimg foot-page will run, — 
Then my lover will ride faster, 

Till he kneeleth at my knee : 

' I am a duke's eldest son ! 
Thousand serfs do call me master, — 

But, Love, I love but thee ! ' 

" He will kiss me on the mouth 
Then, and lead me as a lover 

Through the crowds that praise his deeds ; 

And, when soul-tied by one troth, 
Unto him I will discover 

That swan's nest among the reeds." 

Little EUie, with her smile 
Not yet ended, rose up gayly, 

Tied the bonnet, donned the shoe, 

And went homeward, round a mile, 
Just to see, as she did daily. 

What more eggs were with the two. 

Pushing through the elm-tree copse. 
Winding up the stream, light-hearted. 

Where the osier pathway leads, — 

Past the boughs she stoops — and stops. 
Lo, the wild swan had deserted. 

And a rat had gnawed the reeds. 

Ellie went home sad and slow. 
If she found the lover ever. 

With his red-roan steed of steeds, 

Sooth I knoAV not ! but I know 
She could never show him — never, 

That swan's nest among the reeds ! 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 



GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD MORNING. 

A FAIR little girl sat under a tree 

Sewing as long as her eyes could see ; 

Then smoothed her work and folded it right, 

And said, " Dear work, good night, goodnight ! " 

Such a number of rooks came over her head. 
Crying " Caw, caw ! " on their way to bed, 
She said, as she Avatched their curious flight, 
" Little black things, good night, good night ! " 

The horses neighed, and the oxen lowed. 

The sheep's " Bleat ! bleat ! " came over the 

road ; 
All seeming to say, with a quiet delight, 
" Good little girl, good night, good night ! " 



She did not say to the sun, " Good night ! " 
Though she saw him there like a ball of light ; 
For she knew he had God's time to keep 
All over the world and never could sleep. 

The tall pink foxglove bowed his head ; 
The violets courtesied, and went to bed ; 
And good little Lucy tied up her hair. 
And said, on her knees, her favorite prayer. 

And, while on her pillow she softly lay. 
She knew nothing more till again it was day ; 
And all things said to the beautiful sun, 
" Good morning, good morning ! our work is 
begun." 

Richard monckton Mtlnes. 
(Lord Houghtox.) 



THEEE YEARS SHE GREW. 

Three years she grew in sun and shower ; 
Then Nature said, "A lovelier fl^ower 

On earth was never sown : 
This child I to myself will take ; 
She shall be mine, and I will make 

A lady of my own. 

' ' Myself will to my darling be 
Both law and impulse ; and with me 

The girl, in rock and plain. 
In earth and heaven, in glade and bower, 
Shall feel an overseeing power 

To kindle or restrain. 

" She shall be sportive as the fawn 
That wild with glee across the lawn 

Or up the mountain springs ; 
And hers shall be the breathing balm. 
And hers the silence and the calm. 

Of mute insensate things. 

" The floating clouds their state shall lend 
To her ; for her the willow bend ; 

Nor shall she fail to see 
E'en in the motions of the storm 
Grace that shall mould the maiden's form 

By silent sympathy. 

" The stars of midnight shall be dear 
To her ; and she shall lean her ear 

In many a secret place 
Where rivulets dance their waj^vard round. 
And beauty born of murmuring sound 

Shall pass into her face. 

" And vital feelings of delight 
Shall rear her form to stately height. 

Her virgin bosom swell ; 
Such thoughts to Lucy I will give 
While she and I together live 

Here in this happy dell." 



S> 



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104 



POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



"^ 



Thus Nature spake. The work was done, — 
How soon my Lucy's race was run ! 

She died, and left to me 
This heath, tliis calm and quiet scene ; 
The memory of what has been. 

And nevermore will be. 

William Wordsworth. 



THREAD AND SONG. 

Sweeter and sweeter, 

Soft and low. 
Neat little nymph, 

Thy numbers flow, 
Urging thy thimble, 
Thrift's tidy symbol, 
Busy and nimble. 

To and fro ; 
Prettily plying 

Thread and song, 
Keeping them flying 

Late and long, 
Through the. stitch linger. 
Kissing thy finger. 

Quick, — as it skips along. 

Many an echo, 

Soft and low. 
Follows thy flying 

Fancy so, — 
Melodies thrilling. 
Tenderly filling 
Thee with their trilling, 

Come and go ; 
Memory's finger. 

Quick as thine, 
Loving to linger 

On the line, 
"Writes of another, 

Dearer than brother : 

Would that the name were mine ! 

JOHN WILLIAMSON PALMER. 



f& 



MAIDENHOOD. 

Matden ! with the meek brown. eyes, 
In whose orbs a shadow lies 
Like the dusk in evening skies ! 

Thou whose locks outshine the sun, - 
Golden tresses wreathed in one. 
As the braided streamlets run ! 

Standing, with reluctant feet. 
Where the brook and river meet. 
Womanhood and childhood fleet ! 



Gazing, with a timid glance, 
On the brooklet's swift advance, 
On the river's broad expanse ! 

Deep and still, that gliding stream 
Beautiful to thee must seem 
As the river of a dream. 

Then why pause with indecision, 
When bright angels in thy vision 
Beckon thee to fields Elysian ? 

Seest thou shadows sailing by, 
As the dove, with startled eye. 
Sees the falcon's shadow fly ? 

Hearest thou voices on the shore,' 
That our ears perceive no more. 
Deafened by the cataract's roar ? 

thou child of many prayers ! 

Life hath quicksands, Life hath snares ! 

Care and age come unawares ! 

Like the swell of some sweet tune, 
Morning rises into noon. 
May glides onward into June. 

Childhood is the bough where slumbered 
Birds and blossoms many-nambered ; — 
Age, that bough with snows encumbered. 

Gather, then, each flower that grows. 
When the young heart overflows, 
To embalm that tent of snows. 

Bear a lily in thy hand ; 
Gates of brass cannot withstand 
One touch of that magic wand. 

Bear through sorrow, wrong, and ruth, 
In thy heart the dew of youth. 
On thy lips the smile of truth. 

0, that dew, like balm, shall steal 
Into wounds that cannot heal. 
Even as sleejo our eyes doth seal ; 

And that smile, like sunshine, dart 
Into many a sunless heart, 
For a smile of God thou art. 

Henry wadsworth Longfellow. 



LUCY. 



She dwelt among the untrodden ways 

Beside the springs of Dove ; 
A maid whom there were none to praise, 

And very few to love. 



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YOUTH. 



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O- 



A violet by a mossy stone 

Half hidden from the eye ! 
Fair as a star, when only one 

Is shining in the sky. 

She lived unknown, and few could know 

When Lucy ceased to be ; 
But she is in her grave, and 0, 

The difference to me ! 

William Wordsworth. 



THE PRETTY GIRL OF LOCH DAN. 

The shades of eve had crossed the glen 
That frowns o'er infant Avonmore, 

When, nigh Loch Dan, two weary men. 
We stopped before a cottage door. 

" God save all here," my comrade cries. 
And rattles on the raised latch-pin; 

" God save you kindly," quick replies 
A clear sweet voice, and a.sks us in. 

We enter ; from the wheel she starts, 

A rosy girl with soft black eyes ; 
Her fluttering courtesy takes our hearts. 

Her blushing grace and pleased surprise. 

Poor Mary, she was quite alone. 

For, all the way to Glenmaliire, 
Her mother had that morning gone. 

And left the house in charge with her. 

But neither household cares, nor yet 
The shame that startled virgins feel, 

Could make the generous girl forget 
Her wonted hospitable zeal. 

She brought us in a beechen bowl 

Sweet milk that smacked of mountain thyme, 
Oat cake, and such a yellow roll 

Of butter, — it gilds all my rhyme ! 

And, while we ate the grateful food 
(With weary limbs on bench reclined), 

Considerate and discreet, she stood 
Apart, and listened to the wind. 

Kind wishes both our souls engaged. 
From breast to breast spontaneous ran 

The mutual thought, — we stood and pledged 
The modest rose above Loch Dan. 

" The milk we drink is not more pure, 
Sweet Mary, — bless those budding charms ! — 

Than your own generous heart, I 'm sure, 
Nor whiter than the breast it warms ! " 

She turned and gazed, unused to hear 
Such language in that homely glen ; 



But, Mary, you have naught to fear, 
Thoiigh smiled on by two stranger-men. 

Not for a crown would I alarm 
Your virgin pride by word or sign, 

Nor need a painful blush disarm 

My friend of thoughts as pure as mine. 

Her simple heart could not but feel 

The words we spoke were free from guile ; 

She stooped, she blushed, she fixed her wheel, - 
'T is all in vain, — she can't but smile ! 

Just like sweet April's dawn appears 
Her modest face, — I see it yet, — 

And though I lived a hundred years 
Methinks I never could forget 

The pleasure that, despite her heart. 
Fills all her downcast eyes with light ; 

The lips reluctantly apart, 

The white teeth struggling into sight. 

The dimples eddying o'er her cheek. 
The rosy cheek that won't be still : — 

0, who coirld blame what flatterers speak, 
Did smiles like this reward their skill ? 

For such another smile, I vow. 
Though loudly beats the midnight rain, 

I 'd take the mountain-side e'en now, 
And Avalk to Luggelaw again ! 

SAMUEL Ferguson. 



TO A HIGHLAND GIRL. 

AT INVERSNEYDE, UPON LOCH LOMOND. 

S^^''EET Highland Girl, a very shower 

Of beauty is thy earthly dower ! 

Twice seven consenting years have shed 

Their utmost bounty on thy head ; 

And these gray rocks, this household lawn, 

These trees, — a veil just half withdrawn, — 

This fall of water that doth make 

A murmur near the silent lake. 

This little bay, a quiet road 

That holds in shelter thy abode ; 

In truth together ye do seem 

Like something fashioned in a dream, 

Such forms as from their covert peep 

When earthlj'^ cares are laid asleep ! 

But fair Creature ! in the light 

Of common day so heavenly bright, 

I bless thee. Vision as thou art, 

I bless thee with a human heart : 

God shield thee to thy latest years ! 

I neither know thee nor thy peers ; 

And yet my eyes are filled with tears. 

With earnest feeling I shall praj^ 
For thee when I am far awav ; 



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106 



POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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For never saw I mien or face 
In which more plainly I could trace 
Benignity and home-bred sense 
Ripening in perfect innocence. 
Here scattered like a random seed, 
Remote from men, thou dost not need 
The embarrassed look of shy distress, 
And maidenly shamefacedness : 
Thou wear'st upon thy forehead clear 
The freedom of a mountaineer ; 
A face with gladness overspread, 
Soft smiles, by human kindness bred ; 
And seemliness complete, that sways 
Thy courtesies, about thee plays ; 
"With no restraint, but such as springs 
From quick and eager visitings 
Of thoughts that lie beyond the reach 
Of thy few words of English speech, — 
A bondage sweetly brooked, a strife 
That gives thy gestures grace and life ! 
So have I, not unmoved in mind. 
Seen birds of tempest-loving kind, 
Thus beating up against the wind. 

What hand but would a garland cull 
For thee who art so beautiful ? 

happy pleasure ! here to dwell 
Beside thee in some heathy dell ; 
Adopt your homely ways and dress, 
A shepherd, thou a shepherdess ! 
But I could frame a wish for thee 
More like a gi-ave reality : 

Thou art to me but as a wave 

Of the wild sea ; and I would have 

Some claim upon thee, if I could, 

Though but of common neighborhood. 

What joy to hear thee, and to see ! 

Thy elder brother I would be. 

Thy father, — anything to thee. 

Now thanks to Heaven ! that of its grace 
Hath led me to this lonely place ; 
Joy have I had ; and going hence 

1 bear away my recompense. 
In spots like these it is we prize 

Our Memory, feel that she hath eyes : 
Then why should I be loath to stir ? 
I feel this place was made for her ; 
To give new pleasure like the past. 
Continued long as life shall last. 
Nor am I loath, though pleased at heart. 
Sweet Highland Girl ! from thee to part ; 
For I, methinks, till I gi-ow old 
As fair before me shall behold 
As I do now, the cabin small. 
The lake, the bay, the M'aterfall ; 
And thee, the spirit of them all ! 

William Wordsworth. 



SWEET STREAM, THAT WINDS. 

Sweet stream, that winds through yonder glade, 

Apt emblem of a virtuous maid, — 

Silent and chaste she steals along, 

Far from the world's gay, busy throng ; 

With gentle yet prevailing force. 

Intent upon her destined course ; 

Graceful and useful all she does, 

Blessing and blest where'er she goes ; 

Pure-bosomed as that watery glass. 

And Heaven reflected in her face. 

WILLIAM COWPER. 
♦ 

RUTH. 

She stood breast high amid the corn. 
Clasped by the golden light of morn, 
Like the sweetheart of the sun. 
Who many a glowing kiss had won. 

On her cheek an autumn flush 
Deeply ripened ; — such a blush 
In the midst of brown was born. 
Like red poppies grown with corn. 

Round her eyes her tresses fell, — 
Which were blackest none could tell ; 
But long lashes veiled a light 
That had else been all too bright. 

And her hat, with shady brim. 
Made her tressy forehead dim ; — 
Thus she stood amid the stooks, 
Praising God with sweetest looks. 

Sure, I said, Heaven did not mean 
Where I reap thou shouldst but glean ; 
Lay thy sheaf adown and come. 
Share my harvest and my home. 

THOMAS HOOD. 
• 

NARCISSA. 

FROM "NIGHT THOUGHTS," NIGHT V. 

" Young, gay, and fortunate ! " Each yields a 

theme. 
And, first, thy youth : what says it to gra}' hairs ? 
Narcissa, I 'm become thy pupil now ; — 
Early, bright, transient, chaste as morning dew, 
She sparkled, was exhaled, and -went to heaven. 
Dr. Edward Young. 



IT NEVER COMES AGAIN. 

There are gains for all our losses, 
There are balms for all our pain, 
But when youth, the dream, departs. 
It takes something from our hearts. 
And it never conies again. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



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We are stronger, and are better, 

Under manhood's sterner reign ; 
Still we feel that something sweet 
Followed youth, with flying feet, 
And will never come again. 

Something beautiful is vanished. 

And we sigh for it in vain ; 
"We behold it everywhere. 
On the earth, and in the air. 

But it never comes again. 

Richard Henry Stoddard. 



PEAGMENTS. 

The Baby. 
A babe in a house is a well-spring of pleasure. 

0/ Education. M. F. TUPPER. 

Behold the child, by Nature's kindly law. 
Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw. 

Epistle II. POPE. 

Behold, my lords, 
Although the print be little, the whole matter 
And copy of the father : eye, nose, lip. 
The trick of his frown, his forehead ; nay, the 

valley. 
The pretty dimples of his chin, and cheek ; his 

smiles ; 
The very mould and frame of hand, nail, finger. 

I'FiiUer's Tale, Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

0, 't is a parlous boy ; 
Bold, quick, ingenious, forward, capable ; 
He is all the mother's from the top to toe. 

Richard III., Act.m.Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 



Early Death. 

"Whom the gods love die young," was said of 
yore. 

Don yiia7i. Cant. iv. Stan. 12. BYRON. 

Ere sin could blight or sorrow fade, 

Death came with friendly care ; 
The opening bud to Heaven conveyed, 

And bade it blossom there. 

Epitaph on an Infant. S. T. COLERIDGE. 

Grief fills the room up of my absent child. 
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me ; 
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words, 
Remembers me of all his gracious parts, 
Stuff's out his vacant garments with his form. 

Kin£^ John, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 



Child's Prayer. 
Now I lay me down to take my sleep, 
I pray the Lord my soul to keep : 
If I should die before I wake, 
I pray the Lord my soul to take. 

New England Primer. 



Prophecies. 
Men are but children of a larger growth. 

All for Lo-ve, Act iv. Sc, i. DRYDEN. 

The childhood shows the man 
As morning shows the day. 

Paradise Regained, Book iv. MiLTON. 

A little bench of heedless bishops here, 
And there a chancellor in embryo. 



The Schoolmistress. 



SHENSTONE. 



Look here upon thy brother Geffrey's face ; 
These eyes, these brows, were moulded out of his 
This little abstract doth contain that large 
Which died in Geffrey : and the hand of time 
Shall draw this brief unto as large a volume. 

King John, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame, 

I lisped in numbers, for the numbers came. 

Epistle to Dr. Ariuthnot. POPE. 



Boyish Ambition. 
But strive still to be a man before your mother. 

Motto 0/ No. III. Coiinoisseicr. COWPER. 

Thou wilt scarce be a man before thy mother. 

Love's Cure, Act ii. Sc. 2. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER. 



School-Days. 
The school-boy, with his satchel in his hand. 
Whistling aloud to bear his courage up. 

The Grave. R- BLAIR. 

Besides, they always smell of bread and butter. 

Matt/red. BYRON. 

You 'd scarce expect one of my age 

To speak in public on the stage ; 

And if I chance to fall below 

Demosthenes or Cicero, 

Don't view me with a critic's eye, 

But pass my imperfections by. 

Large streams from little fountains flow, 

Tall oaks from little acorns grow. 

Lines -written/or a School Declamation. D. EVERETT. 

I pray ye, flog them upon all occasions- 
It mends their morals, never mind the pain. 

Don Juan, Cant. ii. BYRON. 



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POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 



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Love is a boy by poets styled ; 

Then spare the rod and spoil the child. 

Hudibras, Part 11. Cant. i. BUTLER. 

Whipping, that 's virtue's governess, 
Tutoress of arts and sciences ; 
That mends the gross mistakes of nature, 
And puts new life into dull matter ; 
That lays foundation for renown, 
And all the honors of the gown. 

Hudibras, Part II. Cant. i. BUTLER. 



AVoRK AND Play. 

If all the year were playing holidays, 
To sport would be as tedious as to work. 

A'. Henry, Part I. Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

How doth the little busy bee 

Improve each shining hour, 
And gather honey all the day, 

From every oj)ening flower ! 

For Satan finds some mischief still 
For idle hands to do. 



Though this may be play to you, 
'T is death to us. 

Fables : The Boys and the Frogs. L'ESTRANGE. 



Quarrelling. 

Let dogs delight to bark and bite. 
For God hath made them so ; 

Let bears and lions growl and fight, 
For 't is their nature too. 

But, children, you should never let 
Your angry passions rise ; 

Your little hands were never made 
To tear each other's eyes. 

Song XVI. 



Careless Childhood. 
And listens like a three years' child. 



Lines added to the Ancient Mariner. 



WORDSWORTH. 



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One eare it heard, at the other out it went. 

Troilus and Creseide, Book iv. CHAUCER. 

Children blessings seem, but tonnents are ; 
When young, our folly, and when old, our fear. 

Dofi Carlos. Otway. 

I remember, I remember 

How my childhood fleeted by, — 
The mirth of its December, 

And the warmth of its July. 

/ i^tijiein-Oer. I Retneinber. PRAED. 



When they are young, they 
Are like bells rung backwards, nothing but noise 
And giddiness. 

Wit -without Money . BEAUMONT and FLETCHER. 

Ah, happy hills ! ah, pleasing shade ! 

Ah, fields beloved in vain ! 
Where once my careless childhood strayed, 

A stranger yet to pain ! 
I feel the gales that from ye blow 
A momentary bliss bestow. 

On a Distant Prospect 0/ Eton College. GRAY. 



Childish Days. 

Sweet childish days, that were as long 
As twenty days are now. 

To a Butterfly. WORDSWORTH. 



Merry Youth. 

Life ! how pleasant in thy morning, 
Young Fancy's rays the hills adorning ! 
Cold-pausing Caution's lesson scorning. 

We frisk away, 
Like school-boys at th' expected warning. 

To joy and play. 

Epistle to James Smith. BURNS. 

Life went a Maying 
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy, 

When I Avas young ! 

Youth and Age. S. T. COLERIDGE. 

Just at the age 'twixt bojr and youth, 
AVhen thought is speech, and speech is truth. 

Marmion, Introditc. to Cant. ii. SCOTT. 

Naught cared this body for wind or weather 
When youth and I lived in 't together. 

Youth and Age. S. T. COLERIDGE. 

Oh, Mirth and Innocence ! Oh, Milk and Water ! 
Ye happy mixtures of more happy days ! 

Manfred. BYRON. 

Fair laughs the morn, and soft the zephyr blows, 
While proudly riding o'er the azure realm 

In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes ; 

Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm ; 

Eegardless of the sweeping whirlwind's sway, 

That, hushed in grim repose, expects his evening 
prey. 

The Bard, II. 2. GRAY. 

Yet, ah ! why should they know their fate. 

Since sorrow never comes too late. 
And happiness too swiftly flies ? 

Thought would destroy their paradise. 
No more ; — where ignorance is bliss, 

'T is folly to be wise. 

On a Distant Prospect ofpton College. GRAY. * 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



FEIENDSHIP. 



BENEDICITE. 

God's love and peace be with thee, where 
Soe'er this soft autumnal air 
Lifts the dark tresses of thy hair ! 

Whether thi-ough city casements comes 
Its kiss to thee, in crowded rooms, 
Or, out among the woodland blooms. 

It freshens o'er thy thoughtful face. 
Imparting, in its glad embrace. 
Beauty to beaut}^ grace to grace ! 

Fair Nature's book together read, 

The old wood-paths tliat knew our tread, 

The maple shadows overhead, — 

The hills we climbed, the river seen 
By gleams along its deep ravine, — 
All keep thy memory fresh and green. 

Where'er I look, where'er I stray. 
Thy thought goes with me on my way. 
And hence the prayer I breathe to-day : 

O'er lapse of time and change of scene, 
The weary waste which lies between 
Thyself and me, my heart I lean. 

Thou lack'st not Friendship's spellword, nor 
The half-unconscious power to draw 
All hearts to thine by Love's sweet law. 

With these good gifts of God is cast 
Thy lot, and many a charm thou hast 
To hold the blessed angels fast. 

If, then, a fervent wish for thee 

The gracious heavens will heed from me. 

What should, dear heart, its burden be ? 

The sighing of a shaken reed, — 
What can I more than meekly plead 
The greatness of our common need ? 



God's love, — unchanging, pure, and true, — 
The Paraclete white-shining through 
His peace, — ■ the fall of Hermon's dew ! 

With such a prayer, on this sweet day, 
As thou mayst hear and I may say, 
I greet thee, dearest, far away ! 

John Ckeenleaf Whittier. 



EAELY FRIENDSHIP. 

The half-seen memories of childish days. 
When pains and pleasures lightly came and went ; 
The symyiathies of boyhood rashly spent 
In fearful wanderings through forbidden ways ; 
The vague, but manly wish to tread the maze 
Of life to noble ends, — - whereon intent, 
Asking to know for what man here is sent, 
The bravest heart must often pause, and gaze; 
The firm resolve to seek the chosen end 
Of manhood's judgment, cautious and mature, — 
Each of these viewless bonds binds friend to friend 
With strength no selfish purpose can secure : 
My happy lot is this, that all attend 
That friendship which first came, and which shall 
last endure. 

AUBREY DE VERB. 



FRIENDSHIP. 

FROM "HAMLET," ACT III. SC. 2. 

Ham. Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man 
As e'er my conversation coped withal. 

HoR. my dear lord — 

Ham. Nay, do not think I flatter : 

For what advancement may I hope from thee 
That no revenue hast but thy good spirits, 
To feed and clothe thee ? Why should the poor 

be flattered ? 
No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp. 
And crook the pregnant hinges of the knee, 
Where thrift mav follow fawning. Dost thou 



hear? 



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POEMS 01<- THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice, 
And could of men distinguish, her election 
Hath sealed thee for herself ; for thou hast been 
As one, in suft'eriug all, that suffers nothing, — 
A man that fortune's buffets and rewards 
Hast ta'en with equal thanks ; and blessed are 

those 
Whose blood and judgment are so well co-mingled. 
That they are not a pipe for Fortune's finger 
To sound what stop she please : Give me that 

man 
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him 
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart. 
As I do thee. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



FRIENDSHIP. 

A RUDDY drop of manly blood 

The surging sea outweighs ; 

The world uncertain comes and goes. 

The lover rooted stays. 

I fancied he was fled, — 

And, after many a year, 

Glowed unexhausted kindliness. 

Like daily sunrise there. 

My careful heart was free again ; 

friend, my bosom said, 

Through thee alone the sky is arched, 

Through thee the rose is red ; 

All things through thee take nobler form. 

And look beyond the earth ; 

The mill-round of our fate appears 

A sun-path in tliy worth. 

Me too thy nobleness has taught 

To master my despair ; 

The fountains of my hidden life 

Are through thy friendship fair. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



THE MEMORY OF THE HEART. 

If stores of dry and learned lore we gain, 
AVe keep them in the memory of the brain ; 
Names, things, and facts, — whate'er we knowl- 
edge call, — 
There is the common ledger for them all; 
And images on this cold surface traced 
Ma.ke slight impression, and are soon effaced. 
But we've a page, more glowing and more bright. 
On which our friendship and our love to write ; 
That these may never from the soul depart. 
We trust them to the memory of the heart. 
There is no dimming, no effaceraent there ; 
Each new pulsation keeps the record clear ; 
Warm, golden letters all the tablet fill. 
Nor lose their lustre till the heart stands still. 
Daniel Webster. 



BILL AND JOE. 

Come, dear old comrade, you and I 
Will steal an hour from days gone by, - — 
The shining days when life was new, 
And all was bright as morning dew, — 
The lusty days of long ago. 
When you were Bill and I was Joe, 

Your name may flaunt a titled trail, 
Proud as a cockerel's rainbow tail ; 
And mine as brief appendix wear 
As Tam O'Shanter's luckless mare ; 
To-day, old friend, remember still 
That I am Joe and you are Bill. 

You 've won the great world's envied prize, 
And grand you look in jieople's eyes. 
With HON. and L L. D. 
In big brave letters, fair to see, — 
Your fist, old fellow ! off they go ! 
How are you. Bill ? How are you, Joe ? 

You 've worn the judge's ermined robe ; 
You 've taught your name to half the globe ; 
You 've sung mankind a deathless strain ; 
You 've made the dead past live again : 
The world may call you what it will. 
But you and I are Joe and Bill. 

The chaffing young folks stare and say, 
" See those old buffers, bent and gray ; 
They talk like fellows in their teens ! 
Mad, poor old boys ! That 's what it means," — 
And shake their heads ; they little know 
The throbbing hearts of Bill and Joe ! 

How Bill forgets his hour of pride. 
While Joe sits smiling at his side ; 
How Joe, in spite of time's disguise, 
Finds the old schoolmate in his eyes, — 
Those calm, stern eyes that melt and fill 
As Joe looks fondly up at Bill. 

Ah, pensive scholar, what is fame ? 

A fitful tongue of leaping flame ; 

A giddy whirlwind's fickle gust. 

That lifts a pinch of mortal dust : 

A few swift years, and who can show 

Which dust was Bill, and which was Joe ? 

The weary idol takes his stand. 

Holds out his bruised and aching hand, 

While gaping thousands come and go, — 

How vain it seems, this empty show ! 

Till all at once his pulses thrill, 

'T is poor old Joe's " God bless you. Bill ! " 



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EMERSON'S HOME AT CONCORD. 

" dell and crag. 

Hollow and lake, hillside and pine-arcade, 
Are tojtched wiih genizis." 



FlllENDSIIIP. 



113 



a 



And shall we breathe in happier spheres 
The names that pleased our mortal ears, — 
In some sweet lull of harp and song, 
For earth-born spirits none too long, — 
Just whispering of the world below, 
Where this was Bill, and that was Joe ? 

No matter ; while our home is here 
No sounding name is half so dear; 
When fades at length our lingering day, 
Who cares what pompous tombstones say ? 
Read on the hearts that love us still, 
Hie jacet Joe. Hie jacet Bill. 

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 



DEEAMS AND REALITIES. 

Rosamond, thou fair and good 
And perfect flower of womanhood ! 

Thou royal rose of June ! 
Why didst thou droop before thy time ? 
Why wither in the. first sweet prime ? 

Why didst thou die so soon ? 

For, looking backward through my tears 
On thee, and on my wasted years, 

I cannot choose but say. 
If thou liadst lived to be my guide. 
Or thou hadst lived and I had died, 

'Twere better far to-day. 

child of light, golden head ! — 
Bright sunbeam for one moment shed 

Upon life's lonely way, — 
Why didst thou vanish from our sight ? 
Could they not spare my little light 

From heaven's unclouded day ? 

friend so true, friend so good ! — 
Thou one dream of my maidenhood, 

That gave youth all its charms, — 
What had I done, or what hadst thou. 
That, through tliis lonesome Avorld till now, 

We walk with empty arms ? 

And yet had this poor soul been fed ' 
With all it loved and coveted ; 

Had life been always fair. 
Would these dear dreams that ne'er depart. 
That thrill with bliss my inmost heart, 

Forever tremble there ? 

If still they kept their earthly place, 
Tlie friends I held in my embrace, 

And gave to death, alas ! 
Could I have learned that clear, calm faith 
That looks beyond the bonds of death, 

And almost longs to pass ? 



Sometimes, I think, the things we see 
Are shadows of the things to be ; 

That what we plan we build ; 
That every hope that hath been crossed. 
And every dream we thought was lost, 

In heaven shall be fulfilled ; 

That even the children of the brain 
Have not been born and died in vain, 

Thoiigh here unclothed and dumb ; 
But on some brighter, better shore 
They live, embodied evermore. 

And wait for us to come. 

And when on that last day we rise. 
Caught up between the earth and skies, 

Tlren shall we hear our Lord 
Say, Thou hast done with doubt and death, 
Henceforth, according to thy faith. 

Shall be thy faith's reward. 

PHCEBE GARY. 



THE DEAD FRIEND. 

FROM " IN MEMORIAM." 

The path by which we twain did go, 

Which led by tracts that pleased us well, 
Through four sweet years arose and fell, 

From flower to flower, from snow to snow. 

But where the path we walked began 
To slant the fifth autumnal slope, 
As we descended, following Hope, 

There sat the Shadow feared of man ; 

Who broke our fair companionship. 
And spread his mantle dark and cold, 
And wrapped thee formless in the fold. 

And dulled the murmur on thy lip. 

When each by turns was guide' to each. 
And Fancy light from Fancy caught. 
And Thought leapt out to wed with Thought 

Ere Thought could wed itself with Speech ; 

And all we met was fair and good. 

And all was good that Time could bring, 
And all the secret of the Spring 

Moved in the chambers of the blood ; 

I know that this was Life, — the track 
Whereon with equal feet we fared ; 
And then, as now, the day prepared 

The daily burden for the back. 

But this it was that made me move 

As light as carrier-birds in air ; 

I loved the weight I had to bear 
Because it needed help of Love : 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Nor could I wearj^, heart or limb, 
AVhen miglity Love would cleave in twain 
The lading of a single pain, 

And part it, giving half to him. 

But I remained, whose hopes were dim. 

Whose life, whose thoughts were little worth. 
To wander on a darkened earth. 

Where all things round me breathed of him. 

friendship, equal-poised control, 
heart, with kindliest motion warm, 

sacred essence, other form, 

solemn ghost, crowned soul ! 

Yet none could better know than I, 
How much of act at human hands 
The sense of human will demands, 

By which we dare to live or die. 

Whatever way my days decline, 

1 felt and feel, though left alone. 
His being working in mine own, 

The footsteps of his life in mine. 

My pulses therefore beat again 

For other friends that once I met ; 
Nor can it suit me to forget 

The mighty hopes that make us men. 

1 woo j^our love : I count it crime 
To mourn for any overmuch ; 

I, the divided half of such 
A friendship as had mastered Time ; 

Which masters Time, indeed, and is 
Eternal, separate from fears : 
The all-assuming months and years 

Can take no part away from this. 

days and hours, your work is this, 
To hold me from my proper place, 
A little while from his embrace, 

For fuller gain of after bliss : 

That out of distance might ensue 

Desire, of nearness doubly sweet; 

And unto meeting when we meet. 
Delight a hundred-fold accrue. 

The hills are shadows, and they flow 

From form to form, and nothing stands ; 
They melt like mist, the solid lands. 

Like clouds they shape themselves and go. 

But in my spirit will I dwell. 

And dream my dream, and hold it true ; 
For tho' my lips may breathe adieu, 

1 cannot think the thing farewell. 

Alfred Tennyson. 



PARTED FPJENDS. 

Friend after friend departs : 

Who hath not lost a friend ? 
There is no union here of hearts 

That finds not here an end ; 
Were this frail world our only rest, 
Living or dying, none were blest. 

Beyond the flight of time. 

Beyond this vale of death. 
There surely is some blessed clime 

Where life is not a breath. 
Nor life's affections transient fire. 
Whose sparks fly upward to expire. 

There is a world above. 

Where parting is unknown ; 
A whole eternity of love. 

Formed for the good alone ; 
And faith beholds the dying here 
Translated to that happier sphere. 

Thus star by star declines. 

Till all are passed away. 
As morning high and higher shines, 

To pure and perfect day ; 
Nor sink those stars in empty night ; 
They hide themselves in heaven's own light. 
James Montgomery. 



MAETIAL FRIENDSHIP. 

FROM "CORIOLANUS," ACT IV. SC. S- 
[Aufidius the Volscian to Caius Marcius Coriolanus.] 

AuF. Marcius, Marcius ! 

Each word thou hast spoke hath weeded from 

my heart 
A root of ancient envy. If Jupiter 
Should from yond' cloud speak divine things, 

and say, 
" 'T is true, "I'd not believe them more than thee, 
All-noble Marcius. — Let me twine 
Mine arms about that body, where-against 
My grained ash an hundred times hath broke. 
And scared the moon with splinters ! Here I clip 
The anvil of my sword ; and do contest 
As hotly and as nobly with thy love. 
As ever in ambitious strength I did 
Contend against thy valor. Know thou first, 
I loved the maid 1 married ; never man 
Sighed truer breath ; but that I see thee here. 
Thou noble thing ! more dances my rapt heart 
Than when I first my wedded mistress saw 
Bestride my threshold. Why, thou Mars ! I tell 

thee. 
We have a power on foot ; and I had purpose 
Once more to hew thy target from thy brawn. 



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FRIENDSHIP. 



115 



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Or lose mine arm for 't. Thou hast beat me out 
Twelve several times, and I have nightly siace 
Dreamt of encounters 'twixt thyself and me, 
We have been down together in my sleep. 
Unbuckling helms, fisting each other's throat, 
And waked half dead with nothing. Worthy 

Marcius, 
Had we no other quarrel else to Rome, but that 
Thou art thence banished, we would muster all 
From twelve to seventy ; and, pouring war 
Into the bowels of ungrateful Rome, 
Like a bold flood o'erbear. 0, come ! go in, 
And take our friendly senators by the hands ; 
Who now are here, taking their leaves of me. 
Who am prepared against your territories. 
Though not for Rome itself. 

A thousand welcomes ! 
And more a friend than e'er an enemy ; 
Yet, Marcius, that was much. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



WHEN TO THE SESSIONS OF SWEET 
SILENT THOUGHT. 

SONNET XXX. 

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought 
I summon up remembrance of things past, 
I sigh the lack of many a thing 1 sought. 
And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste : 
Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow, 
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night. 
And weep afresh love's long-since-cancelled woe. 
And moan the expense of many a vanished sight. 
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone, 
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er 
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan. 
Which I new pay, as if not paid before ; 

But if the while I think on thee, dear friend, 
All losses are restored, and sorrows end. 

Shakespeare. 



B- 



JAFFAR. 

Jaffae, the Barmecide, the good vizier. 
The poor man's hope, the friend without a peer, 
Jaflar was dead, slain by a doom unjust ; 
And guilty Haroun, sullen with mistrust 
Of what the good, and e'en the bad, might say, 
Ordained that no man living from that day 
Should dare to speak his name on pain of death. 
All Araby and Persia held their breath ; 

All but the brave Mondeer : he, proud to show 
How far for love a grateful soul could go. 
And facing death for very scorn and grief 
(For his great heart wanted a great relief), 



Stood forth in Bagdad daily, in the square 
Where once had stood a happy house, and there 
Harangued the tremblers at the scymitar 
On all they owed to the divine Jaffar. 

"Bring me this man," the caliph cried ; the man 
Was brought, was gazed upon. The mutes began 
To bind his arms. "Welcome, brave cords," 

cried he ; 
' ' From bonds far worse Jaff'ar delivered me ; 
From wants, from shames, from loveless house- 
hold fears ; 
Made a man's eyes friends with delicious tears ; 
Restored me, loved me, put me on a par 
With his great self. How can I pay Jaffar ? " 

Haroun, who felt that on a soul like this 
The mightiest vengeance could but fall amiss. 
Now deigned to smile, as one great lord of fate 
Might smile upon another half as great. 
He said, " Let worth grow frenzied if it wiU. ; 
The caliph's judgment shall be master still. 
Go, and since gifts so move thee, take this gem. 
The richest in the Tartar's diadem. 
And hold the giver as thou deemest fit ! " ' 
"Gifts !" cried the friend ; he took, and hold- 
ing it 
High toward the heavens, as though to meet his 

star, 
Exclaimed, " This, too, I owe to thee, Jaffar ! " 

LEIGH HUNT. 



THE MEETING OF THE SHIPS. 

" We take each other by the hand, and we exchange a few words 
and looks of kindness, and we rejoice together for a few short mo- 
ments ; and then days, months, years intervene, and we see and 
know nothing of each other." — WASHINGTON IRVING. 

T-wo barks met on the deep mid-sea, 
When calms had stilled the tide ; 

A few bright days of summer glee 
There found them side by side. 

And voices of the fair and brave 
Rose mingling thence in mirth ; 

And sweetly floated o'er the wave 
The melodies of earth. 

Moonlight on that lone Indian main 

Cloudless and lovely slept ; 
While dancing step and festive strain 

Each deck in triumj)h swept. 

And hands were linked, and answering eyes 

With kindly meaning shone ; 
0, brief and passing sympathies. 

Like leaves together blown ! 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



A little while sucli joy was cast 

Over the deep's repose, 
Till the loud singing winds at last 

Like trumpet music rose. 

And proudl}'-, freely on their way 

The parting vessels bore ; 
In calm or storm, by rock or bay, 

To meet — 0, nevermore ! 

Never to blend in victory's cheei", 

To aid in hours of woe ; 
And thus bright spirits mingle here, 

Such ties are formed below. 

Felicia Hemans. 



THE VALE OF AVOCA. 

There is not in this wide world a valley so sweet 
As that vale in whose bosom the bright waters 

meet ; 
0, the last ray of feeling and life must depart 
Ere the bloom of that valley shall fade from my 

heart ! 

Yet it was not that Nature had shed o'er the scene 
Her purest of crystal and brightest of green ; 
'T was not the soft magic of streamlet or hill, — 
0, no ! it was something more exc[uisite still. 

'T was that friends, the beloved of my bosom, 
were near. 

Who made every dear scene of enchantment 
more dear, 

And who felt how the best charms of nature im- 
prove, 

When we see them reflected from looks that we 
love. 

Sweet Vale of Avoca ! how calm could I resjt 
In thy bosom of shade, with the friends I love 

best; 
Where the storms that we feel in this cold world 

should cease. 
And our hearts, like thy waters, be mingled in 

peace. 

Thomas Moore. 



B- 



WE HAVE BEEN FRIENDS TOGETHER. 

We have been friends together 

In sunshine and in shade. 
Since first beneath the chestnut-tree 

In infancy we played. 
But coldness dwells within thy heart, 

A cloud is on thy brow ; 
We have been friends together. 

Shall a light word part us now ? 



We have been gay together ; 

We have laughed at little jests ; 
For the fount of hope was gushing 

Warm and joyous in our breasts. 
But laughter now hath fled thy lip, 

And sullen glooms thy brow ; 
We have been gay together, 

Shall a light word part us now ? 

We have been sad together ; 

We have wept with bitter tears 
O'er the grass-grown graves where slumbered 

The hopes of early years. 
The voices which were silent then 

Would bid thee clear thy brow ; 
We have been sad together. 

Shall a light word part us now ? 

CAROLINE ELIZABETH SARAH NORTON. 



THE QUARREL OF FRIENDS. 

FROM "CHRISTABEL." 

Alas ! they had been friends in youth : 
But whispering tongues can poison truth ; 
And constancy lives in realms above ; 

And life is thorny ; and youth is vain ; 
And to be wroth with one we love 

Doth work like madness in the brain. 
And thus it chanced, as I divine. 
With Roland and Sir Leoline ! 
Each spoke words of high disdain 

And insult to his heart's best brother ; 
They parted, — ne'er to meet again ! 

But never either found another 
To free the hollow heart from paining. 
They stood aloof, the scars remaining, 
Like cliff's which had been rent asunder ; 

A dreary sea now flows between, 
But neither heat, nor frost, nor thunder 

Shall wholly do away, I ween. 

The marks of that which once hath been. 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 



THE ROYAL GUEST. 

They tell me I am shrewd with other men ; 

With thee I 'm slow, and difficult of speech. 
With others I may guide the car of talk : 

Thou wing'st it oft to realms beyond my reach. 

If other guests should come, I 'd deck my hair, 
And choose my newest garment from the shelf ; 

When thou art bidden, I would clothe my heart 
With holiest purpose, as for God himself. 



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FRIENDSHIP. 



117 



ra 



For them I while the hours with tale or song, 
Or web of fancy, fringed with careless rhyme ; 

But how to lind a fitting lay for thee, 
Who hast the harmonies of every time ? 

friend beloved ! I sit apart and dumb, — 
Sometimes in sorrow, oft in joy divine ; 
\ My lip will falter, but my prisoned heart 

Springs forth to measure its faint pulse with 
thine. 

Thou ai't to me most like a royal guest, 

Whose travels bring him to some lowly roof, 

Where simple rustics spread their festal fare 
And, blushing, own it is not good enough. 

Bethink thee, then, whene'er thou com'st to me. 

From high emprise and noble toil to rest, 
My thoughts are weak and trivial, matched with 
thine ; 
But the poor mansion offers thee its best. 

Julia Ward Howe. 



TOO LATE I STAYED. 

Too late I stayed, — forgive the crime ! 

Unheeded flew the hours : 
How noiseless falls the foot of Time 

That only treads on flowers ! 

And who, with clear account, remarks 

The ebbings of his glass, 
When all its sands are diamond sparks, 

That dazzle as they pass ? 

0, who to sober measurement 
Time's happy swiftness brings, 

When birds of paradise have lent 
Their plumage to his wings ? 

WILLIAM Robert Spencer. 



WE ARE BRETHREN A'. 

A HAPPY bit hame this auld world would be 
If men, when they 're here, could make shift to 

agree. 
An' ilk said to his neighbor, in cottage an' ha', 
" Gome, gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'." 

I ken na why ane wi' anither should fight. 
When to 'gree would make ae body cosie an' right, 
When man meets wi' man, 't is the best way ava, 
To say, "Gi'e me your hand, — we are breth- 
ren a'." 

My coat is a coarse ane, an' yours may be fine, 
And I maun drink water, while you may drink 
wine ; 



But we baith ha'e a leal heart, unspotted to 

shaw : 
Sae gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'. 

The knave ye would scorn, the unfaithfu' deride ; 
Ye would stand like a rock, wi' the truth on 

your side ; 
Sae would I, an' naught else would I value a 

straw : 
Then gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'. 

Ye would scorn to do fausely by woman or man ; 
I hand by the right aye, as weel as I can ; 
We are ane in our joys, our affections, an' a' : 
Come, gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'. 

Your mother has lo'ed you as mithers can lo'e ; 
An' mine has done for me what mithers can do ; 
We are ane high an' laigh, an' we shouldna be 

twa : 
Sae gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'. 

We love the same simmer day, sunny and fair ; 
Hame ! oh, how we love it, an' a' that are there ! 
Frae the pure air of heaven the same life we 

draw : 
Come, gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'. 

Frail shakin' auld age will soon come o'er us 

baith. 
An' creeping alang at his back will be death ; 
Syne into the same mither-yird we will fa' : 
Come, gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'. 

ROBERT NICOLL. 



THE MAHOGANY-TREE. 

Christmas is here ; 
Winds whistle shrill, 
Icy and chill. 
Little care we ; 
Little we fear 
Weather without, 
Sheltered about 
The mahogany-tree. 

Once on the boughs 
Birds of rare plume 
Sang, in its bloom ; 
Night-birds are we ; 
Here we carouse. 
Singing, like them, 
Perched round the stem 
Of the jolly old tree. 

Here let us sport. 
Boys, as M^e sit, — 
Laughter and wit 
Flashing so free. 



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POEMS OF THE AEFECTIONS. 



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Life is but short, — 
When we are gone, 
Let them sing on, 
Round the old tree. 

Evenings we knew, 
Happy as this ; 
Faces we miss, 
Pleasant to see. 
Kind hearts and true. 
Gentle and just, 
Peace to your dust ! 
"We sing round the tree. 

Care, like a dun, 
Lurks at the gate : 
Let the dog wait ; 
Happy we '11 be ! 
Drink, every one ; 
Pile up the coals ; 
Fill the red bowls, 
Round the old tree ! 

Drain we the cup. — 
Friend, art afraid ? 
Spirits are laid 
In the Red Sea. 
Mantle it up ; 
Empty it yet ; 
Let us forget. 
Round the old tree ! 

Sorrows, begone ! 
Life and its ills. 
Duns and their bills. 
Bid we to flee. 
Come with the dawn, 
Blue- devil sprite ; 
Leave us to-night, 
Round the old tree ! 

William Makepeace Thackeray. 



C& 



GIVE ME THE OLD. 

OLD WINE TO DRINK, OLD WOOD TO BURN, OLD BOOKS 
TO READ, AND OLD FRIENDS TO CONVERSE WITH. 

Old wine to drink ! — 
Ay, give the slippery juice 
That drippeth from the grape thrown loose 

Within the tun ; 
Plucked from beneath the cliff 
Of sunny-sided Teneriffe, 

And ripened 'neath the blink 

Of India's sun ! 

Peat whiskey hot. 
Tempered with well-boiled water ! 
These make the long night shorter, — 

Forgetting not 
Good stout old English porter. 



Old wood to burn ! — 
Ay, bring the hillside beech 
From where the owlets meet and screech, 

And ravens croak ; 
The crackling pine, and cedar sweet ; 
Bring too a clump of fragrant peat, 
Dug 'neath the fern ; 

The knotted oak, 

A fagot too, perhap, 
Whose bright flame,' dancing, winking, 
Shall light us at our drinking ; 

While the oozing sap 
Shall make sweet music to our thinking. 

Old books to read ! — 
Ay, bring those nodes of wit. 
The brazen-clasped, the vellum writ, 

Time-honored tomes ! 
The same my sire scanned before, 
The same my grandsire thumbed o'er, 
The same his sire from college bore. 
The well-earned meed 

Of Oxford's domes ; 

Old Homer blind, 
Old Horace, rake Anacreon, by 
Old Tully, Plautus, Terence lie ; 
Mort Arthur's olden minstrelsie, 
Quaint Burton, quainter Spenser, ay ! 
And Gervase Markham's venerie, — 

Nor leave behind 
The Holye Book by which we live and die. 

Old friends to talk ! — 
Ay, bring those chosen few. 
The wise, the courtly, and the true. 

So rarely found ; 
Him for my wine, him for my stud, 
Him for my easel, distich, bud 
In mountain walk ! 
Bring Walter good : 
With soulful Fred ; and learned Will, 
And thee, my alter ego (dearer still 
For eyery mood). 

ROBERT HINCHLEY MESSENGER. 



AULD LANG SYNE. 

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, 
And never brought to min' ? 

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, 
And days o' lang syne ? 



For auld lang syne, my dear, 

For auld lang syne, 
We '11 talc a cup o' kindness yet. 

For auld lang syne. 



-- P 



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FRIENDSHIP. 



119 



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We twa hae run about the braes, 

And pu'd the gowans fine ; 
But we 've wandered mony a weary foot 

Sin' auld lang syne. 

For auld, etc. 

We twa hae paidl't i' the burn, 

Frae mornin' sun till dine ; 
But seas between us braid hae roared 

Sin' auld lang syne. 

For auld, etc. 

And here 's a hand, my trusty fiere, 

And gie 's a hand o' thine ; 
And we '11 tak a right guid-willie waught 

For auld lang syne. 

For auld, etc. ■■ 

And surely ye '11 be your pint-stowp, 

And surely I '11 be mine ; 
And we '11 tak a cup o' kindness yet 

For auld lang syne. 

For auld, etc. 

ROBERT BURNS. 



PLATONIC. 

I HAD sworn to be a bachelor, she had sworn to 
be a maid. 

For we quite agreed in doubting whether matri- 
mony paid ; 

Besides, we had our higher loves, — fair science 
ruled my heart, 

And she said her young affections were all wound 
lip in art. 

So we laughed at those wise men who say that 
friendship cannot live 

'Twixt man and woman, unless each has some- 
thing more to give ; 

We would be friends, and friends as true as e'er 
were man and man ; 

I 'd be a second. David, and she Miss Jonathan. 

We scorned all sentimental trash, — vows, kisses, 

tears, and sighs ; 
High friendship, such as ours, might well such 

childish arts despise ; 
We liked each other, that was all, quite all there 

was to say. 
So we just shook hands upon it, in a business 

sort of way. 

We shared our secrets and our joys, together 

hoped and feared. 
With common pui'pose sought the goal that 

young Ambition reared ; 



We dreamed together of the days, the dream- 
bright days to come, 

We were strictly confidential, and we called 
each other " chum." 

And many a day we wandered together o'er the 
hills, 

I seeking bugs and butterflies, and she, the 
ruined mills 

And rustic bridges, and the like, that picture- 
makers prize 

To run in with their waterfalls, and groves, and 
summer skies. 

And many a quiet evening, in hours of silent 

ease, 
We floated down the river, or strolled beneath 

the trees, 
And talked, in long gradation from the poets to 

the weather, 
While the western skies and my cigar burned 

slowly out together. 

Yet through it all no whispered word, no tell- 
tale glance or sigh. 

Told aught of warmer sentiment than friendly 
sympathy. 

We talked of love as coolly as we talked of 
nebulae, 

And thought no more of being one than we did 
of being three. 

"Well, good b}^, chum ! " I took her hand, for 

the time had come to go. 
My going meant our parting, wlien to meet, we 

did not know. 
I had lingered long, and said farewell with a 

very heavy heart ; 
For although we were but friends, 't is hard for 

honest friends to part. 

" Good-by, old fellow ! don't forget }^our friends 

beyond the sea. 
And some day, when you 've lots of time, drop a 

line or tAvo to me." 
The words came lightly, gayl}^ but a great sob, 

just behind, 
Welled upward with a story of quite a different 

kind. 

And then she raised her eyes to mine, — great 

liquid eyes of blue, 
Filled to the brim, and running o'er, like violet 

cups of dew ; 
One long, long glance, and then I did, what I 

never did before — 

Perhaps the tears meant friendship, but I 'm 

sure the kiss meant more. 

William B. Terrett. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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A TEMPLE TO FRIENDSHIP. 

"A TEMPLE to Friendship," cried Laura, en- 
chanted, 

"I'll bnild in this garden ; the thought is di- 
vine." 

So the temple was built, and she now onlj- 
wanted 

An image of Friendship, to place on the shrine. 

So she flew to the sculptor, who sat down before 

her 
An image, the fairest his art could invent ; 
But so cold,, and so dull, that the youthful 

adorer 
Saw plainly this was not the Friendship she 

meant. 

"0, never," said she, "could I think of en- 
shrining 

An image whose looks are so joyless and dim ; 

But yon little god upon roses reclining, 

We '11 make, if you please, sir, a Friendship of 
him." 

So the bargain was struck ; Avith the little god 

laden. 
She joyfully flew to her home in the grove. 
" Farewell," said the sculptor, " you 're not the 

first maiden 
Who came but for Friendship, and took away 

Love ! " 

THOMAS MOORE. 



FEAGMENTS. 

Friendship. 
Friendship ! mysterious cement of the soul ! 
Sweet'ner of life ! and solder of society ! 

The Grnve. R- ^^'^ 

Friendship is the cement of two minds, 
As of one man the soul and body is ; 
Of which one cannot sever but the other 
Suffers a needful separation. 



GEO. CHAPMAN. 



Friendship 's the image of 
Eternity, in which there's nothing 
Movable, nothing mischievous. 

E7idy]jnon. 



LILLY. 



Flowers are lovely ; Love is flower-like ; 

Friendship is a sheltering tree ; 
O the Joys, that came down shower-like, 

Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty, 
Ere 1 was old ! 

Youth and A^e S. T. COLHRIDGE. 



Heaven gives us friends to bless the present 

scene ; 
Resumes them, to prepare us for the next. 

Night Thoughts. YOUNG. 

'T is sweet, as year by year we lose 
Friends out of sight, in faith to muse 
How grows in Paradise our store. 

Burial of the Dead. KEBLE. 

I praise the Frenchman,* his remark was shrewd, 
How sweet, how passing sweet is solitude ! 
But grant me still a friend in my retreat. 
Whom I may whisper. Solitude is sweet. 

Retirement. COWPER. 



Choice Friends. 

True happiness 
Consists not in the multitude of friends. 
But in the worth and choice. 

Cynthia's Revels. BEN JONSON. 

A generous friendship no cold medium knows, 
Burns with one love, with one resentment glows. 

Iliad, Book ix. HOMER, Pojie's Trans. 

Statesman, yet friend to truth ! of soul sincei'c. 
In action faithful, and in honor clear ; 
AVho broke no promise, served no private end, 
Who gained no title, and who lost no friend. 

Epistle to Mr. Addison. POPE. 

Like the stained web that whitens in the sun. 
Grow pure by being j^urely shone upon. 

LallaRookh: The Veiled Prophet of Khorassan. T.MOORK. 

Who ne'er knew joy but friendship might divide, 
Or gave his father grief but when he died. 

Epitaph on the Hon. S. Harcourt. POPE. 



Though last, not least, in love ! 

Julius Cctsar, Act iii. Sc. i. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Faithful Friends. 

Friendship above all ties does bind the heart ; 
And faith in friendship is the noblest part. 

Henry V. EARL OF ORRERY. 

Be kind to my remains ; and 0, defend. 
Against your judgment, your departed friend ! 

Epistle to CoHgreve. DRYDEN. 



Summer Friends. 

summer friendship. 
Whose flattering leaves, that shadowed us in 
Our prosperity, with the least gust drop oft' 
In the autumn of adversity. 

The Maid of Honor. MASSIN'GE 

* La Bruyire, say3 Bartlett. 



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121 



Like summer friends, 
Flies of estate and sunneshine. 

The Answer. GEORGE HERBERT. 

What the declined is 
He shall as soon read in the eyes of others 
As feel in his own fall ; for men, like butterflies, 
Show not their mealy wings but to the summer. 

Troilus and Cressidci, Act iii, Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



Friends to be Shunned. 

The man that hails you Tom or Jack, 
And proves, by thumping on your back, 

His sense of your great merit, 
Is such a friend, that one had need 
Be very much his friend indeed 

To pardon, or to bear it. 

On Friendship. COVVPER. 

Give me the avowed, the erect, the manly foe. 
Bold I can meet, — perhaps may turn his blow ; 
But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can 

send, 
Save, save, oh ! save me from the Candid Friend ! 

New Moj-ality. GEORGE CANNING. 



Friendship and Love. 

Friendship is constant in all other things, 
Save in the office and affairs of love. 

Much Ado about Nothing, Act ii. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 

If I speak to thee in Friendship's name. 
Thou think'st I speak too coldly ; 

If I mention Love's devoted flame. 
Thou say'st I speak too boldly. 

How Shall I J I -00 ? T. MOORE. 

Friendship, like love, is but a name. 
Unless to one you stint the flame. 

'T is tlius in friendship ; who depend 
On many rarely find a friend. 

The H.ire and Many Friends. Gav. 



Quarrels of Friends. 

1 have shot mine arrow o'er the house, 
And hurt my brother. 

Ifamlet, Actv. Sc.Q. SHAKESPEARE. 

Brother, brother, we are both in the wrong. 

T/ie Heirgar's Opera, Act ii. Sc. 2. GAY. 



A friend should bear his friend's infirmities, 
But Brutus makes mine greater than they are. 

Julius Ccssar, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



Hospitality. 

I 've often wished that I had clear. 
For life, six hundred pounds a year, 
A handsome house to lodge a friend, 
A river at my garden's end. 

Imitation 0/ Horace, Book ii. Sat. 6. SWIFT. 

True friendship's laws are by this rule exprest, 
"Welcome the coming, speed the parting guest. 

Odyssey, -BooA XV Translation 0/ FOPli. Homer. 

j Whoe'er has travelled life's dull round. 
Where'er his stages may have been. 

May sigh to think he still has found 
The warmest welcome at an inn. 

Il'ritten on a IVindow 0/ an Inn. SHENSTONE. 

And do as adversaries do in law, 

Strive mightily, but eat and drink as friends. 

Tayning of the Shreio, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Sir, you are very welcome to our house : 
It must appear in other ways than words, 
Therefore I scant this breathing courtesy. 



The Merchant of Venice, Act v. Sc, 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Good Counsel. 

Neither a borrower nor a lender be, 
For loan oft loses both itself and friend. 

Hamlet. Acti.Sc.3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar : 
The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, 
Grapple them to thy soul witli lioo])s of steel. 



Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Turn him, and see his threads : look if he be 
Friend to himself, that would be friend to thee : 
For that is first required, a man be his own ; 
But he that 's too much that is friend to none. 

Underwood. BEN JONSON. 

Lay this into your breast : 
Old friends, like old swords, still are trusted best. 

Ducliess ofMalfy. JOHN WEBSTER. 



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POEMS OV THE AFFECTIONS. 



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COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION. 



WHEN IN THE CHRONICLE OF WASTED 
TIME. 



SONNET CVI. 



When in the chronicle of wasted time 
I see descriptions of the fairest wights, 
And beauty making beautiful old rhyme, 
In praise of ladies dead, and lovely knights ; 
Then, in the blazon of sweet beauty's best 
Of hand, of foot, of lip, of eye, of brow, 
I see their antique pen would have expressed 
Even such a beauty as you master now. 
So all their praises are but prophecies 
Of this our time, all you prefiguring ; 
And, for they looked but with divining eyes, 
They had not skill enough your worth to sing ; 
For we, which now behold these present days, 
Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues to 
praise. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



MISTRESS MINE. 

FROM "TWELFTH NIGHT," ACT II. SC. 3. 

MISTRESS mine, where are you roaming ? 
0, stay and hear ! your true-love 's coming 

That can sing both high and low ; 
Trip no further, pretty sweeting. 
Journeys end in lovers' meeting, — 

Every wise man's son doth know. 

What is love ? 't is not hereafter ; 
Present mirth hath present laughter ; 

What 's to come is still unsure : 
In delay there lies no plenty, — 
Then come kiss me, Sweet-and-twenty, 

Youth 's a stuff will not endure. 

Shakespeare. 



r:^ 



PORTIA'S PICTURE. 

FROM " THE MERCHANT OF VENICE," ACT III. SC. 2. 

Fair Portia's counterfeit ? What demi-god 
Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes? 
Or whether, riding on the balls of mine. 
Seem they in motion ? Here are severed lips, 
Parted with sugar breath ; so sweet a bar 
Should sunder such sweet friends ; Here in her 

hairs 
The painter plays the spider ; and hath woven 
A golden mesh to entrap the hearts of men. 
Faster than gnats in cobwebs : But her eyes, — 



How could he see to do them ? having made one, 
Methinks it should have power to steal both his, 
And leave itself unfurnished. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



OLIVIA. 



FROM "TWELFTH NIGHT," ACT I. SC. 5. 

Viola. 'T is beauty truly blent, whose red 
and white 
Nature's own sweet and cunning hand laid on : 
Lady, you are the cruel'st she alive, 
If you will lead these graces to the grave. 
And leave the world no copy. 

Shakespeare. 



TO MISTRESS MARGARET HUSSEY. 

Merry Margaret, 

As midsummer flower. 

Gentle as falcon, 

Or hawk of the tower ; 

With solace and gladness, 

Much mirth and no madness, 

All good and no badness ; 

So joyously. 

So maidenly. 

So womanly 

Her demeaning. 

In everything 

Far, far passing 

That I can indite, 

Or suffice to write. 

Of merry Margaret, 

As midsummer flower, 

Gentle as falcon 

Or hawk of the tower ; 

As patient and as still. 

And as full of good-will. 

As fair Isiphil, 

Coliander, 

Sweet Pomander, 

Good Cassander ; 

Stedfast of thought, 

Well made, well wrought ; 

Far may be sought 

Ere you can find 

So courteous, so kind, 

As merry Margaret, 

This midsummer flower, 

Gentle as falcon. 

Or hawk of the tower. 

JOHN SKELTON. 



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COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION. 



• — f— f" 



THE FORWARD VIOLET THUS DID 
I CHIDE. 

SONNET XCIX. 

The forward violet thus did I chide : — 

Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet 

that smells, 
If not from my love's breath ? the purple pride 
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells, 
In my love's veins thou hast too gi-ossly dyed. 
The lily I condemned for thy hand, 
And buds of marjoram had stolen thy hair : 
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand. 
One blushing shame, another white despair ; 
A third, nor red nor white, had stolen of both. 
And to this robbery had annexed thy breath ; 
But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth 
A vengeful canker eat him up to death. 
More flowers I noted, yet I none could see, 
But sweet or color it had stolen from thee. 

Shakespeare. 



THERE IS A GARDEN IN HER FACE. 

FROM "AN HOURE'S RECREATION IN MUSICKE," 1606. 

There is a garden in her face. 

Where roses and white lilies blow ; 

A heavenly paradise is that place, 
Wherein all pleasant fruits do grow ; 

There cherries grow that none may buy, 

Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry. 

Those cherries fairly do enclose 

Of orient pearl a double row. 
Which when her lovely laughter shows. 

They look like rosebuds filled with snow ; 
Yet them no peer nor prince may buy. 
Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry. 

Her eyes like angels watch them still. 
Her brows like bended bows do stand, 

Threatening with piercing frowns to kill 
All that approach with eye or hand 

These sacred cherries to come nigh. 

Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry. 

Richard Allison. 



MY SWEET SWEETING. 

FROM A MS. TEMP. HENRY VIII. 

Ah, my sweet sweeting ; 

My little pretty sweeting, 

My sweeting will I love wherever I go ; 

She is so proper and pure. 
Full, steadfast, stable, and demure. 

There is none such, you may be sure, 
As my sweet sweeting. 



In all this world, as thinketh me, 
Is none so pleasant to my e'e, 
That I am glad so oft to see, 

As my sweet sweeting. 
When I behold my sweeting sweet, 
Her face, her hands, her minion feet, 
They seem to me there is none so mete, 

As my sweet sweeting. 

Above all other praise must I, 
And love my pretty pygsnye, 
For none I find so womanly 
As my sweet sweeting. 

Anonymous. 



THE WHITE ROSE. 

SENT BY A YORKISH LOVER TO HIS LANCASTRIAN 
MISTRESS. 

If this fair rose offend thy sight, 

Placed in thy bosom bare, 
'T will blush to find itself less white, 

And turn Lancastrian there. 

But if thy ruby lip it spy. 
As kiss it thou mayest deign, 

With envy pale 't will lose its dye, 
And Yorkish turn again. 

Anonymous. 



A VISION OF BEAUTY. 

It was a beauty that I saw, — 
So pure, so perfect, as the frame 
Of all the universe were lame 

To that one figure, could I draw, 

Or give least line of it a law : 
A skein of silk without a knot! 

A fair march made without a halt ! 

A curious form without a fault ! 
A printed book without a blot ! 
All beauty ! — and without a spot. 

BEN jonson. 



GIVE PLACE, YE LOVERS. 

Give place, ye lovers, here before 

That spent your boasts and brags in vain ; 

My lady's beauty passeth more 

The best of yours, I dare well say en, 

Than doth the sun the candle-light, 

Or brightest day the darkest night. 

And thereto hath a troth as just 

As had Penelope the fair ; 
For what she saith, ye may it trust. 

As it by writing sealed were : 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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And virtues hath she manj^ mo' 
Than I with pen have skill to show. 

I could rehearse, if that I would, 
The whole effect of Nature's plaint, 

"When she had lost the perfect mould. 
The like to whom she could not paint : 

"With wringing hands, how she did cry, 

And what she said, I know it aye. 

I know she swore with raging mind, 

Her kingdom only set apart. 
There was no loss by law of kind 

That could have gone so near her heart ; 
And this Avas chiefly all her pain ; 
" She could not make the like again." 

Sith Nature thus gave her the praise, 
To be the chiefest work she wrought. 

In faith, methink, some better ways 
On your behalf might well be sought, 

Than to compare, as ye have done, 

To match the candle with the sun. 

HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY. 



TO HIS MISTEESS, 

ELIZABETH, QUEEN OF BOHEMIA. 

YoTJ meaner beauties of the night, 
That poorly satisfy our eyes 

More by your number than your light, — 
You common people of the skies. 
What are you when the moon shall rise ? 

You curious chanters of the wood. 

That warble forth Dame Nature's lays, 

Thinking your passions understood 

By j^our weak accents, — what 's your praise 
When .Philomel her voice shall raise ? 

You violets that first appear. 

By your pure purple mantles known, 

Like the proud virgins of the year, 
As if the spring were all your own, — 
What are you when the rose is blown ? 

So when my mistress shall be seen 
In form and beauty of her mind : 

By virtue first, then choice, a queen, — 
Tell me, if she were not designed 
The eclipse and glory of her kind ? 

Sir Henry Wotton 



53-.- 



CONSTANCY. 

Out upon it, I have loved 
Three whole days together ; 

And am like to love three more, 
If it prove fair weather. 



Time shall moult away his wings. 

Ere he shall discover 
In the whole wide world again 

Such a constant lover. 

But the spite on 't is, no praise 

Is due at all to me ; 
Love with me had made no stays, 

Had it any been but she. 

Had it any been but she. 

And that very face. 
There had been at least ere this 

A dozen in her place. 

Sir John Sucklixg. 



PHILLIS THE FAIR. 

On a hill there grows a flower, 
Fair befall the dainty sweet ! 

By' that flower there is a bower 
Where the heavenly muses meet. 

In that bower there is a chair. 
Fringed all about with gold, 

Where doth sit tlie fairest fair 
That ever eye did yet behold. 

It is Phillis, fair and bright. 
She that is the shepherd's joy, 

She that Venus did despite. 
And did blind her little boy. 

Who would not that face admire ? 

Who would not this saint adore ? 
Who would not this sight desire ? 

Though he thought to see no more. 

Thou that art the shepherd's queen, 
Look upon thy love-sick swain ; 

By thy comfort have been seen 
Dead men brought to life again. 

Ts'ICHOLAS BRETON. 



PHILLIS IS MY ONLY JOY. 

Phillis is my only joy 

Faithless as the wind or seas ; 
Sometimes coming, sometimes coy, 
Yet she never fails to please. 
If with a frown 
I am cast down, 
Phillis, smiling 
And beguiling. 
Makes me happier than before. 

Though, alas ! too late I find 
Nothing can her fancy" fix ; 

Yet the moment she is kind 
I forgive her all her tricks ; 



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COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION. 



125 






Which though I see, 
I can't get free ; 
She deceiving, 
I believing, 
What need lovers wish for more ? 

Sir Charles Sedley. 



GO, LOVELY EOSE. 

Go, lovely rose ! 
Tell her that wastes her time and me, 

That now she knows. 
When I resemble her to thee. 
How sweet and fair she seems to be. 

Tell her that 's young. 
And shuns to have her graces spied. 

That hadst thou sprung 
In deserts, where no men abide. 
Thou must have uncommended died. 

Small is the worth 
Of beauty from the light retired ; 

Bid her come forth, 
Sufl'er herself to be desired. 
And not blush so to be admired. 

Then die, that she 
The common fate of all things rare 

May read in thee ; 
How small a part of time they share. 
That are so wondrous sweet and fair. 

Udmund Waller. 

stanza added by henry kirke white. 
Yet, though thou fade, 
From thy dead leaves let fragrance rise ; 

And teach the maid. 
That goodness Time's rude hand defies. 
That virtue lives when beauty dies. 



DRINK TO ME ONLY WITH THINE 
EYES. 

FRO.M "THE FOREST." 

Drink to me only with thine eyes, 

And I will pledge with mine ; 
Or leave a kiss but in the cup. 

And I '11 not look for wine. 
The thirst that from the soul doth rise 

Doth ask a drink divine ; 
But might I of Jove's nectar sup, 

I would not change for thine. 

I sent thee late a rosy wreath, 

Not so much honoring thee 
As giving it a hope that there 

It could not withered be ; 
But thou thereon didst only breathe 

And seut'st it back to me ; 
Since when it grows, and smells, I swear, 

Not of itself but thee ! 

FHILOSTRATUS (Greek). Trans- 
lation of Ben Jonson. 



LOVE. 



FROM "THE MERCHANT OF VENICE," ACT HI. SC. 2. 

Tell me where is fancy bred. 
Or in the heart, or in the head 'I 
How begot, how nourished ? 
Reply, reply. 

It is engendered in the eyes. 
With gazing fed ; and fancy dies 
In the cradle where it lies. 
Let us all ring fancy's knell ; 
I '11 begin it, — ding, dong, bell. 
Ding, dong, bell. 

Shakespeare. 



ON A GIRDLE. 

That which her slender waist confined 
Shall now my joyful temples bind ; 
NTo monarch but would give his crown. 
His arms might do what this hath done. 

It was my heaven's extremest sphere, 
The pale which held that lovely deer : 
My joy, my grief, my hope, my love. 
Did all within this circle move. 

A narrow compass ! and yet there 
Dwelt all that 's good, and all that 's fair. 
Give me but what this ribbon bound. 
Take all the rest the sun goes round ! 

Edmund Waller. 



TO A LADY ADMIRING HERSELF IN A 
LOOKING-GLASS. 

Faik lady, when you see the grace 

Of beauty in your looking-glass ; 

A stately forehead, smooth and high. 

And full of princely majesty ; 

A sparkling eye no gem so fair. 

Whose lustre dims the Cyprian star ; 

A glorioiis cheek, divinely sweet, 

Wherein both roses kindly meet ; 

A cherry lip that would entice 

Even gods to kiss at any price ; 

You think no beauty is so rare 

That with your shadow might compare ; 

That your reflection is alone 

The thing that men most dote upon. 



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126 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Madam, alas ! your glass doth lie, 
And yon are mucli deceived ; for I 
A beauty know of richer grace 
(Sweet, be not angry), 'tis your face. 
Hence, then, 0, learn more mild to be, 
And leave to lay your blame on me : 
If me your real substance move. 
When you so much your shadow love, 
Wise nature would not let your eye 
Look on her own bright majesty ; 
Which, had you once but gazed upon, 
You could, except yourself, love none : 
What then you cannot love, let me. 
That face I can, you cannot see. 

Now you have what to love, you '11 say. 
What then is left for me, I pray ? 
My face, sweet heart, if it please thee ; 
That which you can, I cannot see : 
So either love shall gain his due, 
Youi-s, sweet, in me, and mine in you. 

THOMAS RANDOLPH. 



WELCOME, WELCOME, DO I SING. 

Welcome, welcome, do I sing, 
Far more welcome than the S2mng ; 
He that farteth from you never 
Shall enjoy a sj^ring forever. 

Love, that to the voice is near, 
Breaking from your ivory pale, 

Need not walk abroad to hear 
The delightful nightingale. 

Welcome, welcome, then I sing, etc. 

Love, that still looks on your eyes, 
Though the winter have begun 

To benumb our arteries, 

Shall not want the summer's sun. 
Welcome, loelcome, then I sing, etc. 

Love, that still may see your cheeks, 
Where all rareness still reposes. 

Is a fool if e'er he seeks 
Other lilies, other roses. 

Welcome, welcome, then I sing, etc. 

Love, to whom your soft lip yields, 
And perceives your breath in kissing. 

All the odors of the fields 

Never, never shall be missing. 

WILLIAM BROWiN'E. 



O- 



WHENAS IN SILKS MY JULIA GOES. 

Whenas in silks my Julia goes, 

Then, then, me thinks, how sweetly flowes 

That liquefaction of her clothes. 



Next, when I cast mine eyes and see 
That brave vibration each way 'free, 
how that glittering taketh me ! 

R. HERRICK. 



A VIOLET IN HER HAIR. 

A VIOLET in her lovely hair, 
A rose upon her bosom fair ! 

But 0, her eyes 
A lovelier violet disclose. 
And her ripe lips the sweetest rose 

That's 'neath the skies. . 

A lute beneath her graceful hand 
Breathes music forth at her command ; 

But still her tongue 
Far richer music calls to birth 
Than all the minstrel power on earth 

Can give to song. 

And thus she moves in tender light. 
The i:)urest ray, where all is bright, 

Serene, and sweet ; 
And sheds a graceful influence round, 
That hallows e'en the very ground 

Beneath her feet ! 

CHARLES SWAIN. 



THE TRIBUTE. 

No splendor 'neath the sky's proud dome 

But serves her for familiar wear ; 
The far-fetched diamond finds its home 

Flashing and smouldering in her hair ; 
For her the seas their pearls reveal ; 

Art and strange lands her pomp supply 
With purple, chrome, and cochineal, 

Ochre, and lapis lazuli ; 
The worm its golden woof presents ; 

Whatever runs, flies, dives, or delves, 
All dofl' for her their ornaments, 

Which suit her better than themselves ; 
And all, by this their power to give 

Proving her right to take, proclaim 
Her beauty's clear prerogative 

To profit so by Eden's blame. 

Coventry Patmore. 



THE COMPLIMENT. 

I DO not love thee for that fair 
Rich fan of thy most curious hair ; 
Though the wires thereof be drawn 
Finer than the threads of lawn, 
And are softer than the leaves 
On which the subtle spider weaves. 



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COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION. 



127 ^-' 



I do not love thee for those flowers 
Growing on thy cheeks, — love's bowers ; 
Though such cunning them hath spread, 
None can paint them white and red : 
Love's golden arrows thence are shot, 
Yet for them I love thee not. 

I do not love thee for those soft 
Eed coral lips I 've kissed so oft ; 
Nor teeth of pearl, the double guard 
To speech whence music still is heard. 
Though from those lips a kiss being taken 
Might tyrants melt, and death awaken. 

I do not love thee, my fairest. 
For that richest, for that rarest 
Silver pillar, which stands under 
Thy sound head, that globe of wonder ; 
Though that neck be whiter far 
Than towers of polished ivory ai'e. 

THOMAS CAREW. 



u- 



THE PORTRAIT. 

Give place, ye ladies, and begone. 
Boast not yourselves at all : 
For here at hand approacheth one 
Whose face will stain you all. 

The virtue of her lively looks 
Excels the precious stone : 
I wish to have none other books 
To read or look upon. 

In each of her two crystal eyes 
Smileth a naked boy : 
It would you all in heart suffice 
To see that lamp of joy. 

I think Nature hath lost the mould 
Where she her shape did take ; 
Or else I doubt if Nature could 
So fair a creature make. 

In life she is Diana chaste. 

In truth Penelope ; 

In word and eke in deed steadfast : 

What will you more we say ? 

If all the world were sought so far, 
Who could find such a wight ? 
Her beauty twinkleth like a star 
Within the frosty night. 

Her rosial color comes and goes 
With such a comely gi'ace. 
More ruddier too thnn in the I'ose, 
Within her lovely face. 



At Bacchus' feast none shall her meet, 
Nor at no wanton play, 
Nor gazing in an open street. 
Nor gadding as astray. 

The modest mirth that she doth use 
Is mixt with shaniefastness ; 
All vice she doth wholly refuse, 
And hateth idleness. 

Lord ! it is a world to see 
How virtue can repair 
And deck in her such honesty, 
Whom Nature made so fair ! 

How might I do to get a graff"e 
Of this unspotted tree ? 
For all the rest are plain but chaff. 
Which seem good corn to be. 

Tho.mas Heywood. 



ROSALINE. 

Like to the clear in highest sphere 
Where all imperial glory shines : 
Of .selfsame color is her hair, 
Whether unfolded, or in twines : 

Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline ! 
Her eyes are sapphires set in snow. 
Resembling heaven by ever}'' wink ; 
The gods do fear whenas they glow, 
And I do tremble when I think 

Heigh-ho, would she were mine ! 

Her cheeks are like the blushing cloud 
That beautifies Aurora's face. 
Or like the silver crimson shroud 
That Phoebus' smiling looks doth grace : 

Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline ! 
Her lips are like two budded roses 
Whom ranks of lilies neighbor nigh, 
Within which bounds she balm encloses 
Apt to entice a deity : 

Heigh-ho, would she were mine ! 

Her neck is like a stately tower 
Where Love himself imprisoned lies 
To watch for glances every hour 
From her divine and sacred eyes ; 

Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline ! 
Her paps are centres of delight. 
Her breasts are orbs of heavenly frame, 
Where Nature inoulds the dew of liglit 
To feed perfection with the same : 

Heigh-ho, would she were min(^ ! 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTlOiNS. 



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With orient pearl, with ruby red, 
With marble white, with sapphire blue, 
Her body every way is fed. 
Yet soft in touch and sweet in view : 

Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline ! 
Nature herself her shajie admires ; 
The gods are wounded in her sight ; 
And Love forsakes his heavenly iires 
A nd at her eyes his brand doth light : 

Heigh-ho, would she were mine ! 

Then muse not. Nymphs, though I bemoan 

The absence of fair Eosaline, 

Since for a fair there 's fairer none, 

Nor for her virtues so divine : 

Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline ! 

Heigh-ho, my heart ! would God that she were 

mine ! 

Thomas Lodge. 



BELINDA. 

FROM THE " RAPE OF THE LOCK." 

On her white breast a sparkling cross she Avore, 
AVhich Jews might kiss, and Infidels adore, 
Her lively looks a sprightly mind disclose, 
(^)uick as her eyes, and as unfixed as those : 
Favors to none, to all she smiles extends : 
Oft she rejects, but never once ofiends. 
Bright as the sun, her eyes the gazers strike. 
And, like the sun, they shine on all alike. 
Yet, graceful ease, and sweetness void of pride. 
Might hide her faults, if belles had faults to hide : 
I f to her share some female errors fall, 
Look on her face, and yoxi '11 forget them all. 

-Alexander pope. 



TO A LADY, WITH SOME PAINTED 
FLOWERS. 

Flovveiis to the fair : to you these flowers I bring. 
And strive to greet you with an earlier spring. 
Flowers sweet, and gay, and delicate like you ; 
Emblems of innocence, and beauty too. 
With flowers the Graces bind their yellow hair, 
And flowery wreaths consenting lovers wear. 
Flowers, the sole luxury which nature knew, 
1 n Eden's pure and guiltless garden grew. 
To loftier forms are rougher tasks assigned ; 
The sheltering oak resists the stormy wind, 
The tougher yew repels invading foes. 
And the tall pine for future navies grows : 
But this soft family to cares unknown, 
Were born for pleasure and delight alone. 
Gay without toil, and lovely without art. 
They spring to cheer the sense and glad the heart. 
Nor blush, my fair, to own you copy these ; 
Your best, your sweetest empire is '■ — to please. 
Anna L^titia Barbauld. 



SHE WAS A PHANTOM OF DELIGHT. 

She was a phantom of delight 
When first she gleamed upon my sight ; 
A lovely apparition, sent 
To be a moment's ornament ; 
Her eyes as stars of twilight fair ; 
Like Twilight's, too, her dusky hair ; 
But all things else about her drawn 
From May-time and the cheerful dawn ; 
A dancing shape, an image gay. 
To haunt, to startle, and wayla}^ 

I saw her upon nearer view, 

A spirit, yet a woman too ! 

Her household motions light and free. 

And steps of virgin-liberty ; 

A countenance in which did meet 

Sweet records, promises as sweet ; 

A creature not too bright or good 

For human nature's daily food. 

For transient sorrows, simple wiles. 

Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles. 

And now I see with eye serene 

The very pulse of the machine ; 

A being breathing thoughtful breath, 

A traveller between life and death : 

The reason firm, the temperate will. 

Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill ; 

A perfect woman, nobly planned 

To warn, to comfort, and command ; 

And yet a spirit still, and bright 

With something of an angel-light. 

William Wordsworth. 



THE ROSE OF THE WORLD. 

Lo, when the Lord made north and south. 

And sun and moon ordained, he, 
Forth bringing each by word of mouth 

In order of its dignity. 
Did man from the crude clay express 

By sequence, and, all else decreed, 
He formed the woman ; nor might less 

Than Sabbath such a work succeed. 

And still with favor singled out. 

Marred less than man by mortal fall, 
Her disposition is devout, 

Her countenance angelical. 
No faithless thought her instinct shrouds, 

But fancy checkers settled sense. 
Like alteration of the clouds 

On noonday's azure permanence. 



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Pure courtesy, composure, ease, 

Declare ati'ectious nobly fixed. 
And impulse sprung from due degrees 

Of sense and spirit sweetly mixed. 
Her modesty, lier chiefest grace, 

The cestus clasping Venus' side, 
Is potent to deject the face 

Of him who would affront its pride. 

Wrong dares not in her presence speak, 

Nor sjDotted thought its taint disclose 
Under the protest of a cheek 

Outbragging Nature's boast, the rose. 
In mind and manners how discreet ! 

How artless in her very art ! 
How candid in discourse ! how sweet 

The concord of her lips and heart ! 

How (not to call true instinct's bent 

And woman's very nature harm). 
How amiable and innocent 

Her pleasure in her power to charm ! 
How humbly careful to attract. 

Though crowned with all the soul desires, 
Connubial aptitude exact. 

Diversity that never tires ! 

COVENTRY PATiMORE. 



SONG. 



The shape alone let others j^rize, 

The features of the fail- : 
I look for spirit in her eyes. 

And meaning in her air. 

A damask cheek, an ivory arm, 

Shall ne'er my wishes win : 
Give me an anunated form. 

That speaks a mind mthin. 

A face where awful honor shines, 
Where sense and sweetness move, 

And angel innocence refines 
The tenderness of love. 

These are the soul of beauty's frame ; 

Without whose vital aid 
Unfinished all her features seem. 

And all her roses dead. 

But ah ! where both their chaiTus unite. 

How perfect is the view. 
With every image of delight. 

With graces ever new : 

Of power to chann the greatest woe, 

The wildest rage control. 
Diffusing mildness o'er the brow, 

And rapture through the soul. 



Their power but faintly to express 

All language must despair ; 
But go, behold Arpasia's face, 

And read it perfect there. 

MARK. AKENSIDE. 



SHE IS NOT FAIR TO OUTWARD VIEW. 

She is not fair to outward view, 

As many maidens be ; 
Her loveliness I never knew 

Until she smiled on me : 
0, then I saw her eye was bright, — 
A well of love, a spring of light. 

But now her looks are coy and cold ; 

To mine they ne'er reply ; 
And yet I cease not to behold 

The love-light in her eye : 
Her very frowns are fairer far 
Than smiles of other maidens are ! 

HARTLEY Coleridge. 



A HEALTH. 

I FILL this cup to one made up 

Of loveliness alone, 
A woman, of her gentle sex 

The seeming paragon ; 
To whom the better elements 

And kindly stars have given 
A form so fair, that, like the aii", 

'T is less of earth than heaven. 

Her every tone is music's own, 

Like those of morning birds. 
And something more than melody 

Dwells ever in her words ; 
The coinage of her heart are they. 

And from her lips each flows, 
As one may see the burdened bee 

Forth issue from the rose. 

Affections are as thoughts to her, 

The measures of her hours ; 
Her feelings have the fragrancy. 

The freshness of young flowers ; 
And lovely passions, changing oft, 

So fill her, she appears 
The image of themselves by turns, — 

The idol of past years ! 

Of her bright face one glance will trace 

A picture on the brain, 
And of her voice in echoing hearts 

A sound must long remain ; 



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But memory, such as mine of her, 

So very much endears. 
When death is nigh my latest sigh 

Will not be life's, but hers. 

I fill this cup to one made up 

Of loveliness alone, 
A woman, of her gentle sex 

The seeming paragon. 
Her health ! and would on earth there stood 

Some more of such a frame, 
That life might be all poetry, 

And weariness a name. 

EDWARD COATE PINKNEY. 



SHE WALKS IN BEAUTY. 

"HEBREW MELODIES.'' 

She walks in beauty, like the night 
Of cloudless climes and starry skies. 

And all that 's best of dark and bright 
Meet in her aspect and her eyes. 

Thus mellowed to that tender light 
Which heaven to gaudy day denies. 

One shade the more, one ray the less, 
Had half impaired the nameless grace 

Which waves in every raven tress 
Or softly lightens o'er her face, 

Where thoughts serenely sweet express 
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place. 

And on that cheek and o'er that brow 

So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, 
The smiles that win, the tints that glow. 

But tell of days in goodness spent, — 
A mind at peace with all below, 

A heart whose love is innocent. 

BYRON. 



I& 



A SLEEPING BEAUTY. 

Sleep on ! and dream of Heaven awhile ! 

Though shut so close thy laughing eyes. 
Thy rosy lips still wear a smile. 

And move, and breathe delicious sighs. 

Ah ! now soft blushes tinge her cheeks 
And mantle o'er her neck of snow ; 

Ah ! now she murmurs, now she speaks. 
What most I wish, and fear, to know. 

She starts, she trembles, and she weeps ! 

Her fair hands folded on her breast ; 
— And now, how like a saint she sleeps ! 

A seraph in the realms of rest ! 



Sleep on secure ! Above control, 

Thy thoughts belong to Heaven and thee ; 
And may the secret of thy soul 

Eemain within its sanctuary ! 

SAMUEL ROGERS. 



0, FAIREST OF THE EUEAL MAIDS ! 

0, FAIREST of the rural maids ! 
Thy birth was in the forest shades ; 
Green boughs, and glimpses of the sky, 
Were all that met thine infant eye. 

Thy sports, thy wanderings, when a child, 
Were ever in the sylvan wild. 
And all the beauty of the place 
Is in thy heart and on thy face. 

The twilight of the trees and rocks 
Is in the light shade of thy locks ; 
Thy step is as the wind, that weaves 
Its playful way among the leaves. 

Thine eyes are springs, in whose serene 
And silent waters heaven is seen ; 
Their lashes are the herbs that look 
On their young figures in the brook. 

The forest depths, by foot unpressed, 
Are not more sinless than thy breast ; 
The holy peace, that fills the air 
Of those cahn solitudes, is there. 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 



HER LIKENESS. 

A GIRL, who has so many wilful ways 

She would have caused Job's patience to for- 
sake him ; 
Yet is so rich in all that 's girlhood's praise, 
Did Job himself upon her goodness gaze,. 
A little better she would surely make him. 

Yet is this girl I sing in naught uncommon, 
And very far from angel yet, I trow. 

Her faults, her sweetnesses, are purely human ; 

Yet she 's more lovable as simple woman 
Than any one diviner that I know. 

Therefore I wish that she may safely keep 

This womanhede, and change not, only grow ; 
From maid to matron, youth to age, may creep, 
And in perennial blessedness, still reap 

On every hand of that which she doth sow. 

DINAH MARIA MULOCK CRAIK. 



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COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION. 



131 



^ 



FEAR THY KISSES, GENTLE MAIDEN. 

I FEAR thy kisses, gentle maiden ; 

Thou needest not fear mine ; 
My spirit is too deeply laden 

Ever to burden tliine. 

I fear thy mien, thy tones, thy motion ; 

Thou needest not fear mine ; 
Innocent is the heart's devotion 

With which I worship thine. 

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. 



BLACK AND BLUE EYES. 

The brilliant black eye 

May in triumph let fly 
All its darts without caring who feels 'em ; 

But the soft eye of blue. 

Though it scatter wounds too, 
Is much better pleased when it heals 'em ! 
Dear Fanny ! 

The black eye may say, 

" Come and worship my ray ; 
By adoring, perhaps you may move me ! " 

But the blue eye, half hid. 

Says, from under its lid, 
" I love, and am yours, if you love me ! " 
Dear Fanny ! 

Then tell me, why. 
In that lovely blue eye. 
Not a cliarm of its tint I discover ; 
Or why should you wear 
The only blue pair 
That ever said " No " to a lover ? 
Dear Fanny ! 

Thomas Moore. 



fS- 



LET THE TOAST PASS. 

FROM "THE SCHOOL FOR SCANDAL." 

Here's to the maiden of bashful fifteen ; 

Here 's to the widow of iifty ; 
Here 's to the flaunting extravagant quean, 
And here 's to the housewife that 's thrifty. 
Let the toast pass, 
Drink to the lass, 
I '11 warrant she'll prove an excuse for the glass. 

Here 's to the charmer whose dimples we prize. 
Now to tlie maid who has none, sir • 

Here 's to the girl witli a pair of blue eyes. 
And here 's to the nymph with but one, sir. 
Let the toast pass, etc. 



Here 's to the maid with a bosom of snow ■ 
Now to her that 's as brown as a berry ; ' 

Here 's to the wife with a face full of woe,' 
And now to the damsel that 's merry. 
Let the toast pass, etc. 

For let 'em be clumsy, or let 'em be slim. 
Young or ancient, I care not a feather ; 
So fill a pint bumper quite up to the brim, 
So fill up your glasses, nay, fill to the brirn, 
And let us e'en toast them together. 
Let the toast pass, etc. 

Richard Brinsley Sheridan. 



MY LITTLE SAINT. 

I CARE not, though it be 

By the preciser sort thought popery : 

We poets can a license show 

For everything we do. 
Hear, then, my little saint ! I 'U pray to thee. 

If now thy happy mind. 

Amidst its various joys, can leisure find 

To attend to anything so low 

As what I say or do, 
Regard, and be what thou wast ever, — kind. 

Let not the blest above 

Engross thee quite, but sometimes hither rove : 

Fam would I thy sweet image see. 

And sit and talk with thee ; 
Nor is it curiosity, but love. 

Ah ! what delight 't would be, 
Wouldst thou sometimes by stealth converse with 
me ! 

How should I thy sweet commune prize, 

And other joys despise ! 
Come, then ! I ne'er was yet denied by thee. 

I would not long detain 

Thy soul from bliss, nor keep tliee here in pain ; 

Nor should thy fellow-saints e'er know 

Of thy escape below : 
Before thou 'rt missed, thou shouldst retm-n again. 

Sure, heaven must needs thy love. 
As well as other qualities, improve : 

Come, then ! and recreate my sight 

With rays of thy pure light ; 
'T will cheer my eyes more than the lamps above. 

But if Fate 's so severe 

As to confine thee to thy blissful sphere, 

(And by thy absence I shall know ' 

Whether thy state be so,) 
Live happy, and be mindful of me there. 

John Norris. 



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132 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



■*-a 



A GOLDEN GIRL. 

Lucy is a golden girl ; 

But a man, a vian, should woo her ! 
They who seek her shrink alaack, 

When they should, like storms, pursue her. 

All her smiles are hid in light ; 

All her hair is lost in splendor ; 
But she hath the eyes of Night 

And a heart that 's over-tender. 

Yet the foolish- suitors fly 

(Is 't excess of dread or duty ?) 
From the starlight of her eye, 

Leaving to neglect her beauty ! 

Men by fifty seasons taught 

Leave her to a young beginner, 
Who, without a second thought, 

Whispers, wooes, and straight must win her. 

Lucy is a golden girl ! 

Toast her in a goblet brimming ! 
May the man that wins her wear 

On his heart the Rose of Women ! 

BRYAN WALLER PROCTER (Barry Corn-wall). 



B- 



THE MILKING-MAID. 

The jrear stood at its equinox, 
And bluff the North was blowing, 

A bleat of lambs came from the flocks. 
Green hardy things were growing ; 

I met a maid with shining locks 
Where milky kine were lowing. 

She wore a kerchief on her neck, 
Her bare arm showed its dimple, 

Her apron spread without a sjDeck, 
Her air was frank and simj)le. 

She milked into a wooden pail. 
And sang a country ditty, — 

An innocent fond lovers' tale, 
That was not wise nor witty, 

Pathetically rustical, 

Too pointless for the city. 

She kept in time without a beat, 
As true as church-bell ringers, 

Unless she tapped time with her feet, 
Or squeezed it with her fingers ; 

Her clear, unstudied notes were sweet 
As many a practised singer's. 

I stood a minute out of sight. 

Stood silent for a minute, 
To eye the pail, and creamy white 

The frothing milk within it, — 



To eye the comely milking-maid. 

Herself so fresh and creamy. 
" Good day to you ! " at last I said ; 

She turned her head to see me. 
" Good day ! " she said, with lifted head ; 

Her eyes looked soft and dreamy. 

And all the while she milked and milked 

The grave cow heavy-laden : 
I've seen grand ladies, plumed and silked, 

But not a sweeter maiden ; 

But not a sweeter, fresher maid 

Than this in homely cotton. 
Whose pleasant face and silky braid 

I have not yet forgotten. 

Seven springs liave passed since then, as I 

Count with a sober sorrow ; 
Seven springs have come and passed me by, 

And spring sets in to-morrow. 

I 've half a mind to shake myself 
Free, just for once, from London, 

To set my work upon the shelf, 
And leave it done or undone ; 

To run down by the early train. 

Whirl doM'n with shriek and whistle, 

And feel the bluff north blow again, 
And mark the sprouting thistle 

Set up on waste patch of the lane 
Its green and tender bristle ; 

And spy the scai'ce-blown violet banks, 
Ci'isp primrose-leaves and others, 

And watch the lambs leap at their pranks. 
And butt their patient mothers. 

Alas ! one point in all my plan 
M.^ serious thoughts demur to : 

Seven years have passed for maid and man, 
Seven years have passed for her too. 

Perhaps my rose is over-blown. 

Not rosy, or too rosy ; 
Perhaps in farm-house of her own 

Some husband keeps her cosy. 
Where I should show a face unknown, — 

Good-by, my wayside posy I 

CHRISTINA GEORGIXA ROSSETTI. 



AT THE CHURCH GATE. 

Although I enter not, 
Yet round about the spot 

Ofttimes I hover ; 
And near the sacred gate, 
With longing eyes I wait. 

Expectant of her. 



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COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION. 



a 



The minster bell tolls out 
Above the city's rout, 

And noise and humming ; 
They 've hushed the minster bell ; 
The organ 'gins to swell ; 

She 's coming, coming ! 

My lady comes at last, 
Timid and stepping fast, 

And hastening hither. 
With modest eyes doA^Ticast ; 
She comes, — she 's here, she 's past ! 

May Heaven go with her ! 

Kneel undisturbed, fair saint ! 
Pour out your praise or plaint 

]\Ieekly and duly ; 
I will not enter there, 
To snlly your pure prayer 

With thoughts unruly. 

But suffer me to pace 
Pound the forbidden place, 

Lingering a minute. 
Like outcast spirits, who wait. 
And see, through heaven's gate, 

Angels within it. 

William Makepeace Thackeray. 



SWEET, BE NOT PROUD. 

Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes. 
Which starlike sparkle in their skies ; 
Nor be you proud that you can see 
All hearts your captives, yours yet free. 
Be you not proud of that rich hair. 
Which wantons with the lovesick air ; 
Whenas that ruby which j^ou wear, 
Sunk from the tip of your soft ear, 
Will last to be a precious stone 
When all your world of beauty 's gone. 

Robert Herrick. 



YEESES WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM. 

Here is one leaf reserved for me, 
From all thy sweet memorials free ; 
And here my simple song might tell 
The feelings thou must guess so well. 
But could I thus, within thy mind, 
One little vacant corner find. 
Where no impression yet is seen. 
Where no memorial yet has been, 
0, it should be my sweetest care 
To write my name forever there ! 

T. MOORE. 



TEAGMENTS. 

Compliments. 
Where none admire, 't is useless to excel ; 
"WHiere none are beaux, 't is vain to be a belle. 

Soliloqity on a Beauty in the Cmtntry. LORD LYTTLETON. 

That man that hath a tongue, I say, is no man, 
If with his tongue he cannot win a woman. 

Two Gentlemen of Verona, Actm. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Woman. 

And when a lady 's in the case. 

You know all other things give place. 

TJie Hare and Many Friends. J. GAY. 

woman ! lovely woman ! nature made thee 
To temper man ; we had been brutes without you. 
Angels are painted fair, to look like you : 
There 's in you all that we believe of heaven ; 
Amazing brightness, purity, and truth. 
Eternal joy, and everlasting love. 

Venice Preserved, Act i. Sc. i. T. OtwaY. 

From women's eyes this doctrine I derive : 
Tliey sparkle still the right Promethean fire ; 
The}'- are the books, the arts, the Academes, 
That show, contain, and nourish all the world. 

Love's Labor Lost, Activ. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



Personal Charms. 

Such was Zuleika ! such around her shone 
The nameless charms unmarked by her alone ; 
The light of love, the purity of gi'ace. 
The mind, the music breathing from her face, 
The heart whose softness harmonized the whole. 
And oh ! that eye was in itself a Soul. 

Brideof Abydos,Cant.\. BVRON. 



Is she not passing fair ? 

Ttuo Gentlemen 0/ Verona, Act iv. Sc. 4. 



Shakespeare. 



And she is fair, and fairer than that word. 

Merchant 0/ Venice, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

There 's nothing ill can dwell in such a temple : 
If the ill spirit have so fair a house. 
Good things Avill strive to dwell with 't. 

The Tempest. Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Beaiity provoketh thieves sooner than gold. 



As You Like It, Act i. Sc. 3. 

Here 's metal more attractive. 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. o. 



SHAKESPEARH 



Skakesprake. 



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134 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



She is pretty to walk with, 

And witty to talk with, 

And pleasant, too, to think on. 



Brenfwralt, Ac 



SIR J» SUCKLING. 



But from the hoop's hewitching round, 
Her verj' shoe has power to wound. 

Fables: T!ie Spider ajid the Bee. E. MOORE. 



We call it only pretty Fanny's way. 

Ail Ele^y to an Old Beauty, 



T. PARNELL. 



The fair, the chaste, and unexpressive she. 

As Yoit Like It, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Angels listen when she speaks : 

She 's my delight, all mankind's wonder ; 
But my jealous heart would break, 

Should we live one day asunder. 
Song. Earl of Rochester. 



Impartial Affection. 

How happy could I be with either. 
Were t' other dear charmer away. 

Beggar's Opera, Act ii. Sc. 2. 



J. GAY. 



Had sighed to man}'', though he loved but one. 

Childe Harolds Pilgrimage, Cant. i. BYRON. 



Compliments fp.om Nature. 

0, thou art fairer than the evening air, 
Clad in the beaiity of a thousand stars. 

Fausttis. MARLOWE. 

When he shall die, 
Take him and cut him out in little stars, 
And he will make the face of heaven so fine, 
That all the woiid will be in love with night, 
And pay no worship to the garish sun. 

Rojneo and yuliet, Ac! iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Hei' eyes the glow-Avorm lend thee, 
The shooting-stars attend thee ; 

And the elves also, 

Whose little eyes glow 
Like the sparks of fire, befriend thee. 



The Night Piece to yulia. 



R. Herrick. 



The sweetest garland to the sweetest maid. 

To a Lady : with a Present of Flowers. T. TICKELL. 



When you do dance, I wi.sh you 
A wave o' th' sea, that you might ever do 
Nothing but that. 

Wijiier's Tale, Act iv. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Some asked me where the Eubies gi'ew, 

And nothing I did say. 
But with my finger pointed to 

The lips of Julia. 

The Rock of Rubies, and the Quarrie of Pearls. R. HERRICK 

Cherry ripe, ripe, ripe, I cry. 

Full and fair ones, — Come and buy ; 

If so be you ask me where 

Thej' do grow, 1 answer, there. 

Where my Julia's lips do smile, 

There's the land, or cherry-isle. 



Cherry Ripe. 



R. Herrick. 



Except I be by Sylvia in the night. 
There is no nmsic in the nightingale. 

Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

But thy eternal summer shall not fade. 

Somtet XVIII. SHAKESPEARE. 

Be thou the rainbow to the storms of life ! 
The evening beam that smiles the clouds away. 
And tints to-morrow with prophetic ray ! 

The Bride of Abydos, Cant, ii, BYRON. 



The Poet's Admiration. 

That eagle's fate and mine are one. 

Which, on the shaft that made him die, 

Espied a feather of his own. 

Wherewith he wont to soar so high. 

To a Lady singifig a Sojig of Jiis Composing. E. WALLER. 

Is she not more than painting can express, 
Or youthful poets fancy when they love ? 



Tlie Fair Pe7iiteHt, Act iii. Sc. 

'T is sweeter for thee despairing. 
Than aught in the world beside, 

Jessy. 



N. ROWE. 



- Jessy ! 

BURNS. 



Flattery. 
Banish all compliments but single truth. 



Faithful Shephei-dess. 



BEAUMONT and FLETCHER. 



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LOVE. 



135 



'~Qi 



LOVE. 



IF IT BE TKUE THAT ANY BEAUTEOUS 
THING. 

If it be true that any beauteous thing 
Raises the pure and just desire of man 
From earth to God, tlie eternal fount of all, 
Sueli 1 believe my love ; for as in her 
So fair, in whom 1 all besides forget, 
I view tlie gentle work of her Creator, 
I have no care for any other thing, 
"Whilst thus I love. Nor is it marvellous. 
Since the efleet is not of my own power. 
If the soul doth, by nature tempted forth. 
Enamored through the eyes, 
Eepose upon the eyes which it resembleth, 
And through them risetli to the Primal Love, 
As to its end, and honors in admiring ; 
For who adores the Maker needs must love his 
work. 

Michael ANGELO (Italian). Translation 
of J. E. TAYLOR. 



SONNET. 

Muses, that sing Love's sensual empirie, 
And lovers kindling your enraged fires 
At Cupid's bonfires burning in the eye, 
Blown with the emj)ty breath of vain desires ; 
You, that prefer the painted cabinet 
Before the wealthy jewels it doth store ye. 
That all your j oys in dying figures set. 
And stain the living substance of your glory ; 
Abjure those joys, abhor their memory ; 
And let my love the honored subject be 
Of love and honor's complete history ! 
Your eyes were never yet let in to see 
The majesty and riches of the mind. 
That dwell in darkness ; for your god is blind. 
George chapman. 



B- 



THE MIGHT OF ONE FAIR FACE. 

The might of one fair face sublimes my love. 
For it hath weaned my heart from low desires ; 
Nor death I heed, nor purgatorial fires. 
Thy beauty, antepast of joys above. 
Instructs me in the bliss that saints approve ; 
For 0, how good, how beautiful, must be 
The God that made so good a thing as thee. 
So fair an image of the heavenly Dove ! 



Forgive me if I cannot turn away 

From those sweet eyes that are my earthly 

heaven. 
For they are guiding stars, benignly given 
To tempt my footsteps to the upward way ; 
And if I dwell too fondly in thy sight, 
I live and love in God's peculiar light. 

Michael Angelo (Italian). Translation 
of J. E. Taylor. 



WERE I AS BASE AS IS THE LOWLY 
PLAIN. 

Were I as base as is the lowly plain. 

And you, my Love, as high as heaven above, 

Yet should the thoughts of me your humble 

swain 
Ascend to heaven, in honor of my Love. 

Were I as high as heaven above the plain. 
And you, my Love, as humble and as low 
As are the deepest bottoms of the main, 
Wheresoe'er you were, with you my Love sliould 



Were you the earth, dear Love, and I the skies, 
My love should shine on you like to the sun, 
And look upon you with ten thousand eyes 
Till heaven waxed blind, and till the world were 
done. 

Wheresoe'er I am, below, or else above you, 
Wheresoe'er you are, my heart shall truly love 

you. 

Joshua Sylvester. 



LIGHT. 



The night has a thousand eyes. 

The day but one ; 
Yet the light of the bright world dies 

With the dying sun. 

The mind has a thousand eyes. 

And the heart but one ; 
Yet the light of a whole life dies 

When its love is done. 

Francis W. bourdillox. 



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136 



POEMS OF 'THE AFFECTIONS. 



--n 



LOVE IS A SICKNESS. 

Love is a sickness full of woes, 

All remedies refusing ; 
A plant that most with cutting grows, 
Most barren with best using. 
Why so ? 
More we enjoy it, more it dies ; 
If not enjoyed, it sighing cries 
Heigh-ho ! 



Love is a tonnent of the mind, 

A tempest everlasting ; 
And Jove hath made it of a kind, 

Not well, nor full, nor fasting. 
Why so ? 
More we enjoy it, more it dies ; 
If not enjoyed, it sighing cries 

Heigh-ho ! 

Samuel Daniel. 



PHILLIDA AND COEYDON. 

In the merry month of May, 
In a morn by break of day, 
With a troop of damsels playing 
Forth I rode, forsooth, a-maying. 
When anon by a woodside. 
Where as May was in his pride, 
I espied, all alone, 
Phillida and Corydon. 

Much ado there was, God wot ! 

He would love and she would not : 

She said, " Never man was true :" 

He says, " None was false to you." 

He said he had loved her long : 

She says, " Love should have no wrong." 

Corydon he would kiss her then. 
She says, " Maids must kiss no men 
Till they do for good and all." 
Then she made the shepherd call 
All the heavens to witness, truth 
Never loved a truer youth. 

Thus, with many a pretty oath, 
Yea and nay, and faith and troth, — 
Such as silly shepherds use 
When they will not love abuse, — 
Love, which had been long deluded, 
Was with kisses sweet concluded ; 
And Phillida, witli garlands gay, 
Was made the lady of the May. 

NICHOLAS BRETON. 



LOVE SCORNS DEGREES. 

FROM "THE MOUNTAIN OF THE LOVERS." 

Love scorns degrees ; the low he lifteth high. 
The high he draweth down to that fair plain 
Whereon, in his divine equality, 
Two loving hearts may meet, nor meet in vain •, 
'Gainst such sweet levelling Custom cries amain. 
But o'er its harshest utterance one bland sigli. 
Breathed passion-wise, doth mount victorious 

still, 
For Love, earth's lord, must have his lordly will. 

PAUL H. HAYNE. 



THE SHEPHERD AND THE KING. 

Ah ! what is love ? It is a pretty thing. 
As sweet unto a shepherd as a king, 

And sweeter too ; 
For kings have cares that wait upon a crown, 
And cares can make the sweetest face to frown : 

Ah then, ah then. 
If country loves such sweet desires gain. 
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ? 

His flocks are folded ; lie comes home at night 
As merry as a king in his delight, 

And merrier too ; 
For kings bethink them what the state require, 
Where shepherds, careless, carol by the fire : 

Ah then, ah then. 
If country loves such sweet desires gain. 
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ? 

He kisseth first, then sits as blithe to eat 
His cream and curd as doth the king his meat, 

And blither too ; 
For kings have often fears when they sup. 
Where shepherds dread no poison in their cup : 

Ah then, ah then. 
If country loves such sweet desires gain, 
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ? 

Upon his couch of straw he sleeps as sound 
As doth the king upon his beds of down, 

More sounder too : 
For cares cause kings full oft tlieir sleep to spill, 
Where weary shepherds lie and snort their fill : 

Ah then, ah then. 
If country loves such sweet desires gain, 
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ? 

Thus with his wife he spends the year as blithe 
As doth the king at every tide or syth. 
And blither too ; 



G^ 



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LOVE. 



137 '-f 



For kings have wars and broils to take in hand, 
When shepherds laugh, and love ui)on the land ; 

Ah then, ah then, 
If country loves such sweet desires gain. 
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ? 

Robert Greene. 



TELL ME, MY HEART, IF THIS BE 
LOVE. 

When Delia on the plain appears, 
Awed by a thousand tender fears, 
I would approach, but dare not move ; — 
Tell nie, my heart, if this be love. 

Whene'er she speaks, my ravished ear 
No other voice than hers can hear ; 
No other wit but hers approve ; — 
Tell me, my heart, if this be love. 

If she some other swain commend. 
Though I was once his fondest friend. 
His instant enemy I prove ; — 
Tell me, my heart, if this be love. 

When she is absent, I no more 
Delight in all that pleased before, 
The clearest spring, the shadiest grove ; — 
Tell me, my heart, if this be love. 

Wlien fond of power, of beauty vain, 
Her nets she spread for every swain, 
I strove to hate, but vainly strove ; ■ — 
Tell me, my heart, if this be love. 

George, Lord Lyttelton. 



MY TRUE-LOVE HATH MY HEART. 

My true-love hath my heart, and I have his. 
By just exchange one to the other given : 

I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss. 
There never was a better bargain driven : 

My true-love hath my heart, and I have his. 

His heart in me keeps him and me in one ; 

jMy heart in him his thoughts and senses guides ; 
He loves my heart, for once it was his own ; 

I cherish his because in me it bides : 
My true-love hath my heart, and I have his. 

Sir PHILIP Sidney. 



t 



I SAW TWO CLOUDS AT MORNING. 

I SAW two clouds at morning. 

Tinged by tlie rising sun. 
And in the dawn they floated on, 

And mingled into one ; 
I thought that moi'niiig cloud was blest. 
It moved so sweetly to the west. 



I saw two summer currents 

Flow smoothly to their meeting, 

And join their course, with silent force, 
In peace each other greeting ; 

Calm was their course through banks of green, 

While dimpling eddies played between. 

Such be your gentle motion. 

Till life's last pulse shall beat ; 
Like summer's beam, and summer's stream. 

Float on, in joy, to meet 
A calmer sea, where storms shall cease, 
A purer sky, where all is peace. 

JOHN GARDINER CALKINS BRAINARD. 



THE FRIAR OF ORDERS GRAY. 

It was a friar of orders gi-ay 
Walked forth to tell his beads ; 

And he met with a lady fair 
Clad in a pilgrim's weeds. 

" Now Christ thee save, thou reverend friar 

I pray thee tell to me. 
If ever at yon holy shrine 

My true-love thou didst see." 

" And lioAv should I know your true-love 

From many another one ? " 
" 0, by his cockle hat, and .staff. 

And by his sandal shoon. 

" But chiefly by his face and mien, 

That were so fair to view ; 
His flaxen locks that sweetly curled. 

And eyes of lovely blue." 

" lady, he is dead and gone ! 

Lady, he 's dead and gone ! 
And at his head a green grass turf. 

And at his heels a stone. 

" Within these holy cloisters long 

He languished, and he died. 
Lamenting of a lady's love. 

And 'plaining of her pride. 

" Here bore him barefaced on his bier 

Six proper youths and tall, 
And many a tear bedewed his grave 

Within yon kirkyard wall." 

" And art thou dead, thou gentle youth ? 

And art thou dead and gone ? 
And didst thou die for love of me ? 

Break, cruel heart of stone ! " 



^ 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



■a 



^ 



' ' 0, weep not, lady, weep not so ; 

Some ghostly comfort seek ; 
Let not vain sorrow rive thy heart, 

Nor tears bedew thy cheek." 

"0, do not, do not, holy friar. 

My sorrow now reprove ; 
For 1 have lost the sweetest youth 

That e'er won lady's love. 

" And now, alas ! for thy sad loss 

I '11 evermore weep and sigh ; 
For thee I only wished to live. 

For thee I wish to die." 

" Weep no more, lady, weep no more. 

Thy sorrow is in vain ; 
For violets plucked, the sweetest showers 

Will ne'er make grow again. 

" Our joys as winged dreams do fly ; 

Why then should sorrow last ? 
Since grief but aggravates thy loss. 

Grieve not for what is past." 

" 0, say not so, thou holy friar ; 

I pray thee, say not so ; 
For since my true-love died for me, 

'T is meet my tears should flow. 

" And will he never come again ? 

Will he ne'er come again ? 
Ah, no ! he is dead, and laid in his grave, 

Forever to remain. 

" His cheek was redder than the rose ; 

The comeliest youth was he ! 
But he is dead and laid in his grave : 

Alas, and woe is me ! " 

" Sigh no more, lady, sigh no more. 

Men were deceivers ever : 
One foot on sea and one on land. 

To one thing constant never. 

" Hadst thou been fond, he had been false. 

And left thee sad and heavy ; 
For young men ever were fickle found, 

Since summer trees were leafy." 

" Now say not so, thou holy friar, 

I pi'ay thee say not so ; 
My love he had the truest heart, 

0, he was ever true ! 

"And art thou dead, thou much-loved youth, 

And didst thou die for me ? 
Then farewell home ; for evermore 

A pilgrim I will be. 



" But first upon my true-love's grave 

My weary limbs 1 '11 lay. 
And thrice I '11 kiss the green-grass turf 

That wraps his breathless clay. " 

" Yet stay, fair lady ; rest awhile 

Beneath this cloister wall ; 
The cold wind through the hawthorn blows. 

And drizzly rain doth fall." 

" 0, stay me not, thou holy friar, 

0, stay me not, I pray ; 
No drizzly rain that falls on me 

Can wash my fault away." 

"Yet stay, fair lady, turn again, 

And dry those pearly tears ; 
For see, beneath this gown of gray 

Thy own true-love appears. 

" Here forced by grief and hopeless love, 

These holy weeds I sought ; 
And here, amid these lonely walls. 

To end my days I thought. 

" But haply, for my year of grace 

Is not yet passed away. 
Might I still hope to win thy love, 

No longer would I stay." 

"Now farewell grief, and welcome joy 

Once more unto my heart ; 
For since I have found thee, lovely youth. 

We nevermore will part." 

Adapted from old ballads by THOMAS PERCY. 



THE HERMIT. 

FROM "THE VICAR OF WAKEFIELD." 

" Turn, gentle Hermit of the dale, 

And guide my lonely way 
To where j^on taper cheers the vale 

With hospitable ray. 

" For here forlorn and lost I tread, 
With fainting steps and slow ; 

Where wilds, immeasurably spread. 
Seem lengthening as I go." 

"Forbear, my son," the Hermit cries, 
"To tempt the dangerous gloom ; 

For yonder faithless phantom flies 
To lure thee to thy doom. 

" Here to the houseless child of want 

My door is open still ; 
And though my portioii is but scant, 

I give it with good will. 



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' ' Then tuni to-night, and freely share 

Whate'er my cell bestows ; 
My nishy couch and frugal fare, 

My blessing and repose. 

" No flocks that range the valley free 

To slaughter I condemn ; 
Taught by that Power that pities me, 

I learn to pity them : 

" But from the mountain's grassy side 

A guiltless feast I bring ; 
A scrip with herbs and fruits supplied. 

And water from the spring. 

"Then, pilgrim, turn, thy cares forego; 

All earth-born cares are wrong : 
Man wants but little here below, 

Nor wants that little long." 

Soft as the dew from heaven descends. 

His gentle accents fell : 
The modest stranger lowly bends, 

And follows to the cell. 

Far in a wilderness obscure 

The lonely mansion lay ; 
A refuge to the neighboring poor, 

And strangers led astray. 

ISTo stores beneath its humble thatch 

Kequired a master's care : 
The wicket, opening with a latch, 

Eeceived the harmless pair. 

And now, when busy crowds retire 

To take their evening rest, 
The Hei'mit trimmed his little fire, 

And cheered his pensive guest ; 

And spread his vegetable store. 
And gayly pressed and smiled ; 

And, skilled in legendary lore, 
The lingering hours beguiled. 

Around, in sympathetic mirth. 

Its tricks the kitten tries ; 
The cricket chirrups on the hearth ; 

The crackling fagot flies. 

But nothing could a charm impart 
To soothe the stranger's woe ; 

For grief was heavy at his heart. 
And tears began to flow. 

His rising cares the Hermit spied. 
With answering care opprest : 

" And whence, unhappy youth," he cried, 
' ' The sorrows of thy bi'east ? 



" From better habitations spurned, 

Eeluctant dost thou rove ? 
Or grieve for friendship unreturned. 

Or unregarded love ? 

"Alas ! the joys that fortune brings 

Are trifling, and decay ; 
And those who prize the paltry things 

More trifling still than they. 

"And what is friendship birt a name, 

A charm that lulls to sleep ; 
A shade that follows wealth or fame, 

And leaves the wretch to weep? 

" And love is still an emptier sound. 

The modern fair one's jest ; 
On earth unseen, or only found 

To warm the turtle's nest. 

"For shame, fond youth ! thy sorrows hush. 

And spurn the sex," he said ; 
But while he spoke, a rising blush 

His lovelorn guest betrayed. 

Surprised, he sees new beauties rise, 

Swift mantling to the view ; 
Like colors o'er the morning skies, 

As bright, as transient too. 

The bashful look, the rising breast. 

Alternate spread alarms : 
The lovely stranger stands confest 

A maid in all her charms. 

" And, ah ! forgive a stranger rude, 

A wretch forlorn," she cried; 
" M^'hose feet unhalloAved thus intrude 

Where heaven and you reside. 

" But let a maid thy pit}' share, 
"Wliom love has taught to stray ; 

Who seeks for rest, but finds despair 
Companion of her way. 

"My father lived beside the Tyne, 

A wealthy lord was he ; 
And all his wealth was marked as mine, — 

He had but only me. 

"To win me from his tender arms. 

Unnumbered suitors came ; 
Who praised me for imputed charms, 

And felt, or feigned, a flame. 

"Each hour a mercenary crowd 

With richest proffers strove : 
Among the rest youug Edwin bowed. 

But never talked of love. 



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"In humble, simplest habit clad, 

No wealth or power had he ; 
Wisdom and worth were all he had, 

But these were all to me. 

" And when beside me in the dale 

He carolled lays of love, 
His breath lent fragi'ance to the gale 

And music to the grove. 

"The blossom opening to the day, 

The dews of heaven refined, 
Could naught of purity display 

To emulate his mind. 

" The dew, the blossonis of the tree, 
With charms inconstant shine ; 

Their charms were his, but, woe to me! 
Their constancy was mine. 

" For still I tried each fickle art. 

Importunate and vain ; 
And while his passion touched my heart, 
, I triumphed in his i>ain : 

"Till, quite dejected with my scorn, 

He left me to my pride ; 
And sought a solitude forlorn, 

In secret, where he died. 

" But mine the sorrow, mine the fault. 

And well my life shall pay ; 
I '11 seek the solitude he sought, 

And stretch me where he la3^ 

"And there forlorn, despairing, hid, 

I '11 lay me down and die ; 
'T was so for me that Edwin did, 

And so for him will I." 

"Forbid it, Heaven !" the Hermit cried. 

And clasped her to his breast : 
The wondering fair one turned to chide, — 

'T was Edwin's self that pressed. 

" Turn, Angelina, ever dear, 

My charmer, turn to see 
Thy own, thy long-lost Edwin here, 

Fiestored to love and thee. 

"Thus let me hold thee to my heart. 

And every care I'esign : 
And shall we never, never part. 

My life, — my all that 's mine ? 

" Ko, never from this hour to part. 

We '11 live and love so true ; 
The sigh that lends thy constant heart 

Shall break thy Edwin's too." 

(ILIVEU GlM-DSMITH. 



ON LOVE. 

TiiEKE is no worldly pleasure here below. 

Which by experience doth not folly prove ; 
But among all the follies that I know, 

The sweetest folly in the world is love : 
But not that passion which, with fools' consent, 

Above the reason bears imperious sway, 
Making their lifetime a perpetual Lent, 

As if a man were boi'ii to fast and praj'. 
No, that is not the humor 1 ajiprove. 

As either yielding pleasure or promotion ; 
I like a mild and lukewarm zeal in love. 

Although I do not like it in devotion ; 
For it has no coherence with my creed, 

To think that lovers die as they pretend ; 
If all that say they dy had dy'd indeed. 

Sure, long ere now the world had had an end. 
Besides, we need not love but if we please, 

No destiny can force men's disposition ; 
And how can any die of that disease 

Whereof himself may be his own physician ? 
But some seem so distracted of their wits. 

That I would tliink it but a venial sin 
To take some of those innocents that sits 

In Bedlam out, and put some lovers in. 
Yet some men, rather than incur the slander 

Of true apostates, will false martyrs prove, 
But I am neither Iphis nor Leander, 

I '11 neither drown nor hang myself for love. 
Methinks a wise man's actions should be such 

As always yield to reason's best advice ; 
Now, for to love too little or too much 

Are both extreams, and all extreams are vice. 
Yet have I been a lover by report, 

Yea I have dy'd for love, as others do ; 
But, praised be God, it was in such a sort. 

That I revived within an hour or two. 
Thus have I lived, thus have I loved till now. 

And find no reason to repent me yet ; 
And whosoever otherways will do. 

His courage is as little as his M'it. 

Sir Robert Avton. 



MY CHOICE. 

Shall I tell you whom I love ? 

Hearken then awhile to me ; 
And if such a woman move 

As I now shall versify, 
Be assured 't is she or none. 
That I love, and love alone. 

Nature did her so much right 
As she scorns the help of art. 

In as many virtues dight 
As e'er A'et embraced a heai't. 



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So much good so truly tried, 
Souie for less were deified. 

Wit she hath, without desire 

To make known how much she hath ; 
And her anger flames no higher 

Thau may fitly sweeten wrath. 
Full of pity as may be, 
Though pei'haps not so to me. 

Reason masters every sense, 

And her virtues grace her birth ; 

Lovely as all excellence. 

Modest in her most of mirth. 

Likelihood enough to prove 

Only worth could kindle love. 

Such she is ; and if you know 

Such a one as I have sung ; 
Be she brown, or fair, or so 

That she be but somewhat young ; 
Be assured 't is she, or none. 
That I love, and love alone. 

William Browne. 



LOVE NOT ME FOR COMELY GRACE. 

Love not me for comely grace, 
For my pleasing eye or face, 
Nor for any outward part, 
No, nor for my constant lieart ; 
For those may fail or turn to ill. 
So thou and I shall sever ; 
Keep therefore a true woman's eye. 
And love me still, but know not why. 
So hast thou the same reason still 
To dote upon me ever. 

Anonymous. 



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DISDAIN RETURNED. 

He that loves a rosy cheek, 

Or a coral lip admires, 
Or from starlike eyes doth seek 

Fuel to maintain his fires ; 
As old Time makes these decay. 
So his flames must waste away. 

But a smooth and steadfast mind. 
Gentle thoughts, and calm desires, 

Hearts with equal love combined, 
Kindle never-djdng fires : — 

Where these are not, I despise 

Lovely cheeks or lips or eyes. 

Thomas Carew. 



LOVE ME LITTLE, LOVE ME LONG, 

ORIGINALLY PRINTED IN 1569. 

Love me little, love me long ! 
Is the burden of my song : 
Love that is too hot and strong 

Burnetii soon to waste. 
Still I would not have thee cold, — 
Not too backwai'd, nor too bold ; 
Love that lasteth till 't is old 

Fadeth not in haste. 
Love me little, love me long ! 
Is the burden of my song. 

If thou lovest me too much, 

'T will not prove as true a touch ; 

Love me little more than such, — 

For I fear the end. 
I 'm with little well content. 
And a little from thee sent 
Is enough, with true intent 

To be steadfast, friend. 

Say thou lovest me, while thou live 
I to thee my love will give. 
Never dreaming to deceive 

While that life endures ; 
Nay, and after death, in sooth, 
I to thee will keep my truth, 
As now when in my May of youth : 

This my love assures. 

Constant love is moderate ever, 
And it will through life persever ; 
Give me that with true endeavor, — 

I will it restore. 
A suit of durance let it be. 
For all weathers, — that for me, — 
For the land or for the sea : 

Lasting evermore. 

Winter's cold or summer's heat, 
Autumn's tempests on it beat ; 
It can never know defeat. 

Never can rebel 
Such the love that I would gain. 
Such the love, I tell thee plain. 
Thou must give, or woo in vain : 

So to thee — farewell ! 

Anonymous. 



THE LOVELINESS OF LOVE. 

It is not Beauty I demand, 

A crystal brow, the moon's despair, 
Nor the snow's daughter, a white hand. 

Nor mermaid's yellow pride of hair : 



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Tell me not of your starry eyes, 
Your lips that seem on roses fed, 

Your breasts, wliere Cupid tumbling lies 
Nor sleeps for kissing of liis bed, — 

A bloomy pair of vermeil clieeks 
Like Hebe's in her ruddiest hours, 

A breath that softer music speaks 

Than summer winds a-wooing flowers ; — 

These are but gauds : nay, what are lips ? 

Coral beneath the ocean-stream. 
Whose brink when your adventurer slips 

Full oft he perisheth on them. 

And what are cheeks, but ensigns oft 
That A¥ave hot youth to fields of blood ? 

Did Helen's breast, though ne'er so soft, 
Do Greece or Ilium any good ? 

Eyes can with baleful ardor burn ; 

Poison can breath, that erst perfumed ; 
There 's many a white hand holds an urn 

"With lovers' hearts to dust consumed. 

For crystal brows there 's naught within ; 

They are but empty cells for pride ; 
He who the Siren's hair would win 

Is mostly strangled in the tide. 

Give me, instead of Beauty's bust, 

A tendej.' heart, a loyal mind, 
"Which with temptation I would trust. 

Yet never linked with error find, — 

One in whose gentle bosom I 

Could pour my secret heart of woes, 

Like the care-burdened honey-fly 

That hides his murmurs in the rose, — 

My earthly Comforter ! whose love 

So indefeasible might be 
That, when my spirit wonued above. 

Hers could not stay, for sympathy. 

ANONYMOUS. 



A MAIDEN'S IDEAL OF A HUSBAND. 

FROM "THE CONTRIVANCES." 

Genteel in personage, 
Conduct, and equipage, 
Noble by heritage. 

Generous and free : 
Brave, not romantic ; 
Learned, not pedantic ; 
Frolic, not frantic ; 

This must he be. 



Honor maintaining, 
Meanness disdaining. 
Still entertaining. 

Engaging and new. 
Neat, but not finical ; 
Sage, but not cynical ; 
Never tyrannical, 

But ever. true. 

HENRY CAREY. 



THE LANDLADY'S DAUGHTEPt. 

Three students were travelling over the PJiine ; 
They stopped when they came to the landlady's 

sign ; 
" Good landlady, have you good beer and wine ? 
And wliere is that dear little daughter of thine ? " 

" My beer and wine are fresh and clear ; 
My daughter she lies on the cold death-bier ! " 
And when to the chamber they made their way. 
There, dead, in a coal-black shrine, she lay. 

The first he drew near, and the veil gently raised. 
And on her pale face he mournfully gazed : 
"Ah ! wert thou but living yet," he said, 
" I 'd love thee from this time forth, fair maid ! " 

The second he slowly put back the shroud. 
And turned him away and wept aloud : 
"Ah ! that thou liest in the cold death-bier ! 
Alas ! I have loved thee for many a year ! " 

The third he once more uplifted the veil, 
And kissed her upon her mouth so pale : 
" Thee loved I always ; I love still but thee ; 
And thee will I love through eternity ! " 

From the German of Ul-ILAND, Translation 
of J. S. DWIGHT. 



THREE LOVES. 

There were three maidens who loved a king ; 

They sat together beside the sea ; 
One cried, " I love him, and I would die 

If but for one day he might love me ! " 

The second whispered, "And I would die 
To gladden his life, or make him great." 

The third one spoke not, but gazed afar 
With dreamy eyes that were sad as Fate. 

The king he loved tlie first for a day, 
The second his life with fond love blest ; 

And yet the woman who never spoke 

Was the one of tlie three who loved him best. 
Lucy h. Hooper. 



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A WOMAN'S QUESTION. 

Before I trust my fate to thee, 

Or place my hand in thine, 
Before I let thy future give 

Color and form to mine, 
Before I peril all for thee, 
Question thy soul to-night for me. 

I break all slighter bonds, nor feel 

A shadow of regret : 
Is there one link within the past 

That holds thy spirit yet ? 
Or is thy faith as clear and free 
As that which I can pledge to thee ? 

Does there within thy dimmest dreams 

A possible future shine. 
Wherein thy life could henceforth breathe. 

Untouched, unshared by mine ? 
If so, at any pain or cost, 
0, tell me before all is lost ! 

Look deeper still : if thou canst feel. 

Within thy inmost soul, 
That thou hast kept a poi'tion back, 

While I have staked the whole. 
Let no false pity spare the blow, 
But in true mercy tell me so. 

Is there within thy heart a need 

That mine cannot fulfil ? 
One chord that any other hand 

Could better wake or still ? 
Speak now, lest at some future day 
My whole life wither and decay. 

Lives there within thy nature hid 

The demon-spirit, change. 
Shedding a passing glory still 

On all things new and strange ? 
It may not be thy fault alone, — 
But shield my heart against thine own. 

Couldst thou withdraw thy hand one day 

And answer to my claim. 
That fate, and that to-day's mistake, — 

Not thou, — had been to blame ? 
Some soothe their conscience thus ; but thou 
Wilt surely warn and save me now. 

Nay, answer not, — I dare not hear ; 

The words would come too late ; 
Yet I would spare thee all remorse. 

So comfort thee, my fate: 
Whatever on my heart may fall, 
K em em her, I ivozild risk it all ! 

Adelaide Annr Procter. 



A WOMAN'S ANSWER. 

I WILL not let you say a woman's part 
Must be to give exclusive love alone ; 

Dearest, although I love you so, my heart 
Answers a thousand claims besides your own. 

I love, — what do I not love ? Earth and air 
Find space within my heart, and myriad things 

You would not deign to heed are cherished there. 
And vibrate on its very inmost strings. 

I love the summer, with her ebb and flow 

Of light and warmth and music, that have 
nursed 

Her tender buds to blossoms . . . and you know 
It was in summer that I saw you first. 

I love the winter dearly too, . . . but then 
I owe it so much ; on a winter's day, 

Bleak, cold, and stormy, you retui'ned again, 
When you had been those weaiy months away. 

I love the stars like friends ; so many nights 
I gazed at them, when you were far from me, 

Till I grew blind with tears . . . those far-off lights 
Could watch you, whom I longed in vain to see. 

I love the flowers ; happy hours lie 

Shut up within their petals close and fast : 

You have forgotten, dear ; but they and I 
Keep every fragment of the golden Past. 

I love, too, to be loved ; all loving praise 
Seems like a crown upon my life, — to make 

It better worth the giving, and to raise 

Still nearer to your own the heart you take. 

I love all good and noble souls ; — I heard 
One speak of you but lately, and for days, 

Only to think of it, my soul was stirred 
In tender memory of such generous jjraise. 

I love all those who love you, all who owe 
Comfort to you ; and I can find regret 

Even for those poorer hearts who once could know, 
And once could love you, and can now forget. 

Well, is my heart so narrow, — I, who spare 
Love for all these ? Do I not even hold 

My favorite books in special tender care, 
And prize them as a miser does his gold ? 



The poets that you used to read to me 

While summer twilights faded in the sky ; 

But most of all I think Aurora Leigh, 

Because — because — do vou remember whv 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Will you Ije jealous ? Did you guess before 
I loved so many things ? — Still you the best : ^ 

Dearest, remember that I love you more, 
0, more a thousand times, than all the rest ! 

Adelaide Anne Procter. 



THE LADY'S "YES." 

"Yes," I answered you last night; 

"No," this morning, sir, I say. 
Colors seen by candle-light 

Will not look the same by day. 

When the viols played their best. 
Lamps above, and laughs below, 

Love me sounded like a jest, 
Fit for i/es or lit for no. 

Call me false or call me free, 
Vow, whatever light may shine. 

No man on your face shall see 
Any grief for change on mine. 

Y'et the sin is on us both ; 

Time to dance is not to woo ; 
Wooing light makes fickle troth, 

Scorn of me recoils on you. 

Learn to win a lady's faith 

Nobly, as the thing is high, 
Bravely, as for life and death, 

With a loyal gravity. 

Lead her from the festive boards. 

Point her to the starry skies. 
Guard her, by your truthful words. 

Pure from courtship's flatteries. 

By your truth she shall be true. 

Ever true, as wives of yore ; 
And her yes, once said to you. 

Shall be Yes forevermore. 

ELIZABETH Barrett Browning. 



THE MAID'S REMONSTRANCE. 

Never wedding, ever wooing, 
Still a lovelorn heart pursuing. 
Read you not the wrong you 're doing 

In my cheek's pale hue ? 
All my life with sorrow strewing, 

Wed, or cease to woo. 

Rivals banished, bosoms plighted. 
Still our days are disunited ; 
Now the lamp of hope is lighted. 

Now half quenched appears. 
Damped and wavering and benighted 

Midst my sighs and tears. 



Charms you call your dearest blessing. 
Lips that thrill at your caressing, 
Eyes a mutual soul confessing. 

Soon you '11 make them grow 
Dim, and worthless your possessing. 

Not with age, but woe 1 

Thomas Cajipbell. 



LOVE'S SILENCE. 

Because I breathe not love to everie one, 
Nor do not use set colors for to weare. 
Nor nourish special locks of vowed haii'e. 
Nor give each speech a full point of a groane, — 
The courtlie nymphs, acquainted with the moane 
Of them who on their lips Love's standard beare, 
"What! he?" say they of me. "Now I 
dare sweare 
He cannot love : No, no ! let him alone." 

And think so still, — if Stella know my minde. 
Profess, indeed, I do not Cupid's art ; 

But you, faire maids, at length this true shall 
tinde, — 
That his right badge is but worne in the hearte. 
Dumb swans, not chattering pies, do loveis 

prove : 
They love indeed who quake to say they love. 
SIR Philip Sidney. 



GIVE ME MORE LOVE OR MORE 
DISDAIN. 

Give me more love or more disdain ; 

The torrid or the frozen zone 
Brings equal ease unto my pain ; 

The temperate alfords me none ; 
Either exti'eme, of love or hate, 
Is sweeter than a calm estate. 

Give me a storm ; If it be love. 
Like Danae in a golden shower, 

I swim in pleasure ; if it prove 
Disdain, that torrent will devour 

My vulture hopes ; and he 's possessed 

Of heaven that's but from hell released; 

Then crown my joys, or cure my pain ; 

Give me more love or more disdain. 

Thomas Cakew. 



LOVE DISSEMBLED. 

FROM "AS YOU LIKE IT," ACT III. SC. 5. 

Think not I love him, though I ask for him ; 
'T is but a peevish boy : ; — yet he talks well ; — 
But what care I for words ? — yet words do well. 
When he that speaks them pleases those that Ik^uv. 



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But, sure, lie 's proud ; and yet his pride becomes Still questioned me the story of my life, 



lum : 
He '11 make a proper man : The best thing in him 
Is his complexion ; and faster than his tongue 
Did make offence, his eye did heal it up. 
He is not very tall ; yet for his years he 's tall ; 
His leg is but so so ; and yet 't is well : 
There was a pretty i-edness in his lip, 
A little riper and more lusty red 
Than that mixed in his cheek ; 't was just the 

difference 
Betwixt the constant red, and mingled damask. 
There be some women, Silvius, had they marked 

him 
In parcels, as I did, would have gone near 
To fall in love with him : but, for my part, 
I love him not, nor hate him not ; and yet 
I have more cause to hate him than to love him : 
For what had he to do to chide at me ? 
He said mine eyes were black, and my hair black ; 
And, now I am remembered, scorned at me : 
I marvel, why I answered not again : 
But that 's all one ; omittance is no quittance. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



OTHELLO'S DEFENCE. 

FROM "OTHELLO," ACT I. SC. 3. 

Othello. Most potent, gi-ave, and reverend 

signiors, 
My very noble and approved good masters, — 
That I have ta'en away this old man's daughter. 
It is most true ; true, I have married her : 
The very head and front of my offending 
Hath this extent, no more. Eude am I in my 

speech, 
And little blessed with the soft phrase of peace ; 
For since these arms of mine had seven years' pith. 
Till now some nine moons wasted, they have used 
Their dearest action in the tented field ; 
And little of this great world can I speak. 
More than pertains to feats of broil and battle ; 
And therefore little shall I grace my cause 
In speaking for myself. Yet, by your gracious 

patience, 
I will a round unvarnished tale deliver 
Of my whole course of love ; what drugs, what 

charms, 
"What conjuration, and what mighty magic, — 
For such proceeding I am charged withal, — 
1 won his daughter. 

I '11 j)resent 
How I did thrive in this fair lady's love. 
And she in mine. 



Her father loved me ; oft invited me 



From year to year ; — the battles, sieges, fortunes. 

That 1 have passed. 

I ran it through, even from my bojash days, 

To the very moment that he bade me tell it : 

Wherein I spake of most disastrous chances, 

Of moving accidents by flood and field ; 

Of hair-breadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly 

breach ; 
Of being taken by the insolent foe, 
And sold to slavery ; of my redemption thence. 
And portance in my travel's history : 
Wherein of antres vast, and deserts idle, 
Eough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads 

touch heaven. 
It was my hint to speak, — such was the process ; 
And of the Cannibals that each other eat. 
The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads 
Do grow beneath their shoulders. This to hear. 
Would Desdemona seriously incline : 
But still the house affairs would draw her theiice ; 
Which ever as she could with haste despatch. 
She 'd come again, and with a greedy ear 
Devour up my discourse. Which I observing. 
Took once a pliant hour ; and found good means 
To draw from her a prayer of earnest heart. 
That 1 would all my pilgrimage dilate. 
Whereof by parcels she had something heard, 
But not intentively: I did consent ; 
And often did beguile her of her tears. 
When I did speak of some distressful stroke, 
That my youth suffered. My story being done. 
She gave me for my pains a world of sighs : 
She swore, — in faith 'twas strange, 'twas pass- 
ing strange ; 
'T was j)itiful, 't was wondrous pitiful : 
She wished she had not heard it ; yet she wished 
Tli»at Heaven had made her such a man : she 

thanked me ; 
And bade me, if I had a friend that loved her, 
I should teach him how to tell my story. 
And that would woo her. Upon this hint, I 

spake : 
She loved me for the dangers I had passed, 
And I loved her that she did pity them. 
This only is the witchcraft I have used : 
Here comes the lady, let her witness it. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



[& 



10 



AH, HOW SWEET. 

FROM " TYRANNIC LOVE," ACT IV. SC. I. 

Ah, how sweet it is to love ! 

Ah, how gay is young desire ! 
And what pleasing pains we prove 

When we first approach love's fire ! 
Pains of love be sweeter far 
Than all other pleasures are. 



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146 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



-n 



Sighs which are from lovers blown 
Do but gentljf heave the heart : 

E'en the tears they shed alone 

Cure, like trickling balm, their smart. 

Lovers, when they lose their breath, 

Bleed away in easy death. 

Love and Time with reverence use, 
Treat them like a parting friend ; 

Nor the golden gifts refuse 

Which in youth sincere they send : 

For each year their price is more. 

And they less simple than before. 

Love, like spring-tides full and high, 
Swells in every youthful vein ; 

But each tide does less supply, 
Till they quite shrink in again. 

If a flow in age appear, 

'T is but rain, and runs not clear. 

JOHN DRYDEN. 



WHY, LOVELY CHARMER? 

FROM "THE HIVE." 

Why, lovely charmer, tell me why, 
So very kind, and yet so shy ? 
Why does that cold, forbidding air 
Give damps of sorrow and despair ? 
Or why tliat smile my soul subdue, 
And kindle up my flames anew ? 

In vain you strive with all your art, 
By turns to fire and freeze my heart ; 
When I behold a face so fail'. 
So sweet a look, so soft an air, 
My ravished soul is charmed all o'er, 
I cannot love thee less or more. 

Anonymous. 



I PRITHEE SEND ME BACK MY HEART. 

I PRITHEE send me back my heart, 

Since I cannot have thine ; 
For if from yours you will not part. 

Why then shouldst thou have mine ? 

Yet, now I think on 't, let it lie ; 

To find it were in vain ; 
For thou 'st a thief in either eye 

Would steal it back again. 

Why should two hearts in one breast lie, 

And yet not lodge together ? 
Love ! where is thy sympathy 

If thus our breasts thou sever ? 



But love is such a mystery, 

I cannot find it out ; 
For when I think I 'm best resolved 

I then am most in doubt. 

Then farewell care, and farewell woe ; 

I will no longer pine ; 
For I '11 believe I have her heart 

As much as she has mine. 

Sir John Suckling. 



IF DOUGHTY DEEDS MY LADY PLEASE. 

If doughty deeds my lady please. 

Right soon I '11 mount my steed. 
And strong his arm and fast his seat 

That bears frae me the meed. 
I '11 wear thy colors in my cap. 

Thy picture at my heart. 
And he that bends not to thine eye 
Shall rue it to his smart ! 

Then tell me how to woo thee. Love ; 

0, tell me how to woo thee ! 
For thy dear sake nae care I '11 take, 
Though ne'er another trow me. 

If gay attire delight thine eye, 

I 'U dight me in array ; 
I '11 tend thy chamber door all night. 

And squire thee all the day. 
If sweetest sounds can win thine ear, 

These sounds I '11 strive to catch ; 
Thy voice I '11 steal to woo thysell. 

That voice that nane can match. 

But if fond love thy heart can gain, 

I never broke a vow ; 
Nae maiden laj^s her skaitli to me ; 

I never loved but you. 
For you alone I ride the ring, 

For you I wear the blue ; 
For you alone I strive to sing, 
0, tell me how to woo ! 

Then tell me how to woo thee, Love ; 

0, tell me how to woo thee ! 
For thy dear sake nae care I '11 take, 
Though ne'er another trow me. 

Graham of Gartmore. 



t& 



TO ALTHEA FROM PRISON. 

When Love with unconfined wings 

Hovers within my gates, 
And my divine Altliea. brings 

To whisper at my grates ; 
AVhen I lie tangled in her hair 

And fettered with her eye. 
The liii-ds that wanton in the air 

Know no such liberty. 



^ 



ifl-- 



LOVE. 



147 



a 



When flowing cups pass swiftly round 

With no allaying Thames, 
Our careless heads with roses crowned, 

Our hearts with loyal flames ; 
When thirsty grief in wine we steep. 

When healths and draughts go free. 
Fishes that tipple in the deep 

Know no such liberty. 

When, linnet-like confined, 

With shriller throat shall sing 
The mercy, sweetness, majesty 

And glories of my King ; 
When I shall voice aloud how good 

He is, how great should be. 
The enlarged winds, that curl the flood, 

Know no such liberty. 

Stone walls do not a prison make, 

Nor iron bars a cage ; 
Minds innocent and quiet take 

That for an hermitage : 
If I have freedom in my love. 

And in my soul am free. 
Angels alone, that soar above, 

Enjoy such liberty. 

Colonel Richard Lovelace. 



JIIVALRY IN LOVE. 

Of all the torments, all the cares, 

With which our lives are curst ; 
Of all the plagues a lover bears, 

Sure rivals are the worst ! 
By partners in each other kind, 

Afflictions easier grow ; 
In love alone we hate to find 

Companions of our woe. 

Sylvia, for all the pangs you see 

Are laboring in my breast, 
I beg not you would favor me ; — 

Would you but slight the rest ! 
How great soe'er your rigors are, 

With them alone I '11 cope ; 
I can endure my own despair, 

But not another's hope. 

William Walsh. 



^- 



TO A VERY YOUNG LADY. 

Ah, Chloris ! that I now could sit 
As unconcerned as when 

Your infant beauty could beget 
No pleasure, nor no pain. 



When I the dawn used to admire, 
And praised the coming day, 

I little thought the growing fire 
Must take my rest away. 

Your charms in harmless childhood lay, 

Like metals in the mine ; 
Age from no face took more away. 

Than youth concealed in thine. 

But as your charms insensibly 

To their perfection prest. 
Fond Love as unperceived did fly, 

And in my bosom rest. 

My passion with your beauty grew, 

And Cupid at mj' heart. 
Still as his mother favored you, 

Threw a new flaming dart. 

Each gloried in their wanton part : 

To make a lover, he 
Employed the utmost of his art ; 

To make a Beauty, she. 

Though now I slowly bend to love 

Uncertain of my fate, 
If your fair self my chains approve, 

I shall my freedom hate. 

Lovers, like dying men, may well 

At first disordered be. 
Since none alive can truly tell 

What fortune they must see. 

Sir Charles Sedley. 



THE FLOWER'S NAME. 

Here 's the garden she walked across, 

Arm in my arm, such a short while since : 
Hark ! now I push its wicket, the moss 

Hinders the hinges, and makes them wince. 
She must have reached this shrub ere she turned. 

As back with that murmur the wicket swung ; 
For shelaid the poor snail my chance foot spurned, 

To feed and forget it the leaves among. 

Down this side of the gravel-walk 

She went wliile her robe's edge brushed the box; 
And here she paused in her gracious talk 

To point me a moth on the milk-white phlox. 
Roses, ranged in valiant row, 

I will never think that she passed you by ! 
She loves you, noble roses, I know ; 

But yonder see where the rock-plants lie ! 

This flower she stopped at, finger on lip, — 
Stooped over, in doubt, as settling its claim ; 

Till she gave me, with pride to make no slip. 
Its soft meandering Spanish name. 



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148 



POEMS 0¥ THE AFFECTIONS. 



-^a 



What a name ! was it love or praise ? 

Speech halt' asleep, or song half awake ? 
I must learn Spanish one of these days, 

Only for that slow sweet name's sake. 

Eoses, if 1 live and do well, 

I may bring her one of these days, 
To fix you fast with as fine a spell, — 

Fit you each with his Spanish phrase. 
But do not detain me now, for she lingers 

There, like sunshine over the ground ; 
And ever I see her soft white fingers 

Searching after the bud she found. 

Flower, you Spaniard ! look that you grow not, — 

Stay as you are, and be loved forever ! 
Bud, if I kiss you, 'tis that you blow not, — 

Mind ! the shut pink mouth opens never ! 
For while thus it pouts, her fingers wrestle, 

Twinkling the audacious leaves between, 
Till round they turn, and down they nestle : 

Is not the dear mark still to be seen ? 

Where I find her not, beauties vanish ; 

Whither I follow her, beauties flee. 
Is there no method to tell her in Spanish 

June's twice June since she breathed it with me? 
Come, bud ! show me the least of her traces; 

Treasure my lady's lightest footfall : 
Ah ! you may flout and turn up your faces, — 

Roses, you are not so fair after all ! 

Robert Brow.mxg. 



WHY? 



Why came the rose ? Because the sun, in shining. 
Found in the mould some atoms rare and fine : 

And, stooping, drew and warmed them into grow- 
ing, — 
Dust, with the spirit's mystic countersign. 

What made the perfume ? All his wondrous kisses 
Fell on the sweet red mouth, till, lost to sight. 

The love became too exquisite, and vanished 
Into a viewless rapture of the night. 

Why did the rose die ? Ah, why ask the tiuestion ? 

There is a time to love, a time to give ; 
She perished gladly, folding close the secret 

AVherein is garnered what it is to live. 

Mary Louise Ritter. 



^ 



A MATCH. 

If love were what the rose is, 

And I were like the leaf, 
Our lives would grow together 
In sad or singirig weather, 



Blown fields or fiowerful closes, 
Green pleasure or gray grief ; 

If love were what the rose is, 
And I were like the leaf. 

If I were what the words are, 
And love were like the tune, 

With double sound and single 

Delight our lips would mingle. 

With kisses glad as birds are 
That get sweet rain at noon ; 

If I were what the words are. 
And love were like the tune. 

If you were life, my darling, 
And I, your love, were death, 

We 'd shine and snow together 

Ere Mai'ch made sweet the weather 

With daffodil and starling 
And hours of fruitful breath ; 

If you were life, my darling, 
And I, your love, were death. 

If you were thrall to sorrow, 

And I were page to joy. 
We 'd play for lives and seasons. 
With loving looks and treasons. 
And tears of night and morrow. 

And laughs of maid and boy ; 
If you were thrall to sorrow, 

And I were page to joy. 

If you were April's lady. 

And I were lord in May, 
We 'd throw with leaves for hours, 
And draw for days with flowers. 
Till day like night were shady, 

And night wei-e bright like day ; 
If you were Ajnil's lad)^ 

And I were loi'd in May. 

If you were queen of pleasure, 

And I ^^'ere king of pain. 
We 'd liunt down love together. 
Pluck out his flying-feather, 
And teach his feet a measure, 

And find his mouth a rein ; 
If you were queen of pleasure. 

And I were king of pain. 

Algernon Charles Swinburne. 



THE FLOWER 0' DUMBLANE. 

The sun has ganedown o'er the lofty Ben Lomond, 
And left the red clouds to preside o'er the scene. 

While lanely 1 stray in the calm summer gloamin'. 

To muse on sweet Jessie, the Flower o' Dum- 

blane. 



^ 



t& 



LOVE. 



149 



:> I — I 



How sweet is the brier, wi' its saft faiildin' blos- 
som, 

And sweet is the birk, M'i' its mantle o' green ; 
Yet sweeter and fairer, and dear to this bosom. 

Is lovely young Jessie, the Flower o' Dumblane. 

She 's modest as ony, and blithe as she 's bonnie, — 
For guileless simplicity marks her its aiii ; 

And far be the villain, divested of feeling, 

Wha 'd blight in its bloom the sweet Flower o' 
Dumblane. 

Sing on, thou sweet mavis, thy hymn to the 
e'ening ! — 
Thou 'rt dear to the echoes of Calderwood glen ; 
Sae dear to this bosom, sae artless and winning, 
Is charming young Jessie, the Flower o' Dum- 
blane. 

How lost were my days till I met wi' my Jessie ! 

The sports o' the city seemed foolish and vain ; 
I ne'er saw a n3'^mph I would ca' my dear lassie 

Till charmed wi' sweet Jessie, the Flower o' 
Dumblane. 

Though mine were the station o' loftiest grandeur, 

Amidst its profusion I 'd languish in pain. 
And reckon as naething the height o' its splendor. 
If wanting sweet Jessie, the Flower o' Dum- 
blane. 

Robert Tannahill. 



U-^ 



MAEY MORISON. 

Mary, at thy window be ! 

It is the wished, the trysted hour ! 
Those smiles and glances let me see 

Tliat make the miser's treasure poor : 
How blithely wad I bide the stoure, 

A weary slave frae sun to sun, 
Could I the rich reward secure. 

The lovely Mary Morison. 

Yestreen when to the trembling string 
The dance gaed through the lighted ha', 

To thee my fancy took its wing, — 
I sat, but neither heard nor saw : 

Though this was fair, and that was braw, 
And yon the toast of a' the town, 

1 sighed, and said amang them a', 

" Ye are na Mary Morison." 

Mary, canst thou wreck his peace 

AVha for thy sake wad gladly dee ? 
Oi' canst thou break that heart of his, 

Whase only faut is loving thee ? 
If love for love thou wilt na gie, 

At least be pity to me shown ; 
A thought ungentle canna be 

The thought o' Mary Morison. 

ROBERT Burns. 



0, SAW YE THE LASS? 

0, SAW ye the lass wi' the bonny blue een ? 
Her smile is the sweetest that ever was seen ; 
Her cheek like the rose is, but fresher, I ween ; 
She 's the loveliest lassie that trips on the green. 
The home of my love is below in the valley, 
Where wild-flowers welcome the wandering bee ; 
But the sweetest of flowers in that spot that is 

seen 
Is the maid that I love wi' the bonny blue een. 

When night overshadows her cot in the glen, 
She '11 steal out to meet her loved Donald again ; 
And when the moon shines on the valley so green, 
I '11 welcome the lass wi' the bonny blue een. 
As the dove that has wandered away from his 

nest 
Eeturns to the mate his fond heart loves the best, 
I '11 fly from the world's false and vanishing scene, 
To my dear one, the lass wi' the bonny blue een. 

Richard Ryan. 



THE LASS OF RICHMOND HILL. 

On Richmond Hill there lives a lass 
More bright than May-day morn, 

Whose charms all other maids surpass, — 
A rose without a thorn. 

This lass so neat, with smiles so sweet, 
Has won my right good-will ; 

I 'd crowns resign to call her mine. 
Sweet lass of Richmond Hill. 

Ye zephjTS gay, that fan the air. 
And wanton through the grove, 

0, whisper to my charming fair, 
I die for her I love. 

How happy will the shepherd be 
Who calls this nymph his own ! 

0, may her choice be fixed on me ! 
Mine 's fixed on her alone. 

James Upton. 



THE BROOKSIDE. 

I WANDERED by the brookside, 

I wandered by the mill ; 

I could not hear the brook flow, — 

The noisy wheel was still ; 

There was no burr of grasshopper, 

No chirp of any bird. 

But the beating of my own heart 

AVas all tlie sound I heard. 



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150 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



I sat beneath the elm-tree ; 

I watched the long, long shade, 

And, as it grew still longer, 

I did not feel afraid ; 

For I listened for a footfall, 

I listened for a word, — ■ 

But the beating of my own heart 

Was all the sound I heard. 

He came not, — no, he came not, — 
The night came on alone, — 
The little stars sat, one by one, 
Each on his golden throne ; 
The evening wind passed by my cheek, 
The leaves above were stirred, — 
But the beating of my own heart 
Was all the sound I heard. 

Fast silent tears were flowing, 
When something stood behind ; 
A hand was on my shoulder, — 
I knew its touch was kind : 
It drew me nearer, — nearer, — 
We did not speak one word. 
For the beating of our own hearts 
Was all the sound we heard. 

Richard Monckton Milnes, 
Lord Houghton. 



MY DEAR AND ONLY LOVE, I PRAY. 

My dear and only love, I pray 

That little world, of thee. 
Be governed by no otlier sway 

Than purest monarchic. 
For if confusion have a part. 

Which virtuous souls abliore. 
And hold a synod in thine heart, 

I '11 never love thee more. 

As Alexander I -will reign. 

And 1 will reign alone ; 
My thoughts did evermore disdain 

A rival on my throne : 
He either fears his fate too much. 

Or his deserts are small. 
That dares not put it to the touch. 

To gain or lose it all. 

But I will reign, and govern still. 

And always give the law. 
And have each subject at my will, 

And all to stand in awe ; 
But 'gainst my batteries if I find 

Thou kick, or vex me sore. 
As that thou set me up a blind, 

I '11 never love thee more. 



And in the empire of thine heart, 

Where 1 should solely be, 
If others do pretend a jjart. 

Or dare to vie with me. 
Or if committees thou erect. 

And go on such a score, 
I '11 laugh and sing at thy neglect, 

And never love thee more. 

But if thou wilt prove faithful then, 

And constant of thy word, 
I '11 make thee glorious by my pen. 

And famous by my sword ; 
I '11 serve thee in such noble ways 

Was never heard before, 
I '11 crown and deck thee all with bays, 

And love thee more and more. 

James graham, Marquess 
of montrose. 



B- 



LOVE AND TIME. 

Two pilgrims from the distant plain 
Come quickly o'er the mossy ground. 

One is a boy, with locks of gold 

Thick curling round his face so fair ; 

The other pilgrim, stern and old. 
Has snowy beard and silver hair. 

The youth with many a merry trick 

Goes singing on his careless way ; 
His old companion walks as quick. 

But speaks no word by night or day. 
Where'er the old man treads, the grass 

Fast fadeth with a certain doom ; 
Biit where the beauteous boy doth pass 

Unnumbered flowers are seen to bloom. 

And thus before the sage, the boy 

Trips lightly o'er the blooming lands. 
And proudly bears a pretty toy, — - 

A crystal glass with diamond sands. 
A smile o'er any brow would pass 

To see him frolic in the sun, — 
To see him shake the crystal glass. 

And make the sands more quickly run. 

And now they leap the streamlet o'er, 

A silver thread so white and thin. 
And now they reach the open door, 

And now they lightly enter in : 
" God save all here," ■ — that kind wish flies 

Still sweeter from his lips so sweet ; 
" God save you kindly," Norah cries, 

" Sit down, my child, and rest and eat." 

"Thanks, gentle Norah, fair and good, 
We '11 rest awhile our weary feet ; 



--ff 



[& 




But though this old man needeth food. 
There 's nothing here that he can eat. 

His taste is strange, he eats alone, 
Beneath some ruined cloister's cope, 

Or on some tottering turret's stone. 
While I can only live on — Hope ! 

" A week ago, ere you were wed, — 

It was the very night before, — 
Upon so many sweets I fed 

While passing by your mother's door, — 
It was that dear, delicious hour 

When Owen here the nosegay brought. 
And found you in the woodbine bower, — 

Since then, indeed, I 've needed naught." 

A blush steals over Norah's face, 

A smile comes over Owen's brow, 
A tranquil joy illumes the place, 

As if the moon were shining now ; 
The boy beholds the pleasing pain, 

The sweet confusion he has done, 
And shakes the crystal glass again. 

And makes the sands more quickly run. 

" Dear Norah, we are pilgrims, bound 

Upon an endless path sublime ; 
We pace the gi-een earth round and round. 

And mortals call us Love and Time ; 
He seeks the many, I the few ; 

I dwell with peasants, he with kings. 
We seldom meet ; but when we do, 

I take his glass, and he my wings. 

"And thus together on we go. 

Where'er I chance or wish to lead ; 
And Time, whose lonely steps are slow, 

Now sweeps along with lightning speed. 
Now on our bright predestined way 

We must to other regions pass ; 
But take this gift, and night and'day 

Look well upon its truthful glass. 

"How quick or slow the bright sands fall 

Is hid from lovers' eyes alone. 
If you can see them move at all. 

Be sure your heart has colder'grown. 
'Tis coldness makes the glass grow dry, 

The icy hand, the freezing brow ; 
But warm the heart and breathe the si^h 

And then they '11 pass you know not\ow." 

She took the glass where Love's warm hands 
^ A bright nnpervious vapor cast. 
She looks, but cannot see the sands 

Although she feels they 're falling fast. 
I>ii^t cold hours came, and then, alas ! 

She saw them falling frozen thi-ough. 
Till Love's warm light suffused the glass, 

And hid the loosening sands from view ! 

Denis Florence MacCarthy. 




FLY TO THE DESEET, FLY WITH ME. 

SONG OF NOURMAHAL IN "THE LIGHT OF THE HAREM." 

" Fly to the desert, fly with me. 
Our Arab tents are rude for thee ; 
But oh ! the choice what heart can doubt 
Of tents with love or thrones without ? 

" Our rocks are rough, but smiling there 
The acacia waves her yellow hair, 
Lonely and sweet, nor loved the less 
For flowering in a wilderness. 

"Our sands are bare, but down their slope 
The silvery-footed antelope 
As gracefully and gayly springs 
As o'er the marble courts of kings. 

"Then come, —thy Arab maid will be 
The loved and lone acacia-tree, 
The antelope, whose feet shall bless 
With their light sound thy loneliness. 

" Oh ! there are looks and tones that dart 
An instant sunshine through the heart, 
As if the soul that minute caught 
Some treasure it through life had sought ; 

" As if the very lips and eyes 
Predestined to have all our sighs, 
And never be forgot again. 
Sparkled and spoke before as then ! 

" So came thy every glance and tone, 
When first on me they breathed and shone ; 
New, as if brought from other spheres, 
Yet welcome as if loved for years ! 

"Then fly with me, if thou hast known 
No other flame, nor falsely thrown 
A gem away, that thou liadst sworn 
Should ever in thy heart be worn. 

" Come, if the love thou hast for me 
Is pure and fresh as mine for thee, — 
Fresh as the fountain underground, 
When first 't is by the lapwing found. 

" But if for me thou dost forsake 
Some other maid, and rudely break 
Her worshipped image from its base. 
To give to me the ruined place ; 

"Then, fare thee well ! — I'd rather make 
My bower upon some icy lake 
When thawing suns begin to shine. 
Than trust to love so false as thine ! " 

There was a pathos in this lay. 

That even without enchantment's art 

Would instantly have found its way 
Deep into Selim's burning hea,rt ; 






152 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



--a 



But breathing, as it did, a tone 
To earthly lutes and lips unknown ; 
With every chord fresh from the touch 
Of music's spirit, 't was too much ! 
Starting, he dashed away the cup, — 

Which, all the time of this sweet air. 
His hand had held, untasted, up, 

As if 't \vere fixed by magic there, 
And naming her, so long unnamed, 
So long unseen, wildly exclaimed, 
' ' Nourmahal ! Nourmahal ! 

Hadst thou but sung this witching strain, 
I could forget — forgive thee all. 

And never leave those eyes again." 

The mask is oft', — the charm is wrought, — 
And Selim to his heart has caught, 
In blushes, more than ever bright, 
His Nourmahal, his Harem's Light ! 
Ajid well do vanished frowns enhance 
The charm of every brightened glance ; 
And dearer seems each dawning smile 
For having lost its light awhile ; 
And, happier now for all her sighs. 

As on his arm her head reposes, 
She whispers him, with laughing eyes, 

" Remember, love, the Feast of Eoses ! " 

Thomas Moore. 



THE WELCOME. 

Come in the evening, or come in the morning ; 
Come when you 're looked for, or come without 

warning ; 
Kisses and welcome you '11 find here before you, 
And the oftener you come here the more I 'U 
adore you ! 
Light is my heart since the day we were 

plighted ; 
Red is my cheek that they told me was 

blighted ; 
The green of the trees looks far greener than 

ever, 
And the linnets are singing, "True lovers 
don't sever ! " 

I '11 pull you sweet flowers, to wear if you choose 
them ! 

Or, after you 've kissed them, they '11 lie on my 
bosom ; 

I 'U fetch from the mountain its breeze to inspire 
you ; 

I '11 fetch from my fancy a tale that won't tire 
yon. 
O, your step 's like the rain to the summer- 
vexed farmer. 
Or sabre and shield to a knight without armor ; 



I 'U sing you sweet songs till the stars rise 

above me, 
Then, wandering, I '11 wish you in silence to 

love me. 

We '11 look through the trees at the cliff and the 

eyrie ; 
We '11 tread round the rath on the track of the 

fairy ; 
AVe '11 look on the stars, and we '11 list to the 

river. 
Till you ask of your darling what gift you can 
give her. 
0, she '11 whisper you, " Love, as unchange- 
ably beaming. 
And trust, when in secret, most tunefully 

streaming ; 
Till the starlight of heaven above us sliall 

quiver. 
As our souls flow in one down eternity's river." 

So come in the evening, or come in the morning ; 

Come when you 're looked for, or come without 

warning ; 

Kisses and welcome yoii '11 find here before you, 

And the oftener you come here the more I '11 

adore you ! 

Light is my heart since the day we were 

plighted ; 

Red is my cheek that they told me was 

blighted ; 

The green of the trees looks far greener than 

ever, 

And the linnets are singing, "True lovers 

don't sever ! " 

Thomas Uavis. 



COME INTO THE GARDEN, MAUD. 

Come into the garden, Maud, 

For the black bat, night, has flown ! 

Come into the garden, Maud, 
I am here at the gate alone ; 

And the woodbine spices are wafted abroad. 
And the musk of the roses blown. 

For a breeze of morning moves. 
And the planet of Love is on high. 

Beginning to faint in the light that she loves. 
On a bed of daffodil sky, — 

To faint in the light of the sun that she loves, 
To faint in its light, and to die. 

All night have the roses heard 

The flute, violin, bassoon ; 
All night has the casement jessamine stirred 

To the dancers dancing in tune, — 
Till a silence fell with the waking bird. 

And a hush with the setting moon. 



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LOVE. 



— a 

153 ^-^ 



u 



I said to the lily, "There is but one 

With whom she has heart to be ga,y. 
When will the dancers leave her alone ? 

She is weary of dance and play." 
Now half to the setting moon are gone, 

And half to the rising day ; 
Low on the sand and loud on the stone 

The last wheel echoes away. 

I said to the rose, " The brief night goes 

In babble and revel and wine. 
young lord-lover, what sighs are those 

For one that will never be thine ? 
But mine, but mine," so I sware to the rose, 

" For ever and ever mine ! " 

And the soul of the rose went into my blood, 

As the music clashed in the hall ; 
And long by the garden lake I stood. 

For I heard your rivulet fall 
From the lake to the meadow and on to the 
wood, 

Our wood, that is dearer than all ; 

From the meadow your walks have left so sweet 
That whenever a March-wind sighs, 

He sets the jewel-print of your feet 
In violets blue as your eyes. 

To the Avoody hollows in which we meet, 
And the valleys of Paradise. 

The slender acacia would not shake 

One long milk-bloom on the tree ; 
The white lake-blossom fell into the lake, 

As the pimpernel dozed on the lea ; 
But the rose was awake all night for your sake, 

Knowing your promise to me ; 
The lilies and roses were all awake, 

They sighed for the dawn and thee. 

Queen rose of the rosebud garden of girls, 
Come hither ! the dances are done ; 

In gloss of satin and glimmer of pearls, 
Queen lily and rose in one ; 

Shine out, little head, sunning over with curls, 
To the flowers, and be their sun. 

There has fallen a splendid tear 

From the passion-flower at the gate. 
She is coming, my dove, my dear ; 

She is coming, my life, my fate ! 
The red rose cries, " She is near, she is near ; " 

And the white rose weeps, " She is late ; " 
The larkspur listens, " I hear, I hear ; " 

And the lily whispers, " I wait." 

She is coming, my own, my sweet ! 

Were it ever so airy a tread. 
My heart would hear her and beat. 

Were it earth in an earthly bed ; 



My dust would hear her and beat, 
Had I lain for a century dead ; 

Would start and tremble under her feet, 
And blossom in purple and red. 

Alfred Tennyson. 



CA' THE YOWES TO THE KNOWES. 

Ca the yoives to the knoives, 
CcC them where the heather groivs, 
Ca' them where the hurnie roices, 
My bonnie dearie. 

Hark the mavis' evening sang 
Sounding Clouden's woods amang ; 
Then a-faulding let us gang. 
My bonnie dearie. 

We '11 gae down by Clouden side, 
Thro' the hazels spreading wide, 
O'er the waves that sweetly glide 
To the moon sae clearly. 

Yonder Clouden's silent towers, 
Where at moonshine midnight hours, 
O'er the dewy bending flowers, 
Fairies dance sae cheerie. 

Ghaist nor bogle shalt thou fear : 
Thou 'rt to Love and Heaven sae dear, 
Nocht of ill may come thee near. 
My bonnie dearie. 

Fair and lovely as thou art, 
Thou hast stown my very heart ; 
I can die — but canna part. 
My bonnie dearie. 

While waters wimple to the sea ; 
While day blinks in the lift sae hie ; 
Till clay-cauld death shall blin' my e'e. 
Ye shall be my dearie. 

ROBERT BURNS. 



CHARLIE MACHEEE. 

Come over, come over 
The river to me. 
If ye are my laddie. 
Bold Charlie machree. 

Here 's Mary McPherson 
And Susy O'Linn, 
Who say ye 're faint-hearted, 
And darena plunge in. 

But the dark rolling water. 
Though deep as the sea, 
I know willna scare ye, 
Nor keep ye frae me ; 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



■a 



For stout is yer back, 
And strong is yer arm, 
And the lieart in yer bosom 
Is faithful and warm. 

Come over, come over 
The river to me, 
If ye are my laddie, 
Bold Charlie machree ! 

I see him, I see him ! 
He 's plunged in the tide, 
His strong arms are dashing 
The big waves aside. 

0, the dark rolling water 
Shoots swift as the sea, 
But blithe is the glance 
Of his bonny blue e'e. 

And his cheeks are like roses, 
Twa buds on a bough ; 
Who says ye 're faint-hearted, 
My brave Charlie, now ? 

Ho, ho, foaming river. 
Ye may roar as ye go, 
But ye canna bear Charlie 
To the dark loch below ! 

Come over, come over 
The river to me, 
My true-hearted laddie, 
My Charlie machree ! 

He 's sinking, he 's sinking, 
0, what shall I do ! 
Sti'ike out, Charlie, boldly, 
Ten strokes and ye 're thro' ! 

He 's sinking, Heaven ! 
Ne'er fear, man, ne'er fear ; 
I 've a kiss for ye, Charlie, 
As soon as ye 're here ! 

He rises, I see him, — 
Five strokes, Charlie, mair, — 
He 's shaking the wet 
From his bonny brown hair ; 

He conquers the current. 
He gains on the sea, — 
Ho, where is the swimmer 
Like Charlie machree ? 

Come over the river. 
But once come to me. 
And I '11 love ye forever, 
Dear Charlie machree ! 



He 's sinking, he 's gone, — 

God ! it is I, 

It is I, who have killed him — 
Help, help ! — he must die ! 

Help, help ! — ah, he rises, — 
Strike out and ye 're free ! 
Ho, bravely done, Charlie, 
Once more now, for me ! 

Now cling to the rock. 
Now gie us yer hand, — 
Ye 're safe, dearest Charlie, 
Ye 're safe on the land ! 

Come rest in mj bosom, 
If there ye can sleep ; 

1 canna speak to ye, 
I only can weep. 

Ye 've crossed the wild river, 
Ye 've risked all for me. 
And I '11 part frae ye never. 
Dear Charlie machree ! 

WILLIAII J. HOPPIN. 



ROBIN ADAIR. 

What 's this dull town to me ? 

Robin 's not near, — - 
He whom I wished to see. 

Wished for to hear ; 
Where 's all the joy and mirth 
Made life a heaven on earth, 
0, they 're all fled with thee, 

Robin Adair ! 

What made the assembly shine ? 

Robin Adair : 
What made the ball so fine ? 

Robin was thei'C : 
What, when the play was o'er, 
What made my heart so sore ? 
0, it was parting with 

Robin Adair ! 

But now thou art far from me, 

Robin Adair ; 
But now I never see 

Robin Adair ; 
Yet him I loved so well 
Still in my heart shall dwell ; 
0, I can ne'er forget 

Robin Adair ! 

AVelcome on shore again, 

Robin Adair ! 
Welcome once more again, 

Robin Adair ! 



&-- 



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155 



ra 



43— 



I feel thy trembling hand ; 
Tears in thy eyelids stand, 
To greet thy native land, 
Robin Adair. 

Long I ne'er saw thee, love, 

Robin Adair ; 
Still I prayed for thee, love, 

Robin Adair ; 
When thon wert far at sea, 
Many made love to me. 
But still I thought on thee, 

Robin Adair. 

Come to my heart again, 

Robin Adair ; 
Never to part again, 

Robin Adair ; 
And if thou still art true, 
I will be constant too. 
And will wed none but you, 

Robin Adair ! 

Lady Caroline Keppel. 



THE SILLER CROHN". 

" And ye sail walk in silk attire. 

And siller hae to spare, 
Gin ye '11 consent to be his bride, 

ISTor think o' Donald mair." 

0, wha wad buy a silken goun 

Wi' a puir broken heart ? 
Or what 's to me a siller croun 

Gin frae my love I part ? 

The mind whose meanest wish is pure 

Far dearest is to me. 
And ere I 'm forced to break my faith, 

I '11 lay me doun an' dee. 

For I hae vowed a virgin's vow 

My lover's fate to share, 
An' he has gi'en to me his heart. 

And what can man do mair ? 

His mind and manners won my heart : 

He gratefu' took the gift ; 
And did I wish to seek it back, 

It wad be waur than theft. 

The langest life can ne'er repay 

The love he bears to me. 
And ere I 'm forced to break my fluth, 

I '11 lay me doun an' dee. 

Susanna Blamire. 



ANNIE LAURIE.* 

Maxwelton banks are bonnie. 

Where early fa's the dew ; 
Where me and Annie Laurie 

Made up the promise true ; 
Made up the promise true. 

And never forget will I ; 
And for bonnie Annie Laurie 

I '11 lay me down and die. 

She 's backit like the peacock. 

She 's breistit like the swan, 
She 's jimp about the middle, 

Her waist ye weel micht span ; 
Her waist ye weel micht span. 

And she has a rolling eye ; 
And for bonnie Annie Laurie 

I '11 lay me down and die. 

DOUGLASS. 



THE SONG OF THE CAMP. 

" Give us a song ! " the soldiers cried. 

The outer trenches guarding, 
When the heated guns of the camps allied 

Grew weary of bombarding. 

The dark Redan, in silent scoff, 
Lay grim and threatening under ; 

And the tawny mound of the Malakoflf 
No longer belched its thunder. 

There was a pause. A guardsman said : 
" We storm the forts to-morrow ; 

Sing while we may, another day 
Will bring enough of sorrow. " 

They lay along the battery's side. 

Below the smoking cannon : 
Brave hearts from Severn and from Clyde, 

And from the banks of Shannon. 

They sang of love, and not of fame ; 

Forgot was Britain's glory : 
Each heart recalled a different name, 

But all sang "Annie Laurie." 

Voice after voice caught up the song, 

Until its tender passion 
Rose like an anthem, rich and strong, — 

Their battle-eve confession. 

Dear girl, her name he dared not speak. 

But as the song grew louder. 
Something upon the soldier's cheek 

Washed off the stains of powder. 

* A daughter of Sir Robert Laurie, whom a Mr. Douglass 
courted in vain, but whose name he immortalized, says Chambers. 



156 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



^- 



Beyond the darkening ocean burned 

The bloody sunset's embers, 
While the Crimean valleys leanied 

How English love remembers. 

And once again a fire of hell 
Eained on the Russian quarters, 

With scream of shot, and burst of shell, 
And bellowing of the mortars ! 

And Irish Nora's eyes are dim 

For a singer dumb and gory ; 
And English Mary mourns for him 

Who sang of "Annie Laurie." 

Sleep, soldiers ! still in honored rest 
Your truth and valor wearing : 

The bravest are the tenderest, — 
The loving are the daring. 

BAYARD TAYLOR. 



NANNY, WILT THOU GANG WI' ME ? 

Nanny, wilt thou gang wi' me, 

Nor sigh to leave the flaunting town ? 
Can silent glens have charms for thee. 

The Ipwly cot and russet gown ? 
Nae langer drest in silken sheen, 

Nae langer decked wi' jewels rare. 
Say, canst thou quit each courtly scene. 

Where thou wert fairest of the fair ? 

Nanny, when thou'rt far awa, 

Wilt thou not cast a look behind ? 
Say, canst thou face the flaky snaw, 

Nor shrink before the winter wind ? 
0, can that soft and gentle mien 

Severest hardships learn to bear, 
Noi", sad, regret each courtly scene. 

Where thou wert fairest of the fair ? 

Nanny, canst thou love so true. 

Through perils keen wi' me to gae ? 
Or, when thy swain mishap shall rue, 

To share with him the pang of wae ? 
Say, should disease or pain befall, 

Wilt thou assume the nurse's care. 
Nor, wishful, those gay scenes recall 

Where thou wert fairest of the fair ? 

And when at last thy love shall die. 

Wilt thou receive his parting breath ? 
Wilt thou repress each struggling sigh. 

And cheer with smiles the bed of death ? 
And wilt thou o'er his much-loved clay 

Strew flowers, and drop the tender tear ? 
Nor then regret those scenes so gay. 

Where thou wert fairest of the fair ? 

BISHOP THOMAS PERCY. 



SMILE AND NEVER HEED ME. 

Though, when other maids stand by, 
I may deign thee no reply, 
Turn not then away, and sigh, — 

Smile, and never heed me ! 
If our love, indeed, be such 
As must thrill at every touch, 
AVhy should others learn as much ? — 

Smile, and never heed me ! 

Even if, with maiden pride, 
I should bid thee quit my side. 
Take this lesson for thy guide, — 

Smile, and never heed me ! 
But when stars and twilight meet, 
And the dew is falling sweet, 
And thou hear'st my coming feet, — 

Then — thou then — mayst heed me ! 
Charles Swain. 



WHISTLE, AND I'LL COME TO YOU", 
MY LAD. 

WHISTLE, and I '11 come to you, my lad, 
whistle, and I '11 come to you, my lad, 
Tho' father and mither and a' should gae mad, 
whistle, and I '11 come to you, my lad. 

But warily tent, when ye come to court me, 
And come na unless the back-yett be a-jee : 
Syne up the back stile, and let naebody see. 
And come as ye were na comin' to me. 
And come, etc. 

whistle, etc. 

At kirk, or at market, whene'er ye meet me. 
Gang by me as tho' that ye cared nae a flie ; 
But steal me a blink o' your bonnie black e'e, 
Yet look as ye were na lookin' at me. 
Yet look, etc. 

whistle, etc. 

Aye vow and protest that ye care na for me. 
And whiles ye may lightly my beauty a wee ; 
But court nae anither, tho' jokin' ye be, 
For fear that she wile your fancy frae me. 
For fear, etc. 

whistle, etc. 

ROBERT BURNS. 



THE WHISTLE. 

"You have heard," said a youth to his sweet- 
heart, who stood, 
While he sat on a corn-sheaf, at daylight's 
decline, — 



^^ 



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LOVE. 



157 



a 



"You have heard of the Danish boy's whistle of 
wood ? 
I wish that that Danish boy's whistle were 
mine." 

"And what would you do with it ? — tell me," 
she said, 
While an arch smile played over her beautiful 
face. 
" I would blow it," he answered ; " and then my 
fair maid 
Would fly to my side, and would here take her 
place." 

"Is that all you wish it for ? That may be yours 
Without any magic," the fair maiden cried : 

"A favor so slight one's good nature secures;" 
And she playfully seated herself by his side. 

" I would blow it again," said the youth, " and 
the charm 
Would work so, that not even Modesty's check 
Would be able to keep from my neck your fine 
arm : " 
She smiled, — and she laid her fine arm round 
his neck. 

"Yet once more would I blow, and the music 
divine 
Would bring me the third time an exquisite 
bliss : 
You would lay your fair cheek to this brown one 
of mine. 
And your lips, stealing past it, would give me 
a kiss." 

The maiden laughed out in her innocent glee, 

"What a fool of yourself with your whistle 
you 'd make ! 
For only consider, how silly 't would be 

To sit there and whistle for — what you might 
take ! " 

Robert Story. 



BEHAVE YOURSEL' BEFORE FOLK. 

Behave yoursel' before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk. 
And dinna be sae rude to me. 

As kiss me sae before folk. 
It wouldna give me meikle pain. 
Gin we were seen and heard by nane. 
To tak' a kiss, or grant you ane ; 

But gudesake ! no before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk, — 
Whate'er you do when out o' view. 

Be cautious aye before folk ! 



Consider, lad, how folks will crack. 
And what a, great aff'air they '11 mak' 

0' naething but a simple smack, 

That 's gi'en or ta'en before folk. 
Behave yoursel' before folk. 
Behave yoursel' before folk, 

Nor gi'e the tongue o' old and young 
Occasion to come o'er folk. 

I 'm sure wi' j^ou I 've been as free 
As ony modest lass should be ; 
But yet it doesna do to see 

Sic freedom used before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk, 

I '11 ne'er submit again to it ; 

So mind you that — before folk ! 

Ye tell me that my face is fair : 
It may be sae — I dinna care — 
But ne'er again gar't blush so sair 

As ye hae done before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk, — 
Nor heat my cheeks wi' your mad freaks. 

But aye be douce before folk ! 

Ye tell me that my lips are sweet : 
Sic tales, I doubt, are a' deceit ; — 
At ony rate, it 's hardly meet 

To prie their sweets before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk, — 
Gin that 's the case, there 's time and place. 

But surely no before folk ! 

But gin ye really do insist 
That I should suffer to be kissed, 
Gae get a license frae the priest, 

And mak' me yours before folk ! 

Behave yoursel' before folk. 

Behave yoursel' before folk, — 
And when we 're ane, baith flesh and bane. 

Ye may tak' ten — before folk ! 

Alexander Rodger. 



THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD TO HIS 
LOVE. 

Come live with me and be my love. 
And we will all the pleasures jirove, 
That hill and valley, grove and field, 
And all the craggy mountains yield. 
There will we sit upon the rocks. 
And see the shepherds feed their flocks 
By shallow rivers, to whose falls 
Melodious birds sing madrigals. 
There will I make thee beds of roses, 
With a thousand fragrant posies ; 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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A cap of flowers and a kirtle 
Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle ; 
A gown made of the finest wool 
Which from our pretty lambs we pull ; 
Slippers lined choicely for the cold, 
With buckles of the purest gold ; 
A belt of straw, and ivy buds. 
With coral clasps and amber studs. 

The shepherd swains shall dance and sing 
For thy delight each May morning ; 
And if these pleasures may thee move. 
Then live with me and be my love. 

Christopher Marlowe. 



THE NYMPH'S REPLY. 

If all the world and love were young, 
And truth in every shepherd's tongue, 
These pretty pleasures might me move 
To live with thee, and be thy love. 

Time drives the flocks from field to fold, 
When rivers rage and rocks grow cold ; 
And Philomel becometh dumb, 
The rest complain of cares to come. 

The flowers do fade, and wanton fields 
To wayward winter reckoning yields ; 
A honey tongue, a heart of gall, 
Is fancy's spring, but sorrow's fall. 

Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses, 
Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies. 
Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten, 
In folly ripe, in reason rotten. 

Thy belt of straw and ivy buds. 
Thy coral clasps and amber studs ; 
All these in me no means can move 
To come to thee and be thy love. 

But could youth last, and love still breed, 
Had joys no date, nor age no need, 
Then these delights my mind might move 
To live with thee and be thy love. 

SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 



MAUD MULLER. 

Maud Muller, on a summer's day. 
Raked the meadow sweet with hay. 

Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth 
Of simple beauty and rustic health. 

Singing, she wrought, and her merry glee 
The mock-bird echoed from his tree. 



But, when she glanced to the far-off" town. 
White from its hill- slope looking down, 

The sweet song died, and a vague unrest 
And a nameless longing filled her breast, — 

A wish, that .she hardly dared to own, 
For something better than she had known. 

The Judge rode slowly down the lane. 
Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane. 

He drew his bridle in the shade 

Of the apple-trees, to greet the maid, 

And ask a draught from the spring that flowed 
Through the meadow, across the road. 

She stooped where the cool spring bubbled iip. 
And filled for him her small tin cup. 

And blushed as she gave it, looking down 
On her feet so bare, and her tattered gown. 

" Thanks ! " said the Judge, " a sweeter draught 
From a fairer hand was never quafi"ed." 

He spoke of the gi-ass and flowers and trees. 
Of the singing birds and the humming bees ; 

Then talked of the ha}'ing, and wondered whether 
The cloud in the west would bring foul weather. 

And Maud forgot her brier-torn gown. 
And her graceful ankles, bare and brown. 

And listened, while a pleased surprise 
Looked from her long-lashed hazel eyes. 

At last, like one M-ho for delay 
Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away. 

Maud Muller looked and sighed : "Ah me ! 
That I the Judge's bride might be ! 

"He Avould dress me up in silks so fine, 
And praise and toast me at his wine. 

" My father should wear a broadcloth coat. 
My brother should sail a jjainted boat. 

" I 'd dress my mother so grand and gay. 
And the baby should have a new toy each day. 

"And I 'd feed the hungry and clothe the poor. 
And all should bless me who left our door." 

The Judge looked back as he climbed the hill, 
And saw Maud Muller standing still : 

" A form more fair, a face more sweet. 
Ne'er hath it been my lot to meet. 



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159 



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' ' And her modest answer and graceful air 
Show her Avise and good as she is fair. 

" Would she were mine, and I to-day, 
Like her, a harvester of hay. 

" No doubtful balance of rights and wrongs. 
Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues, 

" But low of cattle, and song of birds, 
And health, and quiet, and loving words. " 

But he thought of his sister, proud and cold, 
And his mother, vain of her rank and gold. 

So, closing his heart, the Judge rode on. 
And Maud was left in the field alone. 

But the lawyers smiled that afternoon. 
When he hummed in court an old love tune ; 

And the j'oung girl mused beside the well, 
Till the rain on the unraked clover fell. 

He wedded a wife of richest dower. 
Who lived for fashion, as he for power. 

Yet oft, in his maible hearth's bright glow, 
He watched a picture come and go ; 

And sweet Maud Muller's hazel eyes 
Looked out in their innocent surprise. 

Oft, when the wine in his glass was red, 
He longed for the wa5'^side well instead. 

And closed his ej^es on his garnished rooms. 
To dream of meadows and clover blooms ; 

And the proud man sighed with a secret pain, 
' ' Ah, that I were free again ! 

' ' Free as when I rode that day 

Where the barefoot maiden raked the hay." 

She wedded a man unlearned and poor. 
And many children played round her door. 

But care and sorrow, and child-birth pain, 
Left their traces on heart and brain. 

And oft, when the summer sun shone hot 
On the new-mown hay in the meadow lot, 

And she heard the little spring brook fall 
Over the roadside, througli the wall. 

In the shade of the ajiple-tree again 
She saw a rider draw his rein. 



Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls 
Stretched away into stately halls ; 

The weary wheel to a spinnet turned, 
The tallow candle an astral burned ; 

And for him who sat by the chimney lug. 
Dozing and grumbling o'er pipe and mug, 

A manly form at her side she saw, 
And joy was duty and love was law. 

Then she took up her burden of life again, 
Saying only, "It might have been." 

Alas for maiden, alas for judge. 

For rich repiner and household drudge ! 

God pity them both ! and pity us all. 
Who vainly the dreams of youth recall ; 

For of all sad words of tongue or pen. 

The saddest are these : " It might have been ! " 

Ah, well ! for us all some sweet hope lies 
Deepl}'^ buried from human eyes ; 

And, in the hereafter, angels may 
Eoll the stone from its grave away ! 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 



QUAKERDOM. 



THE FOR^IAL CALL. 



U- 



And, gazing down with a timid grace. 
She felt his pleased eyes read her face. 



Through her forced, abnormal quiet 
Flashed the soul of frolic riot. 
And a most malicious laughter lighted up her 
downcast eyes ; 
All in vain I tried each topic. 
Ranged from polar climes to tropic, — 
Eveiy commonplace I started met with yes-or-no 
replies. 

For her mother — stiff and stately. 
As if starched and ironed lately — 
Sat erect, with rigid elbows bedded thus in curv- 
ing palms ; 
There she sat on guard before us. 
And in words precise, decoroiis, 
And most calm, reviewed the weather, and recited 
several psalms. 

How without abruptly ending 

This ni}' visit, and offending 
Wealthy neighbors, was the problem which em- 
ployed my mental care ; 

When the butler, bowing lowly. 

Uttered clearly, stiffly, slowly, 
"Madam, please, the gardener Avants you," — 

Heaven, I thought, has heard my prayer. 



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160 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



" Pardon me ! " she grandly uttered ; 
Bowing low, I gladly muttered, 
"Surely, madam!" and, relieved, I turned to 
scan the daughter's face : 
Ha ! what pent-up mirth outflashes 
From beneath those pencilled lashes ! 
How the drill of Quaker custom yields to Na- 
ture's brilliant grace. 

Brightly springs the prisoned fountain 

From the side of Delphi's mountain 
"When the stone that weighed upon its buoyant 
life is thrust aside ; 
So the long-enforced stagnation 
Of the maiden's conversation 
Now imparted five-fold brilliance to its ever- 
varying tide. 

AVidely ranging, quickly changing, 
Witt}^, winning, from beginning 
Unto end I listened, merely flinging in a casual 
word ; 
Eloquent, and yet how simple ! 
Hand and eye, and eddying dimple. 
Tongue and lip together made a music seen as 
well as heard. 

When the noonday woods are ringing, 

All the birds of summer singing, 
Suddenly there falls a silence, and we know a 
serpent nigh : 

So upon the door a rattle 

Stopped our animated tattle. 

And the stately mother found us prim enough to 

suit lier eye. 

Charles G. Halpine. 



THE CHESS-BOARD. 

My little love, do you remember. 

Ere we were grown so sadly wise. 

Those evenings in the bleak December, 

Curtained warm from the snowy weather, 

When you and I played chess together, 

Checkmated by each other's eyes ? 

Ah I still I see your soft white hand 
Hovering warm o'er Queen and Knight ; 

Brave Pawns in valiant battle stand ; 
The double Castles guard the wings ; 
The Bishop, bent on distant things, 
Moves, sidling, through the fight. 

Our fingers touch ; our glances meet, 
And falter ; falls your golden hair 

Against my cheek ; your bosom sweet 
Is heaving. Down the field, your Queen 
Hides slow, her soldiery all between. 

And checks me unaware. 



Ah me ! the little battle 's done : 
Disperst is all its chivalry. 
Full many a move since then have we 
Mid life's perplexing checkers made. 
And many a game with fortune played ; 

What is it we have won ? 

This, this at least, — if this alone : 

That never, never, nevermore. 

As in those old still nights of yore, 
(Ere we were grown so sadl}^ wise,) 
Can you and I shut out the skies. 

Shut out the world and wintry weather, 
And, eyes exchanging warmth with eyes, 

Play chess, as then we played together. 

Robert bulwer. Lord lytton. 
{Owen Meredith.) 



SONG. 



Too late, alas ! I must confess. 
You need not arts to move me ; 

Such charms by nature you possess, 
'T were madness not to love ye. 

Then spare a heart you may surprise, 
And give my tongue the glory 

To boast, though my unfaithful eyes 
Betray a tender story. 

JOHN WILMOT, EARL OF ROCHESTER. 



SUMMER DAYS. 

In summer, when the days were long. 
We walked together in the wood : 

Our heart was light, our step was strong ; 
weet flutterings were there in our blood. 
In summer, when the days were long. 

We strayed from morn till evening came ; 
We gathered flowers, and wove us crowns ; 

We walked mid poppies red as flame, 
Or sat upon the yellow downs ; 

And always wished our life the same. 

In summer, when the days were long, 
We leaped the hedge-row, crossed the brook ; 

And still her voice flowed forth in song. 
Or else she read some graceful book. 

In summer, when the days were long. 

And then we sat beneath the trees. 
With shadows lessening in the noon ; 

And in the sunlight and tlie breeze, 
We feasted, many a gorgeous June, 

While larks were singing o'er the leas. 



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p 



LOVE. 



161 



In summer, when the days were long, 
On dainty chicken, snow-wliite bread, 

We feasted, with no grace hut song ; 
We phieked wikl strawberries, ripe and red. 

In summer, when the days were long. 

We loved, and yet we knew it not, — • 
For loving seemed like breathing then ; 

We found a heaven in every spot ; 
Saw angels, too, in all good men ; 

And dreamed of God in grove and grot. 

In summer, when the days are long, 
Alone I wander, muse alone. 

I see her not ; but that old song 
Under the fragrant wind is blown, 

In summer, when the days are long. 

Alone I wander in the wood : 
But one fair spirit hears my sighs ; 

And half I see, so glad and good, 
The honest daylight of her eyes. 

That charmed me under earlier skies. 

In summer, when the days are long, 
I love her as we loved of old. 

My heart is light, my step is strong ; 
For love brings back those hours of gold, 

In summer, when the days are long. 

ANONYMOUS. 



Keep, if thou wilt, thy maiden peace, still calm 
and fancy-free. 

For God forbid thy gladsome heart should grow 
less glad for me ; 

Yet, while that heart is still unwon, 0, bid not 
mine to rove, 

But let it nurse its humble faith and uncomplain- 
ing love ; 

If these, preserved for patient years, at last avail 
me not, 

Forget me then ; • — but ne'er believe that thou 

canst be forgot ! 

John Moultrie. 



FORGET THEE? 

" Forget thee ? " — If to dream by night, and 
muse on thee by day. 

If all the worship, deep and wild, a poet's heart 
can pay. 

If prayers in absence breathed for thee to Heav- 
en's protecting power, 

If winged thoughts that flit to thee — a thousand 
in an hour, 

If busy Fancy blending thee with all my future 
lot, — 

If this thou call'st "forgetting," thou indeed 
shalt be forgot ! 

"Forget thee?" — Bid the forest-birds forget 
their sweetest tune ; 

"Forget thee?" — ^ Bid the sea forget to swell 
beneath the moon ; 

Bid the thirsty flowers forget to drink the eve's 
refreshing dew ; 

Thyself forget thine "own dear land," and its 
"mountains wild and blue;" 

Forget each old familiar face, each long-remem- 
bered spot ; — 

When these things are forgot bj'- thee, then thou 
shalt be forgot ! 



DINNA ASK ME. 

0, DINNA ask me gin I lo'e ye : 

Troth, I daurna tell ! 
Dinna ask me gin I lo'e ye, — 

Ask it o' yoursel'. 

0, dinna look sae sair at me, 

For weel ye ken me true ; 
0, gin ye look sae sair at me, 

I daurna look at you. 

When ye gang to yon braw braw town, 

And bonnier lassies see, 
0, dinna, Jamie, look at them. 

Lest ye should mind na me. 

For I could never bide the lass 
That ye 'd lo'e niair than me ; 

And 0, I'm sure my heart wad brak, 
Gin ye 'd prove fause to me ! 

JOHN DUNLOP. 



SONG. 



At setting day and rising morn. 

With soul that still shall love thee, 
I '11 ask of Heaven thy safe return. 

With all that can improve thee. 
I '11 visit aft the birken bush. 

Where first thou kindly told me 
Sweet tales of love, and hid thy blush, 

Whilst round thou didst infold me. 
To all our haunts I will repair. 

By greenwood shaw or fountain ; 
Or where the summer day I 'd share 

With thee upon yon mountain ; 
There will I tell the trees and flowers, 

From thoughts unfeigned and tender, 
By vows you 're mine, by love is yours 

A heart which cannot wander. 

All,in Ra.msa-s'. 



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162 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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^ 



GENEVIEVE. 

All thoughts, all passions, all delights, 
Whatever stirs this mortal frame, 
All are but ministers of Love, 
And feed his sacred flame. 

Oft in my waking dreams do I 
Live o'er again that happy hour. 
When midway on the mount I lay 
Beside the ruined tower. 

The moonshine stealing o'er the scene 
Had blended with the lights of eve ; 
And she was there, my hope, my joy, 
My own dear Genevieve ! 

She leaned against the armed man. 
The statue of the armed knight ; 
She stood and listened to my lay. 
Amid the lingering light. 

Few sorrows hath she of her own. 
My hope ! my joy ! my Genevieve ! 
She loves me best whene'er I sing 
The songs that make her grieve. 

I played a soft and doleful air, 
I sang an old and moving story, — 
An old rude song, that suited well 
That ruin wild and hoary. 

She listened with a flitting blush, 
With downcast ej^es and modest grace ; 
For well she knew, I could not choose 
But gaze upon her face. 

I told her of the Knight that wore 
Upon his shield a burning brand ; 
And that for ten long years he wooed 
The Lady of the Land. 

I told her how he pined : and ah ! 
The deep, the low, the pleading tone 
AVith which I sang another's love 
Interpreted my own. 

She listened with a flitting blush. 
With downcast eyes and modest grace ; 
And she forgave me that I gazed 
Too fondly on Iier face. 

But when I told the cruel scorn 
That crazed that bold and lovely Knight, 
And that he crossed the mountain-woods. 
Nor rested day nor night ; 

That sometimes from the savage den. 
And sometimes from the darksome shade. 
And sometimes starting up at once 
In green and sunny glade. 



There came and looked liim in the face 
An angel beautiful and bright ; 
And that he knew it was a Fiend, 
This miserable Knight ! 

And that rrnknowing Avhat he did, 
He leaped amid a mui'derous band. 
And saved from outrage worse than death 
The Lady of the Land ; 

And how she wept, and clasped his knees ; 
And how she tended him in vain ; 
And ever strove to expiate 

The scorn that crazed his brain ; 

And that she nursed him in a cave, 
And how his madness went away, 
AVhen on the yellow forest-leaves 
A dying man he lay ; 

— His dying words — but when I reached 
That tenderest strain of all the ditty. 
My faltering voice and pausing harp 
Disturbed her soul with pity ! 

All impulses of soul and sense 
Had thrilled my guileless Genevieve ; 
The music and the doleful tale. 
The rich and balmy eve ; 

And hopes, and fears that kindle hope. 
An undistinguishable throng, 
And gentle wishes long subdued. 
Subdued and cherished long. 

She wept with pity and delight. 
She blushed with love, and virgin shame ; 
And like the murmur of a dream, 
I heard her breathe my name. 

Her bosom heaved, — she stepped aside. 
As conscious of my look she stept, — 
Then suddenly, with timorous eye 
She fled to me and wept. 

She half enclosed me with her arms. 
She pressed me with a meek embrace ; 
And bending back her head, looked up. 
And gazed upon my face. 

'T was partly love, and partly fear, 
And partly 't Avas a bashful art 
That I might rather feel than see 
The swelling of her heart. 

I calmed her fears, and she was calm. 
And told her love with virgin pride ; 
And so I won my Genevieve, 

My bright and beauteous Bride. 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 



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LOVE 



163 



:ra 



WHEN THE KYE COMES HAME. 

Come, all ye jolly shepherds 

That whistle through the glen, 
I '11 tell ye of a secret 

That courtiers dinna ken : 
What is the greatest bliss 

That the tongue o' man can name ? 
'T is to woo a bonny lassie 
AVhen the kye comes hame ! 
When the kye comes hame. 
When the kye comes hame, 
'Tween the gloaming and the mirk, 
When the kye comes hame ! 

'T is not beneath the coronet, 

Nor canopy of state, 
'T is not on couch of velvet, 

Nor arbor of the great, — 
'T is beneath the spreading birk, 

In the glen without the name, 
Wi' a bonny, bonny lassie, 

When the kye comes hame ! 
When the kye conies hame, etc. 

There the blackbird bigs his nest 

For the mate he loes to see. 
And on the topmost bough, 

0, a happy bird is he ; 
Where he pours his melting ditty, 

And love is a' the theme. 
And he '11 woo his bonny lassie 

When the kye comes hame ! 
When the kye comes hame, etc. 

W^hen the blewart bears a pearl. 

And the daisy turns a pea, 
And the bonny lucken gowan 

Has fauldit up her ee. 
Then the laverock frae the blue lift 

Doops down, an' thinks nae shame 
To woo his bonny lassie 

When the kye comes hame ! 
When the kye comes hame, etc. 

See yonder pawkie shepherd. 

That lingers on the hill. 
His ewes are in the fauld. 

An' his lambs are lying still ; 
Yet he downa gang to bed, 

For his heart is in a flame. 
To meet his bonny lassie 

When the kye comes hame ! 
When the kye comes hame, etc. 

When the little wee bit heart 

Eises high in the breast. 
An' the little wee bit starn 

Rises red in the east. 



there 's a joy sae dear. 

That the heart can hardly frame, 
Wi' a bonny, bonny lassie. 

When the kye comes hame ! 
When the kye comes hame, etc. 

Then since all nature joins 

In this love without alloy, 
0, wlia wad prove a traitor 
To Nature's dearest joy ? 
0, wha wad choose a crown, 
Wi' its perils and its fame. 
And miss his bonny lassie 
When the kye comes hame ? 
When the kye comes hame. 
When the kye comes hame, 
'Tween the gloaming and the mirk. 
When the kye comes hame ! 

James Hogg. 



LADY BARBARA. 

Earl Gawain wooed the Lady Barbara, 
High-thoughted Barbara, so white and cold ! 
'Mong broad-branched beeches in the summer 

shaw. 
In soft green light his passion he has told. 
When rain-beat winds did shriek across the wold. 
The Earl to take her fair reluctant ear 
Framed passion-trembled ditties manifold ; 
Silent she sat his amorous breath to hear. 
With calm and steady eyes ; her heart was other- 
where. 

He sighed for her through all the summer weeks ; 
Sitting beneath a tree whose fruitful boughs 
Bore glorious apples with smooth, shining cheeks, 
Earl Gawain came and whispered, " Lady, rouse ! 
Thou art no vestal held in holy vows ; 
Out with our falcons to the pleasant heath." 
Her father's blood leapt up into her brows, — 
He who, exulting on the trumpet's breath. 
Came charging like a star across the lists of 
death. 

Trembled, and passed before her high rebuke : 
And then she sat, her hands clasped round her 

knee : 
Like one far-thonghted was the lady's look. 
For in a morning cold as misery 
She saw a lone ship sailing on the sea ; 
Before the north 't was driven like a cloud, 
High on the poop a man sat mournfully : 
The wind was whistling through mast and 

shroud. 
And to the whistling wind thus did he sing 

aloud : — 



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164 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



' ' Didst look last night upon my native vales, 
Thou Sun ! that from the drenching sea hast 

clomb ? 
Ye demon winds ! that glut my gaping sails, 
Upon the salt sea must I ever roam. 
Wander forever on the barren foam ? 
0, happy are ye, resting mariners ! 

Death, tliat thou wouldst come and take me 

home ! 
A hand unseen this vessel onward steers, 
And onward I must float through slow, moon- 
measured years. 

" Ye winds ! when like a curse ye drove us on. 

Frothing the waters, and along our way, 

Nor cape nor headland through red mornings 

shone. 
One wept aloud, one shuddered down to pray. 
One howled, ' Upon the deej) we are astray.' 
On our wild hearts his words fell like a blight : 
In one short hour my hair was stricken gray. 
For all the crew sank ghastly in my sight 
As we went driving on through the cold starry 

night. 

" Madness fell on me in my loneliness. 
The sea foamed curses, and the reeling sky 
Became a dreadful face which did oppi-ess 
Me with the weight'of its unwinking eye. 
It fled, when I burst forth into a cry, — 
A shoal of fiends came on me from the deep ; 

1 hid, but in all corners they did pry, 

And dragged me forth, and round did dance and 

leap; 
They mouthed on me in dream, and tore me 

from sweet sleep. 

' ' Strange constellations burned above my head. 
Strange birds around the vessel shrieked and flew. 
Strange shapes, like shadows, through the clear 

sea fled. 
As our lone ship, wide-winged, came rippling 

through. 
Angering to foam the smooth and sleeping blue. " 
The lady sighed, " Far, far upon the sea, 
My own Sir Arthur, could I die with you ! 
The wind blows shrill between my love and me." 
Fond heart I the space between was but the apple- 
tree. 

There was a cry of joy ; with seeking hands 
She fled to him, like worn bird to her nest ; 
Like washing water on the figured sands. 
His being came and went in sweet unrest, 
As from the mighty shelter of his breast 
The Lady Barbara her head uprears 
"With a wan smile, ' ' Methinks I 'm but half blest : 
Now when I 've found thee, after weary years, 
I cannot see tliee, love ! so blind I am with tears. " 



B^ 



Alexander Smith. 



ATALANTA'S RACE. 

FROM "THE EARTHLY PARADISE.'' 

ATALANTA VICTORIOU.S. 

And there two runners did the sign abide 
Foot set to foot, — a young man slim and fair, 
Crisp-haired, wellknit, with firm limbs often tried 
111 places where no man his strength may spare ; 
Dainty his thin coat was, and on his hair 
A golden circlet of renown he More, 
And in his hand an olive garland bore. 

But on this day with whom shall he contend ? 
A maid stood by him like Diana clad 
"When in the woods she lists her bow to bend, 
Too fair for one to look on and be glad, 
"Who scarcely yet has thirty summers had. 
If he must still behold her from afar ; 
Too fair to let the world live free from war. 

She seemed all earthly matters to forget ; 
Of all tormenting lines her face was clear, 
Her wide gray eyes upon the goal were set 
Calm and unmoved as though no soul were near ; 
But her foe trembled as a man in fear, 
Nor from her loveliness one moment turned 
His anxious face with fierce desire that burned. 

Now through the hush there broke the trum- 
jjet's clang 
Just as the setting sun made eventide. 
Then from light feet a spurt of dust there sprang, 
And swiftly were they running side by side ; 
But silent did the thronging folk abide 
Until the turning-post was reached at last, 
And round about it still abreast they passed. 

But when the people saw how close they ran, 
"When half-way to the starting-point they were, 
A cry of joy broke forth, whereat the man 
Headed the white-foot runner, and drew near 
Unto the very end of all his fear; 
And scarce his straining feet the ground could feel, 
And bliss unhoped for o'er his heart 'gan steal. 

But midst the loud victorious shouts he heard 
Her footsteps drawing nearer, and tlie sound 
Of fluttering raiment, and thereat afeard 
His flushed and eager face he turned around, 
And even then he felt her past him bound 
Fleet as the wind, but scarcely saw her there 
Till on the goal she laid her fingers fair. 

There stood she breathing like a little child 
Amid some warlike clamor laid asleep. 
For no victorious joy her red lips smiled. 
Her cheek its wonted freshness did but keep ; 
No glance lit up her clear gray eyes and deep, 
Though some divine thought softened all her face 
As once more rang the trumpet through the place. 



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LOVE. 



IG 



rQ 



But her late foe stopped short amidst liis course. 
One moment gazed upon her piteously, 
Then with a groan his lingering feet did force 
To leave the spot whence he her eyes could see ; 
And, changed like one who knows his time must be 
But short and bitter, without any word 
He knelt before the bearer of the sword ; 

Then high rose up the gleaming deadly blade, 
Bared of its flowers, andthroughthe crowded place 
Was silence now, and midst of it the maid 
Went by the poor wretch at a gentle pace. 
And he to hers upturned his sad white face ; 
Nor did his eyes behold another sight 
Ere on his soul there fell eternal night. 

ATALANTA CONQUERED. 

Now has the lingering month at last gone by. 
Again are all folk round the running place, 
Nor other seems the dismal pageantry 
Than heretofore, but that another face 
Looks o'er the smooth coui'se ready for the race ; 
For now, beheld of all, Milanion 
Stands on the spot he twice has looked upon. 

But yet — what change is this that holds the 
maid ? 
Does she indeed see in his glittering eye 
More than disdain of the sharp shearing blade, 
Some happy hope of help and victory? 
The others seemed to say, " We come to die, 
Look down upon us for a little while, 
That dead, we may bethink us of thy smile." 

But he — what look of mastery was this 
He cast on her ? why were his lips so red ? 
Why was his face so flushed with happiness? 
So looks not one who deems himself but dead. 
E'en if to death he bows a willing head; 
So rather looks a god well pleased to find 
Some earthly damsel fashioned to his mind. 

Why must she drop her lids before his gaze, 
And even as she casts adown her eyes 
Redden to note his eager glance of praise, 
And wish that she were clad in other guise ? 
Why must the memory to her heart arise 
Of things unnoticed when they first were heard. 
Some lover's song, some answering maiden's word ? 

What makes these longings, vague, without a 

name. 
And this vain pity never felt before. 
This sudden languor, this contempt of fame. 
This tender sorrow for the time past o'er, 
These doubts that grow each minute more and 

more ? 
Why does she tremble as the time grows near. 
And weak defeat and woful victory fear ? 



But while she seemed to hear her beating heart, 
Above their heads the trumpet blast rang out, 
And forth they sprang ; and she must play her 

part ; 
Then flew her white feet, knowing not a doubt, 
Though slackening once, she turned her head 

about. 
But then she cried aloud and faster fled 
Than e'er before, and all men deemed him dead. 

But with no sound he raised aloft his hand, 
And thence what seemed a ray of light there flew 
And past the maid rolled on along the sand ; 
Then trembling she her feet together drew. 
And in her heart a strong desire there grew 
To have the toy ; some god she thought had 

given 
That gift to her, to make of earth a heaven. 

Then from the course with eager steps she ran, 
And in her odorous bosom laid the gold. 
But when she turned again, the great-limbed 

man 
Now well ahead she failed not to behold, 
And mindful of her glory waxing cold. 
Sprang up and followed him in hot pursuit. 
Though with one hand she touched the golden 
fruit. 

Note, too, the bow that she was wont to bear 
She laid aside to grasp the glittering prize. 
And o'er her shoulder from the quiver fair 
Three arrows fell and lay before her eyes 
Unnoticed, as amidst the people's cries 
She sprang to head the strong Milanion, 
Who now the turning-post had wellnigh won. 

But as he set his mighty hand on it. 
White fingers underneath his own were laid. 
And white limbs from his dazzled eyes did flit. 
Then he the second fruit cast by the maid ; 
But she ran on awhile, then as afraid 
Wavered and stopped, and turned and made no 

stay 
Until the globe with its bright fellow lay. 

Then, as a troubled glance she cast around, 
Now far ahead the xirgive could she see. 
And in her garment's hem one hand she wound 
To keep the double prize, and strenuously 
Sped o'er the course, and little doubt had she 
To Avin the day, though now but scanty space 
Was left betwixt him and the winning place. 

Short was the way unto such winged feet, 
Quickly she gained upon him till at last 
He turned about her eager eyes to meet. 
And from his hand the third fair apple cast. 
She wavered not, but turned and ran so fast 



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166 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



"*~B] 



After the prize that should her bliss fulfil, 
That in her hand it lay ere it was still. 

'Nov did she rest, but turned about to win 
Once more, an unblest, woful victory — 
And yet — and yet — why does her breath begin 
To fail her, and her feet drag heavily ? 
Why fails she now to see if far or nigh 
The goal is ? Why do her gray eyes grow dim ? 
Why do these tremors run through every limb ? 

She spreads her arms abroad some stay to find 
Else must she fall, indeed, and findeth this, 
A strong man's arms about her body twined. 
Nor may she shudder now to feel his kiss. 
So wrapped she is in new, unbroken bliss : 
Made happy that the foe the prize hath won, 
She weeps glad tears for all her glory done. 

William Morris. 



B- 



FATIMA AND RADUAN. 

FROJI THE SPANISH. 

" Diamante falso y fingido, 
Engastado en pedernal," etc. 

"False diamolid set in flint! liard heart in 

haughty breast ! 
By a softer, warmer bosom the tiger's couch is 

prest. 
Thou art fickle as the sea, thou art wandering 

as tlie wind, 
And the restless ever-mounting flame is not 

more hard to bind. 
If the tears I shed were tongues, yet all too few 

would be 
To tell of all the treachery that thou hast shown 

to me. 
Oh ! I could chide thee sharply, — but every 

maiden knows 
That ske who chides her lover forgives him ere 

he goes. 

"Thou hast called me oft the flower of all Gre- 
nada's maids, 
Thou hast said that by the side of me the first 

and fairest fades ; 
And they thought thy heart was mine, and it 

seemed to every one 
That what thou didst to win my love, for love of 

me was done. 
Alas ! if they but knew thee, as mine it is to 

know. 
They well might see another mark to which 

thine arrows go ; 
But thou giv'st little heed, — for I speak to one 

who knows 
That she who chides her lover forgives him ere 

he goes. 



" It wearies me, mine enemy, tliat I must weep 

and bear 
What fills thy heart with triumph, and fills my 

own with care. 
TIiou art leagued with those that hate me, and 

ah ! thou know'st I feel 
That cruel words as surely kill as sharpest blades 

of steel. 
'T was the doubt that thou wert false that wrung 

my heart with pain ; 
But, now I know thy perfidy, I shall be well 

again. 
I would proclaim thee as thou art, — but every 

maiden knows 
That she who chides her lover forgives him ere 

he goes." 

Thus Fatima complained to the valiant Eaduan, 

Where underneath the myrtles Alhambra's foun- 
tains ran : 

The Moor was inly moved, and, blameless as he 
was, 

He took her white hand in his own, and pleaded 
thus his cause : 

' ' lady, dry those star-like eyes, — their dim- 
ness does me wrong ; 

If my heart be made of flint, at least 't will keep 
thy image long ; 

Thou hast uttered cruel words, — but I grieve 
the less for those, 

Since she who chides her lover forgives him ere 
he goes." 

WILLIAII CULLEN BRYANT. 



FIRST LOVE. 

FROM " DON JUAN," CANTO I. 

'T IS sweet to hear, 
At midnight on the Uue and moonlit deep. 

The song and oar of Adria's gondolier. 

By distance mellowed, o'er the waters sweep ; 

'T is sweet to see the evening star appear ; 
'T is sweet to listen as the night-winds creep 

From leaf to leaf ; 't is sweet to view on liigh 

The rainbow, based on ocean, span the sky. 

'T is sweet to hear the watch-dog's honest bark 
Bay deep-mouthed welcome as we draw near 
home ; 

'T is sweet to know there is an eye will mark 
Our coming, and look brighter when Ave come ; 

'T is sweet to be awakened by the lark. 

Or lulled by falling waters ; sweet the hum 

Of bees, the voice of girls, the song of birds, 

The lisp of children, and their earliest words. 



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LOVE. 



167 



fi] 



Sweet is the vintage, when the showering grapes 
In Bacchanal profusion reel to earth, 

Purple and gushing : sweet are our escapes 
From civic revelry to rural mirth ; 

Sweet to the miser are his glittering heaps ; 
Sweet to the father is his first-born's birth ; 

Sweet is revenge, — especially to women, 

Pillage to soldiers, prize-money to seamen. 

'T is sweet to win, no matter how, one's laurels. 
By blood or ink ; 't is sweet to put an end 

To strife ; 't is sometimes sweet to have our 
quarrels. 
Particularly with a tiresome friend ; 

Sweet is old wine in bottles, ale in barrels ; 
Dear is the helpless creature we defend 

Against the world ; and dear the school-boy spot 

We ne'er forget, though there we are forgot. 

But sweeter still than this, than these, than all, 
Is first and passionate love, — it stands alone, 

Like Adam's recollection of his fall ; 

The tree of knowledge has been plucked, — 
all 's known, — 

And life yields nothing further to recall 
Worthy of this ambrosial sin, so shown, 

No doubt in fable, as the unforgiven 

Fire which Prometheus filched for us from 
heaven. 



A MAIDEiq" WITH A MILKING-PAIL. 



What change has made the pastures sweet, 
And reached the daisies at my feet, 

And cloud that wears a golden hem ? 
This lovely world, the hills, the sward, — 
They all look fresh, as if our Lord 

But yesterday had finished them. 

And here 's the field with light aglow : 
How fresh its boundary lime-trees show ! 

And how its wet leaves trembling shine ! 
Between their trunks come through to me 
The morning sparkles of the sea, 

Below the level browsing line. 

I see the pool, more clear by half 
Than pools where other waters laugh 

Up at the breasts of coot and rail. 
There, as she passed it on her way, 
I saw reflected yesterday 

A maiden with a mUking-pail. 

There, neither slowly nor in haste, • 
One hand upon her slender waist, 
The other lifted to her pail, — 



She, rosy in the morning light, 
Among the water-daisies white. 

Like some fair sloop appeared to sail. 

Against her ankles as she trod 
The lucky buttercups did nod : 

I leaned upon the gate to see. 
The sweet thing looked, but did not speak ; 
A dimple came iu either cheek, 

And all my heart was gone from me. 

Then, as I lingered on the gate. 
And she came up like coming fate, 

I saw my picture in her eyes, — 
Clear dancirg eyes, more black than sloes ! 
Cheeks like the mountain pink, that grows 

Among white-headed majesties ! 

I said, " A tale was made of old 
That I would fain to thee unfold. 

Ah ! let me, — let me tell the tale." 
But high she held her comely head : 
" I cannot heed it now," she said, 

" For carrying of the milking-pail. " 

She laughed. What good to make ado ? 
I held the gate, and she came through, 

And took her homeward path anon. 
From the clear pool her face had fled ; 
It rested on my heart instead, 

Reflected when the maid was gone. 

With happy youth, and work content. 
So sweet and stately, on she went. 

Right careless of the untold tale. 
Each step she took I loved her more, 
And followed to her dairy door 

The maiden with the milking-pail. 

II. 

For hearts where wakened love doth lurk, 
How fine, how blest a thing is work ! 

For work does good when reasons fail, — 
Good ; yet the axe at every stroke 
The echo of a name awoke, — 

Her name is Mary Martindale. 

I 'm glad that echo was not heard 
Aright by other men. A bird 

Knows doubtless what his own notes tell ; 
And I know not, — but I can say 
I felt as shamefaced all that day 

As if folks heard her name right well. 

And when the west began to glow 
I went — I could not choose but go — 

To that same dairy on the hill ; 
And while sweet Mary moved about 
Within, I came to her without. 

And leaned upon the window-sill. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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The garden border where I stood 

Was sweet with pinks and southernwood. 

I spoke, — her answer seemed to fail. 
I smelt the pinks, — I could not see. 
The dusk came down and sheltered me. 

And in the dusk she heard my tale. 

And what is left that I should tell ? 
I begged a kiss, — I pleaded well : 

The rosebud lips did long decline ; 
But yet, I think — I think 't is true — 
That, leaned at last into the dew, 

One little instant they were mine ! 

life ! how dear thou hast become ! 
She laughed at dawn, and I was dumb ! 

But evening counsels best prevail. 
Fair shine the blue that o'er her spreads, 
Green be the pastures where she treads, 

The maiden with the milking-pail ! 

Jean Ingelow. 



SONG OF THE MILKMAID. 

FROM "QUEEN MARY.", 

Shame upon you, Eobin, 

Shame upon you now ! 
Kiss me would you ? with my hands 

Milking the cow ? 

Daisies grow again. 

Kingcups blow again, 
And you came and kissed me milking the cow. 

Eobin came behind me. 

Kissed me well I vow ; 
Cuff him could I ? with my hands 

Milking the cow ? 

Swallows fly again, 

Cuckoos cry again. 
And you came and kissed me milking the cow. 

Come, Eobin, Eobin, 

Come and kiss me now ; 
Help it can I ? with my hands 

Milking the cow ? 

Eingdoves coo again, 

All things woo again, 
Come behind and kiss me milking the cow ! 
Alfred Tennyson. 



THE MILKMAID'S SONG. 

TuRX, turn, for my cheeks they burn. 

Turn by the dale, my Harry ! 

Fill pail, fill pail. 

He has turned by the dale. 

And there by the stile waits Harry. 



Fill, fill. 

Fill, pail, fill. 

For there by the stile waits Harry ! 

The world may go round, the world may stand 

still. 
But I can milk and marry, 
Fill pail, 
I can milk and marry. 

Wheugh, wheugh ! 

0, if we two 

Stood down there now by the water, 

I know who 'd carry me over the ford 

As brave as a soldier, as proud as a lord. 

Though I don't live over the water. 

Wheugh, wheugh ! he 's whistling through. 

He 's whistling " The Farmer's Daughter." 

Give down, give down. 

My crumpled brown ! 

He shall not take the road to the town, 

For I '11 meet him beyond the water. 

Give down, give down. 

My crumpled brown ! 

And send me to my Harry. 

The folk o' towns 

May have silken gowns. 

But I can milk and marry. 

Fill pail, 

I can milk and marry. 

AVheugh, -wheugh ! he has whistled through 

He has whistled through the water. 

Fill, fill, with a will, a will. 

For he 's whistled through the water. 

And he 's whistling down 

The way to the town. 

And it's not "The Farmer's Daughter ! " 

Churr, churr ! goes the cockchafer. 

The sun sets over the water, 

Churr, churr ! goes the cockchafer, 

I 'm too late for my Harry ! 

And, 0, if he goes a-sqldiering. 

The cows they may low, the bells they may ring, 

But I '11 neither milk nor marry. 

Fill pail. 

Neither milk nor marry. 

My brow beats on thy flank, Fill pail. 

Give down, good wench, give down ! 

I know the primrose bank. Fill pail. 

Between him and the town. 

Give down, good wench, give down. Fill pail. 

And he shall not reach the town ! 

Strain, strain ! he 's whistling again. 

He 's nearer by half a mile. 

More, more ! 0, never before 

Were you such a weary while ! 

Fill, fill ! he 's crossed the hill. 



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LOVE. 



169 



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ta 



I can see him down by the stile, 

He 's passed the hay, he 's coming this wa}', 

He 's coming to me, my Harry ! 

Give silken gowns to the folk o' towns, 

He 's coming to me, my Harry ! 

There 's not so grand a dame in the land, 

That she walks to-night with Harry ! 

Come late, come soon, come sun, come moon, 

0, I can milk and marry, 

Fill pail, 

I can milk and marry. 

Whengh, wheugh ! he has whistled through. 

My Harry ! my lad ! my lover ! 

Set the sun and fall the dew. 

Heigh-ho, merry world, what 's to do 

That you 're smiling over and over ? 

Up on the hill and down in the dale, 

And along the tree-tops over the vale 

Shining over and over. 

Low in the grass and high on the bough, 

Sliiuing over and over, 

world, have you ever a lover ? 

You were so dull and cold just now, 

world, have you ever a lover ? 

1 could not see a leaf on the tree, 

And now I could count them, one, two, three. 

Count them over and over, 

Leaf from leaf like lips apart, 

Like lips apart for a lover. 

And the hillside beats with my beating heart. 

And the apple-tree blushes all over. 

And the May bough touched me and made me 

start. 
And the wind breathes warm like a lover. 

Pull, pull ! and the pail is full. 

And milking 's done and over. 

Wlio would not sit here under the tree ? 

Wliat a fair fair thing 's a green field to see ! 

Brim, brim, to the rim, ah me ! 

1 have set my pail on the daisies ! 

It seems so light, — can the sun be set ? 

The dews must be heavy, my cheeks are wet, 

I could cry to have hurt the daisies ! 

Harry is near, Harry is near. 

My heart 's as sick as if he were here. 

My lips are burning, my cheeks are wet, 

He hasn't uttered a word as yet. 

But the air 's astir with his praises. 

My Harry ! 

The air 's astir with your praises. 

He has scaled the rock by the pixy's stone. 
He 's among the kingcups, — he picks me one, 
I love the grass that I tread upon 
A\''hen I go to my Harry ! 



He has jumped the brook, he has climbed the 

knowe. 
There 's never a faster foot I know. 
But still he seems to tarry. 

Harry ! Harry ! my love, my pride. 
My heart is leaping, my arms are wide ! 
Roll up, roll up, you dull hillside. 

Roll up, and bring my Harry ! 

They may talk of glory over the sea. 

But Harry 's alive, and Harry 's for me, 

My love, my lad, my Harry ! 

Come spring, come winter, come sun, come snow, 

What cares Dolly, whether or no, 

While I can milk and marry ? 

Right or wrong, and wrong or right. 

Quarrel who quarrel, and tight who fight, 

But I '11 bring my pail home every night 

To love, and home, and Harry ' 

We '11 drink our can, we '11 eat our cake. 

There 's beer in the barrel, there 's bread in the 

bake. 
The world may sleep, the world may wake. 
But I shall milk and marrj'^. 
And marry, 

1 shall milk and marry. 

Sydney Dobell. 



FETCHING WATER FROM THE WELL. 

Early on a sunny morning, while the lark was 

singing sweet. 
Came, beyond the ancient farm-house, sounds of 

lightly tripping feet. 
'T was a lowly cottage maiden going, — why, let 

young hearts tell, — 
With her homely pitcher laden, fetching water 

from the well. 
Shadows lay athwart the pathway, all along the 

quiet lane. 
And the breezes of the morning moved them to 

and fro again. 
O'er the sunshine, o'er the shadow, passed the 

maiden of the farm, 
With a charmed heart within her, thinking of 

no ill nor harm. 
Pleasant, surelj', were her musings, for the nod- 
ding leaves in vain 
Sought to press their brightening image on her 

ever-busy brain. 
Leaves and joyous birds went by her, like a dim, 

half- waking dream ; 
And her soul was only conscious of life's gladdest 

summer gleam. 
At the old lane's shady turning lay a well of 

water bright, 
Singuig, soft, its hallelujah to the gracious morn- 
ing light. 



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170 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Fern-leaves, broad and green, bent o'er it where 

its silvery droplets fell, 
And the fairies dwelt beside it, in the spotted 

foxglove bell. 
Back she bent the shading fern -leaves, dipt the 

pitcher in the tide, — 
Drew it, mth the dripping waters flowing o'er 

its glazed side. 
But before her arm could place it on her shiny, 

wavy hair, 
By her side a youth was standing ! — Love re- 
joiced to see the pair ! 
Tones of tremulous emotion trailed upon the 

morning breeze. 
Gentle words of heart-devotion whispered 'neath 

the ancient trees. 
But the holy, blessed secrets it becomes me not 

to tell : 
Life had met another meaning, fetching water 

from the well ! 
Down the rural lane they sauntered. He the 

burden-pitcher bore ; 
She, with dewy eyes down looking, grew more 

beauteous than before ! 
When they neared the silent homestead, up he 

raised the pitcher light ; 
Like a fitting crown he placed it on her hair of 

wavelets bright : 
Emblems of the coming burdens that for love of 

him she 'd bear, 
Calling every burden blessed, if his love but 

lighted there. 
Then, still waving benedictions, further, further 

off he drew, 
While his shadow seemed a glory that across the 

pathway grew. 
Now about her household duties silently the 

maiden went. 
And an ever-radiant halo o'er her daily life was 

blent. 
Little knew the aged "matron as her feet like 

music fell. 
What abundant treasure found she fetching water 

from the well ! 

ANONYMOUS. 



AUF WIEDEESEHEN !* 



The little gate was reached at last, 
Half hid in lilacs down the lane ; 
She pushed it wide, and, as she past, 
A wistful look she backward cast, 
And said, '^ Aitf luicderselien !" 

* Till v/e meet again ! 



With hand on latch, a vision white 

Lingered reluctant, and again 
Half doubting if she did aright. 
Soft as the dews that fell that night, 
She said, ' ' Auf iviedersehen ! " 

The lamp's clear gleam flits up the stair ; 

I linger in delicious pain ; 
Ah, in that chamber, whose rich air 
To breathe in tliought I scarcely dare. 

Thinks she, ' ' Auf loiederselien ! " 

'T is thirteen years : once more I press 

The turf that silences the lane ; 
I hear the rustle of her dress, 
I smell the lilacs, and — ah yes, 
I hear, " Auf loiedersehen ! " 

Sweet piece of bashful maiden art ! 

The English words had seemed too fain, 
But these — they drew us heart to heart, 
Yet held us tenderly apart ; 

She said, "Auf wiederschen ! " 

James Russell Lowell. 



MEETING. 

The gray sea, and the long black land ; 
And the yellow half-moon large and low ; 
And the startled little Avaves, that leap 
In fiery ringlets from their sleep, 
As I gain the cove with pushing prow, 
And quench its speed in the slushy sand. 

Then a mile of warm, sea-scented beach ; 

Three fields to cross, till a farm appears : 

A tap at the pane, the quick sharj) scratch 

And blue spurt of a lighted match, 

And a voice less loud, through its joys and fears, 

Than the two hearts, beating each to each. 

Robert Browning. 



SWEET MEETING OF DESIRES. 

I GREW assured, before I asked. 

That she 'd be mine Mdthout reserve, 
And in her unclaimed graces basked 

At leisure, till the time should serve, - 
With just enough of dread to thrill 

The hope, and make it trebly dear : 
Thus loath to speak the word, to kill 

Either the hope or happy fear. 

Till once, through lanes returning late, 
Her laughing sisters lagged behind ; 

And ere we reached her father's gate. 
We paused with one presentient mind ; 



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ELMWOOD. 
Lowell's Home at Cambridge. 



'And one tall eiin, this hundredth year, 
Doge of our leafy Venice here, 
Who, with an annual ring, doth wed 
Th* ihi4 Adriatic ovtrhead. 



Shadows, with his palatial viass. 
The deep canal of flowing grass. 
Where gloiu the dandelions sparse. 
For shadows of Italian stars." 



iSr 



LOVE, 



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171 



And, in the dim and perfumed mist 

Their coming stayed, who, blithe and free, 

And very women, loved to assist 
A lover's opportunity. 

Twice rose, twice died, my trembling word ; 

To faint and frail cathedral chimes 
Spake time in music, and we heard 

The chafers rustling in the limes. 
Her dress, that touched me where I stood ; 

The warmth of her confided arm ; 
Her bosom's gentle neighborhood ; 

Her pleasure in her power to chai'm ; 

Her look, her love, her form, her touch ! 

The least seemed most by blissful turn, — 
Blissful but that it pleased too much, 

And taught the wayward soul to yearn. 
It was as if a harp with wires 

Was traversed by the breath I drew ; 
And O, sweet meeting of desires ! 

She, answering, owned that she loved too. 

COVENTRY PATMORE. 



u 



ZAEA'S EAR-RINGS. 

FROM THE SPANISH. 

" My ear-rings ! my ear-rings ! they 've dropt 

into the well. 
And what to say to Mxica, I cannot, cannot tell." 
'T was thus, Granada's fountain by, spoke Albu- 

harez' daughter, — 
" The well is deep, far down they lie, beneath 

the cold blue water. 
To me did Mu^a give them, when he spake his 

sad farewell, ' 
And what to say when he comes back, alas ! I 

cannot tell. 

" My ear-rings ! my ear-rings ! they were pearls 
in silver set, 

That when my Moor was far away, I ne'er should 
him forget, 

That I ne'er to other tongue should list, nor 
smile on other's tale. 

But remember he my lips had kissed, pure as 
those ear-rings pale. 

When he comes back, and hears that I have 
dropped them in the well, 

0, what will Mu9a think of me, I cannot, can- 
not tell. 

" My ear-rings ! my ear-rings ! he '11 say they 
should have been, 

Not of pearl and of silver, but of gold and glit- 
tering sheen. 



Of jasper and of onyx, and of diamond shining 

clear. 
Changing, to the changing light, with radiance 

insincere ; 
That changeful mind unchanging gems are not 

befitting well, — 
Thus will he think, — and what to say, alas ! I 

cannot tell. 

" He '11 think when I to market went I loitered 

by the way ; 
He '11 think a willing ear I lent to all the lads 

might say ; 
He '11 think some other lover's hand among my 

tresses noosed. 
From the ears where he had placed them my 

rings of ^learl unloosed ; 
He '11 think when I was sporting so beside this 

marble well. 
My pearls fell in, — and what to say, alas I I 

cannot tell. 

' ' He '11 say I am a woman, and we are all the 
same ; 

He '11 say I loved when he was here to whisper 
of his flame — 

But when he went to Tunis my virgin troth had 
broken, 

And thought no more of Muca, and cai'ed not 
for his token. 

My ear-rings ! my ear-rings ! 0, luckless, luck- 
less well ! 

For what to say to Muca, alas ! I cannot tell. 

"I '11 tell the truth to Mu^a, and I hope he will 

believe. 
That I have thought of him at morn, and thought 

of him at eve ; 
That musing on my lover, when down the sun 

was gone. 
His ear-rings in my hand I held, by the fountain 

all alone ; 
And that my mind was o'er the sea, when from 

my hand they fell. 
And that deep his love lies in my heart, as they 

lie in the well." 

John Gibson lockhart. 



SWALLOW, SWALLOW, FLYING 
SOUTH. 

FROM "THE PRINCESS." 

Swallow, Swallow, flying, flying South, 
Fly to her, and fall upon her gilded eaves. 
And tell her, tell her what I tell to thee. 

tell her. Swallow, thou that knowest each. 
That bright and fierce and fickle is the South, 
And dark and true and tender is the North. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Swallow, Swallow, if I could follow, and 
light 
Upon her lattice, I would pipe and trill, 
And cheep and twitter twenty million loves. 

were I thou that she might take me in. 
And lay me on her bosom, and her heart 
Would rock the snowy cradle till I died ! 

"Why lingereth she to clothe her heart with 
love. 
Delaying as the tender ash delays 
To clothe herself, when all the woods are green ? 

tell her, Swallow, that thy brood is flown : 
Say to her, I do but wanton in the South, 
But in the North long since my nest is made. 

tell her, brief is life, but love is long, 
And brief the sun of summer in the North, 
And brief the moon of beauty in the South. 

Swallow, flying from the golden woods. 
Fly to her, and pipe and woo her, and make her 

mine. 
And tell her, tell her, that I follow thee. 

ALFRED Tennyson. 



ATHULF AND ETHILDA. 

Athttlf. Appeared 

The princess with that merry child Prince Guy : 
He loves me well, and made her stop and sit. 
And sat upon her knee, and it so chanced 
That in his various chatter he denied 
That I could hold his hand within my own 
So closely as to hide it : this being tried 
Was proved against him ; he insisted tlien 
I could not by his royal sister's hand 
Do likewise. Starting at the random word, 
And dumb with trepidation, there I stood 
Some seconds as bewitched ; then I looked up, 
And in her face beheld an orient flush 
Of half-bewildered pleasure : from which trance 
She with an instant ease resumed herself, 
And frankly, with a pleasant laugh, held out 
Her arrowy hand. 

I thought it trembled as it lay in mine. 
But yet her looks were clear, direct, and free. 
And said that she felt nothing. 

SiDEOC. And what felt'st thou ? 

Athulf. a sort of swarming, curling, tremu- 
lous tumbling. 
As though there were an ant-hill in my bosom. 
I said I was ashamed. — Sidroc, you smile ; 
If at my folly, well ! But if you smile, 
Suspicious of a taint upon my heart. 
Wide is your error, and you never loved. 

HENRY TAYLOR. 



SEVEN TIMES THREE. 

LOVE. 

I LEANED out of window, I smelt the white clover, 
Dark, dark was the garden, I saw not the gate ; 
"Now, if there be footsteps, he comes, my one 
lover — - 
Hush, nightingale, hush ! sweet nightin- 
gale, wait 
Till I listen and hear 
If a step draweth near. 
For my love he is late ! 

"The skies in the darkness stoop nearer and 
nearer, 
A cluster of stars hangs like fruit in the tree. 
The fall of the water comes sweeter, comes clearer : 
To what art thou listening, and what dost thou 
see ? 
Let the star-clusters glow. 
Let the sweet waters flow. 
And cross quickly to me. 

" You night-moths that hover where honey brims 
over 
From sycamore blossoms, or settle or sleep ; 
You glow-worms, shine out, and the patliway 
discover 
To him that comes darkling along the rough 
steep. 
Ah, my sailor, make haste. 
For the time runs to waste. 
And my love lieth deep, — 

"Too deep for swift telling; and yet, my one 
> lover, 

I 've conned thee an answer, it waits .thee to- 
night." 
By the sycamore passed he, and through the 
white clover ; 
Then all the sweet speech I had fashioned 
took flight ; 
But I '11 love him more, more 
Than e'er wife loved before. 
Be the days dark or bright. 

Jean Ingelow. 



A SPINSTER'S STINT. 

Six skeins and three, six skeins and three ! 

Good mother, so you stinted me, 

And here they be, — ay, six and three ! 

Stop, bus)'^ wheel ! stop, noisy wheel ! 
Long shadows down my chamber steal, 
And warn me to make haste and reel. 



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LOVE. 



17J 



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'T is done, — the spinning work comi)lete, 

heart of mine, what makes you beat 
So fast and sweet, so fast and sweet ? 

1 must have wheat and pinks, to stick 
My hat from brim to ribbon, thick, — 
Slow hands of mine, be (juick, be quick ! 

One, two, three stars along the skies 
Begin to wink their golden eyes, — 
I 'U leave my thread all knots and ties. 

moon, so red ! moon, so red ! 
Sweetheart of night, go straight to bed ; 
Love's light will answer in your stead. 

A-tiptoe, beckoning me, he stands, — 
Stop trembling, little foolish hands, 
And stop the bands, and stop the bands ! 

ALICE CARY. 



^a 



THE SPINNING-WHEEL SONG. 

Mellow the moonlight to shine is beginning ; 
Close by the window young Eileen is spinning ; 
Bent o'er the fire, her blind grandmother, sitting, 
Is croaning, and moaning, and drowsily knit- 
ting, — 
"Eileen, achora, I hear some one tapping." 
" 'T is the ivy, dear mother, against the glass 

flapping." 
"Eileen, I surely hear somebody sighing." 
" 'T is the sound, mother dear, of the summer 

wind dying." 
Merrily, cheerily, noisily whirring. 
Swings the wheel, spins the reel, while the foot 's 

stirring ; 
Sprightly, and lightly, and airily ringing, 
Thrills the sweet voice of the young maiden 
singing. 

"What 's that noise that I hear at the window, 

I wonder ? " 
" 'T is the little birds chirping the holly-bush 

under." 
" What makes you be shoving and moving your 

stool on. 
And singing all wrong that old song of ' The 

Coolun ' ? " 
There 's a form at the casement, — the form of 

her true-love, — 
And he whispers, with face bent, " I 'm waiting 

for you, love ; 
Get up on the stool, through the lattice step 

lightly, 
We '11 rove in the grove while the moon 's shin- 
ing brightly." 



Merrily, cheerily, noisily whirring. 

Swings the wheel, spins the reel, while the foot 's 

stirring ; 
Sprightly, and lightly, and airily ringing, 
Thrills the sweet voice of the young maiden 



The maid shakes her head, on her lip lays her 
fingers, 

Steals up from her seat, — longs to go, and yet 
lingers ; 

A frightened glance turns to her drowsy grand- 
mother, 

Puts one foot on the stool, spins the wheel with 
the other. 

Lazily, easily, swings now the wheel round ; 

Slowly and lowly is heard now the reel's sound ; 

Noiseless and light to the lattice above her 

The maid steps, — then leaps to the arms of her 
lover. 

Slower — and slower — and slower the wheel 
swings ; 

Lower — and lower — and lower the reel rings ; 

Ere the reel and the wheel stop their ringing and 
moving, 

Through the grove the young lovers by moon- 
light are roving. 

John Francis waller. 



SOMEBODY. 

Somebody 's courting somebody. 
Somewhere or other to-night ; 
Somebody 's whispering to somebody, 
Somebody 's listening to somebody. 
Under this clear moonlight. 

Near the bright river's flow, 
Eunning so still and slow. 
Talking so soft and low. 
She sits with Somebody. 

Pacing the ocean's shore. 
Edged by the foaming roar, 
Words never used before 
Sound sweet to Somebody. 

Under the maple-tree 
Deep though the shadow be, 
Plain enough they can see. 
Bright eyes has Somebody. 

No one sits up to wait, 
Though she is out so late, 
All know she 's at the gate, 
Talking with Somebody. 



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POEMS OP THE AFPECTIONS. 



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Tiptoe to parlor door ; 
Two shadows on the floor ! 
Moonlight, reveal no more, — 
Susy and Somebody. 

Two, sitting side by side 
Float with the ebbing tide, 
" Thus, dearest, may we glide 
Through life," says Somebody. 

Somewhere, Somebody 
Makes love to Somebody, 



To-night. 



ANONYMOUS. 



h 



DANCE LIGHT. 

' ' Ah ! sweet Kitty Neil, rise up from that 
wheel, — 
Your neat little foot will be weary with spin- 
ning ! 
Come trip down with me to the sycamore-tree : 
Half the parish is there, and the dance is be- 
ginning. 
The sun is gone down, but the full harvest moon 
Shines sweetly and cool on the dew-whitened 
valley ; 
"While all the air rings with the soft, loving 
things 
Each little bird sings in the green shaded alley." 

With a blush and a smile Kitty rose up the while. 
Her eye in the glass, as she bound her hair, 
glancing ; 
'T is hard to refuse when a young lover sues. 
So she could n't but choose to go off to the 
dancing. 
And now on the green the glad groups are seen, — 
Each gay-hearted lad Math the lass of his 
choosing ; 
And Pat, without fail, leads out sweet Kitty 
Neil, — 
Somehow, when he asked, she ne'er thought 
of refusing. 

Now Felix Magee put his pipes to his knee. 
And with flourish so free sets each couple in 
motion : 
With a cheer and a bound the lads patter the 
ground ; 
The maids move around just like swans on the 
ocean. 
Cheeks bright as the rose, feet light as the doe's, 

Now coyly retiring, now boldly advancing : 
Search the world all around, from the sky to the 
ground. 
No such sight can be found as an Irish lass 
dancing ! 



Sweet Kate ! who could view your bright eyes 
of deep blue. 
Beaming humidly through their dark lashes so 
mildly, 
Your fair-turned arm, heaving breast, rounded 
form, 
Nor feel his heart warm, and his pulses throb 
wildly ? 
Young Pat feels his heart, as he gazes, depart. 
Subdued by the smart of such painful yet 
sweet love : 
The sight leaves his eye as he cries with a sigh. 
Dance light, for my heart it lies under your 
feet, love ! 

JOHN FRANCIS WALLER. 



BELIEVE ME, IF ALL THOSE ENDEAR- 
ING YOUNG CHARMS. 

Believe me, if all those endearing young 
charms, 
Which I gaze on so fondly to-day. 
Were to change by to-morrow, and fleet in my 
arms. 
Like fairy-gifts fading away, 
Thou wouldst still be adored, as this moment 
thou art. 
Let thy loveliness fade as it will, 
And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart 
Would entwine itself verdantly still. 

It is not while beauty and youth are thine own, 

And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear. 
That the fervor and faith of a soul may be known. 

To which time will but make thee more dear ! 
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets. 

But as truly loves on to the close, 
As the sunflower turns to her god when he sets 

The same look which she turned when he rose ! 

THOMAS MOORE. 



THE SLEEPING BEAUTY. 

FROM "THE DAY DREAM." 

Year after year unto her feet. 

She lying on her couch alone, 
Across the purple coverlet. 

The maiden's jet-black hair has grown ; 
On either side her tranced form 

Forth streaming from a braid of pearl ; 
The slumberous light is rich and warm, 

And moves not on the rounded curb 

The silk star-broidered coverlid 
Unto her limbs itself doth mould. 

Languidly ever ; and anud 

Her full black ringlets, downward rolled, 



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Glows forth each softly shadowed arm, 
With bracelets of the diamond bright. 

Her constant beauty doth inform 

Stillness with love, and day with light. 

She sleeps : her breathings are not heard 

In palace chambers far apart. 
The fragrant tresses are not stirred 

That lie ujion her charmed heart. 
She sleeps ; on either hand upswells 

The gold-fringed pillow lightly prest : 
She sleeps, nor dreams, but ever dwells 

A perfect form in perfect rest. 



THE REVIVAL. 

A touch, a kiss ! the charm was snapt. 

There rose a noise of striking clocks. 
And feet that ran, and doors that clapt. 

And barking dogs, and crowing cocks ; 
A fuller light illumined all, 

A breeze through all the garden swept, 
A sudden hubbub shook the hall. 

And sixty feet the fountain leapt. 

The hedge broke in, the banner blew. 

The butler drank, the steward scrawled, 
The fire shot up, the martin flew, 

The parrot screamed, the peacock squalled. 
The maid and page renewed their strife, 

The palace banged, and buzzed and clackt. 
And all the long-pent stream of life 

Dashed downward in a cataract. 

At last with these the king awoke, 

And in his chair himself upreared. 
And yawned, and rubbed his face, and spoke, 

" By holy rood, a royal beard ! 
How say you ? we have slept, my lords. 

My beard has grown into my lap." 
The barons swore, with many words, 

'T was but an after-dinner's nap. 

" Pardy," returned the king, " but still 

My joints are something stiff or so. 
My lord, and shall we pass the bill 

I mentioned half an hour ago ? " 
The chancellor, sedate and vain. 

In courteous words returned reply : 
But dallied with his golden chain, 

And, smiling, put the question by. 



THE DEPARTURE. 

And on her lover's arm she leant, 
And round her waist she felt it fold : 

And far across the hills they went 
In that new world which is the old. 



Across the hills, and far away 
Beyond their utmost purple rim, 

And deep into the dying day, 
The happy princess followed him. 

" I 'd sleep another hundred years, 

love, for such another kiss ; " 
"0 wake forever, love," she hears, 

" love, 't was such as this and this." 
And o'er them many a sliding star, 

And many a merry wind was borne. 
And, streamed through many a golden bar. 

The twilight melted into morn. 

" eyes long laid in happy sleep ! " 

" happy sleep, that lightly fled ! " 
" happy kiss, that woke thy sleep ! " 

' ' love, thy kiss would wake the dead ! " 
And o'er them many a flowing range 

Of vapor buoyed the crescent bark ; 
And, rapt thro' many a rosy change. 

The twilight died into the dark. 

" A hundred summers ! can it be ? 

And whither goest thou, tell me where ? " 
"0, seek my father's court with me, 

For there are greater wonders there." 
And o'er the hills, and far away 

Beyond their utmost purple rim. 
Beyond the night, across the day. 

Thro' all the world she followed him. 

ALFRED TENxWSON. 



LOCHINVAR. 



FROM "MARMION, • CANTO V. 



0, YOUNG Lochinvar is come out of the west, 
Through all the wide Border his steed was the 

best ; 
And, save his good broadsword, he weapon had 

none, 
He rode all unarmed, and he rode all alone. 
So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war, 
There never was knight like the young Lochinvar. 

He stayed not for brake, and he stopped not for 

stone, 
He swam the Eske River where ford tliere was 

none ; 
But, ere he alighted at Netherby gate, 
The bride had consented, the gallant came late ; 
For a laggard in love, and a dastard in M'ar, 
Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar. 

So boldly he entered the Netherby Hall, 
Among bridesmen, and kinsmen, and brothers, 
~ and all. 



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Then spoke the bride's father, his hand on his 

sword 
(For the poor craven bridegroom said never a 

word), 
' ' 0, come ye in peace here, or come ye in war, 
Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochin- 

var ? " 

" I long wooed your daughter, my suit you de- 
nied ; — 
Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its 

tide, — 
And now I am come, with this lost love of mine, 
To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine. 
There are maitlens in Scotland more lovely by far. 
That would gladly be bride to the young Loch- 
invar." 

The bride kissed the goblet ; the kniglit took it 
up. 

He quaffed off the wine, and threw down the cup. 

She looked down to blush, and she looked up to 
sigh, 

With a smile on her lips, and a tear in her eye. 

He took her soft hand, ere her mother could 
bar, — 

"Now tread we a measure," said young Loch- 
invar. 

So stately his form, and so lovely her face, 

That never a hall such a galliard did grace ; 

While her mother did fret, and her father did 
fume, 

And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet 
and plume ; 

And the bridemaidens whispered, "'T were bet- 
ter by far 

To have matched our fair cousin with young 
Lochinvar." 

One touch to her hand, and one word in her ear, 
When they reached the hall-door, and the charger 

stood near ; 
So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung, 
So light to the saddle before her he sprung ; 
"She is W'On ! we are gone ! over bank, bush, 

and scaur ; 
They'll have fleet steeds that follow," quoth 

young Lochinvar. 

There was mounting 'mong Graemes of the Neth- 

erby clan ; 
Forsters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode 

and they ran ; 
There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lee, 
But the lost bride of Netherby ne'er did they see. 
So daring in love, and so dauntless in war, 
Have ye e'er heard of gallant like young Loch- 
invar ? 

Sir Walter Scott. 



THE EVE OF ST. AGNES. 

St. Agnes' Eve, — ah, bitter chill it was ! 

The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold ; 

The hare limped trembling through tlie frozen 

grass. 
And silent was the flock in woolly fold : 
Numb were the beadsman's fingers while he told 
His rosary, and while his frosted breath. 
Like pious incense from a censer old. 
Seemed taking flight for heaven without a death, 
Past the sweet virgin's picture, while his prayer 

he saith. 

His prayer he saith, this patient, holy man ; 
Then takes his lamp, and riseth from his knees, 
And back returneth, meagre, barefoot, wan. 
Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees ; 
The sculptured dead on each side seem to freeze, 
Emprisoned in black, purgatorial rails ; 
Knights, ladies, praying in dumb orat'ries, 
He passeth by ; and his weak spirit fails 
To think how they may ache in icy hoods and 
mails. 

Northward he turneth through a little door, 
And scarce three steps, ere music's golden tongue 
Flattered to tears this aged man and poor ; 
But no, — already had his death-bell rung ; 
The joys of all his life were said and snug : 
His was harsh penance on St. Agnes' Eve : 
Another way he went, and soon among 
Rough ashes sat he for his soul's reprieve. 
And all night kept awake, for sinners' sake to 
grieve. 

That ancient beadsman heard the prelude soft : 
And so it chanced, for many a door was wide, 
From hurry to and fro. Soon, up aloft. 
The silver, snarling trumpets 'gan to chide ; 
The level chambers, ready with their pride. 
Were glowing to receive a thousand guests : 
The carved angels, ever eager-eyed, 
Stared, where u])on their heads the cornice rests. 
With hair blown back, and wings put crosswise 
on their breasts. 

At length burst in the argent revelry, 
With plume, tiara, and all rich array, 
Numerous as shadows haunting fairily 
The brain, new-stuffed, in youth, with triumphs 

gay 

Of old romance. These let us wish away ; 
And turn, sole-thoughted, to one lady there, 
Whose heart had brooded, all that wintiy day, 
On love, and winged St. Agnes' saintly care. 
As she had heard old dames full many times 
declare. 



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They told her how, upon St. Agnes' Eve, 
Young virgins might have visions of delight, 
And soft adorings from their loves receive 
Upon the honeyed middle of the night, 
If ceremonies due they did aright ; 
As, supperless to bed they must retire. 
And couch supine their beauties, lily white ; 
Nor look behind, nor sideways, but require 
Of heaven with upward eyes for all that they 
desire. 

Full of this whim was thoughtful Madeline ; 
The music, yearning like a god in pain. 
She scarcely heard ; her maiden eyes divine, 
Fixed on the floor, saw many a sweeping train 
Pass by, — she heeded not at all ; in vain 
Came many a tiptoe, amorous cavalier, 
And back retired, not cooled by high disdain. 
]3ut she saw not ; her heart was otherwhere ; 
She sighed for Agnes' dreams, the sweetest of the 
year. 

She danced along with vague, regardless eyes, 
Anxious her lips, her breathing quick and short ; 
The hallowed hour was near at liand ; she sighs 
Amid the timbrels, and the thronged resort 
Of whisperers in anger, or in sport ; 
Mid looks of love, defiance, hate, and scorn. 
Hoodwinked with fairy fancy ; all amort 
Save to St. Agnes and her lambs unshorn, 
And all the bliss to be before to-morrow morn. 

So, purposing each moment to retire. 
She lingered still. Meantime, across the moors, 
Had come young Porphyro, with heart on fire 
For Madeline. Beside the portal doors, 
Buttressed from moonlight, stands he, and im- 
plores 
All saints to give him sight of Madeline ; 
But for one moment in the tedious hours. 
That he might gaze and worship all unseen ; 
Perchance speak, kneel, touch, kiss, — in sooth 
such things have been. 

He ventures in : let no buzzed whisper tell : 
All eyes be muffled, or a hundred swords 
Will storm his heart, love's feverous citadel ; 
For him, those chambers held barbarian hordes, 
Hyena foemen, and hot-blooded lords, 
Whose very dogs would execrations howl 
Against his lineage ; not one breast affords 
Him any mercy, in that mansion foul. 
Save one old beldame, weak in body and in soul. 

Ah, happy chance ! the aged creature came. 
Shuffling along with ivory-headed wand. 
To where he stood, hid from the torch's flame, 
Behind a broad hall-pillar, far beyond 
The sound of merriment and chorus bland. 



He startled her ; but soon she knew his face. 
And grasped his fingers in her palsied hand, 
Saying, "Mercy, Porphyro! hie thee from this 

place ; 
They are all here to-night, the whole blood- 
thirsty race ! 

" Get hence ! get hence ! there 's dwarfish Hilde- 

brand ; 
He had a fever late, and in the fit 
He cursed thee and thine, both house and land ; 
Then there 's that old Lord Maurice, not a whit 
More tame for his gray hairs — Alas me' ! flit ! 
Flit like a ghost away ! " " Ah, gossip dear, 
We 're safe enough ; here in this arm-chair sit, 
And tell me how — " " Good saints ! not here, 

not here ; 
Follow me, child, or else these stones will be thy 

bier." 

He followed through a lowly arched way, 
Brushing the cobwebs with his lofty plume ; 
And as she muttered, " Well-a — well-a-day ! " 
He found him in a little moonlight room. 
Pale, latticed, chill, and silent as a tomb. 
"Now tell me where is Madeline," said he, 
" 0, tell me, Angela, by the holy loom 
Which none but secret sisterhood may see. 
When they St. Agnes' wool are weaving piously." 

" St Agnes ! Ah ! it is St. Agnes' Eve, — 
Yet men will murder upon holy days ; 
Thou must hold water in a witch's sieve, 
And be liege-lord of all the elves and fays, 
To venture so. It fills me with amaze 
To see thee, Porphyro ! — St. Agnes' Eve ! 
God'.s help ! my lady fair the conjurer plays 
This very night ; good angels her deceive ! 
But let me laugh awhile, I 've mickle time to 
grieve." 

Feebly she laugheth in the languid moon. 

While Porphyro upon her face doth look, 

Like puzzled urchin on an aged crone 

Who keepeth closed a wondrous riddle-book, 

As spectacled she sits in chimney nook. 

But soon his eyes grew brilliant, when she told 

His lady's purpose ; and he scarce could brook 

Tears, at the thought of those enchantments cold. 

And Madeline asleep in lap of legends old. 

Sudden a thought came like a full-blown rose, 
Flushing his brow, and in his pained heart 
Made purple riot ; then doth he propose 
A stratagem, that makes the beldame start : 
" A cruel man and impious thou art ! 
Sweet lady, let her pray, and sleep and dream 
Alone with her good angels, far apart 



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From wicked men like thee. Go, go ! I deem 
Thou canst not surely be the same that thou 
didst seem." 

" I will not harm her, hy all saints I swear ! " 
Quoth Porphyro ; "0, may I ne'er find grace 
When my weak voice shall whisper its last 

prayer, 
If one of her soft ringlets I displace, 
Or look with ruffian passion in her face : 
Good Angela, believe me by these tears ; 
Or I will, even in a moment's space. 
Awake, with horrid shout, my foemen's ears, 
And beard them, though they be more fanged 

than wolves and bears." 

" Ah ! why wilt thou affright a feeble soul ? 
A poor, weak, palsy-stricken, churchyard thing, 
"Whose passing-bell may ere the midnight toll ; 
Whose prayers for thee, each morn and evening, 
Were never missed." Thus plaining, doth she 

bring 
A gentler speech from burning Porphyro ; 
So woful, and of such deep sorrowing. 
That Angela gives promise she will do 
Whatever he shall wish, betide her weal or woe. 

Which was, to lead him, in close secrecy. 
Even to Madeline's chamber, and there hide 
Him in a closet, of such privacy 
That he might see her beauty unespied. 
And win perhaps that night a peerless bride, 
While legioned fairies paced the coverlet. 
And pale enchantment held her sleepy-eyed. 
Never on such a night have lovers met, 
Since Merlin paid his demon all the monstrous 
debt. 

" It shall he as thou wisliest," said the dame ; 
" All cates and dainties shall be stored there 
Quickly on this feast-night ; by the tambour 

frame 
Her own lute thou wilt, see ; no time to spare. 
For I am slow and feeble, and scarce dare 
On such a catering trust my dizzy head. 
Wait here, my child, with patience kneel in 

prayer 
The while. Ah ! thou must needs the lady wed, 
Or may I never leave my grave among the dead." 

So saying, she hobbled off with busy fear. 
The lover's endless minutes slowly passed : 
The dame I'eturned, and whispered in his ear 
To follow her ; with aged eyes aghast 
From fright of dim espial. Safe at last, 
Through many a dusky gallery, they gain 
The maiden's chamber, silken, hushed and 
chaste ; 



Where Porphyro took covert, pleased amain. 
His poor guide hurried back with agues in her 
brain. 

Her faltering hand upon the balustrade, 
Old Angela was feeling for the stair, 
When Madeline, St. Agnes' charmed maid, 
Rose, like a missioned spirit, unaware ; 
With silver taper's light, and pious care, 
She turned, and down the aged gossip led 
To a safe level matting. Now prepare, 
Young Porphyro, for gazing on that bed ! 
She comes, she comes again, like ring-dove 
frayed and fled. 

Out went the taper as she hurried in ; 
Its little smoke, in pallid moonshine, died ; 
She closed the door, she panted, all akin 
To sjiirits of the air, and visions wide ; 
No uttered syllable, or, woe betide ! 
But to her heart, her heart was voluble, 
Paining with eloquence her balmy side ; 
As though a tongueless nightingale should swell 
Her throat in vain, and die, heart-stifled in her 
dell. 

A casement high and triple-arched there was. 
All garlanded with carven imageries 
Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot-grass. 
And diamonded with panes of quaint device, 
Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes, 
As are the tiger-moth's deep-damasked wings ; 
And in the midst, 'mong thousand heraldries, 
And twilight saints, and dim emblazonings, 
A shielded scutcheon blushed with blood of 
queens and kings. 

Full on this casement shone the wintry moon, 
And threw warm gules on Madeline's fair breast. 
As down she knelt for heaven's grace and boon ; 
Rose-bloom fell on her hands, together prest. 
And on her silver cross soft amethyst. 
And on her hair a glory, like a saint ; 
She seemed a splendid angel, newly drest. 
Save wings, for heaven. Porphyro grew faint : 
She knelt, so pure a thing, so free from mortal 
taint. 

Anon his heart revives ; her vespers done, 
Of all its wreathed pearls her hair she frees ; 
Unclasps her warmed jewels one by one ; 
Loosens her fragrant bodice ; by degrees 
Her rich attire creeps rustling to her knees ; 
Half hidden, like a mermaid in sea-weed, 
Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees, 
In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed. 
But dares not look behind, or all the charm is 
fled. 



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Soon, trembling in her soft and chilly nest, 
In sort of wakeful swoon, perplexed she lay, 
Until the poppied warmth of sleep oppressed 
Her soothed limbs, and soul fatigued away ; 
Flown like a thonght, until the morrow-day ; 
Blissfully havened both from joy and pain ; 
Clasjied like a missal where swart Paynims pray ; 
Blinded alike from sunshine and from rain. 
As though a rose should shut, and be a bud 



Stolen to this paradise, and so entranced, 
Porphyro gazed upon her empty dress. 
And listened to her breathing, if it chanced 
To wake into a slumberous tenderness ; 
Which when he heard, that minute did he bless. 
And breathed himself ; then from the closet 

crept, 
Noiseless as fear in a wide wilderness. 
And over the hushed carpet, silent, stept. 
And 'tween the curtains peeped, where, lo ! — 

how fast she slept. 

Then by the bedside, where the faded moon 
]\Iade a dim, silver twilight^ soft he set 
A table, and, half anguished, threw thereon 
A cloth of woven crimson, gold, and jet : — 
for some drowsy Morphean amulet ! 
The boisterous, midnight, festive clarion. 
The kettle-drum, and far-heard clarionet, 
Affray his ears, though but in dying tone : — 
The hall-door shuts again, and all the noise is 
gone. 

And still she slept an azure-lidded sleep, 
In blanched linen, smooth, and lavendered ; 
While he from forth the closet brought a heap 
Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and- gourd; 
With jellies soother than the ci'eamy curd, 
And lucent syrops, tinct with cinnamon ; 
Manna and dates, in argosy transferred 
From Fez ; and spiced dainties, every one, 
From silken Samarcand to cedared Lebanon. 

These delicates he heaped with glowing hand 
On golden dishes and in baskets bright 
Of wreathed silver. Sumptuous they stand 
In the retired quiet of tlie night. 
Filling the chilly room with perfume light. — 
" And now, my love, my seraph fair, awake ! 
Thou art my heaven, and I thine eremite ; 
Open thine eyes, for meek St. Agnes' sake. 
Or I shall drowse beside thee, so my soul doth 
ache." 

Thus whispering, his warm, unnerved arm 
Sank in her pillow. Sliaded was her dream 
]3y tbo dusk curtains ; — 't was a midnight charm 
Impossible to melt as iced stream : 



The lustrous salvers in the moonlight gleam ; 
Broad golden fringe upon the carpet lies ; 
It seemed he never, never could redeem 
From such a steadfast spell his lady's eyes ; 
So mused awhile, entoiled in woofed phantasies. 

Awakening irp, he took her hollow lute, — 
Tumultuous, — and, in chords that tenderest be. 
He played an ancient ditty, long since mute. 
In Provence called " La belle dame sans nierci ; " 
Close to her ear touching the melody ; — 
Wherewith disturbed, she uttered a soft moan : 
He ceased ; she panted quick, — and suddenly 
Her blue affrayed eyes wide open shone : 
Upon his knees he sank, pale as smooth-sculptured 
stone. 

Her eyes were open, but she still beheld, 
N^ow wide awake, the vision of her sleep. 
There was a painful change, that nigh expelled 
The blisses of her dream so pure and deep ; 
At which fair Madeline began to weep. 
And moan forth witless words with many a sigh ; 
While still her gaze on Porphyro would keep ; 
Who knelt, with joined hands and piteous eye, 
Fearing to move or speak, she looked so dream- 
ingly. 

" Ah, Porphyro ! " said she, "but even now 
Thy voice was at sweet tremble in mine ear, 
Made tunable with every sweetest vow ; 
And those sad eyes were spiritual and clear ; 
How changed thou art ! how pallid, chill, and 

drear ! 
Give me that voice again, my Porphyro, 
Those looks immortal, those complainings dear ! 
0, leave me not in this eternal woe. 
For if thou diest,my love, I know not where to go." 

Beyond a mortal man impassioned far 
At these voluptuous accents, he arose. 
Ethereal, flushed, and like a throbbing star 
Seen mid the sappliire heaven's deep repose ; 
Into her dream he melted, as the rose 
Blendeth its odor with the violet, — 
Solution sweet ; meantime the frost-wind blows 
Like love's alarum pattering the shai'p sleet 
Against the window-panes : St. Agnes' moon 
hath set. 

'T is dark ; quick pattereth the flaw-blown sleet : 
" This is no dream, my bride, my Madeline ! " 
'T is dark ; the iced gusts still rave and beat : 
" No dream ? alas ! alas ! and woe is mine ! 
Porphyro will leave me here to fade and i)ine. 
Cruel ! what traitor could thee hither biing ? 
I curse not, for my heart is lost in thine. 
Though thou forsakest a deceived thing ; — 
A dove forlorn andlost, witli sick, unpruned wing." 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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" JNIy Madeline ! sweet dreamer ! lovely bride ! 

Say, may I be for aye thy vassal blest ? 

Thy beauty's shield, heart-shaped and vermeil 

dyed ? 
Ah, silver shrine, here will I take my rest 
After so many hours of toil and quest, 
A famished pilgrim, — saved by miracle. 
Though I have found, I will not rob thy nest. 
Saving of thy sweet self ; if thou think'st well 
To trust, fair Madeline, to no rude infidel. 

" Hark ! 't is an elfin storm from faery land, 
Of haggard seeming, but a boon Indeed : 
Arise, arise ! the morning is at hand ; — 
The bloated wassaileis will never heed : 
Let us away, my love, with happy speed ; 
There are no ears to hear, or eyes to see, — • 
Drowned all in Rhenish and the sleepy mead : 
Awake, arise, my love, and fearless be, 
For o'er the southern moors I have a home for 
thee." 

She hurried at his words, beset with fears, 
For there were sleeping dragons all around. 
At glaring watch, perhaps, with read}' spears ; 
Down the wide stairs a darkling way they found, 
In all the house was heard no human sound. 
A chain-drooped lamp was flickering by each door ; 
The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, and hound. 
Fluttered in the besieging wind's uproar ; 
And the long carpets rose along the gusty floor. 

They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall ! 
Like phantoms to the iron porch they glide, 
Where lay the porter, in uneasy spra\^ 1, 
With a huge empty flagon by his side : 
The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his hide, 
But his sagacious eye an inmate owns ; 
By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide ; 
The chains lie silent on the footworn stones ; 
The key turns, and the door upon its hinges groans. 

And they are gone ! ay, ages long ago 
Tliese lovers fled away into the storm. 
That night the baron dreamt of many a woe, 
And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form 
Of witch, and demon, and large coffm-worni. 
Were long be-nightmared. Angela the old 
Died palsy-twitched, with meagre face deform ; 
The beadsman, after thousand aves told. 
For aye unsouglit-for slept among his ashes cold. 

JOHiN KKATS. 



B- 



CURFEW MUST NOT RING TO-NIGHT. 

SLOwr-Y England's sun was setting o'er the hill- 
tops far away. 

Filling all the land with beauty at the close of 
one sad day. 



And the last rays kissed the forehead of a man 

and maiden fair, — 
He with footsteps slow and weary, she with 

sunny floating hair ; 
He with bowed head, sad and thoughtful, she 

with lips all cold and white. 
Struggling to keep back the murmur, — 
" Curfew must not ring to-night." 

"Sexton," Bessie's white lips faltered, pointing 

to the prison old. 
With its turrets tall and gloomy, with its walls 

dark, damp, and cold, 
" I 've a lover in that prisoii, doomed this very 

night to die. 
At the ringing of the Curfew, and no earthly 

help is nigh ; 
Cromwell will not come till sunset," and her 

lips grew strangely white 
As she breathed the husky whisper : — 
" Curfew must not ring to-night." 

" Bessie," calmly spoke the sexton, — every word 

pierced her young heait 
Like the piercing of an arrow, like a deadly 

poisoned dart, — 
" Long, long years I 've rung the Curfew from that 

gloomy, shadowed tower ; 
Every evening, just at sunset, it has told the 

twilight hour ; 
I have done my duty ever, tried to do it just 

and right. 
Now I 'ni old I will not Mter, — 

Curfew, it must ring to-night." 

Wild her eyes and pale her features, stern and 

white her thouglitful brow, 
As within her secret bosom Bessie made a solemn 

vow. 
She had listened while the judges read without 

a tear or sigh : 
" At the ringing of the Curfew, Basil Underwood 

must die." 
And her breath came fast and faster, and her 

eyes grew lai'ge and bright ; 
In an undertone she muiniiired : — 
" Curfew must not ring to-night." 

With quick step she bounded forward, sprung 

within the old church door. 
Left the old man threading slowly paths so oft 

he 'd trod before ; 
Not one moment paused the maiden, but Avith 

eye and cheek aglow 
Mounted up the gloomy tower, where the bell 

swung to and fro 
As she climl)ed the dusty ladder on which fell no 

ray of light. 
Up and up, — her white lips saying : — 
" Curfew nmst not ring to-night." 



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She has reached the topmost ladder ; o'er her 
hangs the great, dark bell ; 

Awful is the gloom beneath hei-, like the path- 
way down to hell. 

Lo, the ponderous tongue is swinging, — 't is the 
hour of Curfew now. 

And the sight has chilled her bosom, stopped 
her breath, and paled her brow. 

Shall she let it ring ? No, never ! flash her eyes 
with sudden light, 

As she springs, and grasps it firmly, — 
" Curfew shall not ring to-night ! " 

Out she swung — far out ; the city seemed a 

speck of light below, 
There 'twixt heaven and earth suspended as the 

bell swung to and fro. 
And the sexton at the bell-rope, old and deaf, 

heard not the bell. 
Sadly thought, " That twilight Curfew rang 

young Basil's funeral knell." 
Still the maiden clung more firmly, and with 

trembling lips so white, 
Said to hush her heart's wild throbbing : — ■ 
" Curfew shall not ring to-night ! " 

It was o'er, the bell ceased swaying, and the 
maiden stepped once more 

Firmly on the dark old ladder where for hun- 
dred years before 

Human foot had not been planted. The brave 
deed that she had done 

Should be told long ages after, as the rays of 
setting sun 

Crimson all the sky with beauty ; aged sires, 
with heads of white. 

Tell the eager, listening children, 

" Curfew did not ring that night." 

O'er the distant hills came Cromwell ; Bessie 

sees him, and her brow, 
Lately white with fear and anguish, has no 

anxious traces now. 
At his feet she tells her story, shows her hands 

all bruised and torn ; 
And her face so sweet and pleading, yet with 

sorrow pale and worn. 
Touched his heart with sudden pity, lit his eyes 

with misty light : 
" Go ! your lover lives," said Cromwell, 
" Curfew shall not ring to-night." 

Wide they flung the massive portal ; led the 

prisoner forth to die, — 
All his bright young life before him. 'Neath the 

darkening English sky 
Bessie comes with flying footsteps, eyes aglow 

with love-light sweet ; 



Kneeling on the turf beside him, lays his pardon 

at his feet. 
In his brave, strong arms he clasped her, kissed 

the face upturned and white, 
"Whispered, " Darling, you liave saved me, — 
Curfew will not ring to-night ! " 

Rose Hartwick Thorpe. 



THE LITTLE MILLINER. 

My girl hath violet eyes and yellow hair, 
A soft hand, like a lady's, small and fair, 
A sweet face pouting in a white straw bonnet, 
A tiny foot, and little boot upon it ; 
And all her finery to charm beholders 
Is the gray shawl drawn tight around her shoulders, 
The plain stufi'-gown and collar white as snow. 
And sweet red petticoat that peeps below. 
But gladly in the busy town goes she. 
Summer and winter, fearing nobodie ; 
She pats the pavement with her fairy feet. 
With fearless eyes she charms the crowded street ; 
And in her pocket lie, in lieu of gold, 
A lucky sixpence and a thimble old. 

We lodged in the same house a year ago : 
She on the topmost floor, I just below, ■ — 
She, a poor milliner, content and wise, 
I, a poor city clerk, with hopes to rise ; 
And, long ere we were friends, I learnt to love 
The little angel on the floor above. 
For, every morn, ere from my bed I stirred. 
Her chamber door would open, and I heard, — 
And listened, blushing, to her coming down. 
And palpitated with her rustling gown, 
And tingled while her foot went downward slow. 
Creaked like a cricket, passed, and died below ; 
Then peeping from the window, pleased and sly, 
I saw the pretty shining face go by. 
Healthy and rosy, fresh from slumber sweet, — 
A sunbeam in the quiet morning street. 

And every night, when in from work she tript, 
Red to the ears I from my chamber slipt, 
That I might hear upon the narrow stair 
Her low "Good evening," as she passed me there. 
And when her door was closed, below sat I, 
And hearkened stilly as she stirred on high, — 
Watched the red firelight shadows m the room, 
Fashioned her face before me in the gloom. 
And heard her close the window, lock the door, 
Moving about more lightly than before, 
And thought, "She is undressing now ! " and, oh ! 
My cheeks were hot, my heart was in a gloM- ! 
And I made pictures of her, — standing bright 
Before the looking-glass in bed-gown white, 



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"ft 



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Unbinding in a knot hex* yellow hair, 

Then kneeling timidly to say a prayer ; 

Till, last, the floor creaked softly overhead, 

'Neath bare feet tripping to the little bed, — 

And all was hushed. Yet still I hearkened on. 

Till the faint sounds about the streets were gone ; 

And saw her slumbering with lips apart, 

One little hand upon her little heart. 

The other pillowing a face that .smiled 

In slumber like the slumber of a child. 

The bright hair shining round the small white ear, 

The soft breath stealing visible and clear, 

And mixing with the moon's, whose frosty gleam 

Made round her rest a vaporous light of dream. 

How free she wandered in the wicked place, 
Protected only by her gentle face ! 
She saw bad things — how could she choose but 

see ? — 
She heard of wantonness and misery ; 
The city closed around her night and day, 
But lightly, happily, she went her way. 
Nothing of evil that she saw or heard 
Could touch a heart so innocently stirred, — 
By simple hopes that cheered it through the storm. 
And little flutterings that kept it warm. 
No power had she to reason out her needs, 
To give the whence and wherefore of her deeds ; 
But she was good and pure amid the strife, 
By virtue of the joy that was her life. 
Here, where a thousand spirits daily fall. 
Where heart and soul and senses turn to gall. 
She floated, pure as innocent could be, 
Like a small sea-bird on a stormy sea. 
Which breasts the billows, wafted to and fro. 
Fearless, uninjured, while the strong winds blow, 
While the clouds gather, and the waters roar, 
And mighty ships are broken on the shore. 
All winter long, witless who peeped the while. 
She sweetened the chill mornmgs with her smile ; 
When the soft snow was falling dimly white, 
Shining among it with a child's delight. 
Bright as a rose, though nipping winds might 

blow. 
And leaving fairy footprints in the snow ! 

'T was when the spring was coming, when the 
snow 
Had melted, and fresh winds began to blow, 
And girls were selling violets in the town, 
That suddenly a fever struck me down. 
The world was changed, the sense of life was 

pained, 
And nothing but a shadow-land remained ; 
Death came in a dark mist and looked at me, 
I felt his breathing, though I could not see. 
But heavily I lay and did not stir. 
And had strange images and dreams of her. 



Then came a vacancy : with feeble breath, 
I shivered under the cold touch of Death, 
And swooned among strange visions of the dead, 
When a voice called from heaven, and he fled ; 
And suddenly I wakened, as it seemed. 
From a deep sleep wherein I had not dreamed. 

And it was night, and I could see and hear, 
And I was in the room I held so dear. 
And unaware, stretched out upon my bed, 
I hearkened for a footstep overhead. 

But all was hushed. I looked around the 
room. 
And slowly made out shapes amid the gloom. 
The wall was reddened by a rosy light, 
A faint fire flickered, and I knew 't was night. 
Because below there was a sound of feet 
Dying away along the quiet street, — 
When, turning my pale face and sighing low, 
I saw a vision in the quiet glow : 
A little figure, in a cotton gown. 
Looking upon the fire and stooping down. 
Her side to me, her face illumed, she eyed 
Two chestnuts burning slowly, side by side, — 
Her lips apart, her clear eyes strained to see, 
Her little hands clasped tight around her knee, 
The firelight gleaming on her golden head. 
And tinting her white neck to rosy red, 
Her features bright, and beautiful, and pure. 
With childish fear and yearning half demure. 

sweet, sweet dream ! I thought, and strained 

mine eyes, 
Fearing to break the spell with words and sighs. 

Softly she stooped, her dear face sweetly fair. 
And sweeter since a light like love was there. 
Brightening, watching, more and more elate, 
As the nuts glowed together in the grate. 
Crackling with little jets of fiery light, 
Till side by side they turned to ashes white, — 
Then up she leapt, her face cast oflT its fear 
For rapture that itself was radiance clear. 
And would have clapped her little hands in 

glee. 
But, pausing, bit her lips and peeped at me, 
And met the face that yearned on her so whitely. 
And gave a cry and trembled, blushing brightly, 
While, raised on elbow, as she turned to flee, 
" Polly !" 1 cried, — and grew as red as she ! 

It was no dream ! for soon my thoughts Avere 
clear. 
And she could tell me all, and I could hear : 
How in my sickness friendless I had lain, 
How the hard people pitied not my pain ; 
How, in despite of what bad people said. 
She left her labors, stopped beside my bed, 



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183 



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And nursed me, thinking sadly I would die ; 
How, in the end, the danger passed me by ; 
How she had sought to steal away before 
The sickness passed, and I was strong once 

more. 
By fits ghe told the story in mine ear. 
And troubled all the telling with a fear 
Lest by my cold man's heart she should be chid, 
Lest I should think her bold in what she did ; 
But, lying on my bed, I dared to say. 
How I had watched and loved her many a day. 
How dear she was to me, and dearer still 
For that strange kindness done while I was ill, 
And how I could but think that Heaven above 
Had done it all to bind our lives in love. 
And Polly cried, turning her face away. 
And seemed afraid, and answered "yea" nor 

"nay ;" 
Then stealing close, with little pants and sighs, 
Looked on my pale tliin fac^e and earnest eyes. 
And seemed in act to fling her arms about 
My neck ; then, blushing, paused, in fluttering 

doubt ; 
Last, sprang upon my heart, sighing and sob- 
bing, — 
That I might feel how gladly hers was throbbing ! 

Ah ! ne'er shall I forget until I die. 
How happily the dreamy days went by. 
While I grew well, and lay with soft heart-beats. 
Hearkening the pleasant murmur from the 

streets, 
And Polly by me like a sunny beam. 
And life all changed, and love a drowsy dream ! 
'T was happiness enough to lie and see 
The little golden head bent droopingly 
Over its sewing, while the still time flew. 
And my fond eyes were dim with happy dew ! 
And then, when I was nearly well and strong. 
And she went back to labor all day long. 
How sweet to lie alone with half-shut eyes, 
And hear the distant murmurs and the cries, 
And think how pure she was from pain and 

sin, — 
And how the summer days were coming in ! 
Then, as the sunset faded from the room, 
To listen for her footstep in the gloom, 
To pant as it came stealing up the stair, 
To feel my whole life brighten unaware 
When the soft tap came to the door, and when 
The dooi* was opened for her smile again ! 
Best, the long evenings ! — when, till late at 

night. 
She sat beside me in the quiet light, 
And happy things were said and kisses won, 
And serious gladness found its vent in fun. 
Sometimes I would draw close her shining head. 
And pour her bright hair out upon the bed, 



And she would laugh, and blush, and try to 

scold. 
While "Here," I cried, "I count my wealth in 

gold ! " 

Once, like a little sinner for transgression. 
She blushed upon my breast, and made con- 
fession : 
How, when that night I woke and looked around, 
I found her busy with a charm profound, — 
One chestnut was herself, my girl confessed, 
The other was the person she loved best, 
And if they burned together side by side. 
He loved her, and she would become his bride ; 
And burn indeed they did, to her delight, — 
And had the pretty charm not proven right ? 
Thus much, and more, with timorous joy, she 

said. 
While her confessor, too, grew rosy red, — 
And close together pressed two blissful faces, 
As I absolved the sinner, with embraces. 

And here is winter come again, winds blow. 
The houses and the streets are white with snow ; 
And in the long and pleasant eventide. 
Why, what is Polly making at my side ? 
What but a silk gown, beautiful and grand, 
We bought together lately in the Strand ! 
What but a dress to go to church in soon. 
And wear right queenly 'neath a honeymoon ! 
And who shall match her with her new straw 

bonnet. 
Her tiny foot and little boot upon it ; 
Embroidered petticoat and silk gown new, 
And shawl she wears as few fine ladies do ? 
And she will keep, to charm away all ill, 
The lucky sixpence in hei' pocket still ; 
And we will turn, come fair or cloudy weather, 
To ashes, like the chestnuts, close together ! 

Robert Buchanan. 



SONG. 

FROM "THE MILLER'S DAUGHTER." 

It is the miller's daughter. 

And she is grown so dear, so dear, 
That I would be the jewel 

That trembles at her ear : 
For, hid in ringlets day and night, 
I 'd touch her neck so warm and white. 

And I would be the girdle 

About her daintj', dainty waist, 

And her heart would beat against me 
In sorrow and in rest : 

And I should know if it beat right, 

I 'd clasp it round so close and tight. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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And I would be the necklace, 
And all day long to fall and rise 

Upon her balmy bosom, 

Witli her laughter or her sighs : 

And I would lie so light, so light, 

I scarce should be unclasped at night. 

ALFRED TENiNYSON. 



BLEST AS THE IMMORTAL GODS. 

Blest as the immortal gods is he, 
The youth who fondly sits by thee, 
And hears and sees thee all the while 
Softly speak, and sweetly smile. 

'T was this deprived my soul of rest. 
And raised suuli tumults in my breast : 
For while I gazed, in transport tost. 
My breath was gone, my voice was lost. 

My bosom glowed ; the subtle flame 
Ran quick through all my vital frame ; 
O'er my dim eyes a darkness hung ; 
My ears with hollow murmurs rung ; 

In dewy damps my limbs were chilled ; 
My blood with gentle horrors thrilled : 
My feeble jjulse forgot to play — 
I fainted, sunk, and died away. 

From the Greek of SAPPHO, 
by AMBROSE PHILLIPS. 



0, DO NOT WANTON WITH THOSE 
EYES. 

0, DO not wanton with those eyes, 

Lest I be sick with seeing ; 
Nor cast them down, but let them rise. 

Lest shame destroy their being. 

0, be not angry with those fires, 
For then tlieir threats will kill me ; 

Nor look too kind on my desires, 
For then my hopes will spill me. 

0, do not steep them in thy tears, 

For so will sorrow slay me ; 
Nor spread them as distract with fears ; 

Mine own enough betray me. 

BEN JONSON. 



THE SUN-DIAL. 

'T IS an old dial, dark with many a stain ; 

In summer crowned with drifting orchard 
bloom. 
Tricked in the autunm with the yellow rain. 

And white in winter like a marble tomb. 



And round about its gray, time-eaten brow- 
Lean letters speak, — a worn and shattered 
row : 

E am a SljaJe : a Sfjatotoc too att tijoit : 
E tnarfte t\}e '^imt : sage, (Kossip, Bost t})ou sot ? 

Here would the ring-doves linger, head to head ; 

And here the snail a silver course would run, 
Beating old Time ; and here the peacock spread 

His gold-green glory, shutting out the sun. 

The tardy shade moved forward to the noon ; 

Betwixt the paths a dainty Beauty stept. 
That swung a flower, and, smiling, hummed a 
tune, — 

Before whose feet a barking spaniel leapt. 

O'er her blue dress an endless blossom strayed ; 

About her tendril-curls the sunlight shone ; 
And round her train the tiger-lilies swayed. 

Like courtiers bowing till the queen be gone. 

She leaned upon the slab a little while. 
Then drew a jewelled pencil from her zone. 

Scribbled a something with a frolic smile, 
Folded, inscribed, and niched it in the stone. 

The shade slipped on, no swifter than the snail ; 

There came a second lady to the place. 
Dove-eyed, dove-robed, and something wan .and 
paje, — 

An inner beauty shining from her face. 

She, as if listless with a lonely love. 

Straying among the alleys with a book, — ■ 

Herrick or Herbert, — watched the circling dove. 
And spied the tiny letter in the nook. 

Then, like to one who confirmation found 
Of some dread secret half-accounted true, — ■ 

Who knew what hearts and hands the letter 
bound. 
And argued loving commerce 'twixt the two, — 

She bent her fair young forehead on the stone ; 

The dark shade gloomed an instant on her 
head ; 
And 'twixt her taper fingers pearled and shone 

The single tear that tear-worn eyes will shed. 

The shade slipped onward to the falling gloom ; 

Then came a soldier gallant in her stead, 
Swinging a beaver with a swaling plume, 

A ribboned love-lock rippling from his head. 

Blue-eyed, frank-faced, with clear and open brow, 
Scar-seamed a little, as the Avonien love ; 

So kindly fronted that you marvelled how 

The frequent sword-hilt had so frayed his 
glove ; 



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LOVE. 



Who switclied at Psyche phiiiging in the sun ; 

UncroAvned three lilies with a backward swinge; 
And standing somewhat widely, like to one 

More nsed to "Boot and Saddle" than to 
cringe 

As courtiers do, but gentleman withal, 

Took out the note ; — held it as one who feared 

The fragile thing he held would slip and fall ; 
Eead and re-read, pulling his tawny beard ; 

Kissed it, I think, and hid it in his breast ; 

Laughed softly in a flattered, happy waj^,' 
Arranged the broidered baldrick on his crest, 

And sauntered past, singing a rou2idelay. 

The shade crept forward through the dying glow 
There came no more nor dame nor cavalier ; 

But for a little time the brass will show 
A small gray spot, —the record of a tear. 

Austin Dobson'. 




ITHE GOLDEN FISH. 

Love is a little golden fish. 

Wondrous shy ... ah, wondrous shy . . . 
You may catch him if you wish ; 
He might make a dainty dish 

But I . . . 

Ah, I 've other fish to fry ! 

For when I t*7 to snare this prize, 

Earnestly and patiently. 
All my skill the rogue defies, 
Lurking safe in Aimee's eyes . . . 

So, you see, 

I am caught and Love goes free ! 

George Arnold. 



COME, REST IN THIS BOSOM. 

FROM " IRISH MELODIES." 

Come, rest in this bosom, my own stricken deer, 
Though the herd have fled from thee, thy home 

is still here ; 
Here still is the smile, that no cloud can o'ercast, 
And a heart and a hand all thy own to the last.' 

Oh ! what was love made for, if 't is not the .same 
Through joy and through torment, through glory 

and shame ? 
I know not, I ask not, if guilt 's in that heart, 
I but know that I love thee, whatever thou art. 

Thou hast called me thy Angel in moments of 

bliss. 
And thy Angel I 'II be, mid the horrors of this, 



Through the furnace, unshrinking, thy steps to 

pursue. 
And .shield thee, and save thee, —or perish there 

too ! 

THOMAS Moore. 



WHEN YOUR BEAUTY APPEARS. 

" When your beauty appears, 

In its graces and airs. 
All bright as an angel new dropt from the skies, 

At distance I gaze, and am awed by my 
fears. 
So strangely you dazzle my eyes ! 

" But when without art 
Your kind thoughts you impart. 
When your love runs in blushes through every 
vein. 
When it darts from your eyes, when it pants 
at your heart. 
Then I know that you 're woman again." 

" There 's a passion and pride 

In our sex," she replied ; 
"And thus (might I gratify both) I would do, — 

Still an angel appear to each lover beside. 
But still be a woman for j^ou." 

Tho.mas Par.\ell. 



THE FIRST KISS. 

How delicious is the winning 
Of a kiss at love's beginning. 
When two mutual hearts are sigliing 
For the knot there 's no untying. 

Yet remember, midst j^our wooing, 
Love has bliss, but love has ruing ; 
Other smiles may make you fickle. 
Tears for other cliarms may trickle. 

Love he comes, and Love he tarries, 
Just as fate or fancy carries, — 
Longest staj^s when sorest chidden, 
Laughs and flies when pressed and bidden. 

Bind the sea to slumber stilly, 
Bind its odor to the lily. 
Bind the aspen ne'er to quiver, — 
Then bind Love to last forever ! 

Love 's a fire that needs renewal 

Of fresh beauty for its fuel ; 

Love's wing moults when caged and captured. 

Only free he soars enraptured. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



Can yon keep the bee from ranging, 
Or the ring-dove's neck from changing ? 
No ! nor fettered Love from dying 
In the knot there 's no nntying. 

THO^rAS Campbell. 



BEDOUIN LOVE-SOE"G. 

FnoM the Desert I come to thee. 

On a stallion shod with fire ; 
And the winds are left behind 

In the speed of my desire. 
Under thy window I stand, 

And the midnight hears my cry : 
I love thee, I love but thee ! 
With a love that shall not die 
Till the sun grows cold, 
And the stars are old, 
And the leaves of the Judgment 
Book unfold ! 

Look from thy window^, and see 

My passion and my pain ! 
I lie on the sands below, 

And I faint in thy disdain. 
Let the night-winds touch thy brow 
With the heat of my burning sigh, 
And melt thee to hear the vow 
Of a love that shall not die 
Till the sun groios cold, 
And the stars are old. 
And the leaves of the Judgment 
Book unfold ! 

M}' steps are nightly driven, 
By the fever in my breast. 
To hear from thy lattice breathed 

The word that shall give me rest. 
Open the door of tliy heart, 

And open thy chamber door, 
And my kisses shall teach thy lips 
The love that shall fade no more 
Till the sun grows cold. 
And the stars are old. 
And the leaves of the Judgment 
Book unfold ! 

Bayard Taylor. 



O- 



SONNET UPON A STOLEN KISS. 

NoAV gentle sleep hath closed up those eyes 
Which, waking, kept my boldest thoughts in awe; 
And free access unto that sweet lip lies. 
From whence I long the rosy breath to draw. 
Methinks no wi-ong it were, if I should steal 
Fromthose two melting rubies one poor kiss ; 
None sees the theft that would the theft reveal. 
Nor rob 'L her of auglit what she can miss : 



Nay, should I twenty kisses take away. 
There would be little sign I would do so ; 
Why then should 1 this robbery delay? 
0, she may wake, and therewith angry grow ! 
Well, if she do, I '11 back restore that one. 
And twenty hundred thousand more for loan. 

Grorgh Wither. 



SLY THOUGHTS. 

" I RAW him kiss your cheek ! " — "'T is true." 
" Modesty ! " — " 'T was strictly kept : 

He thought me asleep ; at least, I knew 
He thought I thought he thought I slept." 
Coventry Patmore. 



KISSES. 

My love and I for kisses played : 

She would keep stakes — I was content ; 
But when 1 won, she would be paid ; 

This made me ask her what she meant. 
"Pray, since I see," quoth she, " your wrangling 

vein, 
Take. your own kisses ; give me mine again." 

William Strode. 



CUPID AND CAMPASPE. 

Cupid and my Campaspe played 

At cards for kisses, — Cupid paid ; 

He stakes his quiver, bow and arrows, 

His mother's doves, and team of sparrows, — 

Loses them too ; then down he throws 

The coral of his lip, the rose 

Growing on 's cheek (but none knows how) ; 

With these the crystal of his brow. 

And then the dimple of his chin, — • 

All these did my Campaspe win. 

At last he set her both his eyes ; 

She won, and Cupid blind did rise. 

Love ! has she done this to thee ? 

M'hat shall, alas I become of me ? 

JOHN LYLY. 



THE KISS. 

1. Among thy fancies tell me this : 
What is the thing we call a kiss ? 

2. I shall resolve ye what it is : 

It is a creature born and bred 
Between the lips all cherry red, 
By love and warm desires fed ; 
Chor. And makes more soft the bridal bed. 



-H,, 



aior 



Chor. 

1. 
1. 



Chor. 
1. 

Chor. 



ft is an active flame, that flies 
First to the babies of the eyes, 
^nd charms them thsre with lullabies,' 
. And stills the bride too when she cries' 

Then to the chin, the cheek, the ear, 
It frisks and flies, — now here, now there -, 
'T is now lar off, and then 't is near ; 
And here, and there, and everywhere. 

Has it a speaking virtue ? — 2. Yes. 
How speaks it, say? — 2. Do you but 

this : 
Part your johied lips, — then speaks your 

kiss ; 
And this love's sweetest language is. 

Has it a body ? — 2. Ay, and wings. 
With tliousand rare encolorings ; 
And as it flies it gently sings ; 
Love honey yields, but never stings. 

RORERT HeRRICK. 



THE PLAIDIE. 

Upon ane stormy Sunday, 

Coming adoon the lane, 
"Were a score of bonnie lassies — 

And the sweetest I maintain 
Was Caddie, 
That I took unneath my plaidie. 

To shield her from the rain. 

She said that the daisies blushed 
For tlie kiss tliat I luul ta'en ; 

I wadna hae thought the lassie 
Wad sae of a kiss complain ; 
" Now, laddie ! 

I winna stay under your plaidie. 
If I gang hame in the rain ! " 

But, on an after Sunday, 

When cloud there was not ane. 
This selfsame winsome lassie 

(We chanced to meet in the lane) 
Said, "Laddie, 
Why dinna ye wear your jilaidie ? 
Wha kens but it may rain ? " 

Charles Sibley. 



KITTY OF COLERAINE. 
As beautiful Kitty one morning was trippin<^ 
With a pitcher of milk, from the fair of Cole- 
raine. 

When she saw me she stumbled, the pitcher it 
tumbled, ' 

And all the sweet buttermilk watered the phuu. 



" 0, what shall I do now - 't was looking at you 

now ! •' 

Sure sure, such a pitcher I '11 ne'er meet again ' 

T was the pride of my dairy: Barney M'( learv i 

^ou re sent as a plague to the girls of (Jole- 

raine." 

I sat down beside her, and gently di<l chide her, 

J iuu such a misfortune should give her such 

pain. 

A kiss then I gave her ; and ere I did leave her 

feiie vowed for such pleasure she'd break it 

again. 

'T was hay-making season — I can't tell the rea- 
son — 

Misfortunes will never come single, 'tis plain • 
For very soon after poor Kitty's disaster 
The devil a pitcher was whole in Coleraine. 

Anonymous. 



KISSING 'S NO SIN. 

Some say that kissing 's a sin ; 

But I think it 's nane ava, 
For kissing has wonn'd in this warld 

Since ever that there was twa. 

0, if it wasna lawfu' 

Lawyers wndna allow it ; 
If it wasna holy. 

Ministers wadna do it. 

If it wasna modest. 

Maidens wadna tak' it ; 
If it wasna plenty, 

Puir folk wadna get it. 

Anonymous. 



COMIN' THROUGH THE EYE. 

Gix a body meet a body 

Comin' tlirough the lye, 
Gin a body kiss a body, 

Need a body cry ? 
Every lassie has her laddie, — 

Ne'er a ane hae I ; 
Yet a' the lads they smile at me 
When comin' through the rye. 
Amang the train there is a sxvain 

I dearly Ide myseV ; 
But tohaur his hame, or ivhat his name, 
I dinna care to tell. 

Gin a body meet a body 

Comin' frae the town. 
Gin a body greet a body. 

Need a body frown ? 



-gj 



[0^. 



188 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



"Q 



Every lassie lias her laddie, — 

Ne'er a ane liae I ; 
Yet a' the lads they smile at me 
When comiii' through the rye. 
Amang the train there is a swain 

I dearly lo'e myseV ; 
But xohaur his hame, or what his name, 
I clinna care to tell. 

Adapted from BURNS. 



KISSING HER HAIR. 

Kissing her hair, I sat against her feet : 

"Wove and unwove it, — wound, and found it 

sweet ; 
Made fast therewith her hands, drew down hei- 

eyes, 
Deep as deep flowers, and dreamy like dim shies ; 
With her own tresses bound, and found her 

fair, — 
Kissing her hair. 

Sleep were no sweeter than her face to me, — 
Sleep of cold sea-bloom under the cold sea : 
What pain could get between my face and hers ? 
What new sweet thing would Love not relish 

worse ? 
Unless, perhaps, white Death had kissed me 
there, — 
Kissing her hair. 

ALGERNON' CHARLES SWINBURNE. 



MAKE BELIEVE. 

Kiss me, though you make believe ; 

Kiss me, though I almost know 
You are kissing to deceive : 

Let the tide one moment flow 
Backward ere it rise and break, 
Only for poor pity's sake ! 

Give me of your flowers one leaf, 
Give me of your smiles one smile. 

Backward roll this tide of grief 
Just a moment, though, the while, 

I should feel and almost know 

You are trifling with my woe. 

Whisper to me sweet and low ; 

Tell me how you sit and weave 
Dreams about me, though I know 

It is only make believe ! 
Just a moment, though 't is plain 
You are jesting with my pain 



[& 



ALICE CARY. 



LOVE'S PHILOSOPHY. 

The fountains mingle with the river, 

And the rivers with the ocean ; 
The winds of heaven mix forever, 

With a sweet emotion ; 
Nothing in the world is single ; 

All things by a law divine 
In one another's being mingle : — 

AVhy not I with thine ? 

See ! the mountains kiss high heaven, 

And the waves clasp one another ; 
No sister flower would be forgiven 

If it disdained its brother ; 
And the sunlight clasps the earth. 

And the moonbeams kiss the sea : — 
What are all these hissings worth. 

If thou kiss not me ? 

PERCY BYSSIIE SHELLEY. 



THE MOTH'S KISS, FIRST! 

FROM " IN A GONDOLA." 

The Moth's kiss, flrst ! 

Kiss me as if you made believe 

You were not sure, this eve. 

How my face, your flowei', had pursed 

Its petals up ; so, here and there 

You brush it, till I grow aware 

Who wants me, and wide open burst. 

The Bee's kiss, now ! 
Kiss me as if you entered gay 
My heart at some noonday, 
A bud that dared not disallow 
The claim, so all is rendered up. 
And passively its shattered cup 
Over your head to slee]) I bow. 

Robert Browning. 



LINES TO AN INDIAN AIR. 

SERENADE. 

I ARISE from dreams of thee 

In the first sweet sleep of night, 
When the winds are breathing low, 

And the stars are shining bright. 
I arise from dreams of thee. 

And a spirit in my feet 
Has led me — who knows how ? — 

To thy chamber-window, sweet ! 

The wandering airs they faint 

On the dark, the silent stream, — 

The champak odors fail 

Like sweet thouglits in a dream ; 



U^ 



t&- 



LOVE. 



189 



ra 



The nightingale's complaint, 

It dies u]fcn her heart, 
As I must die on thine, 

0, beloved as thou art ! 

0, lift me from the grass ! 

I die, I faint, I fail ! 
Let thy love in kisses rain 

On my lips and eyelids pale. 
My cheek is cold and white, alas ! 

My heart beats loud and fast : 
0, press it close to thine again. 

Where it will break at last ! 

Percy Bysshe Shelley. 



SONNETS FROM THE PORTUGUESE. 

Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand 
Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore 
Alone upon the threshold of my door 
Of individual liie, I shall command 
The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand 
Serenely in the sunshine as before. 
Without the sense of that which I forbore, . . . 
Thy touch upon the palm. The widest land 
Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine 
With pulses that beat double. What I do 
.And what I dream include thee, as the wane 
Must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue 
God for myself, he hears that name of thine. 
And sees within my eyes the tears of two. 



Indeed this very love which is my boast. 
And which, when rising up from breast to brow. 
Doth crown me with a ruby lai'ge enow 
To draw men's eyes and prove the inner cost, . . . 
This love even, all my worth, to the rrttermost, 
I should not love withal, unless that thou 
Hadst set me an example, shown me how, 
When first thine earnest eyes with mine were 

crossed. 
And love called love. And thus, I cannot speak 
Of love even, as a good thing of my own. 
Thy soul hath snatched up mine all faint and 

weak. 
And placed it by thee on a golden throne, — 
And that I love (0 soul, we must be meek !) 
Is by thee only, whom 1 love alone. 



If thou must love me, let it be for naught 
Except for love's sake only. Do not say 
"I love her for her smile . . . her look . . . her way 
Of speaking gently, — for a trick of thought 
That falls in well with inine, and certes brought 
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day." 



For these things in themselves, beloved, may 
Be changed, or change for thee, — and love so 

wrought, 
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for 
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry, — 
A creature might forget to weep, who bore 
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby. 
But love me for love's sake, that evermore 
Thou mayst love on, through love's eternity. 



I NEVER gave a lock of hair away 
To a man, Deai-est, except this to thee. 
Which now upon my fingers thoughtfully 
I ring out to the full brown length and say 
" Take it." My day of youth went yesterday ; 
My hair no longer bounds to my foot's glee. 
Nor plant I it from rose or myrtle tree. 
As girls do, any more. It only may 
Now shade on two pale cheeks, the mark of tears. 
Taught drooping from the head that hangs aside 
Through sorrow's trick. I thought the funeral- 
shears 
Would take this first, but Love is justified, — 
Take it thou, . . . finding pure, from all those 

years. 
The kiss my mother left here when she died. 



Say over again, and yet once over again, 
That thou dost love me. Though the word re- 
peated 
Should seem " a cuckoo-song," as thou dost treat 

it. 
Remember, never to the hill or plain, 
Valley and wood, without her cuckoo-strain. 
Comes the fresh spring in all her green completed. 
Beloved, I, amid the darkness greeted 
By a doubtful spirit- voice, in that doubt's pain 
Cry : " Speak once more — thou lovest ! " Who 

can fear 
Too many stars, though each in heaven shall 

roll, — 
Too many flowers, though each shall crown the 



year ? 
Say thou dost love me, love me, love me, — 
The silver iterance ! — only minding, dear, 
To love me also in silence, with tliy soul. 



toll 



My letters ! all dead paper, . . . mute and white ! — 
And yet they seem alive and quiveriiig 
Acrainst my tremulous hands which loose the 

string 
And let them drop down on my knee to-night. 
This said, ... he wished to have me in his sight 
Once, as a friend : this fixed a day in spring 
To come and touch my hand ... a simple thing. 



&^ 



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190 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



'^~Si 



Yet I wept for it ! this, . . . the paper 's light . . . 
Said, Dear, I love thee ; and I sank and quailed 
As if God's future thundered on my past. 
This said, / am thine, — and so its ink has paled 
With lying at my heart that beat too fast. 
And this . . . O Love, thy words have ill availed, 
If what this said, I dared repeat at last ! 

The first time that the sun rose on thine oath 
To love me, I looked forward to the moon 
To slacken all those bonds which seemed too soon 
And quickly tied to make a lasting troth. 
Quick-loving hearts, I thought, may quickly 

loathe ; 
And, looking on myself, I seemed not one 
For such man's love ! — more like an out of tune 
Worn viol, a good singer would be wroth 
To spoil his song with, and which, snatched in 

haste, 
Is laid down at the first ill-sounding note. 
I did not wrong myself so, but I placed 
A wrong on thee. For perfect strains may float 
'Keath master-hands, from instruments defiiced, — 
And great souls, at one stroke, may do and doat. 



First time he kissed me, he but only kissed 
The fingers of this hand wherewith I write ; 
And, ever since, it grew more clean and white, 
Slow to world -greetings, quick with its " list ! " 
When the angels speak. A ring of amethyst 
I could not wear here, plainer to my sight 
Than that first kiss. The second passed in height 
The first, and sought the forehead, and half missed. 
Half falling on the hair. 0, beyond meed ! 
That was the chrism of love, which love's own 

crown. 
With sanctifying sweetness, did precede. 
The third upon my lips was folded down 
In perfect, purple state ; since when, indeed, 
I have been proud, and said, "My love, my own ! " 

How do I love thee ? Let me count the ways. 

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height 

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight 

For the ends of Being and ideal Grace. 

I love thee to the level of every day's 

Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. 

I love thee freely, as men strive for Right ; 

I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise. 

I love thee with the passion put to use 

In my ohl griefs, and with n\y childhood's faith. 

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose 

With my lost saints, — I love thee with the breath, 

Smiles, tears, of all my life ! — and, if God choose, 

I shall but love thee better after death. 

ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 



WAITING FOR THE GRAPES. 

That I love thee, charming maid, I a thousand 

times have said, 

And a thousand times more I have swoi'n it, 

But 't is easy to be seen in the coldness of your 

mien 

That you doubt my affection — or scorn it. 

Ah me ! 

Not a single grain of sense is in the whole of 
these pretences 
For rejecting your lover's petitions ; 
Had I windows in my bosom, 0, how gladly I 'd 
expose 'em. 
To irndo your fantastic suspicions ! 

Ah me ! 

You repeat I 've known you long, and you hint 
I do you wrong. 
In beginning so late to pursue ye ; 
But 't is folly to look glum because people did 
not come 
Up the stairs of your nursery to woo ye. 

Ah me ! 

In a grapery one walks without looking at the 
stalks. 
While the bunches are green that they 're bear- 
ing: 
All the pretty little leaves that are dangling at 
the eaves 
Scarce attract e'en a moment of staring. 

Ah me ! 

But when time has swelled the grapes to a richer 
style of shapes. 
And the sun has lent warmth to their blushes. 
Then to cheer us and to gladden, to enchant us 
and to madden. 
Is the ripe ruddy glory that rushes. 

Ah me ! 

0, 't is then that mortals pant while they gaze 
on Bacchus' plant, — 
0, 't is then, — will my simile serve ye ? 
Should a danrsel fair repine, though neglected 
like a vine ? 
Both erelong shall turn heads topsy-turvy. 

x\h nie ! 
William Maginn. 



[& 



THE LOVE-KNOT. 

Tying her bonnet under her chin, 
She tied her raven ringlets in. 
But not alone in the silken snare 
Did she catch her lovely floating hair, 
For, tying her bonnet under her chin. 
She tied a young man's heart within. 



-& 



G 



LOVE. 



191 



■^ 



The}'- were strolling together up the hill, 

Where the wind came blowing merry and chill ; 

And it blew the curls a frolicsome race, 

All over the happy peach-colored face. 

Till scolding and laughing, she tied them in, 

Under her beautiful, dimpled chin. 

And it blew a color, bright as the bloom 
Of the pinkest fuchsia's tossing plume, 
All over the cheeks of the prettiest girl 
That ever imprisoned a romping curl. 
Or, in tying her bonnet under her chin, 
Tied a young man's hekrt within. 

Steeper and steeper grew the hill, 
Madder, merrier, chiller still. 
The western wind blew down, and played 
The wildest tricks with the little maid, 
As, tying her bonnet under her chin, 
She tied a young man's heart within. 

western wind, do you think it was fair 

To play such tricks with her floating hair ? 

To gladly, gleefully, do your best 

To blow her against the young man's breast, 

Where he has gladly folded her in. 

And kissed her mouth and dimpled chin ? 

Ellery Vane, you little thought, 
An hour ago, when you besought 
This country lass to walk with you, 
After the sun had dried the dew, 
What terrible danger you 'd be in. 
As she tied her bonnet under her chin. 

Nora Perry. 



CX^ 



GREEN GROW THE RASHES 0! 

Green grow the rashes 0, 

Green grow the rashes ; 
The sweetest hours that e'er I spend 

Are spent amang the lasses ! 

There 's naught but care on ev'ry han', 
In every hour that passes ; 

What signifies the life o' man, 
An 't were na for the lasses ? 

The warly race may riches chase. 
An' riches still may fly them ; 

An' though at last they catch them fast. 
Their hearts can ne'er enjoy them ! 

Gie me a canny hour at e'en, 
My arras about my dearie 0, 

An' warly cares an' warly men 
May all gae tapsalteerie O ! 



For you sae douce, ye sneer at this, 
Ye 're naught but senseless asses ; 

The wisest man the warl' e'er saw 
He dearly lo'ed the lasses O 1 

Auld Nature swears the lovely dears 
Her noblest work she classes : 

Pier 'prentice han' she tried on man, 
An' then she made the lasses ! 

Robert Burns 



THE CHRONICLE. 

MARGAurrA first possessed, 
If I remember well, my breast, 

Margarita first of all ; 
But when awhile the wanton maid 
With my restless heart had played, 

Martha took the flying ball. 

JIartha soon did it resign 
To the beauteous Catharine. 

Beauteous Catharine gave place 
(Though loath and angry she to part 
Witli the possession of my heart) 

To Eliza's conquering face. 

Eliza till this hour might reign. 
Had she not evil counsels ta'en ; 

Fundamental laws she broke, 
And still new favorites she chose. 
Till up in arms my passions rose. 

And cast away her yoke. 

Mary then, and gentle Anne, 
Both to reign at once began ; 

Alternately the}"- swayed ; 
And sometimes Mary was the fair, 
And sometimes Anne the crown did wear, 

And sometimes both I obeyed. 

Another Mary then arose. 
And did rigorous laws impose ; 

A mighty tyrant she ! 
Long, alas ! should I have been 
Under that iron-sceptred cpieen, 

Had not Rebecca set me free. 

When fair Rebecca set me free, 

'T was then a golden time with me : 

But soon those pleasures fled ; 
For the gracious princess died 
In her youth and beauty's pride. 

And Judith reigned in her stead. 

One month, three days, and lialf an hour 
Judith held the sovereign power : 
Wondrous beautiful her face ! 



5^ 



[0- 



192 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



-a 



But so weak and small her wit, 
That she to govern was unfit, 
And so Susanna took her place. 

But when Isabella came, 
Armed with a resistless flame, 

And the artillery of her eye ; 
Whilst she proudly marched about, 
Greater conquests to find out, 

She beat out Susan, by the by. 

But in her place I tlien obeyed 
Black-eyed Bess, her viceroy-maid. 

To whom ensued a vacancy : 
Thousand worse passions then possessed 
The interregnum of my breast ; 

Bless nie from such an anarchy ! 

Gentle Henrietta then. 

And a third Mary, next began ; 

Then Joan, and Jane, and Audria ; 
And then a pretty Thomasiue, 
And then another Catharine, 

And then a long ct coctcra. 

But I will briefer with them be, 
Since few of them were long with me. 

An higher and a nobler strain 
My present emperess does claim, 
Heleonora, first o' th' name. 

Whom God grant long to reign ! 

Abrahaji Cowley. 



[& 



TO CHLOE. 

AN APOLOGY FOR GOING INTO THE COUNTRY. 

Chloe, we must not always be in heaven. 
Forever toying, ogling, kissing, billing ; 

The joys for which I thousands would have given, 
Will presently be scarcely worth a shilling. 

Thy neck is fairer than the Alpine snows. 

And, sweetly swelling, beats the down of 
doves ; 

Thy cheek of health, a rival to the rose ; 

Thy pouting lips, the throne of all the loves ; 

Yet, though thus beautiful beyond expression. 

That beauty fadeth by too much possession. 

Economy in love is peace to nature. 
Much like economy in worldly matter ; 
We should be prudent, never live too fast ; 
Profusion will not, cannot always last. 

Lovers are really spendthrifts, — 't is a shame, — ■ 
Nothing their thoughtless, wild career can tame, 

Till penury stares them in the face ; 
And when they find an empty puise. 



Grown calmer, wiser, how the fault they curse, 
And, limping, look with such a sneaking 
grace ! 
Job's war-horse fierce, his neck with tliunder 

hung. 
Sunk to an humble hack that carries dung. 

Smell to the queen of flowers, the fragrant rose — 
Smell twenty times — and then, my dear, thy 

nose 
Will tell thee (not so much for scent athirst) 
The twentieth drank less flavor than the first. 

Love, doubtless, is the sweetest of all fellows ; 

Yet often should the little god I'etire. 
Absence, dear Chloe, is a pair of bellows, 

That keeps alive the sacred fire. 

DR. WOLCOTT {Peter Pindar). 



THE EXCHANGE. 

We pledged our hearts, my love and I, — 
I in my arms the maiden clasping ; 

I could not tell the reason why. 
But, 0, I trembled like an aspen ! 

Her father's love she bade me gain ; 

I went, and shook like any reed ! 
I strove to act the man, — in vain ! 

We had exchanged our hearts indeed. 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 



WISHES TO HIS SUPPOSED MISTRESS. 

Whoe'er she be. 

That not impossible she, 

That shall command my heart and me ; 

Where'er she lie. 

Locked up from mortal eye. 

In shady leaves of destinj'. 

Till that ripe birth 

Of studied fate stand forth. 

And teach her fair steps to our earth ; 

Till that divine 

Idea take a shrine 

Of crystal flesh, through which to shine : 

Meet you her, my Wishes, 
Bespeak her to my blisses. 
And be ye called my absent kisse; 



;es. 



I wish her beauty. 

That owes not all its duty 

To gaudy tire, or glistering shoe-tie. 



— ff 



fl- 



LOVE. 



19; 



r-a 



Something more tlian 

Taffata or tissue can. 

Or rampant feather, or rich fan ; 

Moi-e than the spoil 

Of shop, or silkworm's toil, 

Or a bought blush, or a set smile. 

A face, that 's best 

By its own beauty dressed. 

And can alone command the rest. 

A face, made up 

Out of no other shop, 

Than what Nature's wliite hand sets ope. 

Days, that need borrow 

No part of their good morrow, 

From a fore-spent night of sorrow. 

Days, that in spite 

Of darkness, by tlie light 

Of a clear mind, are day all night. 

Nights, sweet as they 

Made short by lovers' play, 

Yet long by the absence of the day. 

Life that dares send 

A challenge to his end, 

And when it conies, say. Welcome, friend ! 

Sydneian showers 

Of sweet discourse, whose powers 

Can crown old Winter's head with flowers. 

Soft silken hours, 

Open suns, shady bowers ; 

'Bove all — nothing within that lowers. 

Whate'er delight 

Can make day's forehead bright. 

Or give down to the wings of night. 

In her whole frame, 
Have Nature all the name. 
Art and ornament the shame. 

Her flattery, 

Picture and poesj'-, 

Her counsel her own virtue be. 

I wisJi her store 

Of worth may leave her poor 

Of wishes ; and 1 wish — no more. 

Now, if Time knows 

Til at her, whose radiant brows 

Weave them a garland of my vows ; 



Her, whose just bays 

My future hopes can raise, 

A trophy to her present praise ; 

Her, that dares be 

What these lines wish to see : 

I seek no further, it is She. 

'T is She, and here, 
Lo, I unclothe and clear 
My Wish's cloudy character ! 

IMay she enjoy it, 

W^hose merit dare apply it, 

But modesty dares still deny it ! 

Such worth as this is 
Shall fix my flying wishes, 
And determine them to kisses. 

Lot her full glory, 

My fancies, fly before ye, 

Be ye my Actions, but — her story. 

Richard Crasiiaw. 



THE SHEPHERD'S RESOLUTION. 

Shall I, wasting in despair, 
Die because a woman 's fair ? 
Or make pale my cheeks with care 
'Cause another's rosy are ? 
Be she fairer than the day. 
Or the flowery meads in May, — 
If she be not so to me, 
Yv'hat care I how fair she be ? 

Shall my foolish heart be pined 
'Cause I see a woman kind ? 
Or a well-disposed nature 
Joined with a lovely feature ? 
Be she meeker, kinder than 
The turtle-dove or pelican, — 
If she be not so to me, 
What care I how kind she be ] 

Shall a woman's virtues move 
Me to i?erish for her love ? 
Or, her well deservings known, 
Make me quite forget mine own ? 
Be she with that goodness blest 
Which may merit name of best, — 
If she be not such to me. 
What care I how good she be ? 

'Cause her fortune seems too high, 
Shall I play the fool and die ? 
Those that bear a noble mind 
Where they want of riches find. 



13 



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194 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



"^ 



Think what with them they would do 
That without them dare to woo ; 
And unless that mind I see, 
What care I how great she be ? 

Great, or good, or kind, or fair, 

I will ne'er the more despair : 

If she love me, this believe, — 

I will die ere she shall grieve. 

If she slight me when I woo, 

I can scorn and let her go ; — 
For if she be not for me. 
What care I for whom she be ? 

GEORGE WITMCR. 



ROSALIND'S COMPLAINT. 

LovB in my bosom, like a bee. 

Doth suck his sweet ; 
Now with his wings he plays with me. 

Now with his feet ; 
Within mine eyes he makes his nest, 
His bed amidst my tender breast. 
My kisses are his daily feast, 
And yet he robs me of my rest : 

Ah ! wanton, will ye ? 

And if I sleep, then percheth he 

With pretty flight, 
And makes his pillow of my knee. 

The livelong night. 
Strike I the lute, he tunes the string ; 
He music plays, if so I sing ; 
He lends me every lovely thing. 
Yet, cruel, he my heart doth sting : 

Whist ! wanton, still ye ! 

Else I with roses every day 

Will whip you hence, 
And bind you when you long to play. 

For j'our offence ; 
I '11 shut my eyes to keep you in, 
I '11 make you fast it for your sin, 
I "11 count j'^our po\v(>r not worth a pm : 
Alas ! what hereby shall I win 

If he gainsay me ! 

What if I beat the wanton boy 

With many a rod ? 
He will repay me with annoy, 

Because a god ; 
Then sit thou safely on my knee, 
And let thy bower my bosom be ; 
Lurk in my eyes, I like of thee, 
Cupid ! so thou pity me ; 

Spare not, but play thee ! 

Thomas Lodge. 



COUNTY GUY. 

FROM " QUENTIN DURWARD." 

Ah ! County Guy, the hour is nigh, 

The sun- has left the lea, 
The orange- flower perfumes the bower, 

The breeze is on the sea. 
The lark, his lay who trilled all day. 

Sits hushed his partner nigh ; 
Breeze, bird, and flower confess the hour, 

But where is County Guy ? 

The village maid steals through the shade. 

Her shepherd's suit to hear ; 
To beauty shy, by lattice high, 

Sings high-born cavalier. 
The star of Love, all stars above. 

Now reigns o'er earth and sky. 
And high and low the influence know, 

But where is County Guy ? 

Sir Walter Scott. 



LET NOT WOMAN E'ER COMPLAIN. 

List not woman e'er complain 

Of inconstancy in love ; 
Let not woman e'er complain 

Fickle man is apt to rove ; 
Look abroad through Nature's range. 
Nature's nughty law is change ; 
Ladies, would it not be strange 

Man should then a monster prove ? 

Mark the winds, and mark the skies ; 

Ocean's ebb and ocean's flow ; 
Sun and moon but set to rise. 

Round and round the seasons go. 
Why then ask of silly man. 
To oppose great Nature's plan ? 
AVe '11 be constant while we can, — 

You can be no more, you know. 

ROBERT BURNS. 



UNSATISFACTORY. 

" Have other lovers — say, my love — ■ 

Loved thus before to-day ? " 
" They may have, yes, they may, my love ; 

Not long ago they may." 

" But, though they worshipped thee, my love, 

Thy maiden heart was free ? " 
" Don't ask too much of me, my love ; 

Don't ask too much of me." 

" Yet, now 't is you and I, my love, 

Love's wings no more will fly ? " 
" If love could never die, my love, 

Our love should never die." 



^ 



^ 




LOVE-LETTERS IN FLOWERS 



"An exquisite invention this. 
Worthy of Love'' s most honeyed kiss, — 
This art of writing billei-dotix 
In buds, and odors, and bright hues I " 



LOVE. 



• — p^^-i 

195 ^"' 



" For shame ! and is this so, my love, 

And Love and I must go 1 " 
" Lideed, I do not know, my love, 

My life, I do not know." 

" You will, you must be true, mj' love, — 

Not look and love anew ! " 
" I '11 see what I can do, my love, ' 

I '11 see what I can do." 

Anonymous. 



Of Look-at-me and Call-me-to-you 

(Words that, while they greet, go through you) ; 

Of Thoughts, of Flames, Forget-me-not, 

Bridewort, — in short, the whole blest lot 

Of vouchers for a lifelong kiss, — 

And literally, breathing bliss ! 

Leigh hunt. 



LOVE-LETTERS MADE IN FLOWERS. 

ON A PRINT OF ONE OF THEM IN A HOOK. 

An exquisite invention this, 

Woi'thy of Love's most hone)'ed kiss, — • 

This art of writing hillct-doux 

In buds, and odors, and bright hues ! 

In saying all one feels and thinks 

In clever daffodils and pinks ; 

In pi;ns of tulips ; and in phrases, 

Charming for their truth, of daisies ; 

Uttering, as well as silence may, 

The sweetest words the sweetest way. 

How fit too for- the lady's bosom ! 

The place where billet-doux repose 'em. 

What delight in some sweet spot 
Combining love with garden plot, 
At once to cultivate one's flowers 
And one's epistolary powers ! 
Growing one's own choice words and fancies 
In oi'ange tubs, and beds of pansies ; 
One's sighs, and passionate declarations. 
In odorous rhetoric of carnations ; 
Seeing how far one's stocks will reach ; 
Taking due care one's flowers of speech 
To guard from blight as well as bathos. 
And watering evei'y day one's pathos ! 

A letter comes, just gathered. We 
Dote on its tender brilliancy. 
Inhale its delicate expressions 
Of balm and pea, and its confessions 
Made with as sweet a Maiden's Blush 
As ever morn bedewed on bush : 
('T is in reply to one of ours. 
Made of the most convincing flowers. ) 

Then, after we have kissed its wit 
And heart, in water putting it 
(To keep its remarks fresh), go round 
Our little eloquent plot of ground. 
And with enchanted hands compose 
Our answer, — all of lily and rose. 
Of tuberose and of violet. 
And Little Darling (mignonette); 



MY EYES! HOW I LOVE YOU. 

My eyes ! how I love you, 
You sAveet little dove you ! 
There 's no one above you. 

Most beautiful Kitty. 

So glossy your hair is. 
Like a sylph's or a fairj^'s ; 
And your neck, I declare, is 
Exquisitely pretty ! 

Quite Grecian your nose is, 
And your cheeks are like roses, 
So delicious — Moses ! 

Surpassingly sweet ! 

Not the beauty of tulips. 
Nor the taste of mint-juleps, 
Can compare with your two lips. 
Most beautiful Kate ! 

Not the black eyes of Juno, 
Nor Minerva's of blue, no. 
Nor Venus's, you know, 

Can equal your own ! 

0, how my heart prances. 
And frolics and dances, 
When its radiant glances 

Upon me are thrown ! 

And now, dearest Kitty, 
It 's not very pretty. 
Indeed it 's a pity, 

To keep me in sorrow ! 

So, if you '11 but chime in, 

AVe '11 have done with our rhymiu'. 

Swap Cupid for Hymen, 

And be married to-morrow. 

John Godfrey Sa.xe. 



CUPID SWALLOWED. 

T' OTHER day, as I was twining 
Eoses for a crown to dine in, 
What, of all things, midst the heap, 
Should I light on, fast a.sleej^, 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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t& 



But the little desperate elf, 

The tiny traitor, — Love himself ! 

By the wings I pinched him up 

Like a bee, and in a cup 

Of my wine I plunged and sank him ; 

And what d' ye think I did ? — I drank him ! 

Faith, I thought him dead. Not he ! 

There he lives with tenfold glee ; 

And now this moment, with his wings 

I feel him tickling my heart-strings. 

LEIGH HUNT. 



DUNCAN GRAY CAM' HERE TO WOO. 

Duncan Gray cam' here to woo — 
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

On blythe Yule night when we were fou — 
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Maggie coost her head fu' high, 

Looked asklent and unco skeigh, 

Gart poor Duncan stand abeigh — ■ 
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Duncan Heeched and Duncan prayed — 
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

ileg was deaf as Ailsa craig — 

Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Duncan sighed baith out and in, 

Grat his een baith bleer't and blin', 

Spak o' lowpin o'er a linn — 

Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Time and chance are but a tide — 
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Slighted love is sair to bide — 

Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Shall T, like a fool, quoth he, 

For a haughty hizzie dee ? 

She may gae to — France, for me ! 
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

How it comes let doctors tell — 

Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Meg grew sick as he grew heal — 
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Something in her bosom wrings, — 

Foi relief a sigh she brings ; 

And 0, her een they speak sic things ! 
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Duncan "was a lad o' grace — 

Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Maggie's was a piteous case — 

Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Duncan could na be her death : 

Swelling pity smoored his wrath. 

Now they're crouse and canty baith. 
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't ! 

Roi;hrt Burns. 



THE DULE 'S I' THIS BONNET 0' MINE. 

LAN'CASHIRE DIALECT. 

The dule 's i' this bonnet o' mine : 

My libbins '11 never be reet ; 
Here, Mally, aw 'm like to be fine, 

For Jamie '11 be comin' to-neet ; 
He met me i' th' lone t' other day 

(Aw wur gooin' for wayter to th' well). 
An' he begged that aw 'd wed him i' May, 

Bi th' mass, if he '11 let me, aw will ! 

When he took mj^ two bonds into hLs, 

Good Lord, heaw they trembled between ! 
An' aw durst n't look up in his face, 

Becose on him seein' my e'en. 
My cheek went as red as a rose ; 

There 's never a mortal con tell 
Heaw happy aw felt, — for, thae knows, 

One couldn't ha' axed him theirsel'. 

But th' tale wur at th' end o' my tung : 

To let it eawt W'ould n't be reet. 
For aw thought to seem forrud wur wrung ; 

So aw towd him aw 'd tell him to-neet. 
But, Mally, thae knows very weel. 

Though it is n't a thing one should own, 
Iv aw 'd th' pikein' o' th' world to mysel'. 

Aw 'd oather ha Jamie or noan. 

Neaw-, Mally, aw 've towd thae my mind ; 

What would to do iv it wur thee ? 
" Aw 'd tak him just while he 'se inclined, 

An' a farrantly bargain he '11 be ; 
For Jamie 's as greadly a lad 

As ever stept eawt into th' sun. 
Go, jump at thy chance, an' get wed ; 

An' mak th' best o' th' job when it 's done ! " 

Eh, dear ! but it 's time to be gwon : 

Aw should n't like Jamie to wait ; 
Aw connut for shame be too soon, 

An' aw wouldn't for th' wuld be too late. 
Aw 'm o' ov a tremble to th' heel : 

Dost think 'at my bonnet '11 do ? 
" Be off, lass, — tliae looks very weel ; 

He wants noan o' th' bonnet, thae foo ! " 
Edwin Waugh. 



RORY O'MORE; 



OR, ALL FOR GOOD LUCK. 



YouxG Rory O'Morc courted Kathleen bawn, — 
He was bold as a hawk, she as soft as the dawn ; 
He wished in his heart pretty Kathleen to please. 
And he thought the best way to do that was to 
tease. 



^ 



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LOVE. 



197 



"Now, Rory, be aisy ! " sweet Kathleen would j 

Eeproof on her lip, but a smile in her eye, — j 
"With your tricks, I don't know, in troth, what i 

I 'in about : j 

Faith ! you 've tazed till I 've put on my cloak \ 

inside out." 
" Och ! jewel," says Eory, " that same is the way 
Ye 've thrated my heart for this many a day ; ! 
And 't is plazed that I am, and why not, to be ; 

sure ? I 

For 'tis all for good luck," says bold . Rory 

O'More. 

"Indeed, then," says Kathleen, "don't think of 

the like. 
For I half gave a promise to soothering Mike : 
The ground that I walk on he loves, I '11 be 

bound — " 
" Faith! " says Rory, " I 'd rather love you than 

the ground." 
" Now, Rory, I '11 cry if you don't let me go ; 
Sure I dream every night that I 'm hating you 

so ! " 
"Och ! " says Rory, "that same I 'm delighted 

to hear. 
For dhrames always go by conthraries, my dear. 
So, jewel, kape dhraming that same till ye die, 
And bright morning will give dirty night the 

black lie ! 
And 't is plazed that I am, and why not, to be 

sure ? 
Since 'tis all for good luck," saj's bold Rory 

O'More. 

" Arrah, Kathleen, my darlint, you've tazed me 

enough ; 
Sure I 've thrashed, for your sake, Dinuy Grimes 

and Jim Duft^ ; 
And I 've made myself, drinking your health, 

quite a baste, — 
So I think, after that, I may talk to the praste." 
Then Rory, the rogue, stole his arm round her 

neck. 
So soft and so white, without freckle or speck ; 
And he looked in her eyes, that were beaming 

with light. 
And he kissed her sweet lips, — don't you think 

lie was right ? 
" Now, Rory, leave off, sir, — you '11 hug me no 

more, — 
That 's eight times to-day that you 've kissed me 

before." 
"Then here goes another," says he, "to make 

sui'e ! 
For there's luck in odd numbers," says Rory 

O'More. 

Samuel Lover. 



THE LOW-BACKED CAR. 

When first I saw sweet Peggy, 

'T was on a market day : 
A low-backed car she drove, and sat 

Upon a truss of hay ; 
But when that hay was blooming grass, 

And decked with flowers of spring, 
No flower was there that could compare 

With the blooming girl I sing. 
As she sat in the low-backed car, 
The man at the turnpike bar 
Never asked for the toll. 
But just rubbed his owld poll, 
And looked after the low-backed car. 

In battle's wild commotion, 

Tlie proud and mighty Mars 
With hostile scythes demands his tithes 

Of death in warlike cars ; 
While Peggy, peaceful goddess, 

Has darts in her bright eye, 
That knock men down in the market town. 

As right and left they fly ; 
AVhile she sits in her low-backed car, 
Than battle more dangerous far, — 
For the doctor's art 
Cannot cure the heart 
That is hit from that low-backed ear. 

Sweet Peggy round her car, sir, 

Has strings of ducks and geese, 
But the scores of hearts she slaughters 

By far outnumber these ; 
While she among her poultry sits. 

Just like a turtle-dove, 
Well worth the cage, I do engage, 

Of the blooming god of Love ! 
While she sits in her low-backed car. 
The lovers come near and far, 
And envy the chicken 
That Peggy is pickin'. 
As she sits in her low-backed car. 

0, I 'd rather own that car, sir. 

With Peggy by my side, 
Than a coacli and four, and gold galore, 

And a lady for my bride ; 
For the lady would sit forninst me, 

On a cushion made with taste, — . 
While Peggy would sit beside me, 
AVith my arm around her waist, 
While we drove in the low-backed car, 
To be married by Father Mahar ; 
0, my heart would beat high 
At her glance and her sigh, — 
Though it beat in a low-backed car ! 

Samuel Lover. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



[& 



SALLY IN OUR ALLEY. 

Of all the girls that are so smart 

There 's none like pretty Sally ; 
She is the darling of my heart, 

And she lives in our alley. 
There is no lady in the land 

Is half so sweet as Sally ; 
She is the darling of my heart, 

And she lives in our alley. 

Her father lie makes cabbage-nets, 

And through the streets does crj' 'em ; 
Her mother she sells laces long 

To such as please to buy 'em ; 
But sure such folks could ne'er beget 

So sweet a girl as Sally ! 
She is the darling of my heart. 

And she lives in our alley. 

When she is by I leave my work, 

I love her so sincerely ; 
My master comes like any Turk, 

And bangs me most severely. 
But let him bang his bellyful, 

I '11 bear it all for Sally ; 
For she 's the darling of my heart, 

And she lives in our alley. 

Of all the days that 's in the week 

I dearly love but one day, 
And that 's the day that comes betwixt 

The Saturday and Monday ; 
For then I 'm drest all in my best 

To walk abroad with Sally ; 
She is the darling of my heart. 

And she lives in our alley. 

My master carries me to church. 

And often am I blamed 
Because I leave him in the lurch 

As soon a.s text is named : 
I leave the church in sermon-time, 

And slink away to Sally ; 
She is the darling of mj' heai't. 

And she lives in our alley. 

When Christmas conies about again, 

0, then I shall have money ! 
I '11 hoard it up, and box it all. 

And give it to my honey ; 
I would it were ten thousand pound ! 

I 'd give it all to Sally ; 
She is the darling of my heart, 

And she lives in our alley. 

My master and the neighbors all 
Make game of me and Sally, 

And, but for her, 1 'd better be 
A slave, and row a galley ; 



But when my seven long years are out, 

0, then 1 '11 marry Sally ! 
0, then we '11 wed, and then we '11 bed, 

But not in our alley ! 



Henry Carey. 



LOVELY MAEY DONNELLY. 

LOVELY Mary Donnellj', it 's you I love the 
best ! 

If fifty girls were round you, I 'd hardly see the 
rest. 

Be what it may the time of day, the place be 
where it will, 

Sweet looks of Mary Donnelly, they bloom be- 
fore me still. 

Her eyes like mountain water that 's flowing on 

a rock, 
How clear thej^ are ! how dark they are ! and 

they give me many a shock. 
Red rowans warm in sunshine, and wetted with 

a shower. 
Could ne'er express the charming lip that has 

me in its power. 

Her nose is straight and handsome, her eyebrows 

lifted up. 
Her chin is very neat and pert, and smooth like 

a china cup, 
Her hair 's the brag of Ireland, so weighty and 

so fine, — 
It's rolling down upon her neck, and gathered 

in a twine. 

The dance o' last Whit-Monday night exceeded 

all before ; 
No pretty girl for miles about was missing from 

the floor ; 
But Mary kept the belt of love, and 0, but she 

was gay ! 
She danced a jig, she sung a song, that took my 

heart away. 

When she stood up for dancing, her steps were 

so complete 
The music nearly killed itself to listen to her 

feet ; 
The fiddler moaned his blindness, he heard her 

so much praised, 
But blessed himself he was n't deaf wlien once 

her voice she raised. 

And evermore I 'm whistling or lilting what you 

sung, 
Your smile is always in my heart, your name 

beside my tongue ; 



^-ff 



LOVE. 



199 



ft 



But you 've as many sAveethearts as you 'd count 

on both your hands, 
And for myself there 's not a thumb or little 

finger stands. 

0, you're the flower o' womankind in country 

or in town ; 
The higher I exalt you, the lower I 'm cast 

down. 
If some great lord should come this way, and see 

your beauty ])right, 
And you to be his lady, I 'd own it was but 

right. 

0, might we live togetlier in a lofty palace hall. 

Where joyful music rises, and where scarlet cur- 
tains fall ! 

0, might Ave live together in a cottage mean and 
small ; 

With sods of grass the only roof, and mud the 
only wall ! ' 

lovely Mary Donnelly, your beauty 's my dis- 
tress ; 

It 's far too beauteous to be mine, but I '11 never 
wish it less. 

The proudest place would fit your face, and I 
am poor and low ; 

But blessings be about you, dear, wherever you 

may go ! 

William Allingham. 



HER LETTER. 

I 'm sitting alone by the fire, 
Dressed just as I came from the dance, 
In a robe even you would admire, — 
It cost a cool thousand in France ; 
I 'm bediamonded out of all reason. 
My hair is done up in a cue : 
In short, sir, " the belle of the season " 
Is wasting an hour on you. 

A dozen engagements I 've broken ; 

I left in the midst of a set ; 

Likewise a proposal, half spoken, 

That waits — on the stairs — for me yet. 

They say he '11 be rich, — when he grows up. 

And then he adores me indeed. 

And you, sii-, are turning your nose up, 

Three thousand miles off, as you read. 

" And how do I like my position ? " 
" And what do I think of New York ? " 
" And now, in my higher ambition, 
With whom do 1 waltz, flirt, or talk ? " 
' ' And is n't it nice to have riches 
And diamonds and silks and all that ? " 
"And aren't it a change to the ditches 
And tunnels of Poverty Flat ? " 



Well, yes, — if you saw us out driving 
Each day in the park, four-in-hand ; 
If you saw poor dear mamma contriving 
To look supernaturally grand, — 
If you saw papa's picture, as taken 
By Brady, and tinted at that, 
You 'd never suspect he sold bacon 
And flour at Poverty Flat. 

And yet, just this moment, when sitting 
In the glare of the grand chandelier, 
In the bustle and glitter befitting 
The "finest soiree of the year," 
In the mists of a gaze clc chambery 
And the hum of the smallest of talk, — 
Somehow, Joe, I thought of " The Ferry," 
And the dance that we had on " The Fork ; ' 

Of Harrison's barn, with its muster 
Of flags festooned over the wall ; 
Of the candles that shed their soft lustre 
And tallow on head-dress and shawl ; 
Of the steps that we took to one fiddle ; 
Of the dress of my queer vis-d-vis ; 
And how I once went down the middle 
With the man that shot Sandy McGee ; 

Of the moon that was quietly sleeping 
On the hill, when the time came to go ; 
Of the few baby peaks that were peeping 
From under their bedclothes of snow ; 
Of that ride, — that to me was the rarest ; 
Of — the something you said at the gate : 
Ah, Joe, then I was n't an heiress 
To "the best-paying lead in the State." 

Well, well, it 's all past ; yet it 's funny 
To think, as I stood in the glare 
Of fashion and beauty and money. 
That I should be thinking, right there. 
Of some one who breasted high water, 
And swam the North Fork, and all that. 
Just to dance with old Folinsbee's daughter, 
The Lily of Poverty Flat. 

But goodness ! what nonsense I 'm writing ! 
(Mamma says my taste still is low,) 
Instead of my triumphs reciting, 
I 'ni spooning on Joseph, — heigh-ho ! 
And I 'ni to be " finished " by travel, 
Whatever 's the meaning of that, — 
0, why did papa strike pay gravel 
In drifting on Poverty Flat ? 

Good night, — here 's the end of my paper ; 
Good night, — if the longitude please, — 
For maybe, while wasting my taper, 
Yowr sun 's climbing over the trees. 



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200 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



But know, if you haven't got riches, 
And are poor, dearest Joe, and all that. 
That my heart 's somewhere there in the ditches, 
And you 've struck it, — on Poverty Flat. 

Bret Harte. 



WIDOW MACHEEE. 

Widow machree, it 's no Avonder you frown, — 

Och hone ! widow machree ; 
Faith, it ruins your looks, that same dirty black 
gown, — 
Och hone ! widow machree. 
How altered your air. 
With that close cap you wear, — 
'T is destroying your haii-, 

Which should be flowing free : 
Be no longer a churl 
Of its black silken curl, — 
Och hone ! widow machree. 

Widow machree, now the summer is come, — 

Och hone ! widow machree ; 
When everything smiles, should a beauty look 
glum ? 
Och hone ! widow machree ! 
See the birds go in pairs. 
And the rabbits and hares ; 
Why, even the bears 

Now in couples agree ; 
And the mute little fish, 
Though they can't spake, they wish, — 
Och hone ! widow machree ! 

AVidow- machree, and when winter comes in, — 

Och hone ! widow machree, — 
To be poking the fire all alone is a sin, 

Och hone ! widow machree ! 
Sure the shovel and tongs 
To each other belongs, 
And the kettle sings songs 

Full of family glee ; 
While alone with your cup 
Like a hermit you sup, 

Och hone ! widow machree ! 

And how do you know, with the comforts I 've 
towld, — 
Och hone ! widow machree, — 
But you 're keeping some poor fellow out in the 
cowld ? 
Och hone ! widow machree ! 
With such sins on your head. 
Sure your peace would be fled ; 
Could you sleep in your bed 

Without thinking to see 
Some ghost or some sprite. 
That would wake you each night, 

Crying " Och hone ! widow machree ! " 



Then take my advice, darling Avidow machree, — 

Och hone ! widow machree ! — 
And with my advice, faith, I wish you 'd take 
me, 
Och hone ! widow machree ! 
You 'd have me to desire 
Then to stir up the fire ; 
And sure hope is no liar 

In whispering to me 
That the ghosts would depart 
When you 'd me near your heart, — 
Och hone ! widow machree ! 

SAMUEL Lover. 



THE LAIED 0' COCKPEN. 

The laird o' Cockpen he 's proud and he 's great, 
His mind is ta'en up with the things o' the state ; 
He wanted a wife his braw house to keep, 
But favor wi' wooin' was fashions to seek. 

Doun by the dyke-side a lady did dwell. 
At his table-head he thought she 'd look well ; 
M'Clish's ae daughter o' Claverse-ha' Lee, 
A penniless lass wi' a lang pedigree. 

His wig was weel pouthered, and guid as when 

new ; 
His waistcoat was white, his coat it was blue ; 
He put on a ring, a sword, and cocked hat, — ■ 
And wha could refuse the Laird wi' a' that ? 

He took the gray mare, and rade cannilie, — 
And rapped at the yett o' Claverse-ha' Lee ; 
" Gae tell Mistress Jean to come speedily ben : 
She 's wanted to speak wi' the Laird o' Cockpen." 

Mistress Jean she was makin' the elder-flower 

wine ; 
" And what brings the Laird at sic a like time ? " 
She put aff' her apron, and on her silk gown. 
Her mutch wi' red ribbons, and gaed awa' down. 

And when she cam' ben, he boued fu' low. 
And what was his errand he soon let her know. 
Amazed was the Laird when the lady said, Na, 
And wi' a laigh curtsie she turned awa'. 

Dumfoundered he was, but nae sigh did he gi'e ; 
He mounted his mare, and rade cannilie. 
And aften he thought, as he gaed through the glen, 
"She 's daft to refuse the Laird o' Cockpen." 

And now that the Laird his exit had made. 
Mistress Jean she reflected on what she had said ; 
" 0, for ane I '11 get better, it 's waur I '11 get ten ; 
I was daft to refuse the Laird o' Cockpen." 



IB- 



W 



LOVE. 



201 



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Neist time that the Laird and the lady were seen, 
They were gaun arm and arm to the kirk on tlie 

green ; 
Now she sits in the ha' like a weel-tappit hen, 
But as yet there 's nae chickens appeared at 

Coekpen. 

Carolina Oliphant, Baro>:ess N'airne. 



THE FAITHFUL LOVERS. 

I 'd been away from her three years, — about 
that. 
And I returned to find my Mary true ; 
And though I 'd question her, 1 did not doubt 
that 
It was unnecessary so to do. 

'T was by the chimney-corner we were sitting : 
"Mary," said I, " have you been always true ?" 

"Frankly," says she, just pausing in her knit- 
ting, 
" I don't tliink I 've unfaithful been to you : 

But for the tln-ee years past I '11 tell you what 

I 've done ; then say if I 've been true or not. 

" When first you left my grief was uncontrollable; 

Alone I mourned my miserable lot ; 
And all who saw me thought me inconsolable. 

Till Captain Clifford came from Aldershott. 
To flirt Avith him amused me while 't was new : 
I don't count that unfaithfulness — do you ? 

"The next — oh! let me see — was Frankie 
Phipps ; 
I met him at my uncle's, Christmas-tide, 
And 'neath the mistletoe, where lips meet lips. 
He gave me his first kiss — " And here she 
sighed. 
"We stayed six weeks at uncle's — how time 

flow ! 
I don't count that unfaithfulness — do you ? 

"Lord Cecil Fossmore — only twenty-one — 

Lent me his horse. 0, liow vi-e rode and raced ! 
We scoured the downs — we rode to hounds — 
such fun ! 
And often was his arm about mj' waist, — 
That was to lift me up and down. But who 
Would call just that unfaithfulness '? Would 
you ? 

"Do you know P>eggy Vere ? All, how he sings ! 

We met, — 't was at a picnic. O, such weather ! 
He gave me, look, tlie first of these two rings 

When we were lost in Cliefden woods together. 
Ah, what a happj'^ time we spent, — we two ! 
I don't count that unfaithfidness to you. 



" I 've yet another ring from him ; d' ye see 
The plain gold circlet that is shining here ? " 

I took her hand : " Mary ! can it be 

That you — " Quoth she, "that I am Mrs. Vere. 

I don't call that unfaithfulness — do you ? " 

" No," I replied, " for I am married too." 



Ano.nvmous. 



COOKING AND COURTING. 



FROM TOM TO NED. 



Dear Ned, no doubt you '11 be surprised 

When you receive and read this letter. 
I 've railed against the marriage state ; 

But then, you see, I knew no better. 
I 've met a lovely girl out here ; 

Her manner is — well — very winning : 
We 're soon to be — well, Ned, my dear, 

I '11 tell you all, from the beginning. 

I went to ask her out to ride 

Last Wednesday — it was perfect weather. 
She said she could n't possibly : 

The servants had gone off together 
(Hibernians always rush away, 

At cousins' funerals to be looking) ; 
Pies must be made, and she must stay, 

She said, to do that branch of cooking. 

" 0, let me help you," then I cried : 

" I 'II be a cooker too — how jolly ! " 
She laughed, and answered, with a smile, 

" All right ! but you '11 repent your folly ; 
For I shall be a tyrant, sir. 

And good hard work you 'II have to grap'de 
So sit down there, and don't you stir. 

But take this knife, and pare that apple." 

She I'olled her sleeve above her ami, — 

That lovely arm, so plump and rounded ; 
Outside, the morning sun slione bright ; 

Inside, the dough she deftly pounded. 
Her little fingers sprinkled flour, 

And rolled the pie-crust up in masses : 
I passed the most delightful hour 

Mid butter, sugar, and molasses. 

With deep reflection her sweet eyes 

Gazed on each pot and pan and kettle : 
She sliced the apples, filled her pies, 

And then the upper crust did settle. 
Her rippling waves of golden hair 

In one great coil were tightly twisted ; 
But locks would break it, here and there. 

And curl about where'er they listed. 

And then her sleeve came down, and I 
Fastened it up — her hands were doughy ; 

0, it did take the longest time ! — 

Her arm. Nod, was so round and snowy. 



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— 202 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



She blushed, and trembled, and looked shy ; 

Somehow that made me all the bolder ; 
Her arch lips looked so red that I — 

"VVell — found her head upon my shoulder. 

We 're to be married, Ned, next montli ; 

Come and attend the wedding revels. 
1 really think that bachelors 

Are the most miserable devils ! 
You 'd better go for some girl's hand ; 

And if you are uncertain whether 
You dare to make a due demand, 

Why, just try cooking pies togetlier. 

A-NCNYMOUS. 



POSSESSION. 

A Poet loved a Star, 

And to it whisj^ered nightly, 

" Being so fair, why art thou, love, so far ? 

Or why so coldly shine, who shin'st so brightly ? 

Beauty wooed and unpossest ! 

0, might I to this beating breast 

But clasp thee once, and then die blest ! " 

That Star her Poet's love, 

So wildly warm, made human ; 

And leaving, for his sake, lier heaven above, 

His Star stooped earthward, and became a 

AVonian. 
" Thou who hast wooed and hast possest, 
My lover, answer : Wliich was best, 
The Star's beam or the Woman's breast ? " 
" I miss from heaven," the man replied, 
" A light that drew ray spirit to it." 
And to the man the woman sighed, 
" I miss from earth a poet." 

ROBERT BULWER, T.ORD LYTTON'. 
[Owen Maxdtth.) 



fa 



THE AGE OF WISDOM. 

Ho ! pretty page , with the dimpled chin. 
That never has known the barber's shear, 

All your wish is woman to win ; 

This is the way tliat boys begin, — 
Wait till you come to forty year. 

'Curly gold locks cover foolish brains ; 

Billing and cooing is all your cheer, — 
Sighing, and singing of midnight strains, 
iUnder BonnybeU's window-panes, — 

Wait till you come to forty year. 

Forty times over let Michaelmas pass ; 

Grizzling hair the brain doth clear ; 
Then you know a boy is an ass, 
Then you know the worth of a lass, — 

Once you have, come to forty year. 



Pledge me round ; I bid ye declare. 

All good fellows whose beards are gray, — 

Did not the fairest of the fair 

Common grow and wearisome ere 
Ever a month was past away ? 

The reddest lips that ever have kissed, 

The brightest eyes that ever have slione, 
May pray and whisper and we not list, 
Or look away and never be missed, — 
Ere yet ever a month is gone. 

Gillian 's dead ! God rest her bier, — 
How I loved her twenty years syne ! 

Marian 's married ; but I sit here, 

Alone and merry at forty year. 

Dipping my nose in the Gascon wine. 

WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 



THE FIRE OF LOVE. 

FROM THE " EXAMEN MISCELLANEUM," 



1708. 



TriE fire of love in youthful blood. 
Like what is kindled in brushwood, 

But for a moment burns ; 
Yet in that moment makes a mighty noise ; 
It crackles, and to vajior turns. 

And soon itself destroys. 

But when crept into aged veins 

It slowly burns, and then long remains, 

And with a silent heat. 
Like fire in logs, it glows and warms 'em long ; 
And though the flame be not so great. 

Yet is the heat as strong. 

Charles sackville, izarl of Dorset. 



LOVE. 



FROM THE "LAY OF THE LAST TiIINSTREL, ' CANTO UI. 

And said I that my limbs were old. 
And said I that my blood was cold. 
And that my kindly fire was fled. 
And my poor withered heart was dead. 

And that I might not sing of love ? — 
How could I, to the dearest theme 
That ever v/armed a minstrel's dream, 

So foul, so false a recreant prove ! 
How could I name love's very name, 
Nor wake my heart to notes of flame ! 

In peace. Love tunes the shepherd's reed ; 
In war, he mounts the warrior's steed ; 
In halls, in gay attire is seen ; 
In hamlets, dances on the green. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



203 



r^ 



Love rules tlie court, the camp, the grove, 
Aud men below, and saints above ; 
For love is heaven, and heaven is love. 

True love 's the gift which God has given 
To man alone beneath the heaven ; 
It is not fantasy's hot fire, 

Whose wishes, soon as granted, fly ; 
It liveth not in fierce desire. 

With dead desire it doth not die ; 
It is the secret sympathy. 
The silver link, the silken tie, 
AVhich heart to heart, and mind to mind. 
In body and in soul can bind. 

Sir Walter Scott. 



FRAGMENTS. 

Power of Love and Beauty. 

Love, like death, 
Levels all ranks, and lays the shepherd's crook 
Beside the sceptre. 

/.ntiy of Lyons. E. BULWER-LVTTOM. 

Didst thou but know the inly touch of love. 
Thou wouldst as soon go kindle fire with snow, 
As seek to quench the fire of love with words. 

Two Gentlemen of Verona. Act ii. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE, 

Thy fatal shafts unerring move, 
I bow before thine altar, Love ! 

Roderick Random, Ch. xl. T. S510LLETT. 

Alas ! the love of women ! it is known 
To be a lovely and a fearful thing. 

Don Juan, Cant. ii. BYRON. 

Mightier far 
Than strength of nerve or sinew, or the sway 
Of magic potent over sun and star. 
Is love, though oft to agony distrest. 
And though his favorite seat be feeble woman's 
breast. 

Laodai?iia. WORDSWORTH. 

There's a bliss beyond all that the minstrel has 
told. 
When two, that are linked in one heavenly tie, 
With heart never changing, and brow never cold. 
Love on through all ills, and love on till they 
die! 
One hour of a passion so sacred is worth 

Whole ages of heartless and wandering bliss ; 
And 0, if there be an Elysium on earth. 
It is this, it is this. 

Lalla Rookk: Light of the Harem. MOORE. 



Those curious locks so aptly twined 
Whose every hair a soul doth bind. 

Think not'cause men flattering say. T. CAREW. 

To sport with Amaryllis in the shade. 
Or with the tangles of Netera's hair. 

I-ycidas. Ml ETON. 

And beauty draws us -with a single hair. 

Rape of the Lock. Cant. ii. POPE. 

Lie ten nights awake, carving the fashion of a 
new doublet. 

Much Ado about Nothing. Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Still harping on my daughter. 

Hamlet. Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

This is the very ecstasy of love. 

Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 

The light that lies 
In woman's eyes. 

The time I've lost. MOORE. 

It adds a precious seeing to the ej^e. 

Lcne's Labor Lost. Act iv. iV. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

With a smile that glowed 
Celestial rosy red, love's proper hue. 

Paradise Lost. Book viii. Ml ETON. 

Hung over her enamored, and beheld 
Beauty, which, whether waking or asleep, 
Shot forth peculiar graces. 

Paradise I^ost, Book v. Ml ETON. 



Love's Blindness. 

Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, 
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind. 

Midsummer Night's Dream, Acti. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

None ever loved but at first sight they loved. 

Blind Beggar of Alexandria. GEO. CHAPMAN. 

Who ever loved that loved not at first sight ? 

Hero and /,eander. C. MARLOWE. 

But love is blind, and lovers cannot see 
The pretty follies that themselves commit. 

Merchant of I'enice, Act ii. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE. 

Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soxil. 

Rape of the Lock. Cant. v. PoPH. 

Our souls sit close and silently within. 
And their own web i'rom their own entrails s})in ; 
And when eyes meet far off, our sense is such. 
That, spider-like, we feel the tenderest touch. 

Mariage a la Mode, Act ii. Sc. I. DRYDEN. 



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204 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



--a 



Love's Pains. 

A mighty pain to love it is, 
And 't is a pain that pain to miss ; 
But of all pains, the greatest pain 
It is to love, but love in vain. 



: A. COWLEY. 



The sweetest joy, the wildest woe is love ; 
The taint of earth, the odor of the skies 
Is in it. 

Fesliis. P- J- BAILEY. 

Chords that vibrate sweetest pleasure 
Thrill the deepest notes of woe. 

On Sensibility. BURNS. 

Fantastic tyrant of the amorous heart, 
How hard thy yoke ! how cruel is thy dart ! 
Those 'scape thy anger who refuse thy sway, 
And those are punished most who most obey. 

Solomon. M. PRIOR. 

To be in love where scorn is bought with groans ; 
Coy looks, with heart-sore sighs; one fading 

moment's mirth. 
With twenty watchful, weary, tedious nights : 
If haply won, perhaps a hapless gain'; 
If lost, why then a grievous labor won. 

Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPE.'iRE. 

Love is like a landscape which doth stand 
Smooth at a distance, rough at hand. 

On Love. R. HeGGK. 

Vows with so much passion, swears with so much 

grace, 
That 't is a kind of heaven to be deluded by him. 

Alexander the Great, Act i. Sc. 3. N. LEE. 

To love you was pleasant enough, 
And 0, 't is delicious to hate you ! 

To MOORE. 



Sunshine and rain at once. 

King Lear, Act iv. Sc. 3. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Smiles from reason flow. 
To brute denied, and are of love the food. 

Paradise Lost, Book ix. MILTON. 

The rose is fairest when 't is budding new. 

And ho]ie is brightest when it dawns from fears. 

The rose is sweetest washed with morning dew. 
And love is loveliest when embalmed in tears. 

Lady o/the Lake, Cant. iv. SCOTT. 



Sighs, Tears, and Smiles. 

To love. 
It is to be all made of sighs and tears. 

As Yon Like It, Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

The world was sad, — the garden was a wild ; 
And Man, the hermit, sighed — till Woman 
smiled. 

Pleasures of Hope, Part i. T. CAMPBELL. 

O father, what a hell of witchcraft lies 
In the small orb of one particular tear! 

A Lovers Complaint, St. xlii. SHAKESPEARE. 



Sighed and looked unutterable things. 



77?^ Seasons : Summer. 



Shyness of Love. 

Silence in love bewrays more woe 
Tlian words, though ne'er so witty; 

A beggar that is dumb, you know, 
May challenge double pity. 

The Silent Lo-oer. SIR W. RALEIGH. 

Read it, sweet maid, though it be done but slightly: 
Who can show all his love doth love but lightly. 

Sonnet. S. DANIEL. 

I never tempted her with word too large ; 
But, as a brother to his sister, .showed 
Bashful .sincerit}', and comely love. 

Mtuh Ado about Nothing, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Arts of Love. 

Of all the paths lead to a woman's love 
Pity 's the straightest. 

Knight 0/ Malta, Act i. Sc. i. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER. 

So mourned the dame of Ephesus her love ; 
And thus the soldier, armed with resolution. 
Told his soft tale, and was a thriving wooer. 

Richard III. (Altered), Act ii. Sc. i. COLLEY ClEEER. 

The Devil hath not, in all his quiver's choice, 
An arrow for the heart like a sweet voice. 

Doti Juan, Cant. xv. BYRON. 

Love first invented verse, and formed the rhyme, 
The motion measured, harmonized the chime. 

Cymon a7id Iphigenia. DRVDEN. 

Pleased me, long choosing and beginning late. 

Paradise Lost, Book ix. MILTON. 

None without hope e'er loved the brightest fair, 
But love can hope where reason would despair. 

Epigram. GEORGE, LORD LYTTELTON. 



Idle Love. 

IMy only books 
Were woman's looks, 
And folly 's all they 've taught me. 

The time I '-ve lost. 



I&- 



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FRAGMENTS. 



20 



Tn 



Love ill your liearts as idly burns 
As fire in antique Eomau urns. 

Hiidibras, Part ii. Catit. i. BUTLER. 

Love sought is good, but given unsought is better. 

r-wdfth jVisht, Act ii. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 



Discriminating Love. 

The rose tliat all are praising 

Is not th(! rose for me ; 
Too many eyes are gazing 
Upon the costly tree ; 
But there 's a rose in yonder glen 
That shuns the gaze of other men, 
For me its blossom raising, — 
0, that 's the rose for me. 

The rose tliat all are praisin,^. T. H. BAYLY. 

But the fruit that can fall without shaking. 
Indeed is too mellow for me. 

The Answer. LADY MARY W. MONTAGU. 

Love in a hut, with water and a crust, 

Is — Lord forgive us ! — cinders, ashes, dust. 

Lamia. KEATS. 

The cold in clime are cold in blood. 
Their love can scarce deserve the name. 

The Giaour. BYRON. 



I O Love ! O fire ! once he drew 
With one long kiss my whole soul through 
Jly lips, as sunlight drinketh dew. 

Fatiina. TENNYSON. 

A long, long kiss, a kiss of youth and love. 

Don yuan. Cant. ii. BYRON. 

O'er her warm cheek, and rising bosom, move 
The bloom of young Desire and purple light of 
Love. 

Progress 0/ Poesy, i. 3. T. GRAY. 

Still amorous, and fond, and billing. 
Like Philip and Mary on a shilling. 

Hndibras, Part. iii. Cant. i. BUTLER. 

And dallies with the innocence of love. 

T-welflh Night. Act ii. Sc, 4- SHAKESPEARE. 

And, touched by her fair tendance, gladlier grew. 

Paradise Lost, Book viii. MILTON. 

Why, she would hang on him, 
As if increase of appetite had grown 
By what it fed on. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Imparadised in one another's arms. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON. 



Love's Dangers. 

And when once the young heart of a maiden is 
stolen. 
The maiden herself will steal after it soon. 

Ill Omens, MOORE. 

And whispering, " I will ne'er consent," ■ — con- 
sented. 

Don yuan. Cant. i. BYRON. 

The fly that sips treacle is lost in the sweets. 

's opera. Act ii. 5r. 2. J. GAY. 



Then fly betimes, for only they 
Conciuer Love, that run away. 

Conquest by Flight. 



B- 



The Sweets of Love. 

Then awake ! — the heavens look bright, my 

dear ! 
'T is never too late for delight, my dear ! 

And the best of all ways 

To lengthen our days, 
Is to steal a few hours from the night, my dear ! 

Young May Moon. MoORE. 

Lovers' hours are long, though seeming short. 

Venus and Adonis. SHAKESPEARE. 



MuTiTAL Love. 

Two souls with but a single thought. 
Two hearts that beat as one. 

Ingomar the Barbarian, Act ii. MARIA LOVELL. 

Ferd. Here 's my hand. 

MiiiAN. And mine, with my heart in 't. 

Tempest, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

What 's mine is yours, and what is yours is mine. 

Measure for Measure, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Drink ye to her that each loves best. 

And if you nurse a flame 
That 's told but to her mutual breast, 

We will not ask her name. 

Drink ye to her. CAMPBELL. 

Forever, Fortune, wilt thou prove 

An unrelenting foe to love ; 
And, when we meet a mutual heart. 

Come in between and bid us ]3art ? 

Song. Thomson. 

And you must love him, ere to you 
He will seem worthy of your love. 



A Poet's Epitaph. 



WORDSWORTH. 



Ye gods ! annihilate but space and time, 
And make two lovers happy. 

Martinus Scriblerus on the Art oj Sinking 



Poetry, Ch, xi. 
POPE. 



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206 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



-n 



Sweet to entrance 
The raptured soul by intermingling glance. 

Psyche. MRS. TiGHE. 

True iDeauty dwells in deep retreats, 

Whose veil is unremoved 
Till heart with heart in concord beats. 

And the lover is beloved. 

7> . WORDSWORTH. 

that the desert were my dwelling-place, 
With one fair Spirit for my minister, 
That I might all forget the human race, 
And, hating no one, love but only her ! 

C/uMe Harold, Caid. iv. BYRON. 

With thee, all toils are sweet ; each clime hath 

charms ; 
Earth — sea alike — our world within our arms. 

The Bride of Abydos. BYRON. 



True Love. 

Love is a celestial harmony 
Of likely hearts. 

Hy7nn in Honor of Beauty. SPENSER. 

The Gods approve 
The depth, and not the tumult, of the soul ; 
A fervent, not ungovernable, love. 
Thy transports moderate. 

Laodamia. WORDSWORTH. 

In his deportment, shape, and mien appeared 
Elysian beauty, melancholy grace. 
Brought from a pensive, though a happy place. 
He spake of love, such love as Spirits feel 
In worlds whose course is equable and pure ; 
No fears to beat away, — no strife to heal, — 
The past unsighed for, and the future sure. 

Laodamia. WORDSWORTH. 

There 's beggai-y in the love that can be reckoned. 

Antojiy and Cieo;pat7-a, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESl'EARE. 

Forty thousand brothers 
Could not, with all their quantity of love, 
Make up my sum. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Tender Affection. ' 

So loving to my mother, 
That he might not beteem the winds of heaven 
Visit her face too roughly. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE. 



Dear as the vital warmth that feeds my life ; 
Dear as these eyes, that weep iu fondness o'er 
thee. 

Venice Prese>-ved, Act v. Sc. i. T. Otway. 

Dear as the light that visits these sad eyes ; 
Dear as the ruddy drops that warm my heart. 

Tlie Bard, i. 3. T. Gra%-. 

As dear to me as are the ruddy drops 
That visit my sad heart. 



Jnliits Ccesar, Act ii. Sc. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



With thee conversing I forget all time ; 

All seasons and their change, all please alike. 

But neither breath of morn when she ascends 
With charm of earliest birds, nor rising sun 
On this delightful land, nor herb, fruit, flower. 
Glistering witli dew, nor fragrance after showers, 
Nor grateful evening mild, nor silent night 
With this her solemn bird, nor walk bj^ moon. 
Or glittering starlight, without thee is sweet. 

Paradise Lost, Booiix. MiLTON. 



CON.STANCY. 

All love is sweet, 
Given or returned. Common as light is love, 
And its familiar voice wearies not ever. 

Prometheus Unbound, Act ii. Sc. 5. SHELLEY. 

Love is indestructible : 
Its holy flame forever burnetii ; 
From Heaven it came, to Heaven returneth ; 

It soweth here with toil and care, 
But the harvest-time of Love is there. 



Citrse of Kchama, Cant, x. 



R. SOUTHEY. 



They sin who tell us Love can die : 
With Life all other passions fly, 
All others are but vanity. 

Curse of Kchaina, Cant. x. R. 

Doubt thou the stars are fire. 
Doubt that the sun doth move ; 

Doubt truth to be a liar. 
But never doubt I love. 



Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



When love begins to sicken and decay. 

It useth an enforced ceremony. 

There are no tricks in plain and simjile faith. 

Juhtis Casar, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

She hugged the off"ender, and foi-gave the ofi'ence. 
Sex to the last. 

Cymon and Iphiscnia. Dkyden 



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FRAGMENTS. 



207 



rfl] 



Lightly thou say'st that woman's love is false, 
The thought is falser far. 

Bertram. R. MATURIN. 

You say to me-wards your affection 's strong ; 
Pray love me little, so you love me long. 

Love me littk, love me long. R. HeRRICK. 

Let tliose love now who never loved before. 
Let those who always loved now love the more. 

Pcrvisilium Veneris. T. PARNELL. 



Inconstancy and Jealousy. 

All love may be expelled by other love 
As poisons are by poisons. 

All/or Love. DryDEN. 



Frailty, thy name is woman 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Ham. Is this a prologue, or the ])osy of a ring ? 
Oph. 'T is brief, my lord. 
Ham. As woman's love. 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



A little month. 

Hamlet, Act\. Sc. 2. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Framed to make women false. 

Othello, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

To beguile many, and be beguiled by one. 

Othello, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

The lady doth protest too much, methinks. 

Hamlet, Actm. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

0, swear not by the moon, the inconstant moon. 
That monthly changes in her circled orb, 
Lest that thy love prove likewise variable. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

0, beware, my lord, of jealousy ; 
It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock 
The meat it feeds on. 

Othello, Act\\\. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

To be once in doubt. 
Is once to be resolved. 



Othello, Act iii. Sc. 3. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



That we can call these delicate creatures ours, 
And not their ajjpetites ! 

Othello, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

But, 0, what damned minutes tells he o'er,. 
Who dotes, yet doubts ; suspects, yet strongly 
loves ! 

Othello, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Trifles, light as air. 
Are to the jealous confirmations strong 
As proofs of holy writ. 

Othello, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

With groundless fear he thus his soul deceives : 
What phrenzy dictates, jealousy believes. 

Dione. J. GAY. 

At lovers' perjuries. 
They say, Jove laughs. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Fool, not to know that love endures no tie, 
And Jove but laughs at lovers' perjurJ^ 

PaliUnon a7id Arcite, Book ii. DRYDEN, 

Nor jealousy 
Was understood, the injured lover's hell. 

Paradise Lost, Boole v. MILTON. 

Good heaven, the souls of all mj^ tribe defend 
Fi'om jealousy ! 

Othello, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, 
Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned. 

The Mourning Bride, Act iii. Sc. 8. W. CONGREVE. 

Who love too much hate in the like extreme. 

Homer's Odyssey. POPE. 

They that do change old love for new, 
Pray gods, they change for worse ! 

The Arraiginne^it 0/ Paris : Cupid's Curse, G. PeELE. 



Possession. 

I die^ — but first I have possessed, 
And come what may, I have been blest. 

The Giaotir. BYRON. 



1 've lived and loved. 

U'aUcnstein, Part i. Act ii. Sc. 6. 



S. T. COLERIDGE. 



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208 



POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS. 



t] 



MAREIAGE. 



SONNET. 

Let me not to the marriage of true minds 

Admit impediments : love is not love, 

AVhich alters when it alteration finds, 

Or bends with the remover to remove ; 

0, no ! it is an ever-fixed mark, 

That looks on tempests, and is never shaken ; 

It is the star to every wandering bark, 

"Whose Avorth 's unknown, although his height be 

taken. 
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and 

cheeks 
Within his bending sickle's compass come ; 
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 
But bears it out even to the edge of doom. 
If this be error, and upon me proved, 
I never writ, nor no man ever loved. 

SHAKESPEARE, 



LOVE. 



[& 



There are who say the lover's heart 

Is in the loved one's merged ; 
0, never by love's own warm art 

So cold a plea was urged ! 
No ! — hearts that love hath crowned or crossed 

Love fondly knits together ; 
But not a thought or hue is lost 

That made a part of either. 



It is an ill-told tale that tells 

Of "hearts by love made one ; " 
He grows who near another's dwells 

More conscious of his own ; 
In each spring up new thoughts and powers 

That, mid love's warm, clear weather. 
Together tend like climbing flowers, 

And, turning, grow together. 



Such fictions blink love's better part, 

Yield up its half of bliss ; 
The wells are in the neighbor heart 

When there is thirst in this : 
There findeth love the passion-flowers 

On wliich it learns to thrive, 
Makes honey in another's bowers, 

But brings it home to hive. 



Love's life is in its own replies, — 

To each low beat it beats, 
Smiles back the smiles, sighs back the sighs, 

And every throb repeats. 
Then, since one loving heart still throws 

Two shadows in love's sun. 
How should two loving hearts compose 

And mingle into one ? 

Thomas Kibble Hervey. 



THOU HAST SWORN BY THY GOD, MY 
JEANIE. 

Thou hast sworn by thy God, my Jeanie, 

By that pretty white hand o' thine. 
And by a' the lowing stars in heaven. 

That thou wad aye be mine ! 
And I hae sworn by my God, my Jeanie, 

And by that kind heart o' thine, 
By a' the stars sown thick owre heaven, 

That thou shalt aye be mine ! 

Then foul fa' the hands that wad loose sic bands, 

And the heart that wad part sic luve ! 
But there 's nae hand can loose the band, 

But the finger o' God abuve. 
Though the wee, wee cot maun be my bield. 

An' my claithing ne'er sae mean, 
I wad lap me up rich i' the faulds o' luve, — 

Heaven's armfu' o' my Jean ! 

Her white arm wad be a pillow to me, 

Fu' safter than the down ; 
An' Luve wad winnow owre us his kind, kind 
wings, 

An' sweetly I 'd sleep, an' soun'. 
Come here to me, thou lass o' my luve ! 

Come here and kneel wi' me ! 
The morn is fu' o' the presence o' God, 

An' I canna pray without thee. 

The morn-wind is sweet 'mang the beds o' new 

flowers. 

The wee birds sing kindlie an' hie ; 

Our gudeman leans owre his kail-yard dike. 

And a blythe auld bodie is he. 

The Book maun be ta'en whan the carle comes 

hame, 

Wi' the holie psalmodie ; 

And thou maun speak o' me to thy God, 

And I will speak o' thee. 

Allan Cunnln'cham. 



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MARRIAGE. 



209 



^ 



ADAM DESCRIBING EVE. 

FROM "P.\RADISE LOST," KOOK VIII. 

SIiNE eyes he closed, but open left the cell 
Of fancy, my internal sight, by which 
Abstract, as in a trance, luethought I saw. 
Though sleeping, where I lay, and saw the shape 
Still glorious before whom awake I stood ; 
AVho, stooping, opened my left side, and took 
From thence a rib, with cordial spirits warm, 
And life-blood streaming fresh ; wide was the 

wound. 
But suddenly with flesh filled up and healed : 
The rib he formed and fashioned with liis hands ; 
Under liis forming hands a creature grew, 
Manlike, but different sex, so lovely fair, 
That what seemed fair in all the world seemed 

now 
Slean, or in lier summed up, in her contained 
And in her looks, which from that time infused 
Sweetness into my heart, unfelt before. 
And into all tilings from her air inspired 
The spirit of love antl amorous delight. 
She disappeared, and left me dark ; I waked 
To find her, or forever to deplore 
Her loss, and other j^leasures all abjure : 
When out of hope, behold her, not far off. 
Such as I saw her in m}'' dream, adorned 
With what all earth or Heaven could bestow 
To make her amiable. On she came. 
Led by her heavenly Maker, though unseen, 
And guided by his voice, nor uninformed 
Of nuptial sanctity and marriage rites : 
Grace was in all her steps. Heaven in her eye, 
In every gesture dignity and love. 
I, overjoyed, could not forbear aloud : 

"This turn hath made amends; thou hast 

fulfilled 
Thy words. Creator bounteous and benign, 
Giver of all things fair, but fairest this 
Of all thy gifts, nor enviest. I now see 
Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, myself 
Before me ; Woman is her name, of man 
Extracted : for this cause he shall forego 
Father and mother, and to his wife adhere ; 
And they shall be onellesh, one lieart, one soul." 
She heard me thus, and though divinely 

brought. 
Yet innocence and virgin modesty, 
Her virtue and the conscience of her worth. 
That would be wooed, and not unsought be won, 
Not obvious, not obtrusive, but retired. 
The more desirable ; or, to say all, 
Nature herself, though pure of sinful thought. 
Wrought in her so, that, seeing me, she turned ; 
I followed her ; she what was honor knew, 
And with obsequious majesty approved 
My pleaded reason. To the nuptial bovver 



I led her blushing like the morn : all Heaven, 
And ha[)py constellations on that hour 
Shed their selectest influence ; the earth 
Gave sign of gratulation, and each hill ; 
Joyous the birds ; fresh gales and gentle airs 
Whispered it to the woods, and from their wings 
Flung rose, flung odors from the spicy shrub. 
Disporting, till the amorous bird of night 
Sung spousal, and bid haste the evening star 
On his hill-top, to light the bridal lamp. 

When I approach 
Her loveliness, so absolute she seems, 
And in herself complete, so well to know 
Her own, that what she wills to do or say 
Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best ; 
All higher knowledge in her presence falls 
Degraded, wisdom in discourse with her 
Loses discountenanced, and like folly shows ; 
Authority and reason on lier wait. 
As one intended first, not after made 
Occasionally ; and, to consummate all, 
Cireatness of mind and nobleness their seat 
Build in her loveliest, and create an awe 
About her, as a guard angelic placed. 

Neither her outside formed so fair, nor a.ught 

So much delights me, as those graceful acts, 
Those thousand decencies that daily flow 
From all her words and actions, mixed with love 
And sweet compliance, which declare unfeigned 
Union of mind, or in us both one soul ; 
Harmony to behold in wedded pair 
More grateful than harmonious sound to the ear. 

Milton. 



TO A LADY BEFORE MARRIAGE. 

0, FORMED by Nature, and refined by Ai-t, 
With charms to win, and sense to fix the heart ! 
By thousands sought, Clotilda, canst thou free 
Thy crowd of captives and descend to me ? 
Content in shades obscure to waste thy life, 
A hidden beauty and a country wife ? 
0, listen while thy summers are my theme ! 
Ah ! soothe thy partner in his waking dream ! 
In some small hamlet on the lonely plain, 
Where Thames through meadows rolls his mazy 

train. 
Or where high Windsor, thick with greens ar- 
rayed, 
Waves his old oaks, and spreads his ample shade. 
Fancy has figured out our calm retreat ; 
Already round the visionary seat 
Our limes begin to shoot, our flowers to spring. 
The broolcs to murmur, and the birds to sing. 



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210 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



"^ 



AVherc dost thou lie, thou thmly peopled green, 
Thou nameless lawn, and village j^et unseen, 
Where sons, contented with their native ground, 
Ne'er travelled further than ten furlongs round, 
And the tanned peasant and his ruddy bride 
Were born together, and togetlier died, 
AVhere early larks best tell the morning light, 
And only Philomel disturbs the night ? 
Midst gardens here my humble pile shall rise. 
With sweets surrounded of ten thousand dyes ; 
All savage where the embroidered gardens end, 
The haunt of echoes, sliall my woods ascend ; 
And oh ! if Heaven the ambitious thought ap- 
prove, 
A rill shall warble 'cross the gloomy grove, — 
A little rill, o'er pebbly beds conveyed. 
Gush down the steep, and glitter through the 

glade. 
What cheering scents these bordering banks ex- 
hale ! 
How loud that heifer lows from yonder vale ! 
That thrush how shrill ! his note so clear, so 

high. 
He drowns each feathered minstrel of the sky. 
Here let me trace beneath the purpled morn 
The deep-mouthed beagle and the sprightly horn. 
Or lure the trout with well-dissembled flies, 
Or fetch the fluttering partridge from the skies. 
Nor shall thy hand disdain to crop the vine. 
The downy peach, or flavored nectarine ; 
Or rob the beehive of its golden hoard. 
And bear the unbought luxuriance to thy board. 
Sometimes my books by day shall kill the hours. 
While from thy needle rise the silken flowers. 
And thou, ])y turns, to ease my feeble sight, 
Pesumc the volume, and deceive the night. 
0, when I mark thy twinkling eyes oppi'est. 
Soft whispering, let me warn my love to rest ; 
Then watch thee, charmed, while sleep locks 

every sense, 
And to sweet Heaven commend thy innocence. 
Thus reigned our fathers o'er the rural fold, 
Wise, hale, and honest, in the days of old ; 
Till courts arose, where substance pays for show, 
And specious joys are bought with real woe. 

Thomas Tickell. 



U 



THE NIGHT BEFORE THE WEDDING 
OR, TEN YEARS AFTER. 

The country ways are full of mire, 

The boughs toss in the fading light, 
The winds blow out the sunset's fire, 

And sudden droppeth down the night. 
I sit in this familiar room, 

Whei'e mud-splashed hunting squires resort ; 
My sole companion in the gloom 

This slowly dying pint of port. 



'Mong all the joys my soul hath known, 

'Mong errors over which it grieves, 
I sit at this dark hour alone, 

Like Autumn mid his withered leaves. 
This is a night of wild farewells 

To all the past, the good, the fair ; 
To-morrow, and my wedding bells 

Will make a music in the air. 

Like a wet fisher tempest-tost, 

Who sees throughout the weltering nigbt 
Afar on some low-lying coast 

The streaming of a rainy light, 
I saw this hour, — and now 't is come ; 

The rooms are lit, the feast is set ; 
Within the twilight 1 am dumb, 

My heart filled with a vague regret. 

I cannot say, in Eastern style, 

Where'er she treads the pansy blows ; 
Nor call her eyes twin stars, her smile 

A sunbeam, and her mouth a rose. 
Nor can I, as your bridegrooms do, 

Talk of my raptures. 0, how sore 
The fond romance of twenty-two 

Is parodied ere thirty-four ! 

To-night I shake hands with the past, — 

Familiar years, adieu, adieu ! 
An unknown door is open cast, 

An empty future wide and new 
Stands waiting. ye naked rooms. 

Void, desolate, without a charm! 
Will Love's smile chase your lonely glooms, 

And drape your walls, and make them warm ? 

The man who knew, while he was young, 

Some soft and soul-subduing air, 
Melts when again he hears it sung, 

Although 't is only half so fair. 
So I love thee, and love is sweet 

(My Florence, 't is the cruel truth) 
Because it can to age repeat 

That long-lost passion of my youth. 

0, often did my spirit melt, 

Blurred letters, o'er your artless rhymes ! 
Fair tress, in which the sunshine dwelt, 

I 've kissed thee many a million times ! 
And now 't is done. — My passionate tears, 

Mad pleadings with an iron fate, 
And all the sweetness of my years, 

Are blackened ashes in the grate. 

Then ring in the wind, my wedding chimes ; 

Smile, villagers, at every door ; 
Old churchyard, stuHed with buried crimes, 

Be clad in sunshine o'er and o'er ; 



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MARRIAGE. 



211 



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And youthful maidens, white and sweet, 
Scatter your blossoms far and wide ; 

And with a bridal' chorus greet 

This happy bridegroom and his bride. 

"This happy bridegroom !" there is sin 

At bottom of my thankless mood : 
What if desert alone could win 

For me life's chiefest grace and good? 
Love gives itself ; and if not given, 

No genius, beauty, state or wit, 
No gold of earth, no gem of heaven. 

Is rich enough to purchase it. 

It may be, Florence, loving thee, 

My heart will its old memories keep ; 
Like some worn sea-shell from the sea. 

Filled with the music of the deep. • 
And you may watch, on nights of rain, 

A shadow on my brow encroach ; 
Be startled by my sudden pain. 

And tenderness of self-reproach. 

It may be that your loving wiles 

Will call a sigh from far-otf years ; 
It may be that your happiest smiles 

Will brim my eyes with hopeless tears ; 
It may be that my sleeping breath 

Will shake, with painful visions wrung ; 
And, in the awful trance of death, 

A stranger's name be on my tongue. 

Ye phantoms, born of bitter blood. 

Ye ghosts of passion, lean and worn, 
Ye terrors of a lonely mood. 

What do ye here on a wedding-morn ? 
For, as the dawning sweet and fast 

Through all the heaven spreads and Hows, 
Within life's discord, rude and vast. 

Love's subtle music grows and grows. 

And lightened is the heavy curse, 

And clearer is the weaiy road ; 
The very worm the sea- weeds nurse 

Is cared for by the Etei'ual God. 
My love, pale blossom of the snow. 

Has i)ierced earth wet with wintry showers, 
may it drink the sun, and blow, 

And be followed by all the year of flowers ! 

Black Bayard from the stable bring ; 

The rain is o'er, the wind is down. 
Round stirring farms the birds will sing, 

The dawn stand in the sleeping town, 
Within an hour. This is her gate. 

Her sodden roses droop in night. 
And — emblem of my happy fate — 

In one dear window tliere is light. 



The dawn is oozing pale and cold 

Through the damp east for niany a mile ; 
When half my tale of life is told, 

Grim-featured Time begins to smile. 
Last star of night that lingerest yet 

In that long rift of rainy gray. 
Gather thy wasted splendors, set. 

And die into my wedding day. 

ALEXANDER SMITH. 



THE BRIDE. 

FROM "A BALLAD UPON A WEDDING." 

The maid, and thereby hangs a tale, 
For such a maid no Whitsun-ale 

Could ever yet produce : 
No grape that 's kiudly ripe could be 
So round, so plumj], so soft as she, 

Nor half so full of juice. 

Her finger was so small, the ring 

Would not stay on which they did bring, — 

It was too wide a peck ; 
And, to say truth, — for out it must, — 
It looked like the great collar — just — • 

About our young colt's ueck. 

Her feet beneath her petticoat. 
Like little mice, stole in and out. 

As if they feared the light ; 
But 0, she dances such a way ! 
No sun upon an Easter-day 

Is half so fine a sight. 

Her cheeks so rare a white was on, 
No daisy makes comparison ; 

Who sees them is undone ; 
For streaks of red were mingled tliere. 
Such as are on a Katherine pear, 

The side that 's next the sun. 

Her lips were red ; and one was thin, 
Compared to that was next her chin. 

Some bee had stung it newly ; 
But, Dick, her eyes so guard her face, 
I durst no more upon them gaze. 

Than on the sun in July. 

Her mouth so small, when she does speak, 
Thou 'dst swear her teeth her words did break, 

That they might passage get ; 
But she so handled still the matter. 
They came as good as ours, or better, 

And are not spent a whit. 



Sir John suckling 



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POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS. 



^a 



THE BRIDE. 



FROM " THE EPITHALAJIION.' 



LoE ! where she comes along with portly pace, 

Lyke Phcebe, from her chamber of the East, 

Arysing forth to nui her mighty race, 

Clad all in white, that seems a virgin best. 

So well it her beseems, that ye would weene 

Some angell she had beene. 

Her long loose yellow locks lyke golden wyrc, 

Sprinckled with perle, and perling tlowres atweene, 

Doe lyke a golden mantle her attyre. 

And, being crowned with a girland greene. 

Seem lyke some mayden ciueene. 

Her modest eyes, abashed to behold 

So many gazers as on her do stare, 

Upon the lowly ground affixed are, 

Ne dare lift up her countenance too bold, 

But blush to heare her prayses sung so loud, — 

So farre from being proud. 

Nathlesse doe ye still loud her prayses sing, 

That all the woods may answer, and your eecho 



Tell me, ye merchants daughters, did ye see 

So fayre a creature in your towne before ; 

So sweet, so lovely, and so nuld as she, 

Adornd with beautyes grace and vertnes store ? 

Her goodly eyes lyke saphyres shining bright. 

Her forehead yvory white. 

Her cheekes lyke apples which the sun hath 

rudded. 
Her lips lylie cherries, charming men to byte, 
Her brest lyke to a bowl of creame uncrudded, 
Her paps lyke lyllies budded, 
Her snowie necke lyke to a marble towre, 
And all her body like a pallace fayre. 
Ascending up, with many a stately stayre. 
To honors seat and chastities sweet bowre. 
Why stand ye still, ye virgins, in amaze. 
Upon her so to gaze, 

"Whiles ye forget your former lay to sing. 
To which the woods did answer, and your eccho 

ring ? 

Edmund Spenser. 



IB- 



HEBREW WEDDING. 

FROM "THE FALL OF JERUSALEM." 

To the sound of timbrels sweet 
Moving slow our solemn feet. 
We have borne thee on the road 
To the virgin's blest abode ; 
With thy yellow torches gleaming. 
And thy scarlet mantle streamuig, 
And the canopy above 
Swaying as we slowly move. 



Thou hast left the joyous feast, 
And the mirth and wine have ceased ; 
And now we set thee down before 
The jealously unclosing door. 
That the favored youth admits 
Where the veiled virgin sits 
In the bliss of maiden fear. 
Waiting our soft tread to hear, 
And the music's brisker din 
At the bridegroom's entering in. 
Entering in, a welcome guest, 
To the chamber of his rest. 



CHORUS OF MAIDENS. 

Now the jo(;und song is thine. 

Bride of David's kingly line ; 

How thy dove-like bosom trembleth, 

And thy shrouded eye resembleth 

Violets, when the dews of eve 

A moist and tremulous glitter leave 

On the bashful sealed lid ! 
Close within the bride- veil hid, 
Motionless thou sitt'st and mute ; 
Save that at the soft salute 
Of each entering maiden friend, 
Thou dost rise and softly bend. 

Hark ! a brisker, merrier glee ! 
The door unfolds, — 't is he ! 't is he ! 
Thus we lift our lamps to meet him, 
Thus we touch our lutes to greet him. 
Thou shalt give a fonder meeting, 
Thcu shalt give a tenderer greeting. 

Henry Hart Milman. 



MARRIAGE. 



FROM "HUMAN LIFE." 



Then before All they stand, — the holy vow 
And ring of gold, no fond illusions now, 
Bind her as his. Across the threshold led, 
And every tear kissed oif as soon as shed. 
His house she enters, — there to be a light. 
Shining within, when all without is night ; 
A guardian angel o'er his life presiding, 
Doubling his pleasures and his cares dividing, 
Winning him back when mingling in the throng. 
Back from a world we love, alas ! too long, 
To fireside happiness, to hours of ease. 
Blest with that charm, the certainty to please. 
How oft her eyes read his ; her gentle mind 
To all his wishes, all his thoughts inclined ; 
Still subject, — ever on the watch to borrow 
Mirth of his mirth and sorrow of his sorrow ! 



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MARRIAGE. 



21: 



ft 



The soul of music slumbers in tlie shell, 
Till waked and kindled by the master's spell, 
And feeling hearts ■ — touch them but rightly - 

pour 
A thousand melodies unheard before ! 

SAMUEL ROGERS. 



SEVEN TIMES SIX. 

GIVING IN MARRIAGE. 

To bear, to nurse, to rear, 

To watch, and then to lose : 
To see my bright ones disappear, 

Drawn up like morning dews ; — 
To bear, to nurse, to I'ear, 

To watch, and then to lose : T 
This have I done when God drew near 

Among his own to choose. 

To hear, to heed, to wed. 

And with thy lord dej^art 
In tears that he, as soon as shed, 

Will let no longer smart. — 
To hear, to heed, to wed, 

This while thou didst I smiled, 
For now it was not God who said, 

"Mother, give me thy child." 

fond, fool, and blind. 

To God I gave witli tears ; 
But, when a man like grace would find, 

My sold put by her fears. 
fond, fool, and blind, 

God guards in happier spheres ; 
That man will guard where he did bind 

Is hope for unknown years. 

To hear, to heed, to wed, 

Fair lot that maidens choose, 
Thy mother's tenderest words are said, 

Thy face no more she views ; 
Thy mother's lot, my dear. 

She doth in naught accuse ; 
Her lot to bear, to nurse, to rear, 

To love — and then to lose. 

Jean Ingelow. 



LIKE A LAVEROCK IN THE LIFT. 

It 's we two, it 's we two for aye, 

All the world, and we two, and Heaven be our 

stay ! 
Like a laverock* in the lift,t sing, bonny 

bride ! 
All tlie world was Adam once, with Eve by his 

side. 



What's the world, my lass, my love! — what can 

it do ? 
I am thine, and thou art mine ; life is sweet and 

new. 
If the woidd have missed the mark, let it stand 

by; 
For we two have gotten leave, and once more 

will try. 

Like a laverock in the lift, sing, bonny bride ! 
It 's we two, it's we two, happy side by side. 
Take a kiss from me, thy man ; now the song 

begins : 
"All is made afresh for us, and the brave heart 

wins." 

When the darker days come, and no sun will 

shine, 
Thou shalt dry my tears, lass, and I '11 dry thine. 
It's we two, it's wo two, while the world's 

away, 

Sitting by the golden sheaves on our wedding 

day. 

Jean Ingelow. 



[&- 



NOT OURS THE VOWS. 

Not ours tlie vows of such as plight 

Their troth in sunny weather, 
AVhilc leaves are green, and skies are bright. 

To walk on flowers togetlier. 

But we have loved as those who tread 

The thorny path of sorrow. 
With clouds above, and cause to dread 

Yet deeper gloom to-morrow. 

That thorny path, those stormy skies, 
Have drawn our spirits neai-er ; 

And rendered us, by sorrow's ties, 
Each to the other dearer. 

Love, born in hours of joy and mirth. 
With mirth and joy may perish ; 

That to which darker hours gave birth 
Still more and more we cherish. 

It looks beyond the clouds of time. 
And through death's shadowy portal ; 

Made by adversity sublime. 
By faith and hope immortal. 

Bernard barton. 



A WIFE. 

FROM " PHILIP VAN ARTEVELDE." 

She was a creature framed by love divine 
For mortal love to muse a life away 
In pondering her perfections ; so unmoved 
Amidst the world's contentions, if they touched 



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214 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



n 



No vital chord nor troubled what she loved, 
Philosophy might look her in the face, 
And, like a hermit stooping to the well 
That yields him sweet refreshment, might therein 
See but his own serenity reflected 
With a more heavenly tenderness of hue ! 
Yet whilst the world's ambitious empty cares, 
Its small disquietudes and insect stings. 
Disturbed her never, she was one made up 
Of feminine affections, and her life 
Was one full stream of love from fount to sea. 

Henry Taylor. 



fe 



DOLCmO TO MARGARET. 

The world goes up and the world goes down. 
And the sunshine follows the rain ; 

And yesterday's sneer, and yesterday's frown. 
Can never come over again, 
Sweet wife. 
No, never come over again. 

For woman is warm, though man be cold, 
And the night will hallow the day ; 

Till the heart which at even was weary and old 
Can rise in the morning gay. 

Sweet wife. 
To its work in the morning gay. 

CHARLES KlNGSLEY. 



CONNUBIAL LIFE. 

FROM "THE SEASONS: SPRING." 

But happy they ! the happiest of their kind ! 
Whom gentler stars unite, and in one fate 
Their hearts, their fortunes, and their beings 

blend. 
'T is not the coarser tie of human laws, 
Unnatural oft, and foreign to the mind, 
That binds their peace, but harmony itself. 
Attuning all their passions into love ; 
Where friendship full-exerts her softest power, 
Perfect esteem enlivened by desire 
Ineffable, and sympathy of soul ; 
Thought meeting thought, and will preventing 

will, 
With boundless confidence : for naught but love 
Can answer love, and render bliss secure. 
Meantime a smiling otfspring rises round. 
And mingles both their graces. By degrees, 
The human blossom blows ; and every day. 
Soft as it rolls along, shows some new charm, 
The fatlier's lustre and the mother's bloom. , 
Then infant reason grows apace, and calls 
For the kind hand of an assiduous care. 
Delightful task ! to rear the tender thought, 



To teach the young idea how to shoot, 
To pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind, 
To breathe the enlivening spirit, and to fix 
The generous purpose in the glowing breast. 
0, speak the joy ! ye whom the sudden tear 
Surprises often, while you look around, 
And nothing strikes your eye but sights of bliss, 
All various nature pressing on the heart ; 
An elegant sufficiency, content, 
Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books, 
Ease and alternate labor, useful life, 
Progressive virtue, and approving Heaven. 
These are the matchless joys of virtuous love ; 
And thus their moments fly. The Seasons thus, 
As ceaseless round a jarring world they roll. 
Still find them happy ; and consenting Spring 
Sheds her own rosy garland on their heads : 
Till evening comes at last, serene and mild ; 
When after the long vernal day of life. 
Enamored more, as more remembrance swells 
With many a proof of recollected love. 
Together down tliey sink in social sleep ; 
Together freed, their gentle spirits Hy 
To scenes where love and bliss immortal reign. 

James Thomson. 



FEAGMENTS. 



FORELOOKINGS. 



Why don't the men propose, mamma, 
Why don't the men propose ? 

IVhv doHt the men propose } T. H. BAYLY. 



Warnings. 

This house is to be let for life or years ; 
Her rent is sorrow, and her income tears ; 
Cupid, 't has long stood void ; her bills make 

known, 
She must be dearly let, or let alone. 

B:iMe7ns, Book ii. lo. F, QUARLES. 

Look ere thou leap, see ere thou go. 

Of Wi-vins and Thriving. T. TUSSER. 

Thus grief still treads upon the heels of pleasure ; 
Married in haste, we may repent at leisure 

The Old Bachelor, Acts. Sc. i. W. CONGREVE. 

Men are April when they woo, December when 
they wed. 

As You Like It, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

And oft the careless find it to their cost, 
The lover in the husband may be lost. 

Advice to a Lady. LORD LYTTELTON. 



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MARRIAGE. 



215 



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Mercenary Matches. 

Maidens like moths are ever caught by glare. 
And Mammon wins his way where seraphs might 
despair. 

English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. „ _ BYRON. 



Possibilities. 

Find all his having and his holding 
Kednced to eternal noise and scolding, — 
The conjugal petard that tears 
Down all portcullises of ears. 

Hudibras. BUTLER. 

Abroad too kind, at home 't is steadfast hate, 
And one eternal tempest of debate. 

Love cf Fame. E. YOUMG. 

Curse on all laws but those which love has made. 
Love, free as air, at sight of human ties, 
Spreads his light wings, and in a moment flies. 

F.loisa to Ahclard. POPE. 



Certainties. 

The kindest and the happiest pair 
AVill find occasion to forbear ; 
And something every day they live 
To pity and perhaps forgive. 

Miititai Forbearance. C 



Advice. 

Misses ! the tale that I relate 

This lesson seems to carr}^ — 
Choose not alone a proper mate, 

But proper time to marry. 

Pairing- Time Anticipated.- COWPER. 

Let still the woman take 
An elder than herself : so wears she to him, 
So sways she level in her husband's heart, 
For, boy, however we do praise ourselves, 
Our fancies are more giddy and unfirm. 
More longing, wavering, sooner lost and won, 
Than women's are. 

Then let thy love be younger than thyself, 
Or thy afi'ection cannot hold the bent. 

Twelfth Night, ^Ict ii. iV. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 



Such duty as the siibject owes the prince, 
Even such a woman oweth to her husband. 

Tamitig of the Shrevj, Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARR. 

She who ne'er answers till a husband cools. 
Or, if she rules liim, never shows she rules. 

Moral Essays : Epistle 11. POPE; 

And truant husband should return, and say, 
"My dear, I was the first who came away." 

Don yuan, Cant. i. BYRON. 



The Harpy Lot. 

My latest found, 
Heaven's last best gift, nw ever new delight. 

Paradise Lost, SooM v. MiLTON. 

She is mine own ! 
And I as rich in having such a jewel 
As twenty seas, if all their sand were pearl, 
The water nectar, and the rocks pure gold. 

Ttuo Gent, of Verona, Act ii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

How much the wife is dearer than the bride. 

A}t Irregular Ode. LORD LYTTELTON. 

Time still, as he flies, brings increai^e to her truth. 
And gives to her mind what he steals from her 
youth. 

The Happy Marriage. E. MOORE. 

And when with envy Time, transported, 

Shall think to rob us of our joys. 
You '11 in your girls again be courted, 

And I '11 go wooing in my boys. 

U'tnifreda. T. PERCY. 

True Love is but a humble, low-born thing. 
And hath its food served up in earthen ware ; 
It is a thing to walk with, hand in hand, 
Through the every-dayness of this work-day 
world, 

A simple, fireside thing, whose quiet smile 
Can warm earth's poorest hovel to a home. 

Love. J. R. LOWELI- 



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MY _WIFE 'S A WINSOME WEE THING. 

Shk is a winsome wee thing, 
She is a handsome wee thing, 
She is a bonnie wee thing, 
This sweet wee wife o' mine. 

I never saw a fairer, 

1 never lo'ed a dearer, 

And neist my heart I '11 wear her, 

For fear my jewel tine. 

She is a winsome wee thing, 
She is a handsome wee thing. 
She is a bonnie wee thing. 
This sweet wee wife o' mine. 

The warld's wrack we share o't, 
The warstle and the care o't : 
"Wi' her I '11 blythely bear it, 
And think my lot divine. 

Robert Burns. 



ta 



' SONNETS. 

My Love, I have no fear that tho;i shouldst die ; 
Albeit 1 ask no fairer life than this, 
Whose nnmbering-clock is still thy gentle kiss. 
While Time and Peace with hands unlocked fly, — 
Yet care I not where in Eternity 
Wc live and love, well knowing that there is 
No backward step for those who feel the bliss 
Of Faith as their most lofty yearnings high : 
Love hath so purified my being's core, 
Meseems I scarcely should be startled, even, 
To lind, some morn, that thou hadst gone before ; 
Since, with thy love, this knowledge too was 

given, 
Which each calm day doth strengthen more and 

more, 
That they who love are but one step from Heaven. 



I CANNOT think that thou shouldst pass av/aj', 

AVliose life to mine is an eternal law, 

A piece of nature that can have no flaw, 

A new and certain sunrise every day ; 

But, if thou art to be another raj' 

About the Sun of Lil'e, and art to live 

Free from all of thei; that was fugitive, 

The debt of Love I will more fully pay. 

Not downcast with the thought of thee so high. 



But rather raised to be a nobler man, 
And more divine in my Innnanitj', 
As knowing that the waiting eyes which scan 
My life are lighted by a purer being. 
And ask meek, calm-browed deeds, with it agree- 
ing. 

Our love is not a fading, earthly flower : 
Its v.'inged seed dropped down from Paradise, 
And, nursed by day and night, by sun and 

shower. 
Doth momently to fresher beauty rise : 
To us the leafless autumn is not bare, 
Nor winter's rattling boughs lack lusty green. 
Our summer hearts make summer's fulness, where 
No leaf, or bud, or blossom may be seen : 
For nature's life in love's deep life doth lie, 
Love, — whose forgetfulness is beauty's death, 
Whose mystic key these cells of Thou and I 
Into the infinite freedom openeth, 
And makes the body's dark and narrow grate 
The wind-flung leaves of Heaven's palace-gate. 



I THOUGHT our love at full, but I did err ; 
Joey's wreath drooped o'er mine eyes ; I could not 

see 
That sorrow in our happy world must be 
Love's deepest spokesman and interpreter. 
But, as a mother feels her child first stir 
Under her heart, so felt I instantly 
Deep in my soul another bond to thee 
Thrill with that life we saw depaii from her ; 
mother of our angel child ! twice dear ! 
Death knits as well as parts, and still, I wis, 
Her tender radiance shall infold us here, 
Even as the light, borne up by inward bliss. 
Threads the void glooms of space without a fear. 
To print on farthest stars her pitying kiss. 

James Russell Lowell. 



ADAM TO EVE. 

FROM "PARADISE LOST," BOOK IX. 

FAIREST of creation, last and best 
Of all God's works, creature in whom excelled 
Whatever can to sight or thought be formed, 
Holy, divine, good, amiable, or sweet ! 
How art thou lost, how on a sudden lost, 
Defaced, deflowered, and now to death devote ! 
Eather, how hast thou yielded to transgress 



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Tlie strict forbiddaiice, how to violate 

The sacred fruit forbidden ! Some cursed fraud 

Of enemy hath beguiled thee, yet unknown, 

And me with thee hath ruined, for with thee 

Certain my resolution is to die. 

How can I live without thee, how forego 

Thy sweet converse, and love so dearly joined, 

To live again in these wild woods forlorn ? 

Should God create another Eve, and I 

Another rib afford, yet loss of thee 

AVould never from my heart ; no, no, I feel 

The link of nature draw me : flesh of flesh, 

]^)one of my bone thou art, and from thy state 

Mine never shall be parted, bliss or woe. 

However, I with thee have fixed my lot, 
Certain to undergo like doom ; if death 
Consort with thee, death is to me as life ; 
So forcible witliin my heart I feel 
The bond of nature draw me to my own, 
My own in thee, for what thou art is mine ; 
Our state cannot lie severed, we are one, 
One flesh ; to lose thee were to lose myself. 

Milton. 



LORD WALTER'S "WIFE. 

"But why do you go?" said the lady, while 

both sate under the yew. 
And her eyes were alive in their depth, as the 

kraken beneath the sea-blue. 

" Because I fear you," he answered ; — " because 

you ar^; far too fair, 
And able to strangle my soul in a mesh of yoxir 

gold-colored hair." 

" 0, that," she said, " is no reason ! Such knots 

are quicklj^ undone. 
And too much beauty, I reckon, is nothing but 

too much sun." 

"Yet farewell so," he answered; — "the sun- 
stroke 's fatal at times. 

I value your husband, Lord Walter, whoso gallop 
rings still from the limes." 

"0, that," she said, "is no reason. You smell 
a rose through a fence : 

If two should smell it, what matter ? who grum- 
bles, and where 's the pretence ? " 

"But I," he replied, "have promised another, 

when love was free, 
To love her alone, alone, who alone and afar loves 

me." 



"Why, that," she said, "is no reasoji. Love's 

always free, I am told. 
Will you vow to be safe from the headache on 

Tuesday, and think it will hold ? " 

"But you," he replied, "have a daughter, a 
young little child, who was laid 

In your lap to be pure ; so I leave you : the 
angels would make me afraid." 

"0, that," she said, "is no reason. The angels 

keep out of the way ; 
And Dora, the child, observes nothing, although 

you should please me and stay." 

At which he rose up in his anger, — " Why, 
now, you no longer are fair ! 

Why, now, you no longer are fatal, but ugly and 
hateful, I swear." 

At which she laughed out in her scorn, — " These 

men ! 0, these men overnice, 
Who are shocked if a color not virtuous is 

frankly put on by a vice." 

Her eyes blazed upon him — " And yoic ! You 

bring us your vices so near 
That we smell them ! you think in our presence 

a thought 't would defame us to hear ! 

"What reason had you, and what right,—! 

appeal to your soul from my life, — 
To find me too fair as a woman ? Why, sir, I 

am pure, and a wife. 

"Is the day-star too fair up above you? It 
burns you not. Dare yon imply 

I brushed you more close than the star does, 
when Walter had set me as high ? 

" If a man finds a woman too fair, he njeans 

simply adapted too much 
To uses unlawful and fiital. The praise ! — shall 

I thank you for such ? 

" Too fair ? — not unless you misuse us ! and 

surely if, once in a while. 
You attain to it, straightway you call us no 

longer too fair, but too vile. 

" A moment, — I pray your attention ! — I have 

a poor word in my head 
I nmst utter, though womanlj^ custom would set 

it down better unsaid. 

"You grew, sir, pale to impertinence,.once when i 
I showed )^ou a ring. 

You kissed my fan when I dropped it. No mat- 
ter ! 1 've broken the thinq;. 



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"You did me the honor, perhaps, to be moved 

at my side now and then 
In the senses, — a vice, I have heard, which is 

common to beasts and some men. 

" Love 's a virtue for heroes ! — as white as the 
snow on high hills, 

And immortal as every great soul is that strug- 
gles, endures, and fulfils. 

" I love my Walter profoundl)', — you, Maude, 

though you faltered a week. 
For the sake of . . . what was it ? an eyebrow ? 

or, less still, a mole on a cheek ? 

" And since, when all 's said, you 're too noble to 

stoop to the frivolous cant 
About crimes irresistible, virtues that swindle, 

betray, and supplant, 

"I determined to prove to yourself that, what- 
e'er you might dream or avow 

By illusion, you wanted precisely no more of me 
than you have now. 

" There ! Look me full in the face ! — in the 
face. Understand, if you can, 

That the eyes of such women as I am are clean 
as the palm of a man. 

" Drop his hand, you insult him. Avoid us for 
fear we should cost you a scar, — 

You take us for harlots, I tell you, and not for 
the women we are. 

-"You wronged me : but then I considered . . . 

there 's Walter ! And so at the end, 
.'J. vowed that he should not be mulcted, by me, 

in the hand of a friend. 

" Have I hurt you indeed ? We are quits then. 
Nay, friend of my Walter, be mine ! 
I Come, Dora, my darling, my angel, and help me 
to ask him to dine." 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 



POSSESSION. 

" It was our wedding-day 
A month ago,"! dear heart, I hear you say. 
If months, or yei'as, er ages since have passed, 
I knowiuot : I have ceased to question Time. 
I only know tliut.onee there pealed a chime 
Of joyous bells, aiidlthen I held you fast, 



And all stood back, and none my right denied, 
And forth we walked : the world was free and wide 
Before us. Since that day 
I count my life : the Past is washed away. 

It was no dream, that vow : 
It was the voice that woke me from a draam, — 
A happy dream, I think ; but I am waking now, 
And drink the splendor of a sun suj)reme 
That turns the mist of former tears to gold. 
Within these arms I hold 
The lieeting promise, chased so long in vain : 
Ah, weary bird ! thou wilt not fly again : 
Thy wings are clipped, thou canst no more de- 
part, — 
Thy nest is builded in my heart ! 

I was the crescent ; thou 

The silver phantom of the perfect sphere, 

Held in its bosom : in one glory now 

Our lives united shine, and many a year — 

Not the sweet moon of bridal only — we 

One lustre, ever at the full, shall be : 

One 2"iure and rounded light, one planet whole, 

One life developed, one completed soul ! 

For I in thee, and thou in me, 

Unite our cloven halves of destiny. 

God knew his chosen time. 
He bade me slowly ripen to my prime. 
And from my boughs withheld the pr(mused fruit, 
Till storm and sun gave vigor to the root. 
Secure, Love ! secure 
Thy blessing is: I have thee day and night : 
Thou art become my blood, my life, my light : 
God's mercy thou, and therefore shalt endure. 

Bayard Taylor. 



THE DAY RETURNS, MY BOSOM BURNS. 

The day returns, my bosom burns. 

The blissful day we twa did meet ; 
Though winter wild in tempest toiled, 

Ne'er summer sun was half sae sweet. 
Than a' the pride that loads the tide. 

And crosses o'er the s\dtry line, — ■ 
Than kingly robes, and crowns and globes, 

Heaven gave me more ; it made thee mine. 

While day and night can bring delight, 

Or nature aught of pleasure give, — 
While joys above my mind can move. 

For thee and thee alone I live ; 
When that grim foe of life below 

Comes in between to make us part. 
The iron hand that breaks our band. 

It breaks my bliss, — it breaks my heart. 
Robert Burns. 



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219 



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THE POET'S BRIDAL-DAY SONG. 

0, MY love 's like the steadfast sun, 
Or streams that deepen as they run ; 
Nor hoary liairs, nor forty years, 
Nor moments between sighs and tears. 
Nor nights of thought, nor days of pain, 
Nor dreams of glory dreamed in vain, 
Nor mirth, nor sweetest song that flows 
To sober joys and soften woes, 
Can make my heart or fancy flee. 
One moment, my sweet wife, from thee. 

Even while I muse, I see thee sit 

In maiden bloom and matron wit ; 

Fair, gentle as when first I sued. 

Ye seem, but of sedater mood ; 

Yet my heart leaps as fond for thee 

As when, beiieath Arbigland tree, 

We stayed and wooed, and thought the moon 

Set on the sea an hour too soon ; 

Or lingered mid the falling dew, 

"When looks were fond and words were few. 

Though I see smiling at tby feet 
Five sons and ae fair daughter sweet, 
And time, and care, and birthtime woes 
Have dimmed thine eye and touched thy rose. 
To thee, and thoughts of thee, belong 
Whate'er charms me in tale or song. 
When words descend like dews, unsought. 
With gleams of deep, enthusiast thought. 
And Fancy in her heaven flies free. 
They come, my love, they come from thee. 

0, when more thought we gave, of old. 
To silver than some give to gold, 
'T was sweet to sit and ponder o'er 
How we should deck our humble bower ; 
'T was sweet to pull, in hope, with thee, 
The golden fruit of fortune's tree ; 
And sweeter still to choose and twine 
A garland for that brow of thine, — 
A song-wreath which may grace mj'' Jean, 
While rivers flow, and woods grow green. 

At times there come, as come there ought, 
Grave moments of sedater thought. 
When Fortune frowns, nor lends our night 
One gleam of her inconstant light ; 
And Ho})e, that decks the peasant's bower, 
Shines like a rainbow through the shower ; 
O, then I see, while seated nigh, 
A mother's heart shine in thine eye. 
And proud resolve and purpose meek. 
Speak of thee more than words can speak. 
I think this wedded wife of mine 
The best of all that 's not divine. 

Allan Cunningham. 



THE POET'S SONG TO HIS WIFE. 

How many summers, love, 

Have I been thine ? 
How many days, thon dove, 

Hast thou been mine ? 
Time, like the winged wind 

When 't bends the flowers, 
Hath left no mark behind. 

To count the hours ! 

Some weight of thought, though loath. 

On thee he leaves ; 
Some lines of care round both 

Perhaps he weaves ; 
Some fears, — a soft regret 

For joys scarce known ; 
Sweet looks we half forget; — 

All else is flown ! 

Ah ! — With wliat thankless heart 

I mourn and sing ! 
Look, where our children start, 

Like sudden spring ! 
With tongues all sweet and low 

Like a pleasant rhyme. 
They tell how much I owe 

To thee and time ! 

B. W. Procter (Barry Cornivail). 



IF THOU WERT BY MY SIDE, MY LOVE. 

LINES WRITTEN TO HIS WIFE, WHILE ON A VISIT TO 
UPPER INDIA. 

If thou wert by my side, my love ! 

How fast would evening fail 
In green Bengala's palmy grove. 

Listening the nightingale ! 

If thou, my love, wert by my side, 

My babies at my knee. 
How gayly would our pinnace glide 

O'er Gunga's mimic sea ! 

I miss thee at the dawning gray, 

When, on our deck reclined, 
In careless ease my limbs I lay 

And woo the cooler wind. 

I miss thee when by Gunga's stream 

My twilight steps I guide. 
But most beneath the lamp's pale beam 

I miss thee from my side. 

I spread my books, my pencil try, 

The lingering noon to cheer. 
But miss thy kind, approving eye, 

Thy meek, attentive ear. 



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But. when at morn and eve the star 

Beholds nie on my knee, 
I feel, though thou art distant far, 

Thy prayers ascend for me. 

Then on ! then on ! where duty leads, 

My course be onward still, 
O'er broad Hindostan's sultry meads, 

O'er bleak Alniorah's hill. 

That course nor Delhi's kinglj' gates, 

Nor mild Malwah detain ; 
For sweet the bliss us both awaits 

By yonder western main. 

Thy towers, Bombay, gleam bright, they say, 

Across the dark blue sea ; 
But never were hearts so light and gay 

As then shall meet in thee ! 

Reginald Heber. 



WIFE, CHILDREN, AND FRIENDS. 

When the black-lettered list to the gods was 
presented 
(The list of what Fate for each mortal intends), 
At the long string of ills a kind goddess relented, 
And slipped in three blessings, — wife, chil- 
dren, and friends. 

In vain surly Pluto maintained he was cheated, 
For justice divine could not compass its ends ; 
The scheme of man's penance he swore was de- 
feated. 
For earth becomes heaven with — wife, chil- 
dren, and friends. 

If tlie stock of our bliss is in stranger hands 
vested. 
The fund, ill secured, oft in bankruptcy ends ; 
But the heart issues bills which are never pro- 
tested. 
When drawn on the firm of — wife, children, 
and friends. 

Though valor still glows in his life's dying em- 
bers. 
The death-wounded tar, who his colors defends. 
Drops a tear of regret as he dying remembers 
How blessed was his home with — wife, chil- 
dren, and friends. 

TJie soldier, whose deeds live immortal in story. 
Whom duty to far distant latitudes sends. 

With transport would barter whole ages of glory 
For one happy day with — wife, children, and 
friends. 



Though spice-breathing gales on his caravan 
hover. 
Though for him all Arabia's fragrance ascends. 
The merchant still thinks of the woodbines that 
cover 
The bower where he sat with — wife, children, 
and friends. 

The dayspring of youth, still unclouded by sor- 
row. 
Alone on itself for enjoyment depends ; 
But drear is the twilight of age, if it borrow 
No warmth from the smile of — wife, children, 
and friends. 

Let the breath of renown ever freshen and 
nourish 
The laurel which o'er the dead favorite bends ; 
O'er me wave the willow, and long may it 
flourish. 
Bedewed with the tears of — wife, children, 
and friends. 

Let us drink, for my song, growing graver and 

graver. 

To subjects too solemn insensibly tends ; 

Let us drink, pledge me high, love and virtue 

shall flavor 

The glass which I fill to — wife, children, and 

Iriends. 

William Robert Spencer. 



LOVE LIGHTENS LABOR. 

A GOOD wife rose from her bed one morn, 

And thought, with a nervous dread, 
Of the piles of clothes to be washed, and more 

Than a dozen mouths to be fed. 
" There 's the meals to get for the men in the 
field, 

And the children to fix away 
To school, and the milk to be skimmed and 
churned ; 

And all to be done this day." 

It had rained in the night, and all the wood 

Was wet as it could be ; 
There were puddings and pies to bake, besides 

A loaf of cake for tea. 
And the day was hot, and her aching head 

Throbbed wearily as she said, 
"If maidens but knew what good vnvcs know, 

They would not be in haste to wed ! " 

"Jennie, what do you think I told Ben Brown ? " 

Called the farmer from the well ; 
And a flush crept up to his bronzed brow, 

And his eyes half-bashfully fell . 



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"It was this," lie said, and coming near 

He smiled, and stooping down, 
Kissed her cheek, — " 't was this, that you were 
the best 

And the dearest wife in town ! " 

The farmer went back to the field, and the wife. 

In a smiling, absent way, 
Sang snatches of tender little songs 

She 'd not sung for many a day. 
And the jiain in her head was gone, and the 
clothes 

Were white as the foam of the sea ; 
Her breatl was light, and her butter was sweet, 

And as golden as it could be. 

"Just think," the children all called in a breath, 

"Tom Wood has run off to sea ! 
He would n't, I know, if he 'd only had 

As happy a home as we." 
The night came down, and the good wife smiled 

To herself, as she softly said : 
" 'T is so sweet to labor for those we love, — 

It 's not strange that maids ■will wed ! " 

ANONyMOUS. 



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0, LAY THY HANTt IN MINE, DEAR ! 

0, LAY thy hand in mine, dear ! 

We 're growing old ; 
But Time hath brought no sign, dear. 

That hearts grow cold. 
'T is long, long since our new love 

Made life divine ; 
But age enrieheth true love, 

Like noble wine. 

And lay thy cheek to mine, dear, 

And take thy rest ; 
Mine arms around thee twine, dear, 

And make thy nest. 
A many cares are pressing 

On this dear head ; 
But Sorrow's hands in blessing 

Are surely laid. 

0, lean thy life on mine, dear ! 

'T will shelter thee. 
Thou wert a winsome vine, dear. 

On my young tree : 
And so, till boughs are leafless, 

And songbirds Hown, 
We '11 twine, then lay us, griefless. 

Together down. 

Gerald Massey. 



THE WORN WEDDING-RING. 

Your wedding-ring Avears thin, dear wife ; ah, 

summers not a few, 
Since I put it on your finger first, have passed 

o'er me and you ; 
And, love, what changes we have seen, — what 

cares and pleasures, too, — 
Since j'ou became my own dear wife, when this 

old rincf was new ! 



0, blessings on that happy day, the happiest of 

my life, 
When, thanks to God, your low, sweet "Yes" 

made you my loving wife ! 
Your heart will say the same, I know ; that 

day 's as dear to you, — 
That day that made n:e yours, dear wife, when 

this old ring was new. 



How well do I remember now your young sweet 

face that day ! 
How fair you were, how dear you were, my 

tongue could hardly say ; 
Nor how I doated on you ; 0, how proud I was 

of you ! 
But did I love you more than now, when this 

old ring was new ? 

No — no ! no fairer were you then than at this 

hour to me ; 
And, dear as life to me this day, how could you 

dearer be ? 
As sweet your face might be that day as now it 

is, 'tis true ; 
But did I know your heart as well when this old 

ring was new ? 



partner of my gladness, wife, what care, what 

grief is there 
For me you would not bravely face, with me you 

would not share ? 
0, what a weary want had every day, if wanting 

you, 
Wanting the love that God made mine when 

this old ring was new ! 

Years bring fresh links to bind us, wife, — young 

voices that are here ; 
Young faces round our fire that make their 

mother's j'et more dear ; 
Young loving hearts your care each day makes 

yet more like to you, 
More like the loving heart made mine when this 

old ring was new. 



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And blessed be God ! all he has given are with 

us yet ; around 
Our table every precious life lent to us still is 

found. 
Though cares we 've known, w-ith hopeful hearts 

the worst we 've struggled through ; 
Blessed be his name for all his love since this 

old ring was new ! 

The past is dear, its sweetness still our memo- 
ries treasure yet ; 

The griefs we 've borne, together borne, we would 
not now foi'get. 

Whatever, wife, the future brings, heart unto 
heart still true. 

We '11 share as we have shared all else since this 
old ring was new. 

And if God spare us 'mongst our sons and daugh- 
ters to grow old. 

We know his goodness will not let your heart 
or luine grow cold. 

Your aged eyes will sec in mine all they've still 
shown to you, 

And mine in yours all they have seen since this 
old ring was new. 

And 0, when death shall come at last to bid me 

to my rest. 
May I die looking in those eyes, and resting on 

that breast ; 
0, may my parting gaze be blessed with the dear 

sight of you, 
Of those fond eyes, — fond as they were when 

this old ring was new ! 

William cox Bennett. 



^y— 



JOHN ANDERSON, MY JO. 

John Andkrson, my jo, John, 

When we were first acquent, 
Your locks were like the raven. 

Your bonnie brow was brent ; 
But now your brow is held, John, 

Your locks are like the snaw ; 
But blessings on your frosty pow, 

John Anderson, my jo. 

John Anderson, my jo, John, 

We clamb the hill thegither ; 
And monie a canty day, John, 

We've had wi' ane anither. 
Now we maun totter down, John, 

But hand in hand we '11 go : 
And sleep thegither at the foot, 

John Anderson, my jo. 

Robert Burns. 



FILIAL LOVE. 



FROM "CHILDE HAROLD." 



Theke is a dungeon in whose dim drear light 
What do I gaze on ? Nothing : look again ! 
Two forms are slowly shadowed on my sight, — 
Two insulated phantoms of the brain : 
It is not so ; I see them full and plain, — 
An old man and a female young and fair. 
Fresh as a nursing mother, in whose vein 
The blood is nectar : but what doth she there. 
With her unmantled neck, and bosom white and 
bare ? 

Full swells the deep pure fountain of young life. 
Where on the heart and from the heart we took 
Our first and sweetest nurture, when the wife, 
Blest into mother, in the innocent look, 
Or even the pi'ping cry of lips that brook 
No pain and small suspense, a joy perceives 
Man knows not, Avhen from out its cradled nook 
She sees her little bud put forth its leaves — 
What may the fruit be yet ? I know not — Cain 
was Eve's. 

But here youth offers to old age the food. 
The milk of his own gift : it is her sire 
To whom she renders back the debt of blood 
Born with her birth. No ! he shall not expire 
While in those warm and lovely veins tlxe lire 
Of health and holy feeling can provide 
Great Nature's Nile, whose deep stream rises 

higher 
Than Egypt's river ; — from that gentle side 
Drink, drink and live, old man ! Heaven's realm 

holds no such tide. 

The starry fable of the milky-way 

Has not thy story's purity ; it is 

A constellation of a sweeter ray, 

And sacred Nature triumphs more in this 

Reverse of her decree, than in the abyss 

Where sparkle distant worlds : — 0, holiest 

nurse ! 
No drop of that clear stream its way shall miss 
To thy sire's heart, replenishing its source 
With life, as our freed souls rejoin the universe. 

BVRON. 

ROCK ME TO SLEEP. 

Backward, turn backward, Time, in your 

flight, 
Make me a child again just for to-night ! 
Mother, come back from the echoless shore, 
Take me again to your heart as of yore ; 
Kiss from my forehead the furrows of care. 
Smooth the few silver threads out of my hair ; 
Over my slumbers your loving watch keep ; — 
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep I 



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Backward, flow backward, tide of the years ! 
I am so weary ot" toil and of tears, — 
Toil without recompense, tears all in vain, — ■ 
Take them, and give me my childhood again ! 
I have grown weary of dust and decay, — 
AVeary of Hinging my soul-wealth away ; 
Weary of sowing for otliers to reap ; — 
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep ! 

Tired of the hollow, the base, the untrue. 
Mother, mother, my heart calls for you ! 
Manjr a summer tlie grass has grown green, 
Blossomed, and faded our faces between, 
Yet with strong yearning and passionate pain 
Long I to-night for your presence again. 
Come from the silence so long and so deep ; — 
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep ! 

Over my heart, in the days that are flown, 
No love like mother-love ever has shone ; 
No other worship abides and endures, ■ — 
Faithful, iinsellish, and patient, like yours : 
None like a mother can charm away pain 
From the sick soul and the world-weary brain. 
Slumber's soft calms o'er my heavj'" lids creep ; — 
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep ! 

Come, let your brown hair, just lighted with gold, 
Fall on your shoulders again as of old ; 
Let it drop over my forehead to-night. 
Shading niy faint eyes away from the light ; 
For with its sunnj^-edged shadows once more 
Llaply will throng the sweet visions of yore ; 
Lovingly, softly, its bright billows sweep ; — ■ 
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep ! 

Mother, dear mother, the years have been long 
Since I last listened your lullaby song : 
Sing, then, and unto my soul it shall seem 
Womanhood's years have been only a dream. 
Clasped to your heart in a loving embrace, 
AVith your light lashes just sweeping your face, 
Never hereafter to wake or to weep ; — 
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep ! 
Elizabeth Akers Allen (Florence Percy). 



HOMESICK. 

Come to me, my Mother ! come to me. 
Thine own son slowly dying far away ! 
Througli tlie moist ways of the wide ocean, blown 
By gi-eat invisible winds, come stately ships 
To this calm bay for quiet anchorage ; 
They come, they rest awhile, they go away, 
But, my Mother, never comest thou ! 
The snow is I'ound thy dwelling, the white snow. 



That cold soft revelation pure as light. 
And the pine-spire is mystically fringed, 
Laced with incrusted silver. Here — ah me ! — 
The winter is decrepit, under-born, 
A leper with no power but his disease. 
Why am I from thee, Mother, far from thee ? 
Far from the frost enchantment, and the woods 
Jewelled from bough to bough ? home, my 

home ! 
river iu the valley of my home. 
With mazy-winding motion intricate, 
Twisting thy deathless music underneath 
The polished ice-work, — must 1 nevermore 
Behold thee with familiar eyes, and watch 
Thy beauty changing with the changeful day. 
Thy beauty constant to the constant change ? 

David Cray. 



TO AUGUSTA. 

HIS SISTER, AUGUSTA LEIGH. 

My sister ! my sweet sister ! if a name 
Dearer and purer were, it should be thine, 

Mountains and seas divide us, but I claim 
No tears, but tenderness to answer mine : 

Go where I will, to me thou art the same, — ■ 
A loved regret which I would not resign. 

There yet are two things in my destiny, — 

A world to roam through, and a home with thee. 

The first were nothing, — had I still the last. 
It were the haven of my happiness ; 

But other claims and other ties thou hast. 
And mine is not the wish to make them less. 

A strange doom is thy father's son's, and past 
Recalling, as it lies beyond redress ; 

Reversed for him our grandsire's fate of yore, — 

He had no rest at sea, nor I on shore. 

If my inheritance of storms hath been 
In other elements, and on the rocks 

Of perils, overlooked or unforeseen, 

1 have sustained my share of worldly shocks, 

The fault was mine ; nor do I seek to screen 
My errors with defensive paradox ; 

I have been cunning in mine overthrow. 

The careful pilot of my proper woe. 

Mine were my faults, and mine be their reward, 
My whole life was a contest, since the day 

That gave me being gave me tliat which marred 
The gift, — a fate, or will, that walked astray : 

And I at times have found the struggle hard, 
And thought of shaking off my bonds of clay : 

But now I fain would for a time survive, 

If but to see what next can well arrive. 



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Kingdoms and empires in my little day 
I have outlived, and yet I am not old ; 

And when I look on this, the petty spray 

Of my own years of trouble, which have rolled 

Like a wild bay of breakers, melts away : 

Something — I know not what — does still 
uphold 

A spirit of slight patience ; — not in vain, 

Even for its own sake, do we purchase pain. 

Perhaps the workings of defiance stir 

Within me, — or perhaps of cold despair, 

Brought on when ills habitually recur, — 
Perhaps a kinder clime, or purer air, 

(For even to this may change of soul refer, 
And with light armor we may learn to bear,) 

Have taught me a strange c|uiet, which was not 

The chief companion of a calmer lot. 

I feel almost at times as I have felt 

In happy childhood ; trees, and flowers, and 
brooks. 
Which do remember me of where I dwelt 

Ere my young mind w^as sacrificed to books, 
Come as of yore upon me, and can melt 

My heart with recognition of their looks ; 
And even at moments I could think I see 
Some living thing to love, — but none like thee. 

Here are the Alpine landscapes which create 
A fund for contemplation ; — to admire 

Is a brief feeling of a trivial date ; 

But something worthier do such scenes inspire. 

Here to be lonely is not desolate, 

For much I view which I could most desire. 

And, above all, a lake I can behold 

Lovelier, not dearer, than our own of old. 

that thou wert but with me ! — but I grow 
The fool of my own wishes, and forget 

The solitude which I have vaunted so 
Has lost its praise in this but one regret ; 

There may be others which I less may show ; 
I am not of the plaintive mood, and yet 

1 feel an ebb in my philosophy. 

And the tide rising in my altered eye. 

I did remind thee of our own dear Lake, 

By the old Hall which may be mine no more. 

Lemau's is fair ? but think not I forsake 
The sweet remembrance of a dearer shore ; 

Sad havQfj Time must with my memory make. 
Ere that or thou can fade these eyes before ; 

Though, like all things which I have loved, they 
are 

Resigned forever, or divided far. 



Tlie world is all before me ; I but ask 

Of Nature that witli which she will comply, — 

It is but in her summer's sun to bask. 
To mingle with the quiet of her sky, 

To see her gentle face without a mask. 
And never gaze on it with apathy. 

She was my early friend, and now shall be 

My sister, — till I look again on thee. 

I can reduce all feelings but this one ; 

And that I would not ; for at length I see 
Such scenes as those wherein my life begun. 

The earliest, — even the only paths for me, — 
Had I but sooner learnt the crowd to shun, 

I had been better than I now can be ; 
The passions which have torn me would have 

slept : 
/ had not suffered, and thoic hadst not wept. 

With false Ambition what had I to do ? 

Little with Love, and least of all with Eame ! 
And yet they came unsought, and with me grew. 

And made me all which they can make, — a 
name. 
Yet this was not the end I did pursue ; 

Surely I once beheld a nobler aim. 
But all is over ; I am one the more 
To baffled millions which have gone before. 

And for the future, this world's future may 
From me demand but little of my care ; 

I have outlived myself by many a day 

Having survived so many things that were ; 

My years have been no slumber, but the prey 
Of ceaseless vigils ; for I had the share 

Of life which might have filled a century. 

Before its fourth in time had passed me by. 

And for the remnant which may be to come, 
I am content ; and for the past I feel 

Not thankless, — for within the crowded sum 
Of struggles, happiness at times would steal. 

And for the present, I wouhl not benumb 
My feelings farther. — Nor shall I conceal 

That with all this I still can look around, 

And worship Nature with a thought profound. 

For thee, my own sw^eet sister, in thy heart 
I know myself secure, as thou in mine : 

We were and are — I am, even as thou art — 
Beings who ne'er each other can resign ; 

It is the same, together or apart. 

From life's commencement to its slow decline 

We are intwined, — let death come slow or fast, 

The tie which bound the first endures the last ! 



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HOME. 

CiJN'G to thy home ! if there the meanest shed 
Yiekl thee a hearth and shelter for thy head, 
And some poor plot, with vegetables stored, 
Be all that Heaven allots thee for thy board, — 
Unsavory bread, and herbs that scattered grow 
Wild on the river brink or mountain brow. 
Yet e'en this cheerless mansion shall provide 
More heart's repose than all the world beside. 

From the Greek of LEONIDAS, 
by ROBERT BLAND. 



HOME, SWEET HOME. 

FROM THE OPERA OF " CLARI, THE MAID OF MILAN." 

Mid pleasures and palaces tliongh we may roam. 
Be it ever so humble there 's no place like home ! 
A charm from the .skies seems to hallow us there, 
W^hich, seek through the world, is ne'er met with 
elsewhere. 

Home ! home ! sweet, sweet home ! 

There 's no place like home ! 



An exile from home, .splendor dazzles in vain : 
0, give me my lowly thatched cottage again ! 
The birds singing gayly that came at my call ; — 
Give me them, — and the peace of mind dearer 
than all ! 
Home ! home ! sweet, sweet home ! 
There 's no place like home ! 

John Howard Payne. 



A WISH. 

Mine be a cot heside the hill ; 
A beehive's hum shall soothe my ear ; 
A willowy brook that turns a mill. 
With many a fall shall linger near. 

The swallow, oft, beneath my thatch 
Shall twitter from her clay-built nest ; 
Oft shall the pilgrim lift the latch, 
And share my meal, a welcome guest. 

Around my ivied porch shall spring 
Each fragrant flower that drinks the dew ; 
And Lucy, at her wheel, shall sing 
In russet gown and apron blue. 

The village-church among the trees. 
Where first our marriage- vows were given, 
With merry peals shall swell the breeze 
And point with taper spire to heaven. 

Samuel Rogers. 



ODE TO SOLITUDE. 

Happy the man, whose wish and care 
A few paternal acres bound. 
Content to breathe his native air 
In his own ground. 

Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread. 
Whose flocks supply him with attire ; 
Whose trees in summer yield him shade, 
In winter, fire. 

Blest, who can unconcern'dly find 
Hours, days, and years slide soft away 
In health of body, peace of mind, 
Quiet by day, 

Sound sleep by night ; study and ease 
Together mixed ; sweet recreation. 
And innocence, which most does please 
With meditation. 

Thus let me live, unseen, unknown ; 

Thus unlamented let me die ; 

Steal from the world, and not a stone 

Tell where I lie. 

Alexander Pope. 



A SHEPHERD'S LIFE. 

■ from "third part of henry VI.," act II. sc. 5. 

King HenPi.y. God ! methinks, it were a 

happy life. 
To be no better than a homely swain ; 
To ,sit upon a hill, as I do now. 
To carve out dials ciuaintly, point by point, 
Thereby to see the minutes how they run : 
How many make the hour full complete, 
How many hours bring about the day, 
How many days will finish up the year, 
How many years a mortal man may live. 
When this is known, then to divide the times ; — 
So many hours must I tend my flock ; 
So many hours must I take my rest ; 
So many hours must I contemplate ; 
So many hours must I sport myself ; 
So many days my ewes have been with young ; 
So many weeks ere the poor fools will yean ; 
So many years ere I shall shear the fleece : 
So minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and 

years, 
Passed over to the end they were created. 
Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave. 
Ah, what a life were this ! how sweet ! how 

lovely ! 
Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade 
To shepherds, looking on their sillj" sheep. 
Than doth a rich embroidered canopy- 
To kings that fear their subjects' treachery ? 

Shakhspeari-.. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



THE MEANS TO ATTAIN HAPPY LIFE. 

Mautial, the things that do attain 
The happy life be these, I find, — 

The riches left, not got with pain ; 
The fruitful ground, the quiet mind, 

The equal friend ; no grudge, no strife ; 

No charge of rule, nor governance ; 
Without disease, the healthful life ; 

The household of continuance ; 

The mean diet, no delicate fare ; 

True wisdom joined with simpleness ; 
The night discharged of all care. 

Where wine the wit may not oppress ; 

The faithful wife, without debate ; 

Such sleeps as may beguile the night ; 
Contented with thine own estate, 

Ne wish for death, ne fear his might. 

Henry Howard, Earl of surrey. 



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THE FIRESIDE. 

Dear Chloe, while the busy crowd, 
The vain, the wealthy, and the proud, 

In folly's maze advance ; 
Though singularity and pride 
Be called our choice, we '11 step aside, 

Nor join the giddy dance. 

From the gay world we '11 oft retire 
To our own family and fire. 

Where love our hours employs ; 
No noisy neighbor enters here, 
No intermeddling stranger near, 

To spoil our heartfelt joys. 

If solid happiness we prize. 
Within our breast this jewel lies, 

And they are fools who roam ; 
The world hath nothing to bestow, — 
From our own selves our bliss must flow. 

And that dear hut, our home. 

Of rest was Noah's dove bereft, 
When with impatient wing she left 

That safe I'etreat, the ark ; 
Giving her vain excursion o'er. 
The disappointed bird once more 

Explored the sacred bark. 

Though fools spurn Hymen's gentle powers, 
We, who improve his golden hours, 

By sweet experience know 
That marriage, rightly understood, 
Gives to the tender and the good 

A paradise below. 



Our babes shall richest comforts bring ; 
If tutored right, they '11 prove a spring 

Whence pleasures ever rise-: 
We '11 form their minds, with studious care. 
To all that 's manly, good, and fair. 

And train them for the skies. 

While they our wisest hours engage. 
They'll joy our youth, support our age. 

And crown our hoary hairs : 
They '11 grow in virtue every day, 
And thus our fondest loves repay, 

And recompense our cares. 

No borrowed joys, they 're all our own. 
While to the world we live unknown, 

Or by the world forgot : 
Monarchs ! we envy not your state ; 
We look with pity on the great. 

And bless our humbler lot. 

Our portion is not large, indeed ; 
But then how little do we need, 

For nature's calls are few ; 
In this the art of living lies, 
To want no more than may suffice. 

And make that little do. 

We '11 therefore relish with content 
Whate'er kind Providence has sent, 

Nor aim beyond our power ; 
For, if our stock be very small, 
'T is prudence to enjoy it all. 

Nor lose the present hour. 

To be resigned when ills betide. 
Patient when favors are denied. 

And pleased with favors given, — 
Dear Chloe, this is wisdom's part, 
This is that incense of the heart, 

Whose fragrance smells to heaven. 

We '11 ask no long-protracted treat. 
Since winter-life is seldom sweet ; 

But when our feast is o'er. 
Grateful from table we '11 arise. 
Nor grudge our sons with envious eyes 

The relics of our store. 

Thus, liand in hand, through life we '11 go ; 
Its checkered paths of joy and woe 

With cautious steps we '11 tread ; 
Quit its vain scenes without a tear, 
Without a trouble or a fear, 

And mingle with the dead : 

While Conscience, like a faithful friend. 
Shall through the gloomy vale attend. 






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And cheer our dying bi'eath ; 
Shall, when all other comforts cease, 
Like a kind angel whisper peace, 

And smooth the bed of death. 



Nathaniel Cotton. 



MY AIN FIRESIDE. 

I HAE seen great anes and sat in great ha's, 
'Mang lords and fine ladies a' covered wi' braws, 
At feasts made for princes wi' princes I 've been, 
When the grand shine o' sj)lendor has dazzled 

my een ; 
But a sight sae delightfu' I trow I ne'er spied 
As the bonny blithe blink o' my ain fireside. 
My ain fireside, my ain fireside, 
0, cheery 's the blink o' my ain fireside ; 

My ain fireside, my ain fireside, 

0, there 's naught to compare wi' ane's ain 
fireside. 

Ance mair, Gude be thankit, round my ain heart- 
some ingle, 
Wi' the friends o' my youth I cordialljr mingle ; 
Nae forms to compel me to seem wae or glad, 
I may laugh when I 'm merry, and sigh when 

I 'm sad. 
Nae falsehood to dread, and 'nae malice to fear. 
But truth to delight me, and friendship to cheer ; 
Of a' roads to happiness ever were tried. 
There 's nane half so sure as ane's ain fireside. 
My ain fireside, my ain fireside, 
0, there 's naught to compare wi' ane's ain 
fireside. 

When I draw in my stool on my cozy hearth- 

stane. 

My heart loups sae light I scarce ken 't for my 

ain ; 

Care's down on the wind, it is clean out o' 

sight. 

Past troubles they seem but as dreams o' the 

night. 

I hear but kend voices, kend faces I see, 

And mark saft affection glent fond frae ilk ee ; 

Nae fleechings o' flattery, nae boastings o' pride, 

'T is heai't speaks to heart at ane's ain fireside. 

My ain fireside, my ain fireside, 

0, there 's naught to compiare wi' ane's ain 

fireside. 

Elizabeth Hamilton. 



BY THE FIRESIDE 

What is it fades and flickers in the fire. 

Mutters and sighs, and yields reluctant breath, 

As if in the red embers some desire. 

Some word prophetic burned, defying death ? 



Lords of the forest, stalwart oak and pine. 
Lie down for us in flames of martyrdom : 

A human, household warmth, their death-fires 
shine ; 
Yet fragrant with high memories they come, 

Bringing the mountain-winds that in their boughs 
Sang of the torrent, and the plasliy edge 

Of storm-swept lakes ; and echoes that arouse 
The eagles from a splintered eyrie ledge ; 

And breath of violets sweet about their roots ; 

And earthy odors of the moss and fern ; 
And hum of rivulets ; smell of ripening fruits ; 

And green leaves that to gold and crimson turn. 

What clear Septembers fade out in a spark ! 

What rare Octobers drop with every coal ! 
Within these costly ashes, dumb and dark. 

Are hid spring's budding hope, and summer's 
soul. 

Pictures far lovelier smoulder in the fire, 

Visionsof friends who walked among these trees, 

Whose presence, like the free air, could inspire 
A winged life and boundless sympathies. 

E3res with a glow like that in the brown beech. 
When sunset through its autumn beauty shines ; 

Or the blue gentian's look of silent speech, 
To heaven appealing as earth's light declines ; 

Voices and steps forever fled away 

From the familiar glens, the haunted hills, — 
Most pitiful and strange it is to stay 

Without you in a world your lost love fills. 

Do you forget us, — under Eden trees, 
Or in full sunshine on the hills of God, — 

Who miss you from the shadow and the breeze, 
And tints and perfumes of the woodland sod ? 

Dear for your sake the fireside where we sit 
Watching these sad, bright pictures come and 
go; 

That waning years are with your memory lit 
Is the one lonely comfort that we know. 

Is it all memory ? Lo, these forest-boughs 
Burst on the hearth into fresh leaf and bloom ; 

Waft a vague, far-ofl" sweetness through the house. 
And give close walls the hillside's breathing- 
room. 



A second life, more spiritual than the first. 
They find, — a life won only out of death. 

sainted souls, within you still is nursed 
For us a flame not fed by mortal breath ! 



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Unseen, ye bring to us, who love and wait, 

Wafts irom the lieavenly hills, immortal air ; 
No flood can quench your hearts' warmth, or 
abate ; 
Ye are our gladness, here and everywhei-e. 

Lucy larcom. 



A WINTER-EVENING HYMN TO MY 
FIKE. 

THOU "of home the guardian Lar, 

And, when our earth hath wandered far 

Into the cold, and deep snow covers 

The walks of our New England lovers, 

Their sweet secluded evening-star ! 

'T was with thy rays the English Muse 

Iiipened her mild domestic hues ; 

'T v/as by thy flicker that she conned 

The fireside wisdom that enrings 

With light from heaven familiar things ; 

By thee she found the homely faith 

In whose mild eyes thy comfort stay'th. 

When Death, extinguishing his torch. 

Gropes for the latch-string in the porch ; 

The love that wanders not beyond 

His earliest nest, but sits and sings 

While children smooth his patient wings : 

Therefore with thee I love to I'ead 

Our brave old poets : at thy touch how stirs 

Life in the withered words ! how swift recede 

Time's shadows ! and how glows again 

Through its dead mass the incandescent verse. 

As when upon the anvils of the brain 

It glittering lay, cyclopically wrought 

By the fast -throbbing hammers of the poet's 

thought ! 
Thou murmurest, too, divinely stirred, 
The aspirations unattained, 
The rhythms so rathe and delicate, 
They bent and strained 
And broke, beneath the sombre weight 
Of any airiest mortal word. 

What warm protection dost thou bend 
Eound curtained talk of friend with friend. 
While the gray snow-storm, held aloof. 
To softest outline rounds the roof. 
Or the rude North with baffled strain 
Shoulders the frost-starred window-pane ! 
Now the kind nymph to Bacchus borne 
By Morj^heus' daughter, she that seems 
Gifted upon her natal morn 
By him with fii'e, by her with dreams, 
Nieotia, dearer to the Muse 
Than all the grapes' bewildering juice. 



We worship, un forbid of thee ; 

And, as her incense floats and curls 

In airy spires and wayward whirls, 

Or poises on its tremulous stalk 

A flower of frailest revery, 

So winds and loiters, idly free, 

The current of unguided talk. 

Now laughter-rippled, and now caught 

In smooth dark pools of deeper thought. 

Meanwhile thou mellowest every word, 

A sweetly unobtrusive third ; 

For thou hast magic beyond wine, 

To unlock natures each to each ; 

The unspoken thought thou canst divine ; 

Thou fill'st the pauses of the speech 

With whispers that to dream-land reach, 

And frozen fancy-springs unchain 

In Arctic outskirts of the brain ; 

Sun of all inmost confidences. 

To thy rays doth the heart unclose 

Its formal calyx of pretences. 

That close against rude day's offences, 

And open its shy midnight rose ! 

James Russell Lowell. 



I KNEW BY THE SMOKE THAT SO 
GRACEFULLY CURLED. 

I KNEW by the smoke that so gracefully curled 
Above the green elms, that a cottage was near, 

And I said, "If there 's peace to be found in the 
world, 
A heart that is humble might hope for it here ! " 

It was noon, and on flowers that languished 
around 
In silence reposed the voluptuous bee ; 
Every leaf was at lest, and I heard not a sound 
But the woodpecker tapping the hollow beech- 
tree. 

And " Here in this lone little wood," I ex- 
claimed, 
" With a maid who was lovely to soul and to 
eye, 
Who would blush when I praised her, and weep 
if I blamed. 
How blest could I live, and how calm could I 
die! 

" By the shade of yon sumach, whose red berry 
dips 
In the gush of the fountain, how sweet to re- 
cline, 
And to know that I sighed upon innocent lips. 
Which had never been sighed on by any but 
mine ! " 



THOMAS MOORE. 



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HEART-REST. 

FROM " PHILIP VAN ARTEVELDE." 

The heart of man, walk it which way it will, 
Sequestered or frequented, smooth or rough, 
Down the deep valley amongst tinkling Hocks, 
Or mid the clang of trumpets and the march 
Of clattering ordnance, still must have its halt, 
Its hour of truce, its instant of rex^ose, 
Its inn of rest ; and craving still must seek 
The food of its affections, — still must slake 
Its constant thirst of what is fresh and pure, 
And pleasant to behold. 

HENRY TAYLOR. 



TWO PICTURES. 

Ax old farm-house M'ith meadows wide, 
And sweet with clover on each side ; 
A bright-eyed boy, who looks from out 
Tlic door with woodbine wreathed about, 
And wishes his one thouglit all day : 
"0, if I could but fly away 

From this dull spot, the world to see. 
How happy, happy, happy. 

How happy I should be ! " 

Amid the city's constant din, 
A man who round the world has been, 
"WJio, mi<l the tumult and the throng, 
Is thinking, thinking all day long : 
" 0, could I only tread once more 
The field-patli to the farm-house door. 

The old, green meadow could I see. 
How happy, happy, happy. 

How happy 1 should be ! " 

Annie D. Green (Marian Doii^/ns). 



HOBIE. 

FROM "THE TRAVELLER." 

But where to find that happiest spot below, 
Who can direct, when all pretend to know ? 
The shuddering tenant of tlie frigid zone 
Boldly proclahns that happiest spot his own ; 
Extols the treasures of his stormy seas. 
And his long nights of revelry and ease : 
Tlie naked negro, panting at the line. 
Boasts of his golden sands and prdmy wine. 
Basks in the glare, or stems the tepid wave, 
And thanks his gods for all the good they gave. 
Such is the patriot's boast, where'er we roam. 
His first, best country, ever is at home. 
And yet, perhaps, if countries we compare. 
And estimate the blessings which they share. 
Though patriots flatter, still sliall wisdom find 
An equal portion dealt to all numkind ; 
As dilferent good, by art or nature given. 
To difl'erent nations makes their blessing even. 
Olivhr Goldsmith. 



THE HOMES OF ENGLAND. 

The stately Homes of England, 

How beautiful they stand I 

Amidst their tall ancestral trees, 

O'er all the pleasant land ; 

The deer across their greensward bound 

Tlirough shade and sunny gleam. 

And the swan glides past them with the sound 

Of some rejoicing stream. 

The merry Homes of Englnnd ! 

Around tlieir hearths by night, 

What gladsome looks of household lovo 

Meet in the ruddy light. 

There woman's voice flows forth in song, 

Or childish tale is told ; 

Or lips move tunefully along 

Some glorious page of old. 

The blessed Homes of England ! 

How softly on their bowers 

Is laid the holy quietness 

That breathes from Sabbath hours ! 

Solemn, j'et sweet, the church-bell's chime 

Floats through their woods at morn ; 

All otlier sounds, in that still time. 

Of breeze and leaf are born. 

The cottage Homes of England ! 

By thousands on her plains, 

They are smiling o'er the silvery brooks, 

And round the hamlet-fanes. 

Tlirough glowing orchards forth they peep. 

Each fi'om its nook of leaves ; 

And fearless there the lowly sleep. 

As the bird beneath their eaves. 

The free, fair Homes of England ! 

Long, long in hut and hall. 

May hearts of native proof be reared 

To guard each hallowed wall ! 

And green forever be the groves, 

And bright the flowery sod, 

Where first the child's glad spirit loves 

Its country and its God. 

FELICIA HEMANS. 



• A PICTURE. 

The farmer sat in his easy-chair, 

Smoking his pipe of clay. 
While liis hale old wife, with busy care, 

Was clearing the dinner away ; 
A sweet little girl, with fine blue eyes. 
On her grandfather's knee was catching flies. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Tlie old man laid his hand on her head, 
With a tear on his wrinkled face ; 

He thought how often her mother, dead, 
Had sat in the self-same place. 

As the tear stole down from his half-shut eye, 

" Don't smoke ! " said the child ; " how it makes 
you cry ! " 

The house-dog lay stretched out on the floor, 
Where the shade after noon used to steal ; 

The busy old wife, by the open door. 
Was turning the spinning-wheel ; 

And the old brass clock on the mantel-tree 

Had plodded along to almost three. 

Still the farmer sat in his easy-chair, 

While close to his heaving breast 
The moistened brow and the cheek so fair 

Of his sweet grandchild were pressed ; 
His head, bent down, on her soft hair lay : 
Fast asleep were they both, that summer da}'- ! 
Charles Gamage Eastman. 



u 



'NOT ONE TO SPARE. 

" Which shall it be ? AVhich shall it be ? ' 

I looked at John — John looked at me 

(Dear, patient John, who loves me yet 

As well as though my locks were jet); 

And when I found that I must speak. 

My voice seemed strangely low and weak : 

"Tell me again what Robert said." 

And then I, listening, bent my head. 

" This is his letter : ' I will give 

A house and land while you shall live, 

If, in return, from out your seven, 

One child to me for aye is given.' " 

I looked at John's old garments worn, 

I thought of all that John had borne 

Of poverty and work and care. 

Which I, though willing, could not share ; 

I thought of seven mouths to feed. 

Of seven little children's need. 

And then of this. " Come, John," said I, 

" We '11 choose among them as they lie 

Asleep ; " so, walking hand in hand, 

Dear John and I surveyed our band. 

Fh'st to the cradle lightly stepped, 

Where Lilian, the baby, slept, 

A glory 'gainst the iiillow white. 

Softly the father stooped to lay 

His rough hand down in a gentle way, 

When dream or whisper made her stir. 

And huskily he said, " Not her, not her ! " 

We stopped beside the trundle-bed. 

And one long ray of lamplight shed 



Athwart the boyish faces there. 

In sleep so pitiful and fair ; 

I saw on Jamie's rough, i-ed cheek 

A tear undried. Ere John could speak, 

" He 's but a baby, too," said I, 

And kissed him as we hurried by. 

Pale, patient Robbie's angel face 

Still in his sleep bore suffering's trace. 

" No, for a thousand crowns, not him ! " 

He whispered, while our eyes were dim. 

Poor Dick ! bad Dick ! our wayward son, 

Turbulent, reckless, idle one — 

Could he be spared ? Nay ; He who gave. 

Bid us befriend him to his gi-ave ; 

Only a mother's heart can be 

Patient enough for such as he ; 

"And so," said John, "I would not dare 

To send him from our bedside prayer." 

Then stole we softly up above 

And knelt by Mary, child of love. 

" Perhaps for her 'twould better be," 

I said to John. Quite silently 

He lifted up a curl that lay 

Across her cheek in wilful way. 

And shook his head : " Nay, love ; not thee," 

The while my heart beat audibly. 

Only one more, our eldest lad. 

Trusty and truthful, good and glad — 

So like his father. " No, John, no- 

I cannot, will not, let him go." 

And so we wrote, in courteous way. 

We could not drive one child away ; 

And afterward toil lighter seemed. 

Thinking of that of which we dreamed, 

Happy in truth that not one face 

Was missed from its accustomed place ; 

Thankful to work for all the seven. 

Trusting the rest to One in heaven. 

Anonymous. 



THE CHILDREN. 

"When the lessons and tasks are all ended, 

And the school for the day is dismissed, 
And the little ones gather around me. 

To biJ me good night and be kissed ; 
the little white arms that encircle 

]\ly neck in their tender embrace ! 
the smiles that are halos of heaven. 

Shedding sunshine of love on my face ! 

And when they are gone, I sit di'eaming 
Of ni}' childhood, too lovely to last ; 

Of love that my heait will remember 
When it wakes to the jjulse of the past, 



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HOME. 



231 



^ 



Ere the world and its wickedness made me 

A partner of sorrow and sin, — 
When the glory of God was about me, 

And the glory of gladness within. 

All my heart grows weak as a woman's, 

And the fountains of feeling will How, ' 
When I think of the paths steep and stony. 

Where the feet of the dear ones must go ; 
Of the mountains of sin hanging o'er them, 

Of the tempest of Fate blowing wild ; 
0, there 's nothing on earth half so holy 

As the innocent heart of a child ! 

They are idols of hearts and of households ; 

They are angels of God in disguise ; 
His sunlight still sleeps in their tresses. 

His glory still gleams in their eyes ; 
0, these truants from home and from heaven, — 

They have made me more manly and mild ; 
And I know now how Jesus could liken 

The kingdom of God to a child ! 

I ask not a life for the dear ones. 

All radiant, as others have done. 
But that life may have just enough shadow 

To temper the glare of the sun ; 
I would i^ray God to guard them from evil, 

But my prayer would bound back to myself ; 
Ah ! a seraph may pray for a sinner, 

But a sinner must pray for himself. 

The twig is so easily bended, 

I have banished the rule and the rod ; 
I have taught them tlie goodness of knowledge, 

They have taught me the goodness of God. 
My heart is the dungeon of darkness. 

Where I shut them for breaking a rule ; 
My frown is sufficient correction ; 

My love is the law of the school. 

I shall leave the old house in the autumn, 

To traverse its threshold no more ; 
Ah ! how shall I sigli for the dear ones 

Tliat meet me each morn at the door ! 
I shall miss the "good nights" and the kisses, 

Antl the gush of their innocent glee. 
The group on its green, and the flowers 

That are brought every morning to me. 

I shall miss them at morn and at even, 

Their song in the school and the street ; 
I shall miss the low hum of their voices, 

And the tread of their delicate feet. 
When the lessons of life are all ended. 

And death says, "The school is dismissed ! " 
May the little ones gather around me, 

To bid mo good night and be kissed ! 

Charles M. Dickinson. 



FAITH AND HOPE. 

0, don' T be sorrowful, darling ! 

Now, don't be sori'owful, pray ; 
For, taking the year together, my dear, 

There is n't more night than day. 
It 's rainy weather, my loved one ; 

Time's wheels they heavily run ; 
But taking the year together, my dear, 

There is n't more cloud than sun. 

We 're old folks now, companion, — 

Our heads they are growing gray ; 
But taking the year all round, my dear, 

You always will find the Alay. 
We 've had our May, my darling. 

And our roses, long ago ; 
And the time of the year is come, my dear, 

For the long dark nights, and the snow. 

But God is God, my faithful, 

Of night as well as of day ; 
And we feel and know that we can go 

Wherever he leads the way. 
Ay, God of night, my darling ! 

Of the night of death so grim ; 
And the gate that from life leads out, good wife, 

Is the gate that leads to Him. 

Rembrandt Phale. 



FRAGMENTS. 

The Wife. 

To cheer thy sickness, watch thy health, 
Partake, but never waste thy wealth, 
Or stand with smile unmurmuring by, 
And lighten half thy poverty. 

Bride of A by do s, Canl.K. BYRON. 

She gave me eyes, she gave me ears ; 

And humble cares, and delicate fears, 

A heart, the fountain of sweet tears ; 

And love, and thought, and joy. 

The Sparrow's Nest. WORDSWORTH. 



This flour of wifly patience. 

The Clerkes Tale, Pars v. CHAUCER. 

And mistress of herself, though china fall. 

Moral Essays : Epistle //. POPE. 

The Married State. 

Wedlock, indeed, hath oft compared been 
To public feasts, where meet a public rout, 
Where they that are without would fain go in, 
And they that arc within would fain go out. 

Contention bet-Mixt a VVi/e, etc. SIR J. DaVIES. 



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232 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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fie upon this single life ! forego it. 



Duchess ofMal/j. 



J. WEBSTER. 



1. That man must lead a happy life 

2. AVlio is directed by a wife ; 

3. Wlio's free from matrimonial chains 

4. Is sure to suffer for his pains. 

5. Adam could find no solid peace 

6. Till lie beheld a woman's face ; 

7. When Eve was given for a mate, 

8. Adam was in a happy state. 

L'.pi^ra})l on Matrijnoiiy : Read altdrnatd lines, - 
S. 7. 6.'3. 



Inconstancy. 

Trust not a man : we are by nature false, 
Dissembling, subtle, cruel and inconstant ; 
When a man talks of love, with caution hear 

him ; 
But if he swears, he '11 certainly deceive thee. 

The Orphan. T . OTWAY. 

Nay, women are frail too ; 
Ay, as the glasses where they view themselves ; 
Which are as easy broke as they make forms. 



Measure for Measure, Act ii. Sc. 4. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



In part to blame is she. 
Which hath without consent bin only tride : 
He comes to neere that comes to be denide. 

A I Wife. SIR T. OVER BURY. 

Virtue she finds too painfnl an endeavor, 
Content to dwell in decencies forever. 

Moral Essays : Epislle II. POPE . 



Completion. 

Man is but half without woman ; and 
As do idolaters their heavenly gods. 
We deify the things that we adore. 

Festus. P.J. Bailey. 

He is the half part of a blessed man, 

Left to be finished by sucli as she ; 
And she a fair divided excellence, 
MHiose fulness of perfection lies in him. 

Kinif John, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Home Life. 

Domestic happiness, thou only bliss 
Of paradise that has survived the fall ! 



The first sure symptom of a mind in health 
Is rest of heart, and pleasure felt at home. 

Nisht Thoushts. E. YOUNG. 



And hie him home, at evening's close. 
To sweet repast and calm repose. 



Ode on the Plea 



'.re arising from y'icissitude. 



The social smile, the sympathetic tear. 

Education and Governmeftt. T. GRAY. 

Oh ! blessed with temper, whose unclouded ray 
Can make to-morrow cheerful as to-day. 

Moral Essays : Epistle II. POPE. 

Why loft you wife and children, — 
Those precious motives, those strong knots of love ? 

Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



MOTIIEII-LOVE. 

The only love which, on this teenring earth, 
Asks no return for passion's wayward birth. 

The Dream. HON. MRS. NORTON. 

A mother's love, — how sweet the name ! 

What is a mother's love ? — 
A noble, pure, and tender flame, 

Enkindled from above. 
To bless a heart of earthly mould ; 
The warmest love that can grow cold ; — 

This is a mother's love. 

A Mother s Love. J. MONTGOMERY. 

Hath he set bounds between their love and me ? 
I am their mother ; who shall bar me from them ? 

Richard III., Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

The poor wren, 
The most diminutive of birds, will fight, 
The young ones in her nest against the owl. 

Macbeth, Act iv .Sc.i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Where yet was ever found a mother 
Who 'd give her booby for another ? 

Fables: The Mother, the Nurse, and the Fairy. J. GAY. 



Home Pleasures. 

At Christmas play, and make good cheer. 
For Christmas comes but once a year. 

The Fanners Daily Diet. T. TUSSER.. 

So saying, with despatchful looks in haste 
She turns, on hospitable thoughts intent. 

Paradise Lost, Book v . M I ETON . 

Alike all ages : dames of ancient days 

Have led tlieir children through the mirthful 

maze ; 
And the gay grandsire, skilled in gestic lore, 
Has frisked beneath the burden of threescore. 

The Traveller. GOLDSIUTH. 



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PARTING. 






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PARTINa. 



GOOD BY. 

" Farewell ! farewell ! " is often heard 

From the lips of those who part : 
'T is a whispered tone, — 't is a gentle word, 

But it springs not from the heart. 
It may serve for the lover's closing lay, 

To be sung 'neath a summer sky ; 
But give to me the lips that say 

The honest words, " Good by ! " 

"Adieu ! adieu !" may greet the ear, 

In the guise of courtly speech : 
But when we leave the kind and dear, 

'T is not what the soul would teach. 
Whene'er we grasp the hands of those 

We would have forever nigh. 
The flame of Friendship bursts and glows 

In the warm, frank words, " Good by." 

The mother, sending forth her child 

To meet with cares and strife, 
Breathes through her tears her doubts and fears 

For the loved one's future life. 
No cold "adieu," no "farewell," lives 

Within her choking sigh. 
But the deepest sob of anguish gives, 

" God bless thee, boy ! Good by ! " 

Go, watch the pale and dying one, 

When the glance has lost its beam ; 
When the brow is cold as the marble stone, 

And the world a passing dream ; 
And the latest pressure of the hand, 

The look of tlie closing eye. 
Yield what the heart 7nust understand, 

A long, a last Good-by. 

AN-QNYMOUa' 



QUA CUESUM VENTUS. 

As ships, becalmed at eve, tliat lay 
Witli canvas drooping, side by side, 

Two towers of sail at dawn of day 

Are scarce long leagues apart descried. 

When fell the night, up sprang the breeze. 
And all the darkling hours they plied, 

Nor dreamt but each the selfsame seas 
By each was cleaving, side by side : 



E'en so, — but why the tale reveal 

Of those whom, year by year unchanged, 

Brief absence joined anew to feel. 

Astounded, soul from soul estranged ? 

At dead of night their sails were filled. 
And onward each rejoicing steered ; — ■ 

Ah ! neither blame, for neither willed 
Or wist what first with dawn appeared. 

To veer, how vain ! On, onward strain. 
Brave barks ! In light, in darkness too, 

Through winds and tides one compass guides 
To that and your own selves be true. 

But blithe breeze ! and great seas ! 

Thoirgh ne'er, that earliest parting past, 
On your wide plain they join again, — 

Together lead them home at last. 

One port, methought, alike they sought, — 
One purpose hold where'er they fare ; 

bounding breeze, rushing seas, 
At last, at last, unite them there ! 

Arthur Hugh Clough. 



AE FOND KISS BEFORE WE PAKT. 

Ae fond kiss, and then we sever ; 
Ae fareweel, alas, forever ! 
Deep in heart-wrung tears I '11 pledge thee ; 
Warring sighs and groans I '11 wage thee. 
Who shall say that fortune grieves him, 
While the star of hope she leaves him ? 
Me, nae cheerfu' twinkle lights me ; 
Dark despair around benights me. 

I '11 ne'er blame my partial fancy — ■ 
Naething could resist mj' Nancy : 
But to see her was to love her. 
Love but her, and love forever. 
Had we never loved sae kindly. 
Had we never loved sae blindly. 
Never met • — or never parted. 
We had ne'er been broken-hearted. 

Fare thee weel, thou first and fairest ! 
Fare thee weel, thou best and dearest ! 
Tliine be ilka joy and treasure. 
Peace, enjoyment, love, and pleasure ! 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



Ae fond kiss, and then we sever ; 

Ae fareweel, alas, forever ! 

Deep in heart-wrung tears I '11 pledge thee, 

Warring sighs and groans I '11 wage thee ! 

RoBURT Burns. 



0, MY LUVE 'S LIKE A RED, RED ROSE. 

0, MY Luve 's like a red, red rose 
That 's newly sprung in June : 

0, my Luve 's like the melodie 
That 's sweetly played in tune. 

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass, 

So deep in luve am I : 
And I will luve thee still, my dear. 

Till a' the seas gang dry : 

Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear. 
And the rocks melt wi' the sun : 

And I will luve thee still, my dear, 
While the sands o' life shall run. 

And fare thee weel, my only Luve ! 

And fare thee weel awhile ! 
And I will come again, my Luve, 

Tho' it were ten thousand mile. 

Robert Burns. 



THE KISS, DEAR MAID. 

The kiss, dear maid ! thy lip has left 

Shall never part from mine. 
Till happier hours restore the gift 

Untainted back to thine. 

Thj^ parting glance, which fondly beams, 

An equal love may see : 
The tear that from thine eyelid streams 

Can weep no change in me. 

I ask no pledge to make me blest 

In gazing when alone ; 
Nor one memorial for a breast 

Whose thoughts are all thine own. 

Nor need I write — to tell the tale 

My pen were doubly weak : 
'0, what can idle words avail. 

Unless the heart could speak ? 

By day or night, in weal or woe, 

That heart, no longer free, 
Must bear the love it cannot show, 

And silent, ache for thee. 



u 



MAID OF ATHENS, ERE WE PART. 

Zcirj fiov eras ayanai.* 

Maid of Athens, ere we part, 
Give, 0, give me back my heart ! 
Or, since that has left my breast. 
Keep it now, and take the rest ! 
Hear my vow before I go, 
Ziirj fiov (ras ayairia. 

By those ti'esses i;nconfined. 
Wooed by each J^lgean wind ; 
By those lids whose jetty fringe 
Kiss thy soft cheeks' blooming tinge ; 
By those wild eyes like the roe, 
Xdrt jxov (yds ayairco. 

By that lip I long to taste ; 
By that zone-encircled waist ; 
By all the token-flowers that tell 
What words can never speak so well ; 
By love's alternate joy and woe, 
Ziii] (MOV ads ayairai. 

Maid of Athens ! I am gone. 
Think of me, sweet ! when alone. 
Though I fly to Istambol, 
Athens holds my heart and soul : 
Can I cease to love thee ? No ! 
Ziif] fiov ads ayairai. 



SONG 



OF THE YOUNG HIGHLANDER SUMMONED FKOM THE SIDE 
OF HIS BRIDE BY THE " FIERY CROSS " OF RODERICK DHU. 

FROM "THE LADY OF THE LAKE." 

The heath this night must be my bed. 
The bracken curtain for my head. 
My lullaby the warder's tread. 

Far, far fi-om love and thee, Mary ; 
To-morrow eve, more stilly laid 
My couch may be my bloody plaid. 
My vesper song, thy wail, sweet maid ! 

It will not waken me, j\Iary ! 

I may not, dare not, fancy now 

The grief that clouds thy lovely brow, 

I dare not think upon thy vow, 

And all it promised me, Mary. 
No fond regret must Norman know ; 
When bursts Clan-Alpine on the foe, 
His heart must be like bended bow, 

His foot like arrow free, Mary. 



My life, I love thee. 



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PARTING. 



235 



t] 



A time will come with feeling fraught ! 
For, if I fall in battle fought, 
Thy hapless lover's dying thought 

Shall be a thought on thee, Mary. 
And if returned from conquered foes, 
How blithely will the evening close. 
How sweet the linnet sing repose, 

To my young bride and me, Mary ! 

Sir Walter Scott. 



TO LUCASTA, 

ON GOING TO THE WARS. 

Tell me not, sweet, I am unkinde, 

That from the nunnerie 
Of thy chaste breast and quiet minde. 

To warre and amies I flee. 

True, a new mistresse now I chase, — 

The first foe in the field ; 
And with a stronger faith imbrace 

A sword, a horse, a shield. 

Yet this inconstancy is such 

As you, too, shall adore ; 
I could not love thee, deare, so much. 

Loved I not honor more. 

Richard Lovelace. 



BLACK-EYED SUSAN. 

All in the Downs the fleet was moored. 
The streamers waving in the wind. 

When black-eyed Susan came aboard ; 
" 0, where shall I my true-love find ? 

Tell me, ye jovial sailors, tell me true 

If my sweet William sails among the crew." 

William, who high upon the yard 
Rocked with the billow to and fro. 

Soon as her well-known voice he heard 
He sighed, and cast his eyes below : 

The cord slides swiftly through his glowino 
hands, 

And quick as lightning on the deck he stands. 

So the sweet lark, high poised in air, 
Shuts close his pinions to his breast 

If chance his mate's shrill call he hear, 
And drops at once into her nest : — 

The noblest captain in the British fleet 

Might envy William's lip those kisses sweet. 

" Susan, Susan, lovely dear. 

My vows shall ever true remain ; 
Let me kiss off that falling tear ; 

We only part to meet again. 
Change as ye list, ye winds ; my heart shall be 
The faithful compass that still points to thee. 



"Believe not what the landmen say 

Who tempt with doubts thy constant mind : 

They '11 tell thee, sailors, when away, 
In every port a mistress find : 

Yes, yes, believe them when they tell thee so, 

For Thou art present wheresoe'er I go. 

" If to fair India's coast we sail, 
Thy eyes are seen in diamonds bright, 

Thy breath is Afric's spicy gale, 
Thy skin is ivory so white. 

Thus every beauteous object that I view 

Wakes in my soul some charm of lovely Sue. 

" Though battle call me from thy arms, 

Let not mj'- pretty Susan mourn ; 
Though cannons roar, yet safe from harms 

William shall to his dear return. 
Love turns aside the balls that round me fly. 
Lest precious tears should drop from Susan's eye." 

The boatswain gave the dreadful word, 
The sails their swelling bosom spread ; 

No longer must she stay aboard : 

They kissed, she sighed, he hung his head. 

Her lessening boat unwilling rows to land ; 

"Adieu ! " she cried ; and waved her lily hand. 

John gay. 



HERO TO LEANDER. 

0, 00 not yet, my love, 

The night is dark and vast ; 
The white moon is hid in her heaven above, 

And the waves climb high and fast. 
0, kiss me, kiss me, once again. 

Lest thy kiss should be the last. 
0, kiss me ere we part ; 
Grow closer to my heart. 
My heart is warmer surely than the bosom of 
the main. 
joy ! bliss of blisses ! 

My heart of hearts art thou. 
Come, bathe me with thy kisses. 

My eyelids and my brow. 
Hark how the wild rain hisses. 

And the loud sea roars below. 

Thy heart beats through thy rosy limbs, 

So gladly doth it stir ; 
Thine eye in drops of gladness swims. 

I have bathed thee with the pleasant 
myrrh ; 
Thy locks are dripping balm ; 
Thou shalt not wander hence to-night, 

I '11 stay thee with my kisses. 
To-night the roaring brine 

Will rend thy golden tresses ; 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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The ocean with the morrow light 
"Will be both blue and calm ; 
And the billow will embrace thee with a kiss as 
soft as mine. 

No Western odors wander 

On the black and moaning sea, 
And when thou art dead, Leander, 

My soul naust follow thee ! 
0, go not yet, my love. 

Thy voice is sweet and low ; 
The deep salt wave breaks in above 

Those marble steps below. 
The turret-stairs are wet 

That lead into the sea. 
Leander ! go not yet. 
The pleasant stars have set : 
0, go not, go not yet, 

Or I will follow thee. 

ALFRED TENNYSON. 



THE PARTING LOVEES. 

She says, " The cock crows, — hark ! " 
He says, " No ! still 't is dark." 

She says, " The dawn grows bright," 
He says, "0 no, my Light." 

She says, "Stand up and say, 
Gets not the heaven gray?" 

He says, " The morning star 
Climbs the horizon's bar." 

She says, " Then quick depart : 
Alas ! you now must start ; 

But give the cock a blow 
"Who did begin our woe ! " 

Anonymous (Chinese). Translation 
of WILLIAM R. Alger. 



h 



PARTING LOVERS. 



I LOVE thee, love thee, Giulio ! 

Some call nie cold, and some demure. 
And if thou hast ever guessed that so 

I love thee . . . well ; — the proof was poor. 

And no one could be sure. 

Before thy song (with shifted rhymes 

To suit my name) did I undo 
The persian .? If it moved sometimes. 

Thou hast not seen a hand push through 

A flower or two. 



My mother listening to my sleep 

Heard nothing but a sigh at night, — 

The short sigh rippling on the deep, — 
When hearts run out of breath and sight 
Of men, to God's clear light. 

When others named thee, . . . thought thy brows 
Were straight, thy smile was tender, . . . "Here 

He conies between the vineyard-rows ! " — 
I said not " Ay," ^nor waited. Dear, 
To feel thee step too near. 

I left such things to bolder girls, 

Olivia or Clotilda. Nay, 
When that Clotilda through her curls 

Held both thine eyes in hers one day, 

I marvelled, let me say. 

I could not try the woman's trick : 
Between us straightway fell the blush 

Which kept me separate, blind, and sick. 
A wind came with thee in a flush, 
As blown through Horeb's bush. 

But now that Italy invokes 

Her young men to go forth and chase 
The foe or perish, — nothing chokes 

My voice, or drives me from the place : 

I look thee in the face. 

I love thee ! it is understood, 

Confest : I do not shrink or start : 

No blushes : all my body's blood 
Has gone to greaten this poor heart, 
That, loving, we may part. 

Our Italy invokes the youth 

To die if need be. Still there 's room. 
Though earth is strained with dead, in truth. 

Since twice the lilies were in bloom 

They had not grudged a tomb. 

And many a plighted maid and wife 
And mother, who can say since then 

"My country," cannot say through life 

"Myson," "my spouse," "my flower of men," 
And not weep dumb again. 

Heroic males thfe country bears, 

But daughters give up more than sons. 

Flags wave, drums beat, and unawares 
You flash your souls out with the guns, 
And take your heaven at once ! 

But we, — we empty heart and home 
Of life's life, love ! we bear to think 

You 're gone, ... to feel you may not come, . . • 
To hear the door-latch stir and clink 
Yet no more you, . . . nor sink. 



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PARTING. 



237 *— ^ 



Dear God ! when Italy is one 

And perfected from bound to bound, . . . 
Suppose (for my share) eartli 's undone 

By one grave in 't ! as one small wound 

May kill a man, 't is found ! 

What then ? If love's delight must end, 
At least we '11 clear its truth from flaws. 

I love thee, love thee, sweetest friend ! 
Now take my sweetest without pause, 
To help the nation's cause. 

And thus of noble Italy 

We '11 both be worthy. Let her show 

The future how we made her free, 
Not sparing life, nor Giulio, 
Nor this , . . this heart-break. Go ! 

Elizabeth Barrett BrowiVing. 



U-- 



GO WHERE GLORY WAITS THEE. 

FROM. "IRISH MELODIES." 

Go where glory waits thee, 
But, while fame elates thee, 

0, still remember me ! 
When the praise thou meetest 
To thine ear is sweetest, 

0, then remember me ! 
Other arms may press thee, 
Dearer friends caress thee. 
All the joys that bless thee. 

Sweeter far may be ; 
But when friends are nearest, 
And when joys are dearest, 

0, then remember me ! 

When at eve thou rovest 
By the star thou lovest, 

0, then remember me ! 
Think, when home returning, 
Bright we 've seen it burning, 

0, thus remember me ! 
Oft as summer closes, 
On its lingering roses. 

Once so loved by thee, 
Think of her who wove them, 
Her who made thee love them, 

0, then remember me ! 

AVhen, around thee dying, 
Autunm leaves are lying, 

0, then remember me ! 
And, at night, -when gazing 
On the gay hearth blazing, 

0, still remember me ! 



Then should music, stealing 
All the soul of feeling, 
To thy heart appealing. 

Draw one tear from thee ; 
Then let memory bring thee 
Strains I used to sing thee, — 

0, then remember me ! 

THOMAS Moore. 



LOCHABER NO MORE. 

Farewell to Lochaber ! and farewell, my Jean, 
Where heartsome with thee I hae mony day been; 
For Lochaber no more, Lochaber no more, 
We '11 maybe return to Lochaber no more ! 
These tears that I shed they are a' for my dear. 
And no for the dangers attending on wear. 
Though borne on rough seas to a far bloody shore. 
Maybe to return to Lochaber no more. 

Though hurricanes rise, and rise every wind, 
They '11 ne'er make a tempest like that in my 

mind ; 
Though loudest of thunder on louder waves roar, 
That 's naething like leaving my love on the shore. 
To leave thee behind me my heart is sair pained ; 
By ease that 's inglorious no fame can be gained ; 
And beauty and love 's the reward of the brave, 
And I nmst deserve it before 1 can crave. 

Then glory, my Jeany, maun plead my excuse ; 
Since honor commands me, how can I refuse ? 
Without it I ne'er can have merit for thee, 
And without thy favor I 'd better not be. 
I gae then, my lass, to win honor and fame. 
And if I should luck to come gloriously hame, 
I '11 bring a heart to thee with love running o'er, 
And then I'll leave thee and; Lochaber no more. 

Allan Ramsay. 



AS SLOW OUR SHIP. 

A.s slow our ship her foamy track 

Against the wind was cleaving. 
Her trembling pennant still looked back 

To that dear isle 't was leaving. 
So loath we part from all we love. 

From all the links that bind us ; 
So turn our hearts, as on we rove, 

To those w^e 've left behind us ! 

When, round the bowl, of vanished years 

We talk with joyous seeming, — 
With smiles that might as well be tears, 

So faint, so sad their beaming ; 
While memory brings us back again 

Each early tie that twined us, 
0, sweet 's the cup that circles then 

To those we 've left behind us ! 



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And when, in other climes, we meet 

Some isle or vale enchanting, 
Where all looks flowery, wild, and sweet, 

And naught but love is wanting ; 
We think how great had been our bliss 

If Heaven had but assigned us 
To live and die in scenes like this. 

With some we 've left behind us ! 

As travellers oft look back at eve 

When eastward darkly going, 
To gaze upon that light they leave 

Still faint behind them glowing, — 
So, when the close of pleasure's day 

To gloom hath near consigned us, 
We turn to catch one fading ray 

Of joy that 's left behind us. 

Thomas Moore. 



&- 



ADIEF, ADIEU! MY NATIVE SHORE. 

Adieu, adieu ! my native shore 

Fades o'er the waters blue ; 
The night- winds sigh, the breakers roar. 

And shrieks the wild sea-mew. 
Yon sun that sets upon the sea 

We follow in his flight ; 
Farewell awhile to him and thee. 

My native Land — Good Night ! 

A few short hours, and he will rise 

To give the morrow birth ; 
And I shall hail the main and skies, 

But not my mother earth. 
Deserted is my own good hall, 

Its hearth is desolate ; 
Wild weeds are gathering on the wall ; 

My dog howls at the gate. 



MY OLD KENTUCKY HOME. 

NEGRO SONG. 

The sun shines bright in our old Kentucky home ; 

'Tis summer, the darkeys are gay ; 
The corn top 's ripe and the meadow 's in the 
bloom, 

While the birds make music all the day ; 
The young folks roll on the little cabin floor, 

All merry, all happy, all bright ; 
By 'mbyhard times comesaknockin'atthedoor, — 

Then, my old Kentucky home, good niglit ! 



Weep no more, my lady ; 0, weep no more to- 
day ! 
We '11 sing one song for the old Kentucky home, 
For our old Kentucky home far away. 



They hunt no more for the possum and the coon, 

On the meadow, the hill, and the shore ; 
They sing no more by the glimmer of the moon. 

On the bench by the old cabin door ; 
The day goes by, like a shadow o'er the heart. 

With sorrow where all was delight ; 
The time has come, when the darkeys have to 
part. 

Then, my old Kentucky home, good night ! 
Weep no more, my lady, etc. 

The head must bow, and the back will have to 
bend, 
AVherever the darkey may go ; 
A few more days, and the troubles all will end, 

In the field where the sugar-cane grow ; 
A few more days to tote the weary load, 

No matter, it will never be light ; 
A few more days till we totter on the road. 
Then, my old Kentucky home, good night ! 
Weep no more, my lady, etc. 

Stephen Collins foster. 



FAEEWELL! IF EVER FONDEST 
PRAYER. 

Farew^ell ! if ever fondest prayer 

For other's weal availed on high. 
Mine will not all be lost in air. 

But waft thy name beyond the sky. 
'T were vain to speak, to weep, to sigh : 

Oh ! more than tears of blood can tell. 
When wrung from guilt's expiring eye, 

Are in that word — Farewell ! — Farewell ! 

These lips are mute, these ej^es are dry : 

But in my breast and in my brain 
Awake the pangs that pass not by. 

The thought that ne'er shall sleep again. 
My soul nor deigns nor dares complain. 

Though grief and passion there rebel : 
I only know we loved in vain — 

I only feel — Farewell ! — Farewell ! 



FAREWELL TO HIS W^IFE. 

Fake thee well ! and if forever, 

Still forever, fare thee well ; 
Even though unforgiving, never 

'Gainst thee shall my heart rebel. 

Would that breast were bared before thee 
Where thy bead so oft hath lain, 

While that placid sleep came o'er thee 
Which thou ne'er canst know again : 



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PARTING. 



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239 



Would that brecast, by thee glanced over. 
Every inmost thought could show ! 

Then thou wouldst at last discover 
'T was not well to spurn it so. 

Though the world for this commend thee, - 
Though it smile upon the blow, 

Even its praises must offend thee. 
Founded on another's woe : 

Though my many faults defaced me, 

Could no other arm be found 
Than the one which once embraced me, 

To intlict a cureless wound ? 

Yet, 0, yet thyself deceive not : 
Love may sink by slow decay ; 

But by sudden wrench, believe not 
Hearts can thus be torn away : 

Still thine own its life retaineth, — • 

Still must mine, though bleeding, beat ; 

And the undying thought which paineth 
Is — that we no more may meet. 

These are words of deeper sorrow 
Than the wail above the dead ; 

Both shall live, but every morrow 
Wake us from a widowed bed. 

And when thou wouldst solace gather. 
When our child's first accents flow. 

Wilt thou teach her to say " Father ! " 
Though his care she must forego ? 

When her little hands shall press thee, 
When her lip to thine is pressed. 

Think of him whose prayer shall bless thee. 
Think of him thy love had blessed ! 

Should her lineaments resemble 

Those thou nevermore mayst see. 
Then thy heart will softly tremble 

With a pulse yet true to me. 
• 
All my faults perchance thou knowest, 

All my madness none can know ; 
All my hopes, where'er thou goest, 

Wither, yet with thcc they go. 

Every feeling hath been shaken ; 

Pride, which not a world could bow, 
Bows to thee, — by thee forsaken, 

Even my soul forsakes me jiow ; 

But 't is done ; all words are idle, — " 
Words from me are vainer still ; 

But the thoughts we cannot bridle 
Force their way without the will. 



Fare thee well ! — thus disunited. 

Torn from every nearer tie. 
Seared in heart, and lone, and blighted. 

More than this I scarce can die. 

Byron. 



JAFFIER PARTING WITH BELVIDERA. 

FROM "VENICE PRESERVED." 

Then hear me, bounteous Heaven, 
Pour down your blessings on this beauteous head, 
M^here everlasting sweets are always springing, 
With a continual giving liand : let ])eace. 
Honor, and safety always hover round her : 
Feed her with plenty ; let her eyes ne'er see 
A sight of sorrow, nor her heart know mourning; 
Crown all her days with joy, her nights with rest, 
Harmless as her own thoughts ; and prop her 

virtue. 
To bear the loss of one that too much loved ; 
And comfort her with patience in our parting. 

Thomas Otvvav. 



COME, LET US KISSE AND . PARTE. 

Since there 's no helpe, — come, let us kisse and 
parte, 

Nay, I have done, — you get no more of me ; 
And I am glad, — yea, glad with all my hearte. 

That thus so cleanly I myselfe can free. 
Shake hands forever ! — cancel all our vows ; 

And when we meet at any time againe. 
Be it not seene in either of our brows, 

That we one jot of former love retaine. 

Now — at the last gaspe of Love's latest breath — • 
When, his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies ; 
When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death. 

And Innocence is closing up his eyes, 
Now ! if thou wouldst — when all have given 
him over — 
From death to life thou mightst him yet re- 
cover. 

MICHAEL Drayton. 



FAREWELL! THOU ART TOO DEAR. 

Farewell ! thou art too dear for my possessing. 
And like enough thou know'st thy estimate : 
The charter of thy worth gives thee releasing ; 
My bonds in thee are all determinate. 
For how do I hold thee but by thy g]-anting ? 
And for that riches where is my deserving ? 
The cause of this fair gift in me is wanting, 
And so my patent back again is sM'erving. 



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Thyself thou gav'st, thy own worth then not 

knowing, 
Or nie, to whom thou gav'st it, else mistaking ; 
So thy great gift, upon misprision growing, 
Comes home again, on better judgment making. 
Thus have I had thee, as a dream doth flatter; 
In sleep a king, but, waking, no such matter. , 

SHAKESPEARE. 



ta 



AN EARNEST SUIT, 

TO HIS UNKIND MISTRESS NOT TO FORSAKE HIM. , 

And wilt thou leave me thus ? 
Say nay ! say nay ! for shame ! 
To save thee from the blame 
Of all my grief and graine. 
And wilt thou leave me thus ? 
Say nay ! say nay ! 

And wilt thou leave me thus, 
That hath loved thee so long, 
In wealth and woe among ? 
And is thy heart so strong 
As for to leave me thus ? 
Say nay ! say nay ! 

And wilt thou leave me thus, 
That hath given thee my heart, 
Never for to depart, 
Neither for pain nor smart ? 
And wilt thou leave me thus ? 
Say nay ! say nay ! 

And wilt thou leave me thus, 
And have no more pity 
Of him that loveth thee ? 
Alas ! thy cruelty ! 
And wilt thou leave me thus ? 
Say nay ! say nay ! 

Sir Thomas wyatt. 



WE PARTED IN SILENCE. 

"We parted in silence, we parted by night. 
On the banks of that lonely river ; 

Where the fragrant limes their boughs unite. 
We met — and we parted forever ! 

The night-bird sung, and the stars above 
Told many a touching story. 

Of friends long passed to the kingdom of love, 

AVliere the soul wears its mantle of glory. 

We parted in silence, — our cheeks were wet 
With the tears that were past controlling ; 

We vowed we would never, no, never forget, 
And those vows at the time were consoling : 



But those lips that echoed the sounds of mine 

Are as cold as that lonely river ; 
And that eye, that beautiful spirit's shrine, 

Has shi'ouded its fires forever. 

And now on the midnight sky 1 look. 

And my heart grows full of weeping ; 
Each star is to me a sealed book. 

Some tale of that loved one keeping. 
We parted in silence, — we parted in tears. 

On the banks of that lonely river : 
But the odor and bloom of those bygone years 

Shall hang o'er its waters forever. 

Julia Crawford. 



FAREWELL! BUT WHENEVER. 

Farewell ! — but whenever you welcome the 

hour 
That awakens the night-song of mirth in your 

bower. 
Then think of the friend who once welcomed it 

too. 
And forgot his own griefs, to be happy with you. 
His griefs may return — not a hope jnay remain 
Of the few that have brightened his pathway of 

pain — • 
But he ne'er can forget the short vision that 

threw 
Its enchantment around him while lingering 

with you ! 

And still on that evening when Pleasure fills up 
To the highest top sparkle each heart and each 

cup. 
Where'er my path lies, be it gloomy or bright. 
My soul, happy friends ! will be with you that 

night ; 
Shall join in your revels, your sports, and your 

Aviles, 
And return to me, beaming all o'er with your 

smiles — 
Too blest if it tell me that, mid the gay cheer. 
Some kind voice has murmured, " I wish he 

were here ! " 

Let Fate do her worst, there are relics of joy. 
Bright dreams of the past, which she cannot 

destroy ; 
Which come, in the night-time of sorrow and en re, 
And bring back the features which joy used to 

wear. 
Long, long be my heart with such memories filled ! 
Like the vase in which roses have once been 

distilled — ■ 
You may break, you may shatter the vase, if you 

will, 
But the scent of the roses will hang round it still. 

Thomas Moore. 



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ABSENCE. 



241 ^-^ 



FKAGMENTS. 

Fakewells. 

Farewell ! a word that must be, and hath been — 
A sound which makes us linger ; — yet — fare- 
well. 

Cliilde Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 

Good night, good night : parting is such sweet 

sorrow. 
That I shall say good night till it be morrow. 

Romeo and Julkt, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Juliet. 0, think'st thou we shall ever meet 

again ? 
Romeo. I doubt it not ; and all these woes 

shall serve 
For sweet discourses in our time to come. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act iii. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

So sweetly she bade me "Adieu," 
I thought that she bade me return. 

A Pastoral. SHENSTONE. 



He did keep 
The deck, with glove, or hat, or handkerchief, 
Still waving as the fits and stirs of his mind 
Could best express how slow his soul sailed on, - 
How swift his ship. 

Cymbeline, Act i. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

All farewells should be sudden, when forever, 
Else they make an eternity of moments, 
And clog the last sad sands of life with tears. 

Sardanapalus, BYRON. 

"When we two parted 

In silence and tears. 

Half broken-hearted, 

To sever for years, 

Pale grew thy cheek and cold. 

Colder thy kiss : 

Truly that hour foretold 

Sorrow to this ! 

When -wc two parted. BYRON. 

And so, without more circumstance at all, 
I hold it fit that we shake hands and part. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 5. _ SHAKESPEARE. 



ABSENCE. 



TO HER ABSENT SAILOR. 

FROM "THE TENT ON THE BEACH." 

Hek window opens to the bay, 
Oir glistening light or misty gray, 
And there at dawn and set of day 

In praj'er she kneels : 
" Dear Lord ! " she saith, "to many a home 
From wind and wave the wanderers come ; 
I only see the tossing foam 

Of stranger keels. 

" Blown out and in by summer gales. 
The stately ships, with crowded sails, 
And sailors leaning o'er their rails, 

Before me glide ; 
They come, they go, but nevermore, 
Spice-laden from the Indian shore, 
I see his swift-winge<l Isidore 

The waves divide. 

" Thou ! with whom the night is day 
And one the near and far away. 
Look out on yon gray waste, and say 
Where lingers he. 



Alive, perchance, on some lone beach 
Or thirsty isle beyond the reach 
Of man, he hears the mocking speech 
Of wind and sea. 

" dread and cruel deep, reveal 
The secret which thy waves conceal, 
And, ye wild sea-birds, hither wheel 

And tell your tale. 
Let winds that tossed his raven hair 
A message from my lost one bear, — 
Some thought of me, a last fond prayer 

Or dying wail ! 

" Come, with j^our dreariest truth shut out 
The fears that haunt me round about ; 
God ! I cannot bear this doubt 

That stifles breath. 
The worst is better than the dread ; 
Give me but leave to mourn my dead 
Asleep in trust and hope, instead 

Of life in death ! " 

It might have been the evening breeze 
That whispered in the garden trees. 
It might have been the sound of seas 
That rose and fell ; 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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But, with her heart, if not her ear, 
The old loved voice she seemed to hear : 
" I wait to meet thee : be of cheer, 
For all is well ! " 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 



TO LUCASTA. 

If to be absent were to be 
Away from thee ; 
Or that, when I am gone, 
You or I were alone ; 
Then, my Lucasta, might I crave 
Pity from blustering wind or swallowing wave. 

But I '11 not sigh one blast or gale 
To swell my sail. 
Or pay a tear to 'suage 
The foaming blue-god's rage ; 
For, whether he will let me pass 
Or no, I 'm still as happy as I was. 

Though seas and lands be 'twixt us both, 
Our faith and troth, 
Like separated souls. 
All time and space controls : 
Above the highest sphere we meet, 
Unseen, unknown ; and greet as angels greet. 

So, then, we do anticipate 
Our after-fate. 
And are alive i' th' skies. 
If thus our lips and eyes 
Can speak like spirits unconfined 
In heaven, — their earthly bodies left behind. 

COLONEL RICHARD LOVELACE. 



I LOVE MY JEAN. 

Of a' the airts * the wind can blaw, 

I dearly like the west ; 
For there the bonnie lassie lives, 

The lassie I lo'e best. 
There wild woods grow, and rivers row. 

And monie a hill 's between ; 
But day and night my fancy's flight 

Is ever wi' my Jean. 

I see her in the dewy flowers, 

I see her sweet and fair ; 
I hear her in the tunefu' birds, 

I hear her charm the air ; 
There 's not a bonnie flower that springs 

By fountain, sbaw, or green ; 
There 's not a bonnie bird that sings, 

But minds me of my Jean. 



LOVE'S MEMOPtY. 

FROM "ALL 'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL," ACT I. SC. I. 

I AM undone : there is no living, none, 

If Bertram be away. It were all one. 

That I should love a bright particular star, 

And think to wed it, he is so above me : 

In his bright radiance and collateral light 

Must I be comforted, not in his sphere. 

The ambition in my love thus plagues itself : 

The hind that would be mated by the lion 

Must die for love. 'T was pretty, though a plague, 

To see him every hour ; to sit and draw 

His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls. 

In our heart's table, — heai't too capable 

Of every line and trick of his sweet favor : 

But now he 's gone, and my idolatrous fancy 

Must sanctify his relics. 

Shakespeare. 



Robert burns. 



fy- 



The points of the compass. 



0, SAW YE BONNIE LESLEY? 

0, SAW ye bonnie Lesley 
As she gaed o'er the border ? 

She 's gane, like Alexander, 

To spread her conquests farther. 

To see her is to love her. 

And love but her forever ; 
For nature made her what she is, 

And ne'er made sic anither ! 

Thou art a queen, fair Lesley, 
Thy subjects we, before thee ; 

Thou art divine, fair Lesley, 
The hearts o' men adore thee. 

The deil he could na scaith thee, 
Or aught that wad belang thee ; 

He 'd look into thy bonnie face. 
And say, " I canna wrang thee ! " 

The Powers aboon will tent thee ; 

Misfortune sha' na steer* thee ; 
Thou 'rt like themselves sae lovely 

That ill they '11 ne'er let near thee, 

Eeturn again, fair Lesley, 

Eeturn to Caledonie ! 
That we may brag we hae a lass 

There 's nane again sae bonnie. 

Robert Burns. 



JEANIE MORRISON. 

I 'vE wandered east, I 've wandered west. 
Through mony a weary way ; 

But never, never can forget 
The luve o' life's young day ! 



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ABSENCE. 



243 



-a 



The fire that 's blawn on Beltane e'en 

May weel be black gin Yule ; 
But blacker fa' awaits the heart 

Where first fond luve grows cule, 

dear, dear Jeanie Morrison, 
The thochts o' b_ygane years 

Still fling their shadows ower my path, 

And blind my een wi' tears : 
They blind my een wi' saut, saut tears. 

And sair and sick I pine, 
As memory idly summons rip 

The blithe blinks o' langsyne. 

'T was then we luvit ilk ither weel, 

'T was then we twa did part ; 
Sweet time — sad time ! twa bairns at scule, 

Twa bairns, and but ae heart ! 
'T was then we sat on ae laigh bink, 

To leir ilk ither lear ; 
And tones and looks and smiles were shed, 

Kemembered evermair. 

1 wonder, Jeanie, aften yet, 
AVhen sitting on that bink. 

Cheek touchin' cheek, loof locked in loof, 
What our wee heads could think. 

When baith bent doun ower ae braid page, 
Wi' ae bulk on our knee. 

Thy lips were on thy lesson, but 
My lesson was in thee. 

0, mind ye how we hung our heads. 

How cheeks brent red wi' shame. 
Whene'er the scule-weans, laughin', said 

We cleeked thegither hame ? 
And mind ye o' the Saturdays, 

(The scirle then skail't at noon,) 
When we ran off to speel the braes, — 

The broom y braes o' June ? 

My head rins round and round about, — 

My heart flows like a sea. 
As ane by ane the thochts rush back 

0' scule-time, and o' thee. 
mornin' life ! mornin' luve ! 

lichtsome days and lang, 
When hinnied hopes around our hearts 

Like simmer blossoms sprang ! 

0, mind ye, luve, how aft we left 

The deavin', dinsome toun. 
To wander by the green burnside. 

And hear its waters croon ? 
The simmer leaves hung ower our heads, 

The flowers burst round our feet, 
And in the gloamin' o' the wood 

The throssil whusslit sweet : 



The throssil whusslit in the wood. 

The burn sang to the trees, — 
And we, with nature's heart in tune. 

Concerted harmonies ; 
And on the knowe abune the burn, 

For hours thegither sat 
In the silentness o' joy, till baith 

Wi' very gladness grat. 

Ay, ay, dear Jeanie Morrison, 

Tears trickled doun your clieek 
Like dew-beads on a rose, yet nane 

Had ony power to speak ! 
That was a time, a blessed time. 

When hearts were fresh and young. 
When freely gushed all feelings forth, 

Unsyllabled — unsung ! 

I marvel, Jeanie Morrison, 

Gin I hae been to thee 
As closely twined wi' earliest thochts 

As ye hae been to me ? 
0, tell me gin their music fills 

Thine ear as it does mine ! 
0, say gin e'er your heart grows grit 

Wi' dreamings o' langsyne ? 

I 've wandered east, I 've wandered west, 

I 've borne a weary lot ; 
But in my wanderings, far or near, 

Ye never were forgot. 
The fount that first burst frae this heart 

Still travels on its waj'^ ; 
And channels deeper, as it rins, 

The luve o' life's young day. 

dear, dear Jeanie Morrison, 
Since we were sindered young 

1 've never seen your face nor heard 

The music o' your tongue; 
But I could hug all wretchedness, 

And happy could I dee, 
Did I but ken your heart still dreamed 

0' bygaue days and me ! 

William Motherwell. 



THE RUSTIC LAD'S LAMENT IN THE 
TOWN. 

0, WAD that my time were owre but, 

Wi' this wintry sleet and snaw, 
That I might see our house again, 

I' the bonnie birken shaw ! 
For this is no my ain life. 

And I peak and pine away 
Wi' the thochts o' hame and the young flowers, 

In the glad green month of May. 



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I used to wauk in the morning 

Wi' the lond sang o' the lark, 
And tlie whistling o' the ploughman lads, 

As they gaed to their wark ; 
I used to wear the bit young lambs 

Frae the tod and the roaring stream ; 
But the warld is changed, and a' thing now 

To me seems like a dream. 

There are busy crowds around me, 

On ilka lang dull street ; 
Yet, though sae niony surround me, 

I ken na ane I meet : 
And I think o' kind kent faces. 

And o' blithe an' cheery days, 
"When I wandered out wi' our ain folk. 

Out owre the simmer braes. 

Waes me, for my heart is breaking ! 

I think o' my brither sma', 
And on my sister greeting, 

"When I cam frae hame awa. 
And 0, how my mither sobbit, 

As she shook me by the hand, 
"When I left the door o' our auld house. 

To come to this stranger land. 

There 's nae hame like our ain hame — 

0, I wush that I were there ! 
There 's nae hame like our ain hame 

To be met wi' onywhere ; 
And that I were back again. 

To our farm and fields sae green ; 
And heard the tongues o' my ain folk, 

And were what I hae been ! 

David Macbeth Moir. 



THE WIFE TO HER HUSBAND. 

Linger not long. Home is not home without 
thee : 

Its dearest tokens do but make me mourn. 
0, let its memory, like a chain about thee. 

Gently compel and hasten thy return ! 

Linger' not long. Though crowds should woo thy 
staying, 
Bethink thee, can the mirth of thy friends, 
though dear. 
Compensate for the grief thy long delaying 
Costs the fond heart that sighs to have thee 
here ? 

Linger not long. How shall I watch thy coming. 
As evening shadows stretch o'er moor and dell ; 

When the wild bee hath ceased her busy humming. 
And silence hangs on all things like a spell ! 



How shall I watch for thee, when fears grow 
stronger. 

As night grows dark and darker on the hill ! 
How shall I weep, when I can watch no longer ! 

Ah ! art thou absent, art thou absent still ? 

Yet I shall grieve not, though the eye that seeth 
me 
Gazeth through tears that make its splendor 
dull ; 
For oh ! I sometimes fear when thou art with me, 
My cup of happiness is all too full. 

Haste, haste thee home unto thy mountain dwell- 
ing, 
Haste, as a bird unto its peaceful nest ! 
Haste, as a skiff, through tempests wide and 
swelling. 
Flies to its haven of securest rest ! 

Anonymous. 



ABSENCE. 

What shall I do with all the days and hours 
That must be counted ere I see thy face ? 

How shall I charm the interval that lowers 
Between this time and that sweet time of grace ? 

Shall I in slumber steep each weary sense, 
Weary with longing ? — shall I flee away 

Into past days, and with some fond pretence 
Cheat myself to forget the present day ? 

Shall love for thee lay on my soul the sin 
Of casting from me God's great gift of time ? 

Shall I, these mists of memory locked within. 
Leave and forget life's purposes sublime ? 

0, how or b}'' what means may I contrive 

To bring the hour that brings thee back more 
near ? 

How may I teach my drooping hope to live 
Until that blessed time, and thou art here ? 

I '11 tell thee ; for thy sake I will lay hold 
Of all good aims, and consecrate to thee. 

In worthy deeds, each moment that is told 
While thou, beloved one ! art far from me. 

For thee I will arouse my thoughts to try 

All heavenward flights, allhigh and holy strains ; 

For thy dear sake I will walk patiently 

Through these long hours, nor call their min- 
utes pains. 

I will this dreary blank of absence make 
A noble task-time ; and will therein strive 

To follow excellence, and to o'ertake 

ilore good than I have won since yet I live. 



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245 



ft 



So may this doomed time build up in me 

A thousand graces, which shall thus be thine 

So may my love and longing hallowed be, 
And thy dear thought an influence divine. 

Frances Anne Kemble. 



DAY, IN MELTING PURPLE DYING. 

Day, in melting purple dying : 
Blossoms, all around me sighing ; 
Fragrance, from the lilies straying ; 
Zephyr, with my ringlets playing ; 

Ye but waken my distress ; 

I am sick of loneliness ! 

Thou, to whom I love to hearken, 
Come, ere night around me darken ; 
Though thy softness but deceive me. 
Say thou 'rt true, and I '11 believe thee ; 
Veil, if ill, thy soul's intent. 
Let me think it innocent ! 

Save thy toiling, spare thy treasure ; 

All I ask is friendship's pleasure ; 

Let the shining ore lie darkling, — 

Bring no gem in lustre sparkling ; 

Gifts and gold are naught to me, 
I would only look on thee ! 

Tell to thee the high-wroTight feeling, 

Ecstasy but in revealing ; 

Paint to thee the deep sensation, 

Rapture in participation ; 

Yet but torture, if comprest 
In a lone, unfriended breast. 

Absent still ! Ah ! come and bless me ! 

Let these eyes again caress thee. 

Once in caution, I could fly thee ; 

Now, I nothing could deny thee. 
In a look if death there be, 
Come, and I will gaze on thee ! 

MARIA GOWEN BROOKS (.l/iir/n del Occidetite). 



WHAT AILS THIS HEART 0' MINE? 

What ails this heart o' mine ? 

What ails this watery e'e ? 
What gars me a' turn pale as death 

When I take leave o' thee ? 
When thou art far awa', 

Thou 'It dearer grow to me ; 
But change o' place and change o' folk 

May gar thy fancy jee. 

When I gae out at e'en, 

Or walk at morning air. 
Ilk rustling bush will seem to say 

I used to meet thee there : 



Then I '11 sit down and cry, 

And live aneath the tree, 
And when a leaf fa's i' my lap, 

I '11 ca 't a word frae thee. 

I '11 hie me to the bower 

That thou wi' roses tied. 
And where wi' mony a blushing bud 

I strove myself to hide. 

I '11 doat on ilka spot 

Where I ha'e been wi' thee ; 
And ca' to mind some kindly word 

By ilka burn and tree. 

Susanna Blamire. 



A PASTORAL. 

My time, ye Muses, was happily spent, 
When Phcebe went with me wherever 1 went ; 
Ten thousand sweet pleasures I felt in my 

breast : 
Sure never fond shepherd like Colin was blest ! 
But now she is gone, and has left me behind, 
What a marvellous change on a sudden 1 find ! 
When things were as fine as could possibly be, 
I thought 't was the Spring ; but alas ! it was 

she. 

With such a companion to tend a few sheep, 
To rise up and play, or to lie down and sleep ; 
I was so good-humored, so cheerful and gay. 
My heart was as light as a feather all day ; 
But now I so cross and so peevish am grown. 
So strangely uneasy, as never was known. 
My fair one is gone, and myjoysareall drowned. 
And my heart — I am sure it weighs more than 
a pound. 

The fountain that wont to run sweetly along. 
And dan(!e to soft murmurs the pebbles among ; 
Thou know'st, little Cupid, if Phcebe was there, 
'T was pleasure to look at, 't was music to hear : 
But now she is absent, I walk by its side. 
And still, as it murmurs, do nothing but chide ; 
Must you be so cheerful, while I go in pain ? 
Peace there with your bubbling, and hear me 
complain. 

My lambkins around me would oftentimes 

pifiy> 

And Phoebe and I were as joyful as they ; 

How pleasant their sporting, how happy their 

time. 
When Spring, Love, and Beauty were all in 

their prime ; 
But now, in their frolics when by me they pass, 
I fling at their fleeces a handful of grass ; 
Be still, then, I cry, for it makes me quite mad, 
To see you so merry while I am so sad. 



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*-B] 



U 



My dog I was ever well pleased to see 
Come wagging his tail to my fair one and me ; 
And Phoebe was pleased too, and to my dog said, 
" Come hither, poor fellow ; " and patted his 

head. 
But now, when he 's fawning, I with a sour look 
Cry "Sirrah !" and give him a blow with my 

crook : 
And I '11 give him another ; for why should not 

Tray 
Be as dull as his master, when Phtebe 's away ? 

When walking with Phoebe, what sights have 

I seen. 
How fair was the flower, how fresh was the 

green ! 
"What a lovely appearance the trees and the 

shade, 
The cornfields and hedges and everything made ! 
But now she has left me, though all are still 

there, 
They none of them now so delightful appear : 
'T was naught but the magic, I find, of her eyes. 
Made so many beautiful prospects arise. 

Sweet music went with us both all the wood 

through. 
The lark, linnet, throstle, and nightingale too ; 
Winds over us whispered, flocks by us did bleat. 
And chirp ! went the grasshopper under our 

feet. 
But now she is absent, though still they sing on. 
The woods are but lonely, the melody 's gone : 
Her voice in the concert, as now I have found, 
Gave everything else its agreeable sound. 

Rose, what is become of thy delicate hue ? 
And where is the violet's beautiful blue ? 
Does aught of its sweetness the blossom beguile ? 
That meadow, those daisies, why do they not 

smile ? 
Ah ! rivals, I see what it was that you drest. 
And made yourselves fine for — a place in her 

breast ? 
You put on your colors to pleasure her eye. 
To be plucked by her hand, on her bosom to die. 

How slowly Time creeps till my Phoebe re- 
turn, 
While amidst the soft zephyr's cool breezes I 

burn ! 
Methinks, if I knew whereabouts he would tread, 
I could breathe on his wings, and 't would melt 

down the lead. 
Fly swifter, ye minutes, bring hither my dear. 
And rest so much longer for 't when she is here. 
Ah, Colin ! old Time is full of delay, 
Nor will budge one foot faster for all thou canst 
say. 



Will no pitying power, that hears me com- 
plain. 
Or cure my disquiet or soften my pain ? 
To be cured, thou must, Colin, thy passion re- 
move ; 
But what swain is so silly to live without love ! 
No, deity, bid the dear nymph to return. 
For ne'er was poor shepherd so sadly forlorn. 
Ah ! what shall I do ? I shall die with despair ; 
Take heed, all ye swains, how ye part with your 

fair. 

John Byrom. 



THE SAILOR'S WIFE.* 

And are ye sure the news is true ? 

And are ye sure he 's weel ? 
Is this a time to think o' wark ? 

Ye jades, lay by your wheel ; 
Is this the time to spin a thread, 

Wlien Colin 's at the door ? 
Reach down my cloak, I '11 to the quay, 

And see him come ashore. 
For there 's nae luck about the house, 

There 's nae luck at a' ; 
There 's little pleasure in the house 

When our gudeman 's awa'. 

And gie to me my bigonet. 

My bishop' s-satin gown ; 
For I maun tell the baillie's wife 

That Colin 's in the town. 
My Turkey slippers maun gae on. 

My stockin's pearly blue ; 
It 's a' to pleasure our gudeman, 

For he 's baith leal and true. 

Rise, lass, and mak a clean fireside, 

Put on the muckle pot ; 
Gie little Kate her button gown, 

And Jock his Sunday coat ; 
And mak their slioon as black as slaes, 

Their hose as white as snaw ; 
It 's a' to please my ain gudeman. 

For he 's been long awa'. 

There 's twa fat hens upo' the coop 

Been fed this month and mair ; 
Mak haste and thraw their necks about, 

That Colin weel may fare ; 
And spread the table neat and clean, 

Gar ilka thing look braw. 
For wha can tell how Colin fared 

When he was far awa' ? 



' Bartleft. in liis Fai-nilinr Ouotatwiis, lias the following 
Mari7ie7-'s JVi/e is now g;iven, ' by connnon consent," saj'S 
Tytler, to Jean Adam, 1710-1765.'' 



" The 
Saral] 



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ABSENCE. 



247 



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Sae true his heart, sae smooth his speech, 

His breath like caller air ; 
His very foot has music in 't 

As he comes up the stair, — 
And will 1 see his face again ? 

And will I hear him speak ? 
I 'm downright dizzy wi' the thought, 

In troth I 'm like to greet ! 

If Colin 's weel, and weel content, 

I hae nae mair to crave : 
And gin I live to keep him sae 

I 'm blest aboon the lave : 
And w"ill I see his face again ? 

And will I hear him speak ? 
I 'm downright dizzy wi' the thought, 

In troth I 'm like to greet. 
For there 's nae luck about the house. 

There 's nae luck at a' ; 
There 's little pleasure in the house 

When our gudeman 's awa'. 

William James Mickle. 



ABSENCE. 

When I think on the happy days 

I spent wi' you, my dearie ; 
And now what lands between us lie. 

How can I be but eerie ! 

How slow ye move, ye heavy hours, 

As ye were wae and weary ! 
It w^as na sae ye glinted by 

When I was wi' my dearie. 

Anonymous. 



ON" A PICTURE. 

When summer o'er her native hills 

A veil of beauty spread. 
She sat and watched her gentle flocks 

And twined her flaxen thread. 

The mountain daisies kissed her feet ; 

The moss sprung greenest there ; 
The breath of summer fanned her cheek 

And tossed her wavy hair. 

The heather and the yellow gorse 
Bloomed over hill and wold, 

And clothed them in a royal robe 
Of purple and of gold. 

There rose the skylark's gushing song, 
There hummed the laboring bee ; 

And merrily the mountain stream 
Ran singing to the sea. 



But while she missed from those sweet sounds 

The voice she sighed to heai-. 
The song of bee and bird and stream 

Was discord to her ear. 

Nor could the bright green world around 

A joy to her impart. 
For still she missed the eyes that made 

The summer of her heart. 

Anne C. Lynch (Mrs. Botta). 



COME TO ME, DEAREST. 

Come to me, dearest, I 'm lonely without thee. 
Daytime and night-time, I 'm thinknig about 

thee ;' 
Night-time and daytime, in dreams I behold 

thee ; 
Unwelcome the waking which ceases to fold thee. 
Come to me, darling, my sorrows to lighten. 
Come in thy beauty to bless and to biighten ; 
Come in thy womanhood, meekly and lowly, 
Come in thy lovingness, queenly and holy. 

Swallows will flit round the desolate ruin. 
Telling of spring and its joyous renewing ; 
And thoughts of thy love, and its manifold treas- 
ure. 
Are circling my heart with a promise of pleasure. 
Spring of my spirit, May of my bosom. 
Shine out on my soul, till it bourgeon and blos- 
som ; 
The waste of my life has a rose-root within it, 
And thy fondness alone to the sunshine can 
win it. 

Figure that moves like a song through the even ; 
Features lit up by a reflex of heaven ; 
Eyes like the skies of poor Erin, our mother, 
Where shadow and sunshine are chasing each 

other ; 
Smiles coming seldom, but childlike and simple. 
Planting in each rosy cheek a sweet dimple ; — 
0, thanks to the Saviour, that even thy seeming 
Is left to the exile to brighten his dreaming. 

You have been glad when you knew I was glad- 
dened ; 

Dear, are you sad now to hear I am saddened ? 

Our hearts ever answer in tune and in time, 
love. 

As octave to octave, and rhyme unto rhyme, 
love : 

I cannot weep but your tears v»'ill be flowing. 

You cannot smile but my cheek will be glowing ; 

I would not die without you at my side, love, 

You will not linger when I shall have died, love. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



Come to me, dear, ere I die of my sorrow. 
Rise on my gloom like the sun of to-morrow ; 
Strong, swift, and fond as the words which I 

speak, love, 
With a song on your lip and a smile on your 

cheek, love. 
Come, for my heart in your absence is weary, — 
Haste, for my spirit is sickened and dreary, — 
Come to the arms which alone should caress thee. 
Come to the heart that is throbbing to press thee ! 

' JOSEPH BRENNAN. 



FRAGMENTS. 

Memory in Absence. 
And memory, like a drop that night and day 
Falls cold and ceaseless, wore my heart away ! 

UzUa Rookh. MOORE. 

Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see. 
My heart untravelled fondly turns to thee ; 
Still to my brother turns, with ceaseless pain, 
And drags at each reuiove a lengthening chain. 

The Tra-vcUer. GOLDSIIITH. 

Of all affliction taught the lover yet, 
'T is sure the hardest science to forget. 

Eloisa to Abelard. POPE. 

Ere such a soul regains its peaceful state, 
How often must it love, how often hate. 
How often hope, despair, resent, regret. 
Conceal, disdain, — do all things but forget. 

Eloisa to Abelard. POPE. 

Though absent, present in desires they be ; 
Our souls much further than our eyes can see. 

M. Drayton. 

"When, musing on companions gone. 
We doubly feel ourselves alone. 

Martnion, Cant. ii. Introd. 



SCOTT. 



To live with them is far less sweet 
Than to remember thee ! 

/ saiu thy form. 



Hope Defekred. 

Long did his wife. 
Suckling her babe, her only one, look out 
The way he went at parting, — but he came not ! 

Italy. KOGERS. 



Absence strengthens Lovf 
There's not a wind but whispers of thy name. 

Mirandola. B. W. PROCTER. 

Short absence hurt him more, 
And made his wound far greater than before ; 
Absence not long enough to root out quite 
All love, increases love at second sight. 

Henry II. T. MAY. 

'T is distance lends enchantment to the view. 
And robes the mountain in its azure hiie. 

Pleasures 0/ Hope, Parti. T. CAMPBELL. 

Absence makes the heart grow fonder ; 
Isle of Beauty, fare thee well ! 

Isle of Beauty. T. H. BAYLY. 



Time in Absence. 
Love reckons hours for months, and days for 

years ; 
And every little absence is an age. 

Amphictrion. DRYDE^f. 

What ! keep a week away ? Seven days and 

nights ? 
Eightscore eight hours ? And lovers' absent 

hours 
More tedious than the dial eightscore times ? 
0, weary reckoning ! 

Othello, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 



The Unwelcome Lover. 



I dote on his very absence. 

Merchant of Venice, Act i. Sc. 2. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Presence in Absence. 

Our two souls, therefore, which are one, 
Though I must go, endure not yet 
A breach, but an expansion. 
Like gold to airy thinness beat. 
If they be two, they are two so 
As stiff twin compasses are two ; 
Thy soul, the lixt foot, makes no show 
To move, but doth if the other do. 
And though it in the centre sit. 
Yet when the other far doth roam, 
It leans and hearkens after it, 
And grows erect, as that comes home. 
Such wilt thou be to me, who must. 
Like the other foot, obliquely run. 
Thy firmness makes my circle just. 
And makes me end where I begun. 

A Valediction forbidding Mourning-. DR. J. DONNE. 



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DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT. 



SONNET. 

With how sad steps, Moon ! thou climb' st the 

skies, 
How silently, and with how wan a face ! 
What may it be, that even in heavenly place 
That busy Archer his sharp arrows tries ? 
Sure, if that long with love acquainted eyes 
Can judge of love, thou feel'st a lover's case ; 
I read it in thy looks, thy languished grace 
To me that feel tlie like thy state descries. 
Then, even of fellowship, Moon, tell me. 
Is constant love deemed there but want of wit ? 
Are beauties there as proud as here they be ? 
Do they above love to be loved, and yet 
Those lovers scorn whom that love doth possess ? 
Do they call virtue there ungratefulness ? 

Sir Philip Sidney. 



THE BANKS 0' DOON. 

Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon, 
How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair ? 

How can ye chant, ye little birds. 
And I sae weary, fu' o' care ? 

Thou 'It break my heart, thou warbling bird. 
That wantons through the flowering thorn ; 

Thou minds me o' departed joys, 
Departed : — never to return. 

Thou 'It break my heart, thou bonnie bird. 

That sings beside thy mate ; 
For sae I sat, and sae I sang, 

And wistna o' my fate. 

Aft hae I roved by bonnie Doon, 

To see the rose and woodbine twine ; 

And ilka bird sang o' its luve. 
And, fondly, sae did I o' mine. 

Wi' lightsome heart I pou'd a rose, 

Fu' sweet upon its thorny tree ; 
And my fause luver stole my rose, 

But ah ! he left the thorn wi' me. 

ROBERT BURNS. 



t& 



AULD EOBIN GRAY. 

When the sheep are in the fauld, and the kye a'' 

at hame. 
When a' the weary world to sleep are gane. 
The waes o' my heart fa' in sho^vers frae my e'e. 
While my gudeman lies sound by me. 



Young Jamie lo'ed me weel, and sought me for 

his bride ; 
But saving a crown, he had naething else beside. 
To make the crown a pound, my Jamie g"aed to 

sea ; 
And the crown and the pound, they were baith 

for me ! 

He hadna been awa' a week but only twa, 
When my mither she fell sick, and the cow was 

stown awa ; 
My father brak his arm — my Jamie at the sea — 
And Auld Robin Gray came a-courting me. 

My father couldna work, — my mither couldna 

spin ; 
I toiled day and night, but their bread I couldna 

win ; 
Auld Rob maintained them baith, and, wi' tears 

in his e'e, 
Said, "Jennie, for their sakes, will you marry 

me ? " 

My heart it said na, and I looked for Jamie back ; 
But hard blew the winds, and his ship was a wrack ; 
His ship it was a wrack ! Why didna Jennie dee ? 
And wherefore was I sjjared to cry, Wae is me ! 

My father argued sair — my mither didna speak. 
But she looked in my face till my heart was like 

to break ; 
They gied him my hand, but my heart was in the 

sea ; 
And so Auld Robin Gray, he was gudeman to me. 

I hadna been his wife, a week but only four, 
When, mournfu*^ as I sat on the stane at the door, 
I saw my Jamie's ghaist — • I couldna think it he, 
Till he said, " I 'm come hame, my love, to marry 
thee!."- 

sair, sair did we greet, and mickle did we say : 
Ae kiss we took, — nae mair — I bad him gang 

away. 

1 wisli that I were dead, but I 'm no like to dee, 
And why dp I live to say, Wae is me ! 

I gang like a ghaistj and I caren^ to spin ; 
I darena think o' Jamie, for that wad be a sin. 
But I will do my best a gude wife aye to be, 
For Auld Robin Graj', he is kind to me. 

Lady Anne Barnard, 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



a 



THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE. 

FROM "MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM," ACT I. SC. I. 

For aught that ever I could read, 

Could ever hear by tale or history, 

The course of true love never did run smooth : 

But, either it was different in blood, 

Or else misgraffed in respect of years ; 

Or else it stood upon the choice of friends ; 

Or, if there were a sympathy in choice, 

War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it, 

Making it momentary as a sound, 

Swift as a shadow, short as any dream ; 

Brief as the lightning in the coUied night, 

That, in a spleen, iinfolds both heaven and earth. 

And ere a man hath power to say, — Behold ! 

The jaws of darkness do devour it up : 

So quick bright things come to confusion. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



[& 



BYRON'S LATEST VERSES. 

[Missolonghi, January 23, 1824. On this day I completed my 
thirty-sixth year.] 

'T IS time this heart should be unmoved, 

Since others it has ceased to move : 
Yet, though I cannot be beloved, 
Still let me love ! 

My days are in the yellow leaf, 

The flowers and fruits of love are gone : 
The worm, the canker, and the grief, 
Are mine alone. 

The fire that in my bosom preys 
Is like to some volcanic isle ; 
N.0 torch is kindled at its blaze, — 
A funeral pile. 

The hope, the fear, the jealous care, 

The exalted portion of the pain 

And power of love, I cannot share. 

But wear the chain. 

But 't is not thus, — and 't is not hej'e, 

Such thoughts should shake my soul, nor now, 
"Where glory decks the hero's bier, 
Or binds his brow. 

The sword, the banner, and the field, 

Glory and Greece about us see ; 
The Spartan borne upon his shield 
Was not more free. 

Awake ! — not Greece, — she is awake ! 

Awake my spirit ! think through whom 
Thy life-blood tastes its parent lake, 
And then strike home ! 



Tread those reviving passions down, 

Unworthy manhood ! unto thee 
Indifferent should the smile or frown 
Of beauty be. 

If thou regrett'st thy youth, — why live ? 

The land of honorable death 
Is here : — up to the field, and give 
Away thy breath ! 

Seek out — less often sought than found — 

A soldier's grave, for thee the best ; 
Then look around, and choose thy ground. 
And take thy rest ! 



LEFT BEHIND. 

It was the autumn of the year ; 
The strawberry-leaves were red and sear ; 
October's airs were fresh and chill. 
When, pausing on the windy hill. 
The hill that overlooks the sea, 
You talked confidingly to me, — 
Me whom your keen, artistic sight 
Has not yet learned to read ariglit, 
Since I have veiled my heart from you, 
And loved you better than you knew. 

You told me of your toilsome past ; 
The tardy honors won at last. 
The trials borne, the conquests gained. 
The longed-for boon of Fame attained ; 
I knew that every victory 
But lifted you away from me. 
That every step of high emprise 
But left me lowlier in your eyes ; 
I watched the distance as it gi-ew, 
And loved you better than you knew. 

You did not see the bitter trace 
Of anguish sweep across my face ; 
You did not hear my proud heart beat, 
Heavy and slow, beneath your feet ; 
You thought of triumphs still unwon, 
Of glorious deeds as yet undone ; 
And I, the while you talked to me, 
I watched the gulls float lonesomely. 
Till lost amid the hungry blue. 
And loved you better than you knew. 

You walk the sunny side of fate ; 

The wise world smiles, and calls you great : 

The golden fruitage of success 

Drops at your feet in plenteousness ; 

And you have blessings manifold : — 

Renown and power and friends and gold, — 



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They iDuild a wall between us twain, 
Which may not be thrown down again, 
Alas ! for I, the long years through. 
Have loved you better than you knew. 

Your life's proud aim, your art's high truth, 
Have kept the promise of your youth ; 
And while you won the crown, which now 
Breaks into bloom upon your brow, 
My soul cried strongly out to you 
Across the ocean's yearning blue. 
While, unremembered and afar, 
I watched you, as I watch a star 
Through darkness struggling into view. 
And loved you better than you knew. 

I used to dream in all these years 

Of patient faith and silent tears, 

That Love's strong hancl would put aside 

The barriers of place and pride. 

Would reach the pathless darkness through. 

And draw me softly up to you ; 

But that is past. If you should stray 

Beside my grave, some future day, 

Perchance the violets o'er my dust 

Will half betray their buried trust. 

And sa}% their blue eyes full of dew, 

"She loved j'ou better than you knew." 

Elizabeth AKERS AL-I-EN {F/omice Percy). 



LINDA TO HAFED. 

FROM^"THE FIRE-WORSHIPPERS." 

*' How sweetly," said the trembling maid. 
Of her own gentle voice afraid. 
So long had they in silence stood, 
Looking upon that moonlight flood, — 
" How sweetly does the moonbeam smile 
To-night upon yon leafy isle ! 
Oft in my fancy's wanderings, 
I 've wished that little isle had wings. 
And we, within its fairy bowers. 

Were wafted off to seas unknown, 
AVhere not a pulse should beat but ours, 

And we might live, love, die alone ! 
Far fi-om the cruel and the cold, — • 

Where the bright eyes of angels only 
Should come around us, to behold 

A paradise so pure and lonely ! 
Would this be world enough for thee ? " — 
Playful she turned, that he might see 

The passing smile her cheek put on ; 
But when she marked how mournfully 

His eyes met hers, that smile was gone ; 
And, bursting into heartfelt tears, 
"Yes, yes," she cried, "my hourly fears, 
My dreams, have boded all too right, — 
We part — forever part — to-night ! 



I knew, I knew it co7dd not last, — 

'T was bright, 't was heavenly, but 't is past ! 

0, ever thus, from childhood's hour, 

I 've seen my fondest hopes decay ; 
I never loved a tree or flower 

But 't was the first to fade away. 
I never nursed a dear gazelle, 

To glad me with its soft black eye, 
But when it came to know me well, 

And love me, it was sure to die ! 
Now, too, the joy most like divine 

Of all I ever dreamt or knew. 
To see thee, hear thee, call thee mine, — 

misery ! must I lose that too ? " 

THOMAS MOORE. 
♦ 

UNREQUITED LOVE. 

FROM "TWELFTH NIGHT," ACT I. SC. 4. 

Viola. Ay, but I know, — 

Duke. What dost thou know ? 

Viola. Too well what love women to men 
may owe : 
In faith, they are as true of heart as we. 
My father had a daughter loved a man. 
As it might be, perhaps, were I a woman, 
I should your lordship. 

Duke. And what 's her history ? 

Viola. A blank, my lord. She never told 
her love, 
But let concealment, like a worm i' the bud. 
Feed on her damask cheek ; she pined in thought ; 
And, with a green and yellow melancholy. 
She sat like Patience on a monument, 
Smiling at grief. Was not this love, indeed ? 
We men may say more, swear more : but, indeed. 
Our shows are more than will ; for still we prove 
Much in our vows, but little in our love. 

Shakespeare. 



DOROTHY IN THE GARRET. 

In the low-raftered garret, stooping 

Carefully over the creaking boards, 
Old Maid Dorothy goes a-groping 

Among its dusty and eobwebbed hoards ; 
Seeking some bundle of patches, hid 

Far under the eaves, or bunch of sage, 
Or satchel hung on its nail, amid 

The heirlooms of a bygone age. 

There is the ancient family chest, 

There the ancesti'al cards and hatchel ; 
Dorothy, sighing, sinks down to rest. 

Forgetful of patches, sage, and satchel. 
Ghosts of faces peer from the gloom 

Of the chimney, where, with swifts and reel. 
And the long-disused, dismantled loom. 

Stands the old-fashioned spinning-wheel. 



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She sees it back in the clean-swept kitchen, 

A part of her girlhood's little world ; 
Her mother is there by the window, stitching ; 

Spindle buzzes, and reel is whirled 
With many a click : on her little stool 

She sits, a child, by the open door, 
Watching, and dabbling her feet in the pool 

Of sunshine spilled on the gilded floor. 

Her sisters are spinning all day long ; 

To her wakening sense the first sweet warning 
Of daylight come is the cheerful song 

To the hum of the wheel in the early morning. 
Benjie, the gentle, red-cheeked boy, 

On his way to school, peeps in at the gate ; 
In neat white pinafore, pleased and coy, 

She reaches a hand to her bashful mate ; 

And under the elms, a prattling pair, 

Together they go, through glimmer and 
gloom ; — • 
It all comes back to her, dreaming there 

In the low-raftered garret-room ; 
The hum of the wheel, and the summer weather. 

The heart's first trouble, and love's beginning. 
Are all in her memory linked together ; 

And now it is she herself that is spinning. 

With the bloom of youth on cheek and lip, 

Turning the spokes with the flashing pin, 
Twisting the thread from the spindle-tip, 

Stretching it out and winding it in. 
To and fro, with a blithesome tread, 

Singing she goes, and. her heart is full. 
And many a long-drawn golden thread 

Of fancy is spun with the shining wool. 

. Her father sits in his favorite place. 

Puffing his pipe by the chimney-side ; 
Through curling clouds his kindly face 

Glows upon her with love and pride. 
Lulled by the wheel, in the old arm-chair 

Her mother is musing, cat in lap. 
With beautiful drooping head, and hair 

Whitening under her snow-white cap. 

One by one, to the grave, to the bridal, 

They have followed her sisters from the door ; 
Now they are old, and she is their idol : — 

It all comes back on her heart once more. 
In the autumn dusk the hearth gleams brightly. 

The wheel is set by the shadowy wall, — • 
A hand at the latch, — 't is lifted lightly, 

And in walks Benjie, manly and tall. 

His chair is placed ; the old man tips 

The pitcher, and brings his choicest fruit ; 

Benjie basks in the blaze, and sips, 

And tells his story, and joints his flute : 



0, sweet the tunes, the talk, the laughter ! 

They fill the hour with a glowing tide ; 
But sweeter the still,' deep moments after. 

When she is alone by Benjie's side. 

But once Avith angry words they part : 

0, then the weary, weary days ! 
Ever with restless, wretched heart. 

Plying her task, she turns to gaze 
Far up the road ; and early and late 

She harks for a footstep at the door. 
And starts at the gust tlaat swings the gate. 

And prays for Benjie, who comes no more. 

Her fault ? Benjie, and could you steel 

Your thoughts toward one who loved you so ? — 
Solace she seeks in the whirling wheel. 

In duty and love that lighten woe ; 
Striving with labor, not in vain, 

To drive away the dull day's dreariness, — 
Blessing the toil that blunts the pain 

Of a deeper grief in the body's weariness. 

Proud and petted and spoiled was she : 

A word, and all her life is changed ! 
His wavering love too easily 

In the gi-eat, gay city grows estranged : 
One year : she sits in the old church pew ; 

A rustle, a murmur, — Dorothy ! hide 
Your face and shut from your soul the view 

'T is Benjie leading a white-veiled bride ! 

Now father and mother have long been dead, 

And the bride sleeps under a churchyard stone, 
And a bent old ]nan with grizzled head 

Walks up the long dim aisle alone. 
Years blur to a mist ; and Dorothy 

Sits doubting betwixt the ghost she seem. 
And the phantom of youth, more real than she. 

That meets her there in that haunt of dreams. 

Bright young Dorothy, idolized daughter. 

Sought by many a youthful adorer, 
Life, like a new-risen dawn on the water, 

Shining an endless vista before her ! 
Old Maid Dorothy, wrinkled and gray, 

Groping under the farm-house eaves, — 
And life was a brief November day 

That sets on a world of withered leaves ! 

Yet faithfulness in the humblest part 

Is better at last than proud success, 
And patience and love in a chastened heart 

A.re pearls more precious than happiness ; 
And in that morning when she shall wake 

To the spring-time freshness of youth again, 
All trouble will seem but a flying flake, 

And lifelong sorrow a breath on the pane. 

John Tovvnsend Trowbridge. 



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DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT. 



25 



m 



THE DIRTY OLD MAN. 

A LAY OF LEADENHALL. 

[A bingular man, uamed Nathaniel Bentley, for many years kept 
a large liardware-shop in Leadenhall Street, London. He was 
best known as Dirty Dick (Dick, for alliteration's sake, probably), 
and his place of business as the Dirty Warehouse. He died about 
the year i8og. These verses accord with the accounts respecting 
himself and his house.] 

In a dirty old house lived a Dirty Old Man ; 
Soap, towels, or brushes were not in his plan. 
For forty long years, as the neighbors declared. 
His house never once had been cleaned or re- 
paired. 

'T was a scandal and shame to the business-like 

street, 
One terrible blot in a ledger so neat : 
The shop full of hardware, but black as a hearse, 
And the rest of the mansion a thousand times 



Outside, the old plaster, all spatter and stain. 
Looked spotty in sunshine and streaky in rain ; 
The window-sills sprouted with mildewy grass. 
And the panes from being broken were known to 
be glass. 

On the rickety sign-board no learning could spell 
The merchant who sold, or the goods he'd to 

■ sell ; 

But for house and for man a new title took 

growth, 
Like a fungus, — the Dirt gave its name to them 

■ both. 

Within, tliere were carpets and cushions of dust. 
The wood was half rot, and the metal half rust. 
Old curtains, half cobwebs, hung grimly aloof ; 
'T was a Spiders' Elysium from cellar to roof. 

There, king of the spiders, the Dirty Old Man 
Lives busy and dirty as ever he can ; 
With dirt on his fingers and dirt on his face, 
For the Dirty Old Man thinks the dirt no dis- 
grace. 

From his wig to his shoes, from his coat to his 

shirt. 
His clothes are a proverb, a marvel of dirt ; 
The dirt is pervading, unfading, exceeding, — 
Yet the Dirty Old Man has both learning and 

breeding. 

Fine dames from their carriages, noble and fair, 
Have entered his shop, less to buy than to stare ; 
And have afterwards said, though the dirt was 

so frightful. 
The Dirty Man's manners were truly delightful. 



Upstairs might they venture, in dirt and in 

gloom, 
To peep at the door of the wonderful room 
Such stories are told about, none of them true ! — - 
The keyhole itself has no mortal seen through. 

That room, — forty years since, folk settled and 

decked it. 
The luncheon 's prepared, and the guests are 

expected. 
The handsome young host he is gallant and gay, 
For his love and her friends will be with him 

to-day. 

With solid and dainty the table is drest. 

The wine beams its brightest, the flowers bloom 

their best ; 
Yet the host need not smile, and no guests will 

appear. 
For his sweetheart is dead, as he shortly shall 

hear. 

Full forty years since turned the key in that 

door. 
'T is a room deaf and dumb mid the city's uproar. 
The guests, for whose joyance that table was 

spread. 
May now enter as ghosts, for they 're every one 

dead. 

Through a chink in the shutter dim lights come 

and go ; 
The seats are in oj'der, the dishes a-row : 
But the luncheon was wealth to the rat and the 

mouse 
Whose descendants have long left the Dirty Old 

House. 

Cup and platter are masked in thick layers of 

dust ; 
The flowers fallen to powder, the wine swathed 

in crust ; 
A nosegay was laid before one special chair, 
And the faded blue ribbon that bound it lies 

there. 

The old man has played out his part in the scene. 
Wherever he now is, I hope he 's more clean. 
Yet give we a thought free of scofling or ban 
To that Dirty Old House and that Dirty Old 

Man. 

William Allingham. 



AN EXPERIENCE AND A MORAL. 

I LENT my love a book one day ; 

She brought it back ; I laid it by : 
'T was little either had to say, — ■ 
She was so strange, and I so shy. 



J. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



n 



But yet we loved indifferent things, — 
The sprouting buds, the birds in tune, — 

And Time stood still and wreathed his wings 
With rosy links from June to June. 

For her, what task to dare or do ? 

What peril tempt ? what hardship bear ? 
But with her — ah ! she never knew 

My heart, and what was hidden there ! 

And she, with me, so cold and coy. 
Seemed a little maid bereft of sense ; 

But in the crowd, all life and joy, 
And full of blushful impudence. 

She married, — well, ■ — a woman needs 
A mate, her life and love to share, — 

And little cares sprang up like weeds 
And played around iier elbow-chair. 

And years rolled by, — but I, content, 

Trimmed my own lamp, and kept it bright, 

Till age's touch my hair besprent 
With rays and gleams of silver light. 

And then it chanced I took the book 
Which she perused in days gone by ; 

And as I read, such passion shook 
My soul, — I needs must curse or cry. 

For, here and there, her love was writ. 

In old, half-faded pencil-signs, 
As if she yielded — bit by bit — 

Her heart in dots and underlines. 

Ah, silvered fool, too late you look ! 

I know it ; let me here record 
This maxim : Lend no girl a book 

Unless you read it afterward ! 

Frederick Swartwout Cozzens. 



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LOCKSLEY HALL. 

Comrades, leave me here a little, while as yet 

't is early morn, — 
Leave me here, and when you want me, sound 

upon the bugle horn. 

'T is the place, and all around it, as of old, the 

curlews call. 
Dreary gleams about the moorland, flying over 

Locksley Hall : 

Locksley Hall, that in the distance overlooks the 
sandy tracts. 

And the hollow ocean-ridges roaring into cata- 
racts. 



Many a night from yonder ivied casement, ere I 

went to rest. 
Did I look on great Orion sloping slowly to the 

west. 

Many a night I saw the Pleiads, rising through 

the mellow shade. 
Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies tangled in a silver 

braid. 

Here about the beach I wandered, nourishing a 

youth sublime 
With the fairy tales of science, and the long 

result of time ; 

When the centuries behind me like a fruitful 

land reposed ; 
When I clung to all the present for the promise 

that it closed ; 

When I dipt into the future far as human eye 

could see, — 
Saw the vision of the world, and all the wonder 

that would be. 

In the spring a fuller crimson comes upon the 

robin's breast ; 
In the spring the wanton lapwing gets himself 

another crest ; 

In the spring a livelier iris changes on the 

burnished dove ; 
In the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns 

to thoughts of love. 

Then her cheek was pale and thinner than should 

be for one so young. 
And her eyes on all my motions with a mute 

observance hung. 

And I said, " My cousin Amy, speak, and speak 

the truth to me ; 
Trust me, cousin, all the current of my being 

sets to thee." 

On her pallid cheek and forehead came a color 

and a light. 
As I have seen the rosy red flushing in the 

northern night. 

And she turned, — her bosom shaken with a 

sudden storm of sighs ; 
All the spirit deeply dawning in the dark of 

hazel eyes, — 

Saying, "I have hid my feelings, fearing they 

should do me wrong ; " 
Saying, " Dost thou love me, cousin ? " weeping, 

" I have loved thee long." 



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DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT. 



255 



Love took up the glass of time, and turned it in 

his glowing hands ; 
Every moment, lightly shaken, ran itself in 

golden sands. 

Love took up the harp of life, and smote on all 

the chords with might ; 
Smote the chord of self, that, trembling, passed 

in music out of sight. 

Many a morning on the moorland did we hear the 

copses ring, 
And her whisper thronged my pulses with the 

fulness of the spring. 

Many an evening by the waters did we watch the 

stately ships. 
And our spirits rushed together at the touching 

of the lips. 

O my cousin, shallow-hearted ! my Amy, 

mine no more ! 
the dreary, dreary moorland ! the barren, 

barren shore ! 

Falser than all fancy fathoms, falser than all songs 

have sung, — 
Puppet to a father's threat, and servile to a 

shrewish tongue ! 

Is it well to wish thee happy ? — having known 

me ; to decline 
On a range of lower feelings and a narrower heart 

than mine ! 

Yet it sliall be : thou shalt lower to his level day 
by day. 

What is fine within thee growing coarse to sym- 
pathize with clay. 

As the husban-d is, the wife is ; thou art mated 

with a clown. 
And the gi-ossness of his nature will have weight 

to drag thee down. 

He will hold thee, when his passion shall have 

spent its novel force. 
Something better than his dog, a little dearer 

than his horse. 



He will answer to the purpose, easy things to 

understand, — 
Better thou wert dead before me, though I slew 

thee with my hand. 

Better thou and I were lying, hidden from the 

lieart's disgrace. 
Rolled in one another's arms, and silent in a last 

embrace. 

Cursed be the social wants that sin against the 

strength of youth ! 
Cursed be the social lies that warp us from the 

living truth ! 

Cursed be the sickly forms that err from honest 
nature's rule ! 

Cursed be the gold that gilds the straitened fore- 
head of the fool ! 

Well — 't is well that I should bluster ! — Hadst 

thou less unworthy proved, 
Would to God — for I had loved thee more than 

ever wife was loved. 

Am I mad, that I should cherish that which 

bears but bitter fruit ? 
I will pluck it from my bosom, though my heart 

be at the root. 

Never ! though my mortal summers to such length 
of years should come 

As the many-wintered crow that leads the clang- 
ing rookery home. 

Where is comfort ? in division of the records of 

the mind ? 
Can I part her from herself, and love her, as I 

knew her, kind ? 

I remember one that perished ; sweetly did she 

speak and move ; 
Such a one do I remember, whom to look at was 

to love. 

Can I think of her as dead, and love her for the 

love she bore ? 
No, — she never loved me truly ; love is love 

forevermore. 



What is' this ? his ej^es ai-e heavy, — think not Comfort? comfort scorned of devils ! this is truth 

they are glazed with wine. the poet sings. 

Go to him ; it is thy duty, — kiss him ; take his i That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering 



a 



hand in thine. 

It maj"- be my lord is weary, that his brain is 

overwrought, — 
Soothe him with thy finer fancies, touch him 

with thy lighter thought. 



happier things. 

Drug thy memories, lest thou learn it, lest thy 

heart be put to proof, 
In the dead, unhappy night, and when the rain 

is on the roof. 



a 



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256 



POEMS OF TI-ID AFFECTIONS. 



a 



Like a dog, he hunts in dreams ; and thou art 

staring at the M'all, 
Where the dying night-lamp flickers, and the 

shadows rise and fall. 

Then a hand shall pass before thee, pointing to 

his drunken sleep, 
To thy widowed marriage-pillows, to the tears 

that thou wilt weep. 

Thou shalt hear the "Never, never," whispered 

by the phantom years, 
And a song from out the distance in the ringing 

of thine ears ; 

And an eye shall vex thee, looking ancient kind- 
ness on thy pain. 

Turn thee, turn thee on thy pillow ; get thee to 
thy rest again. 

Nay, but nature brings thee solace ; for a tender 

voice will cry ; 
'T is a purer life than thine, a lip to drain thy 

trouble dry. 

Baby lips will laugh me down ; my latest rival 

brings thee rest, — 
Baby fingers, waxen touches, press me from the 

mother's breast. 

0, the child too clothes the father with a dear- 

ness not his due. 
Half is thine and half is his : it will be worthy 

of the two. 

0, I see thee old and formal, fitted to thy petty 

part, 
With a little hoard of maxims preaching down a 

daughter's heart. 



I had been content to perish, falling on the foe* 

man's ground, 
When the ranks are rolled in vapor, and the 

winds are laid with sound. 

But the jingling of the guinea helps the hurt 

that honor feels. 
And the nations do but murmur, snarling at each 

other's heels. 

Can I but relive in sadness ? I will turn that 
earlier page. 

Hide me from my deep emotion, thou won- 
drous mother-age ! 

Make me feel the wild pulsation that I felt be- 
fore the strife, 

When I heard my days before me, and the tu- 
mult of my life ; 

Yearning for the large excitement that the com- 
ing years would yield. 

Eager-hearted as a boy when first he leaves his 
father's field, 

And at night along the dusky highway near and 

nearer drawn, 
Sees in heaven the light of London flaring like 

a dreary dawn ; 

And his spirit leaps within him to be gone be- 
fore him then, 

Underneath the light he looks at, in among the 
throngs of men ; 

Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever reap- 
ing something new : 

That which they have done but earnest of the 
things that they shall do : 



" They were dangerous guides, the feelings — she ', For I dipt into the future, far as human eye 



herself was not exempt — • 
Truly, she herself had suff"ered " — Perish in thy 
self-contempt ! 

Overlive it — lower yet — be happy ! wherefore 

should I care ? 
I myself must mix with action, lest I wither by 

despair. 

What is that which I should turn to, lighting 

upon days like these ? 
Every door is barred with gold, and opens but to 

golden keys. 

Every gate is thronged with suitors, all the 

markets overflow. 
I have but an angry fancy : what is that which 

I should do ? 



could see. 

Saw the vision of the world, and all the wonder 
that would be ; 

Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies of 

magic sails, 
Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with 

costly bales ; 

Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there 

rained a ghastly dew 
From the nations' airy navies grappling in the 

central blue ; 

Far along the w^orld-wide whisper of the south- 
wind rushing warm. 

With the standards of the peoples plunging 
through the thunder-storm ; 



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DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT. 



257 



ft 



Till the war-drum throbbed no longer, and the 

battle-flags were furled 
In the parliament of man, the federation of the 

world. 

There the common sense of most shall hold a 
fretful realm in awe, 

And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in uni- 
versal law. 

So I triumphed ere my passion sweeping through 

me left me dry, 
Left me with a palsied heart, and left me with 

the jaundiced eye ; 

Eye, to which all order festers, all things here 

are out of joint. 
Science moves, but slowly, slowly, creeping on 

from point to point : 

Slowly comes a hungry people, as a lion, creep- 
ing nigher, 

Glares at one that nods and winks behind a 
slowly dying fire. 

Yet I doubt not through the ages one increasing 

purpose runs, 
And the thoughts of men are widened with the 

process of the suns. 

What is that to him that reaps not harvest of 

his youthful joys, 
Though the deep heart of existence beat forever 

like a boy's ? 

Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers ; and I 

linger on the shore. 
And the individual withers, and the world is 

more and more. 

Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers, and he 
bears a laden breast. 

Full of sad experience moving toward the still- 
ness of his rest. 

Hark ! my merry comrades call me, sounding on 

the bugle horn, — 
They to whom my foolish passion were a target 

for their scorn ; 

Shall it not be scorn to me to harp on such a 

mouldered string ? 
I am shamed through all my nature to have loved 

so slight a thing. 



t 



"Weakness to be wroth with weakness ! woman's Fool, again the dream, the fancy ! but I know 
pleasure, woman's pain — my words are wild, 

Nature made them blinder motions bounded in But I count the gray barbarian lower than the 
a shallower brain ; I Christian child. 

17 



Woman is the lesser man, and all thy passions, 

matched with mine, 
Are as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water 

unto wine — ■ 

Here at least, where nature sickens, nothing. 

Ah for some retreat 
Deep in yonder shining Orient, where my life 

began to beat ! 

Where in wild Mahratta-battle fell my father, 

evil-starred ; 
I was left a trampled orphan, and a selfish 

uncle's ward. 

Or to burst all links of habit, — there to wander 

far away, 
On from island unto island at the gateways of 

the day, — 

Larger constellations burning, mellow moons and 

happy skies, 
Breadths of tropic shade and palms in cluster, 

knots of Paradise. 

Never comes the trader, never floats an European 

flag, — 
Slides the bird o'er lustrous woodland, swings 

the trailer from the crag, — 

Droops the heavy-blossomed bower, hangs the 

heavy-fruited tree, — 
Summer isles of Eden lying in dark-purple 

spheres of sea. 

There, methinks, would be enjoyment more than 

in this march of mind — • 
In the steamship, in the railway, in the thoughts 

that shake mankind. 

There the passions, cramped no longer, shall 
have scope and breathing-space ; 

I will take some savage woman, she shall rear 
my dusky race. 

Iron-jointed, supple-sinewed, they shall dive, 

and they shall run. 
Catch the wild goat by the hair, and hurl their 

lances in the sun. 

Whistle back the parrot's call, and leap the 

rainbows of the brooks. 
Not with blinded eyesight poring over miserable 

books — - 



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I, to herd with narrow foreheads, vacant of our 

glorious gains, 
Like a beast with lower pleasures, like a beast 

with lower pains ! 

Mated with a squalid savage, — what to me were 

sun or clime ? 
I, the heir of all the ages, in the foremost files 

of time, — 

I, that rather held it better men should perish 

one by one, 
Than that earth should stand at gaze like Joshua's 

moon in Ajalon ! 

Not in vain the distance beacons. Forward, 
forward let us range ; 

Let the great world spin forever down the ring- 
ing grooves of change. 

Through the shadow of the globe we sweep into 

the younger day : 
Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of 

Cathay. 

Mother-age, (for mine I knew not,) help me as 

when life begun, — 
Rift the hills, and roll the waters, flash the 

lightnings, weigh the sun, — 

0, I see the crescent promise of my spirit hath 

not set ; 
Ancient founts of inspiration well through all my 

fancy yet. 

Howsoever these things be, a long farewell to 

Locksley Hall ! 
Now for me the woods may wither, now for me 

the roof-tree fall. 

Comes a vapor from the margin, blackening over 

heath and holt. 
Cramming all the blast before it, in its breast a 

thunderbolt. 

Let it fall on Locksley Hall, with rain or hail, or 

fire or snow ; 
For the mighty wind arises, roaring seaward, and 

I go. 

ALFRED TENNYSON. 



U 



ONLY A WOMAN. 

" She loves with love that cannot tire : 

And if, ah, woe ! she loves alone. 
Through passionate duty love flames higher. 

As grass grows taller round a stone. "" 

COVENTRY PATMORE. 

So, the truth 's out. I '11 gi-asp it like a snake, - 
It will not slay me. My heart shall not break 
Awhile, if only for the children's sake. 



For his, too, somewhat. Let him stand unblamed ; 
None say, he gave me less than honor claimed. 
Except — one trifle scarcely worth being named — 

The heart. That's gone. The corrupt dead might 

be 
As easily raised up, breathing, — fair to see, 
As he could bring his whole heart back to me. 

I never sought him in coquettish sport, 
Or courted him as silly maidens court, 
And wonder when the longed-for prize falls short. 

I only loved him, — any woman would : 
But .shut my love up till he came and sued, 
Then poured it o'er his dry life like a flood. 

I was so happy I could make him blest ! — 

So happy that I was his first and best. 

As he mine, — when he took me to his breast. 

Ah me ! if only then he had been true ! 

If for one little year, a month or two, 

He had given me love for love, as was my due ! 

Or had he told me, ere the deed was done, 

He only raised me to his heart's dear throne — 

Poor substitute — because the queen was gone ! 

0, had he whispered, when his sweetest kiss 
Was warm upon my mouth in fancied bliss. 
He had kissed another woman even as this, — 

It were less bitter ! Sometimes I could weep 
To be thus cheated, like a child asleep ; — 
Were not my anguish far too dry and deep. 

So I built my house upon another's gi'ound ; 
Mocked with a heart just caught at the rebound, — 
A cankered thing that looked so firm and sound. 

And when that heart grew colder, — colder still, ^ 

1, ignorant, tried all duties to fulfil, 
Blaming my foolish pain, exacting will, 

All, — anything but him. It was to be 
The full draught others drink up carelessly 
Was made this bitter Tantalus-cup for me, 

I say again, — he gives me all I claimed, 
I and my children never shall be shamed : 
He is a just man, — he will live unblamed. 

Only — God, God, to cry for bread. 
And get a stone ! Daily to lay my head 
Upon a bosom where the old love 's dead ! 

Dead ? — Fool ! It never lived. It only stirred 
Galvanic, like an hour-cold corpse. None heard : 
So let me bury it without a word. 



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DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT. 



259 



^ I — I 



He '11 keep that other woman from my sight. 
I know not if her face be foul or bright ; 
I only know that it was his delight — 

As his was mine ; I only know he stands 
Pale, at the touch of their long-severed hands, 
Then to a flickering smile his lips commands, 

Lest I should grieve, or jealous anger show. 
He need not. When the ship 's gone down, I trow, 
We little reck whatever wind may blow. 

And so my silent moan begins and ends. 

No world's laugh or world's taunt, no pity of 

friends 
Or sneer of foes, with this my torment blends. 

None knows, — none heeds. I have a little pride ; 
Enough to stand up, wifelike, by his side, 
With the same smile as when I was his bride. 

And I shall take his children to my arms ; 
They will not miss these fading, worthless charms ; 
Their kiss — ah ! unlike his — all pain disarms. 

And haply as the solemn years go by. 

He will think sometimes, with regretful sigh, 

The other woman was less true than I. 

• Dinah Maria Mulock Craik. 



DEATH OF THE WHITE FAWN. 

The wanton troopers, riding by. 
Have shot my fawn, and it will die. 
Ungentle men ! they cannot thrive 
Who killed thee. Thou ne'er didst, alive, 
Them any harm ; alas ! nor could 
Thy death yet do them any good. 
I 'm sure I never wished them ill, — 
Nor do I for all this, nor will ; 
But if my simple prayers may yet 
Prevail with Heaven to forget 
Thy mui'der, I will join my tears. 
Rather than fail. But, my fears ! 
It cannot die so. Heaven's king 
Keeps register of everything ; 
And nothing may we use in vain ; 
Even beasts must be with justice slain, — 
Else men are made their deodands. 
Though they should wash their guilty hands 
In this warm life-blood, which doth part 
From thine and wound me to the heart, 
Yet could they not be clean, — their stain 
Is dyed in such a purple grain ; 
There is not such another in 
The world to offer for their sin. 
Inconstant Sylvio, when yet 
I had not found him counterfeit. 



One morning (I remember well) 
Tied in this silver chain and bell, 
Gave it to me ; nay, and I know 
What he said then, — I 'm sure I do : 
Said he, " Look how your huntsman here 
Hath taught a fawn to hunt his dear ! " 
But Sylvio soon had me beguiled : 
This waxed tame, while he grew wild ; 
And, quite regardless of my smart, 
Left me his fawn, but took his heart. 

Thenceforth I set myself to play 
My solitary time away 
With this ; and, very well content, 
Could so mine idle life have spent. 
For it was full of sport, and light 
Of foot and heart, and did invite 
Me to its game. It seemed to bless 
Itself in me ; how could I less 
Than love it ? 0, I cannot be 
Unkind to a beast that loveth me ! 

Had it lived long, I do not know 
Whether it, too, might have done so 
As Sylvio did, • — his gifts might be 
Perhaps as false, or more, than he. 
For I am sure, for aught that I 
Could in so short a time espy, 
Thy love was far more better than 
The love of false and cruel man. 

With sweetest milk and sugar, first 
I it at mine own fingers nursed ; 
And as it gi'ew, so every day 
It waxed more white and sweet than they. 
It had so sweet a breath ! and oft 
I blushed to see its foot more soft 
And white — shall I say than my hand ? 
Nay, any lady's of the land. 

It is a wondrous thing how fleet 
'T was on those little silver feet. 
With what a pretty, skipping grace 
It oft would challenge me the race ; 
And when 't had left me far away, 
'T would stay, and run again, and stay ; 
For it was nimbler much than hinds, 
And trod as if on the four winds. 

I have a garden of my own, — 
But so with roses overgrown, 
And lilies, that you would it guess 
To be a little wilderness ; 
And all the springtime of the year 
It only loved to be there. 
Among the beds of lilies I 
Have sought it oft, where it should lie ; ^ 
Yet could not, till itself would rise, 
Find it, although before mine eyes ; 
For in the flaxen lilies' shade 
It like a bank of lilies laid. 
Upon the roses it would feed. 
Until its lips even seemed to bleed ; 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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And then to me 't would holdly trip, 
And print those roses on my lip. 
But all its chief delight was still 
On roses thus itself to fill ; 
And its pure virgin limbs to fold 
In whitest sheets of lilies cold. 
Had it lived long, it would have been 
Lilies without, roses within. 

O, help ! 0, help ! I see it faint, 
And die as calmly as a saint ! 
See how it weeps ! the tears do come, 
Sad, slowly, dropping like a gum. 
So weeps the wounded balsam ; so 
The holy frankincense doth flow ; 
The brotherless Heliades 
Melt in such amber tears as these. 

I in a golden phial will 
Keep these two crystal tears, and fill 
It, till it do o'erflow, with mine ; 
Then place it in Diana's shrine. 

Now my sweet fawn is vanished to 
"Whither the swans and turtles go, 
In fair Elysium to endure, 
With milk-white lambs, and ermines pure. 
0, do not run too fast ! for I 
Will but bespeak thy grave — and die. 

First, my unhappy statue shall 
Be cut in marble ; and withal. 
Let it be weeping too. But there 
The engraver sure his art may spare ; 
For I so truly thee bemoan 
That I shall weep, though I be stone, 
Until my tears, still dropping, wear 
My breast, themselves engraving there. 
There at my feet shalt thou be laid. 
Of purest alabaster made ; 
For I would have thine image be 
White as I can, though not as thee. 

ANDREW MARVELL. 



THE MAID'S LAMENT. 

I LOVED him not ; and yet, now he is gone, 

I feel I am alone. 
I checked him while he spoke ; yet could he speak, 

Alas ! I would not check. 
For reasons not to love him once I sought. 

And wearied all my thought 
To vex myself and him : I now would give 

My love, could he but live 
Who lately lived for me, and when he found 

'T was vain, in holy ground 
He hid his face amid the shades of death ! 

I waste for him my breath 
Who wasted his for me ; but mine returns, 

And this lone bosom burns 
With stifling heat, heaving it up in sleep, 

And waking me to weep 



Tears that had melted his soft heart : for years 

Wept he as bitter tears ! 
" Merciful God ! " such was his latest prayer, 

" These may she never share ! " 
Quieter is his breath, his breast more cold 

Than daisies in the mould. 
Where children spell athwart the churchyard gate 

His name and life's brief date. 
Pray for him, gentle souls, whoe'er ye be. 

And 0, pray, too, for me ! 

Walter savage Landor. 



IN A YEAR. 

Never any more 

While I live, 
'Need I hope to see his face 

As before. 
Once his love grown chill, 

Mine may strive, — 
Bitterly we re-embrace, 

Single still. 

Was it something said, 

Something done. 
Vexed him ? was it touch of hand, 

Turn of head ? 
Strange ! that very way 

Love begun. 
I as little understand 

Love's decay. 

When I sewed or drew, 

I recall 
How he looked as if I sang 

— Sweetly too. 
If I spoke a word, 

First of all 
Up his cheek the color sprang, 

Then he heard. 

Sitting by my side. 

At my feet, 
So he breathed the air I breathed, 

Satisfied ! 
I, too, at love's brim 

Touched the sweet : 
I would die if death bequeathed 

Sweet to him. 

" Speak, — I love thee best ! " 

He exclaimed. 
•' Let thy love my own foretell," ■ — 

I confessed : 
" Clasp my heart on thine 

Now unblamed. 
Since upon thy soul as well 

Hangeth mine ! " 



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DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTEANGEMENT. 



261 



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"Was it wrong to own, 

Being truth ? 
Why should all the giving prove 

His alone ? 
I had wealth and ease, 

Beauty, youth, — 
Since my lover gave me love, 

I gave these. 

That was all I meant, 

— To be just, 

And the passion I had raised 

To content. 
Since he chose to change 

Gold for dust, 
If I gave him what he praised, 

Was it strange ? 

Would he loved me yet, 

On and on, 
AVhile I found some way undreamed, 

— Paid my debt ! 
Gave more life and more, 

Till, all gone. 
He should smile, " She never seemed 
Mine before. 

" What — she felt the while. 

Must I think ? 
Love 's so different with us men," 

He should smile. 
" Dying for my sake — ■ 

White and pink ! 
Can't we touch these bubbles then 

But they break ? " 

Dear, the pang is brief. 

Do thy part. 
Have thy pleasure. How perplext 

Grows belief ! 
Well, this cold clay clod 

Was man's heart. 

Crumble it, — and what comes next ? 

Is it God ? 

Robert Browning. 



U- 



BLIGHTED LOVE. 

Flow^ers are fresh, and bushes green. 

Cheerily the linnets sing ; 
Winds are soft, and skies serene ; 

Time, however, soon shall throw 
Winter's snow 
O'er the buxom breast of Spring ! 

Hope, that buds in lover's heart. 
Lives not through the scorn of years 

Time makes love itself depart ; 

Time and scorn congeal the mind, — 
Looks unkind 

Freeze aflection's warmest tears. 



Time shall make the bushes green ; 

Time dissolve the winter snow ; 
Winds be soft, and skies serene ; 

Linnets sing their wonted strain : 
But again 
Blighted love shall never blow ! 

From the Portuguese of LUIS DE CAMOENS. 
Translation of LORD STRANGFORD. 



DISAPPOINTMENT. 

FROM "ZOPHIEL, OR THE BRIDE OF SEVEN." 

The bard has sung, God never formed a soul 
Without its own peculiar mate, to meet 

Its wandering half, when ripe to crown the whole 
Bright plan of bliss most heavenly, most com- 
plete. 

But thousand evil things there are that hate 
To look on happiness : these hurt, impede, 
And leagued with time, space, circumstance, and 
fate, 
Keep kindred heart from heart, to pine, and 
pant, and bleed. 

And as the dove to far Palmyra flying 

From where her native founts of Antioch beam, 

Weary, exhausted, longing, panting, sighing. 
Lights sadly at the desert's bitter stream ; 

So many a soul, o'er life's drear desert faring, 
Love's pure congenial spring unfound, un- 
quaffed. 
Suffers — recoils — then thirsty and despairing 
Of what it would, descends and sips the near- 
est draught ! 

Maria Govven Brooks (Maria del Occidentc). 



SHIPS AT SEA. 

I HAA''E ships that went to sea 

More than fifty years ago ; 
None have yet come home to me. 

But are sailing to and fro. 
I have seen them in my sleep, 
Plunging through the shoreless deep, 
With tattered sails and battered hulls. 
While around them screamed the gulls. 
Flying low, flying low. 

I have wondered wh}^ they strayed 

From me, sailing round the' world : 
And I 've said, " I 'm half afraid 

That their sails will ne'er be furled." 
Great the treasures that they hold, 
Silks, and plumes, and bars of gold ; 
While the spices that they bear 
Fill with fragrance all the air. 
As they sail, as they sail. 



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262 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Ah ! each sailor in the port 

Knows that I have ships at sea, 
Of the waves and winds the sport, 

And the sailors pity me. 
Oft they come and with me walk. 
Cheering me with hopeful talk. 
Till I put my fears aside, 
And, contented, watch the tide 
Kise and fall, rise and fall, 

I have waited on the piers, 

Gazing for them down the bay. 

Days and nights for many years, 
Till I turned heart-sick away. 

But the pilots, when they land. 

Stop and take me by the hand. 

Saying, " You will live to see 

Your proud vessels come from sea, 
One and all, one and all." 

So I never quite despair. 

Nor let hope or courage fail ; 
And some day, when skies are fair, 

Up the bay my ships will sail. 
I shall buy then all I need, — 
Prints to look at, books to read. 
Horses, wines, and works of art. 
Everything — except a heart 
That is lost, that is lost. 

Once, when I was pure and young, 

Richer, too, than I am now. 
Ere a cloud was o'er me flung, 

Or a wrinkle creased my brow. 
There was one whose heart was mine ; 
But she 's something now divine. 
And though come my ships from sea. 
They can bring no heart to me 
Evermore, evermore. 

Robert Stevenson Coffin. 



t& 



LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM. 

FROM " IRISH MELODIES." 

THE days are gone when beauty bright 

My heart's chain wove ! 
When my dream of life, from morn till night. 
Was love, still love ! 
New hope may bloom, 
And days may come. 
Of milder, calmer beam. 
But there 's nothing half so sweet in life 

As love's young dream ! 
0, there 's nothing half so sweet in life 
As love's young dream ! 

Though the bard to purer fame may soar. 

When wild 5'outh 's past ; 
Though he win the wise, who frowned before, 

To smile at last ; , 



He '11 never meet 

A joy so sweet 
In all his noon of fame 
As when first he sung to woman's ear 

His soul-felt flame, 
And at every close she blushed to hear 

The one loved name ! 

0, that hallowed form is ne'er forgot. 

Which first love traced ; 
Still it lingering haunts the greenest spot 
On memory's waste ! 
'T was odor fled 
As soon as shed ; 
'T was morning's Avinged dream ; 
'T was a light that ne'er can shine again 
■ On life's dull stream ! 
0, 't was a light that ne'er can shine again 
On life's dull stream ! 

Thomas Moore. 



WHEN THE LAMP IS SHATTERED. 

When the lamp is shattered 
The light in the dust lies dead ; 
When the cloud is scattered. 
The rainbow's glory is shed. 
AVhen the lute is broken, 
Sweet tones are remembered not ; 
When the lips have spoken. 
Loved accents are soon forgot. 

As music and splendor 

Survive not the lamp and the lute. 

The heart's echoes render 

No song when the spirit is mute, — 

No song but sad dirges, 

L-ike the wind through a ruined cell. 

Or the mournful surges 

That ring the dead seaman's knell. 

When hearts have once mingled. 

Love first leaves the well-built nest ; 

The weak one is singled 

To endure what it once possessed. 

Love ! who bewailest 

The frailty of all things here, 

Why choose you the frailest 

For your cradle, your home, and your bier ? 

Its passions will rock thee 

As the storms rock the ravens on high ; 

Bright reason will mock thee 

Like the sun from a wintry sky. 

From thy nest every rafter 

Will rot, and thine eagle home 

Leave thee naked to laughter. 

When leaves fall and cold winds come. 

Percy Bysshe Shelley. 



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DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT. 



^^ 



TAKE, 0, TAKE THOSE LIPS AWAY* 

Take, 0, take those lips away, 
That so sweetly were forsworn ; 

And those eyes, like break of day, 
Lights that do mislead the morn ; 

But my kisses bring again. 

Seals of love, but sealed in vain. 

Hide, 0, hide those hills of snow 
Which thy frozen bosom bears, 

On whose tops the pinks that grow 
Are yet of those that April wears ! 

But first set my poor heart free. 

Bound in those icy chains by thee. 

Shakespeare and John Fletcher. 



WHY SO PALE AND WAN? 

Why so pale and wan, fond lover ? 

Pr'y thee, why so pale ? 
Will, when looking well can't move her. 

Looking ill prevail ? 

Pr'y thee, why so pale ? 

Why so dull and mute, j'oung sinner ? 

Pr'y thee, why so mute ? 
Will, when speaking well can't win her, 

Saying nothing do 't ? 

Pr'y thee, why so mute ? 

Quit, quit, for shame ! this will not move, 

This cannot take her : 
If of herself she will not love. 

Nothing can make her : 

The devil take her ! 

SIR JOHN SUCKLING. 



IS 



OUTGROWN. 

Nay, you wrong her, my friend, she 's not fickle ; 

her love she has simply outgrown : 
One can read the whole matter, translating her 

heart by the light of one's own. 

Can you bear me to talk with you frankly ? There 
is much that my heart would say ; 

And you know we were children together, have 
quarrelled and " made up " in play. 

And so, for the sake of old friendship, I venture 

to tell you the ti'uth, — 
As plainly, perhaps, and as bluntly, as I might 

in our earlier youth. 



* The first stanza of this song appears in Shakespeare's 
Measure for Measure, Act iv. Sc. i. ; the same, with the second 
stanza added, is found in Beaumont aiid Fletcher's Bloody 
Erolher, Act v. Sc. 2. 



Five summers ago, when you wooed her, you 

stood on the .self-same plane. 
Face to faci^, heart to heart, never dreaming your 

souls could be parted again. 

She loved you at that time entirely, in the bloom 

of her life's early May ; 
And it is not her fault, I repeat it, that she does 

not love you to-day. 

Nature never stands still, nor souls either : they 

ever go up or go down ; 
And hers has been steadily soaring, — but how 

has it been with your own ? 

She has struggled and yearned and aspired, — 
grow7i purer and wiser each year : 

The stars are not farther above you in yon lumi- 
nous atmosphere ! 

For she whom you crowned with fresh roses, 
down yonder, five summers ago, 

Has learned that the first of our duties to God 
and ourselves is to grow. 

Her eyes they are sweeter and calmer ; but their 

vision is clearer as well : 
Her voice has a tenderer cadence, but is pure as 

a silver bell. 

Her face has the look worn by those who with 
God and his angels have talked : 

The white robes she wears are less white than 
the spirits with whom she has walked. 

And you ? Have you aimed at the highest ? Have 
you, too, aspired and prayed ? 

Have you looked upon evil unsullied ? Have you 
conquered it undismayed ? 

Have you, too, grown purer and wiser, as the 
months and the years have rolled on ? 

Did you meet her this morning rejoicing in the 
triumph of victory won ? 

Nay, hear me ! The truth cannot harm you. 

When to-day in her presence you stood. 
Was the hand that you gave her as white and 

clean as that of her womanhood ? 

Go measure yourself by her standard. Look 
back on the years that have fled ; 

Then ask, if you need, why she tells you that 
the love of her girlhood is dead ! 

She cannot look down to her lover : her love, 

like her soul, aspires ; 
He must stand by her side, or above her, who 

would kindle its holy fires. 



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Now farewell ! For the sake of old friendship 

I have ventured to tell you the truth, 

As plainl}', perhaps, and as bluntly, as I might 

in our earlier youth. 

Julia C. R. Dorr. 



ALAS ! HOW LIGHT A CAUSE MAY 
MOVE. 

FROM "THE LIGHT OF THE HAREM." 

Alas ! how light a cause may move 

Dissension between hearts that love ! 

Hearts that the world in vain has tried, 

And sorrow but more closely tied ; 

That stood the storm when waves were rough, 

Yet in a sunny hour fall off. 

Like ships that have gone down at sea. 

When heaven was all tranquillity ! 

A something light as air, — a look, 

A word unkind or wrongly taken, — 
0, love that tempests never shook, 

A breath, a touch like this has shaken ! 
And ruder words will soon nish in 
To spread the breach that words begin ; 
And eyes forget the gentle ray 
They wore in courtship's smiling day ; 
And voices lose the tone that shed 
A tenderness round all they said ; 
Till fast declining, one by one, 
The sweetnesses of love are gone, 
And hearts, so lately mingled, seem 
Like broken clouds, — or like the stream. 
That smiling left the mountain's brow. 

As though its waters ne'er could sever, 
Yet, ere it reach the plain below. 

Breaks into floods that part forever. 

you, that have the charge of Love, 

Keep him in rosy bondage bound. 
As in the Fields of Bliss above 

He sits, with flowerets fettered round ; — 
Loose not a tie that round him clings. 
Nor ever let him use his wings ; 
For even an hour, a minute's flight 
Will rob the plumes of half their light. 
Like that celestial bird, — whose nest 

Is found beneath far Eastern skies, — 
Whose wings, though radiant when at rest, 

Lose all their glory when he flies ! 

Thomas Moore. 



k 



AUX ITALIENS. 

At Paris it M'as, at the opera there ; 

And she looked like a queen in a book that 
night. 
With the wreath of pearl in her raven hair, 

And the brooch on her breast so bright. 



Of all the operas that Verdi wrote, 

The best, to my taste, is the Trovatore ; 

And Mario can soothe, with a tenor note, 
The souls in purgatory. 

The moon on the tower slept soft as snow ; 

And who was not thrilled in the strangest way. 
As we heai'd him sing, while the gas burned low, 

" Non ti scordar di me" ? 

The emperor there, in his box of state, 
Looked gi-ave, as if he had just then seen 

The red flag wave from the citj^ gate. 
Where his eagles in bronze had been. 

The empress, too, had a tear in her eye : 

You 'd have said that her fancy had gone back 
again. 

For one moment, under the old blue sky. 
To the old glad life in Spain. 

Well ! there in our front-row box we sat 
Together, my bride betrothed and I ; 

My gaze was fixed on my opera hat, 
And hers on the stage hard by. 

And both were silent, and both were sad ; — 
Like a queen she leaned on her full white arm. 

With that regal, indolent air she had ; 
So confident of her charm ! 

I have not a doubt she was thinking then 
Of her former lord, good soul that he was, 

Who died the richest and roundest of men. 
The Marquis of Carabas. 

I hope that, to get to the kingdom of heaven. 
Through a needle's eye he had not to pass ; 

I wish him well for the jointure given 
To my lady of Carabas. 

Meanwhile, I was thinking of mj'^ first love 
As I had not been thinking of aught for years ; 

Till over my eyes there began to move 
Something that felt like tears. 

I thought of the dress that she wore last time. 
When we stood 'neath the cypress-trees together. 

In that lost land, in that soft clime, 
In the crimson evening weather ; 

Of that muslin dress (for the eve was hot) ; 

And her warm white neck in its golden chain ; 
And her full soft hair, just tied in a knot. 

And falling loose again ; 

And the jasmine flower in her fair }''oung breast ; 

(0 the faint, sweet smell of that jasmineflower !) 
And the one bird singing alone to his nest ; 

And the one star ovei' the tower. 



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DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT. 



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I thought of our little quarrels and strife, 

And the letter that brought me back my ring ; 

And it all seemed then, in the waste of life. 
Such a very little thing ! 

For I thought of her grave below the hill, 
Which the sentinel cypress-tree stands over : 

And I thought, " Were she only living still, 
How I could forgive her and love her ! " 

And I swear, as I thought of her thus, in that hour, 
And of how, after all, old things are best. 

That I smelt the smell of that jasmine flower 
Which she used to wear in her breast. 

It smelt so fiiint, and it smelt so sweet, 
It made me creep, and it made me cold ! 

Like the scent that steals from the crumbling sheet 
W^here a mummy is half unrolled. 

And I turned and looked : she was sitting there. 
In a dim box over the stage ; and drest 

In that muslin dress, with that full soft hair, 
And that jasmine in her breast ! 

I was here, and she was there ; 

And the glitteringhorseshoecurved between ! — 
From my bride betrothed, with her raven hair 

And her sumptuous scornful mien, 

To my early love with her ej^es downcast, 
And over her primrose face the shade, 

(In short, from the future back to the past,) 
There was but a step to be made. 

To my early love from my future bride 

One moment I looked. Then I stole to the door, 

I traversed the passage ; and down at her side 
1 Avas sitting, a moment more. 

My thinking of her, or the music's strain, 
Or something which never will be exprest, 

Had brought her back from the grave again, 
With the jasmine in her breast. 

She is not dead, and she is not wed ! 

But she loves me now, and she loved me then ! 
And the very first word that her sweet lips said, 

^ly heart grew youthful again. 

The marchioness there, of Carabas, 

She is wealthy, and young, and handsome still ; 
And but for her — well, we '11 let that pass ; 

She may marry whomever she will. 

But I will marry my own first love. 

With her primrose face, for old things are best ; 
And the flower in her bosom, I prize it above 

The brooch in my lady's breast. 



The world is filled with folly and sin, 
And love must cling where it can, I say ; 

For beauty is easy enough to win ; 
But one is n't loved every day. 

And I think, in the lives of most women and men. 
There 's a moment when all would go smooth 
and even. 

If only the dead could find out when 
To come back and be forgiven. 

But 0, the smell of that jasmine flower ! 

And 0, that music ! and 0, the way 
That voice rang out from the donjon tower, 

Non ti scordar di vie, 
Non ti scordar di me ! 

ROBERT BULWER-LyttON (Owfn Afcrcdiih). 



THE PORTRAIT. 

Midnight past ! Not a sound of aught 

Through the silent house, but the wind at his 
prayers. 

I sat by the dying fire, and thought 
Of the dear dead woman up stairs. 

A night of tears ! for the gusty rain 

Had ceased, but the eaves were dripping yet ; 

And the moon looked forth, as though in pain, 
With her face all white and wet : 

Nobody with me, my watch to keep. 

But the friend of my bosom, the man I love : 

And grief had sent him fast to sleep 
In the chamber up above. 

Nobody else, in the country place 

All round, that knew of my loss beside, 

But the good young Priest with the Piaphael-face, 
Who confessed her when she died. 

That good young Priest is of gentle nerve. 

And my grief had moved him beyond control ; 

For his lip grew white, as I could observe, 
When he speeded her parting soul. 

I sat by the dreary hearth alone : 
I thought of the pleasant days of yore : 

I said, " The staff of my life is gone : 
The woman I loved is no more. 

"On her cold dead bosom m)^ portrait lies, 
Which next to her heart she used to wear — 

Haunting it o'er with her tender eyes 
When my own face was not there. 

" It is set all round with rubies red. 
And pearls which a Peri might have kept. 

For each ruby there my heart hath bled : 
For each pearl my eyes have wept. " 



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And I said — " The thing is precious to me : 
They will bury her soon in the churchyard 
clay ; 

It lies on her heart, and lost must be 
If I do not take it away." 

I lighted my lamp at the dying flame, 

And crept up the stairs that creaked for fright, 

Till into the chamber of death 1 came, 
Where she lay all in white. 

The moon shone over her winding-sheet, 
There stark she lay on her carven bed : 

Seven burning tapers about her feet, 
And seven about her head. 

As I stretched my hand, I held my breath ; 

I turned as I drew the curtains apart : 
I dared not look on the face of death : 

I knew where to find her heart. 

I thought at first, as my touch fell there, 
It had warmed that heart to life, with love ; 

For the thing I touched was warm, I swear, 
And I could feel it move. 

'Twas the hand of a man, that was moving 
slow 
O'er the heart of the dead, — from the other 
side : 
And at once the sweat broke over my brow : 
" Who is robbing the corpse ? " I cried. 

Opposite me by the tapers' light, 

The friend of my bosom, the man I loved, 

Stood over the corpse, and all as white, 
And neither of us moved. 

" What do you here, my friend ?". . . The man 
Looked first at me, and then at the dead. 

"Tliere is a portrait here," he began ; 
" There is. It is mine," 1 said. 

Said the friend of my bosom, " Yours, no doubt. 
The portrait was, till a month ago, 

When this sufl'ering angel took that out, 
And placed mine there, I know. " 

" This woman, she loved me well," said I. 

" A month ago," said my friend to me : 
" And in your throat," I groaned, " you lie ! " 

He answered, ..." Let us see." 

" Enough ! " I returned, " let the dead decide : 
And whosesoever the portrait prove. 

His shall it be, when the cause is tried. 
Where Death is arraigned by Love." 



We found the portrait there, in its place : 
We opened it by the tapers' shine : 

The gems were all unchanged : the face 
Was — neither his nor mine. 

" One nail drives out another, at least ! 

The face of the portrait there," I cried, 
" Is our friend's, the Raphael-faced young Priest, 

Who confessed her when she died." 

The setting is all of rubies red. 

And pearls which a Peri might have kept. 
For each ruby there my heart hath bled : 

For each pearl my eyes have wept. 

ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON (Owen Meredith). 



THE ROMAUNT OF THE ROSE. 

FROM "VIGNETTES IN RHYME." 

Poor Rose ! I lift you from the street — 

Far better I should own you 
Than you should lie for random feet 

Where careless hands have thrown you. 

Poor pinky petals, crushed and torn ! 

Did heartless Mayfair use you. 
Then cast you forth to lie forlorn, 

For chariot-wheels to bruise you ? 

I saw you last in Edith's hair. 

Rose, you would scarce discover 
That I she passed upon the stair 

Was Edith's faVored lover, 

A month — "a little month " — ago — 

theme for moral writer ! — 
'Twixt you and me, my Rose, you know, 

She might have been politer ; 

But let that pass. She gave you then — 

Behind the oleander — 
To one, perhaps, of all the men. 

Who best could understand her. 

Cyril, that, duly flattered, took. 

As only Cyril 's able. 
With just the same Arcadian look 

He used, last night, for Mabel ; 

Then, having waltzed till every star 

Had paled away in morning. 
Lit up his cynical cigar, 

And tossed you downward, scorning. 

Kismet, my Rose ! Revenge is sweet, — 

She made my heart-strings quiver ; 
And yet — you sha'n't lie in the street, 

1 '11 drop you in the River. 

AUSTIN DOESON- 



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267 



m 



TRANSIENT BEAUTY. 

FROM " THE GIAOUR." 

As, rising on its purple wing, 
The insect-qiieen of Eastern spring, 
O'er emerald meadows of Kashmeer, 
Invites the young pursuer near, 
And leads him on from flower to flower, 
A weary chase and wasted hour, 
Then leaves him, as it soars on high, 
With panting heart and tearful eye ; 
So Beauty lures the full-grown child, 
With hue as bright, and wind as wild ; 
A chase of idle hopes and fears, 
Begun in folly, closed in tears. 
If won, to equal ills betrayed, 
Woe waits the insect and the maid : 
A life of pain, the loss of peace, 
From infant's play and man's caprice ; 
The lovely toy, so fiercely sought. 
Hath lost its charm by being caught ; 
For every touch that wooed its stay 
Hath brushed its brightest hues away, 
Till, charm and hue and beauty gone, 
'T is left to fly or fall alone. 
With wounded wing or bleeding breast. 
Ah ! where shall either victim rest ? 
Can this with faded pinion soar 
From rose to tulip as before ? 
Or Beauty, blighted in an hour. 
Find joy within her broken bower ? 
No ; gayer insects fluttering by 
Ne'er droop the wing o'er those that die, 
And lovelier things have mercy shown 
To every failing but their own, 
And every woe a tear can claim. 
Except an erring sister's shame. 



WOMAN'S INCONSTANCY. 

I LOVED thee once, I '11 love no more, 
Thine be the grief as is the blame ; 
Thou art not what thou wast before. 
What reason I should be the same ? 
He that can love unloved again. 
Hath better store of love than brain : 
God sends me love my debts to pay. 
While unthrifts fool their love away. 

Nothing could have my love o'erthrown. 

If thou hadst still continued mine ; 
Yea, if thou hadst remained thy own, 
I might perchance have yet been thine. 
But thou thy freedom didst recall, 
That if thou might elsewhere inthrall ; 
And then how could I but disdain 
A captive's captive to remain ? 



AVhen new desires had conquered thee, 
And changed the object of thy will, 
It had been lethargy in me, 

Not constancy, to love thee still. 

Yea, it had been a sin to go 

And prostitute afl"ection so, 

Since we are taught no prayers to say 

To such as must to others pray. 

Yet do thou glory in thy choice, 

Thy choice of his good fortune boast ; 
I '11 neither grieve nor yet rejoice. 
To see him gain what I have lost ; 
The height of my disdain shall be. 
To laugh at him, to blush for thee ; 
To love thee still, but go no more 
A begging to a beggar's door. 

SIR ROBERT AYTON, 



LADY CLARA VERE DE VERE. 

Lady Clara Vere de Vere, 

Of me you shall not win renown ; 
You thought to break a country heart 

For pastime, ere you went to town. 
At me you smiled, but unbeguiled 

I saw the snare, and I retired : 
The daughter of a hundred Earls, 

You are not one to be desired. 

Lady Clara Vere de Vere, 

I know you proud to bear your name ; 
Your pride is yet no mate for mine. 

Too proud to care from whence I came. 
Nor would I break for your sweet sake 

A heart that dotes on truer charms. 
A simple maiden in her flower 

Is worth a hundred coats-of-arms. 

Lady Clara Vere de Vere, 

Some meeker pupil you must find, 
For were you cpreen of all that is, 

I could not stoop to such a mind. 
You sought to prove how I could love. 

And my disdain is mj'^ reply. 
The lion on your old stone gates 

Is not more cold to you than I. 

Lady Clara Vere de Vere, 

You put strange memories in my head. 
Not thrice your branching limes haA'^e blown 

Since I beheld young Laurence dead. 
your sweet eyes, your low replies : 

A great enchantress you may be ; 
But there was that across his throat 

Which you had hardl}' cared to see. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Lady Clara Vere de Vere, 

Wlien thus he met his mother's view, 
She had the passions of her kind, 

She spake some certain truths of you. 
Indeed I heard one bitter word 

That scarce is fit for you to hear ; 
Her manners had not that repose 

Which stamps the caste of Vere de Vere. 

Lady Clara Vere de Vere, 

There stands a spectre in your hall : 
The guilt of blood is at your door : 

You changed a wholesome heart to gall. 
You held your course without remorse, 

To make him trust his modest worth, 
And, last, you fixed a vacant stare, 

And slew him with your noble birth. 

Trust me, Clara Vere de Vere, 

From yon blue heavens above us bent 
The grand old gardener and his wife 

Smile at the claims of long descent. 
Howe'er it be, it seems to me, 

'T is only noble to be good. 
Kind hearts are more than coronets, 

And simple faith than Norman blood. 

I know you, Clara Vere de Vere : 

You pine among your halls and towers : 
The languid light of your proud eyes 

Is wearied of the rolling hours. 
In glowing health, with boundless wealth, 

But sickening of a vague disease. 
You know so ill to deal with time, 

You needs must play such pranks as these. 

Clara, Clara Vere de Vere, 

If Time be heavy on your hands, 
Are there no beggars at your gate. 

Nor any poor about your lands ? 
Oh ! teach the orphan- boy to read. 

Or teach the orphan-girl to sew. 
Pray Heaven for a human heart, 

And let the foolish yeoman go. 

ALFRED Tennyson. 



LINES ON ISABELLA MAP.KH:AM. 

Whence comes my love ? heart, disclose 
It was from cheeks that shamed the rose. 
From lips that spoil the ruby's praise. 
From eyes that mock the diamond's blaze : 
Whence comes my woe ? as freely own ; 
Ah me ! 't was from a heart like stone. 

The blushing cheek speaks modest mind, 
The lips befitting words most kind, 



The eye does tempt to love's desire, 
And seems to say 't is Cxipid's fire ; 
Yet all so fair but speak my moan, 
Sith nought doth say the heart of stone. 

Why thus, my love, so kind bespeak 

Sweet eye, sweet lip, sweet blushing cheek — 

Yet not a heart to save my pain ; 

Venus, take thy gifts again ! 

Make not so fair to cause oirr moan, 

Or make a heart that 's like our own. 

John Harrington. 



THE VOW. 

In holy night we made the vow ; 

And the same lamp which long before 
Had seen our early passion grow 

Was witness to the faith we swore. 

Did I not swear to love her ever ; 

And have I ever dared to rove ? 
Did she not own a rival never 

Should shake her faith, or steal her love ? 

Yet now she says those words were air, 
Those vows were written all in water, 

And by the lamp that saw her swear 
Has yielded to the first that sought her. 

From the Greek of MEI.EAGER. 
Translation of JOHN HERMAN MERIVALE. 



WALY, WALY, BUT LOVE BE BONNY. 

0, WALY, waly up the bank, 
And Avaly, walj^ down the brae, 

And Avaly, waly yon burn side. 
Where I and my love wont to gae. 

I leaned my back irnto an aik, 
I thought it was a trusty tree ; 

But first it bowed, and syne it brak — 
Sae my true love did lightly me ! 

0, waly, waly, but love be bonny, 

A little time while it is new ; 
But when 't is auld it waxeth cauld. 

And fades away like the morning dew. 

0, wherefore should I biisk my head ? 

Or wherefore should I kame my hair ? 
For my true love has me forsook, 

And says he '11 never love me mail'. 

Now Arthur-Seat shall be my bed ; 

The sheets shall ne'er be fyled by me ; 
Saint Anton's well shall be my drink. 

Since my true love has forsaken me. 



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DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT. 



269 






JIartinmas wind, when wilt thoii blaw, 
And shake the green leaves oil' the tree ? 

gentle death, when M'ilt thou come ? 
For of my life I 'm weary, 

'T is not the frost that freezes fell, 
Nor blawing snaw's inclemency ; 

'T is not sic cauld that makes me cry, 
But my love's heart grown cauld to me. 

When we came in b}"- Glasgow town. 
We were a comely sight to see ; 

Jly love was clad in the black velvet, 
And I mysell in cramasie. 

But had I wist, before I kissed, 
That love had been sae ill to win, 

1 'd locked my heart in a case of gold. 

And pinned it with a silver pin. 

Oh, oh, if my young babe were bom. 
And set upon the nurse's knee, 

And I mysell were dead and gane. 
And the green grass growin' over me ! 
Anony.mous. 



LADY ANN BOTH WELL'S LAMENT. 



A SCOTTISH SONG. 



Balow, my babe, ly stil and sleipe ! 
It grieves me sair to see thee weipe ; 
If thoiist be silent, Ise be glad. 
Thy maining maks my heart ful sad. 
Balow, my boy, thy mither's joy ! 
Thy father breides me great aunoy. 

Balow, my babe, ly stil and sleipe! 

It grieves me sair to see thee iveipe. 

When he began to court my luve. 
And with his sugred words to muve. 
His faynings fals and flattering cheire 
To me that time did not appeire : 
But now I see, most cruell hee, 
Cares neither for my babe nor mee. 
Balow, etc. 

Ly stil, my darlinge, sleipe awhile. 
And when thou wakest sweitly smile : 
But sniile not, as thy father did. 
To cozen maids ; nay, God forbid ! 
But yette I feire, thou wilt gae neire. 
Thy fatheris hart and face to beire. 
Balow, etc. 

I cannae chuse, but ever will 
Be hiving to thy father stil : 
Whaireir ho gae, whaireir he ryde. 
My luve with him maun stil abyde : 



In weil or wae, whaireir he gae, 
Jline hart can neir depart him frae. 
Balow, etc. 

But doe not, doe not, prettie mine. 
To faynings fals thine hart incline ; 
Be loyal to thy luver trew. 
And nevir change hir for a new ; 
If gude or faire, of hir have care, 
For woniens banning's wonderous sair. 
Balow, etc. 

Bairne, sin thy cruel father is gane. 
Thy winsome smiles maun eise my paine ; 
My babe and I '11 together live, 
He '11 comfort me when cares doe grieve ; 
My babe and I right saft will ly. 
And f[uite forgeit man's cruelty. 
Balow, etc. 

Fareweil, fareweil, thou falsest youth 
That ever kist a woman's mouth ! 
I wish all maids be Avarned by mee, 
Nevir to trust man's curtesy ; 
For if we doe but chance to bow, 
They '11 use us then they care not how. 

Balow, my babe, ly stil and sUi-pe ! 

It grieves me sair to see thee v;eipc. 
Anonymous. 



MY HEID IS LIKE TO REND, WILLIE. 

My held is like to rend, Willie, 

My heart is like to break ; 
I 'm wearin' aff my feet, Willie, 

I 'm dyin' for your sake ! 
0, lay your cheek to mine, Willie, 

Your hand on my briest-bane, — 
0, say ye '11 think on me, Willie, 

When I am deid and gane ! 

It 's vain to comfort me, Willie, 

Sair grief maun ha'e its will ; 
But let me rest upon your briest 

To sab and greet my fill. 
Let me sit on your knee, Willie, 

Let me shed by your hair. 
And look into the face, Willie, 

I never sail see mair ! 

I 'm sittin' on j'our knee, Willie, 

For the last time in my life, — 
A puir heart-broken thing, Willie, 

A mither, yet nae wife. 
Ay, press your hand upon my heart, 

And press it mair and mair, 
Oi- it will burst the silken twine, 

Sae Strang is its despair. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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0, wae 's me for the lioiir, Willie, 

When we thegither met, — 
0, wae's me for the time, Willie, 

That our first tryst was set ! 
0, wae's me for the loanin' green 

Where we were wont to gae, — 
And wae 's me for the destinie 

That gart me luve thee sae ! 

0, dinna mind my words, Willie, 

I downa seek to blame ; 
But 0, it 's hard to live, Willie, 

And dree a warld's shame ! 
Het tears are hailin' ower your cheek, 

And hailin' ower your chin : 
Why weep ye sae for worthlessness, 

For sorrow, and for sin ? 

I 'm weary o' this warld, Willie, 

And sick wi' a' I see, 
I canna live as 1 ha'e lived. 

Or be as I should be. 
But fauld unto your heart, Willie, 

The heart that still is thine. 
And kiss ance mair the white, white cheek 

Ye said was red langsyne. 

A stoun' gaes through my held, Willie, 

A sair stoiin' through my heart ; 
0, baud me up and let me kiss 

Thy brow ere we twa pairt. 
Anithei', and ahither yet ! — 

How fast my life-strings break ! — 
Fareweel ' fareweel ! through yon kirk-yard 

Step lichtly for my sake ! 

The lav'rock in the lift, Willie, 

That lilts far ower our held, 
Will sing the morn as merrilie 

Abune the clay-cauld deid ; 
And this green turf we 're sittin' on, 

Wi' dew-draps shimmerin' sheen. 
Will hap the heart that luvit thee 

As warld has seldom seen. 

Biit 0, remember me, Willie, 

On land where'er ye be ; 
And 0, think on the leal, leal heart, 

That ne'er luvit ane but thee ! ' 
And 0, think on the cauld, cauld mools 

That file my yellow hair, 
That kiss the cheek, and kiss the chin 

Ye never sail kiss mair ! 

William Motherwell. 



& 



A WOMAN'S LOVE. 

A SENTINEL angel, sitting high in glory. 
Heard this shrill wail ring out from Purgatory 
" Have mercy, mighty angel, hear my story ! 



"I loved, — and, blind with passionate love, I 

fell. 
Love brought me down to death, and death to 

Hell; 
For God is just, and death for sin is well. 

" I do not rage against his high decree, 
Nor for myself do ask that grace shall be ; 
But for my love on earth who mourns for me. 

" Great Spirit ! Let me see my love again 
And comfort him one hour, and I were fain 
To pay a thousand years of fire and pain." 

Then said the pitying angel, " Nay, repent 
That wild vow ! Look, the dial-finger 's bent 
Down to the last hour of thy punishment ! " 

But still she wailed, " I firay thee, let me go ! 
I cannot rise to peace and leave him so. 
0, let me soothe him in his bitter woe ! " 

The brazen gates ground sullenly ajar, 
And upward, joyous, like a rising star, . 
She rose and vanished in the ether far. 

But soon adown the dying sunset sailing. 
And like a wounded bird her pinions trailing, 
She fluttered back, with broken-hearted wailing. 

She sobbed, " I found him by the summer sea 
Reclined, his head upon a maiden's knee, — 
She curled his hair and kissed him. Woe is me ! " 

She wept, " Now let my punishment begin ! 
I have been fond and foolish. Let me in 
To expiate my sorrow and my sin." 

The angel answered, " Nay, sad soul, go higher ! 
To be deceived in your true heart's desire 
Was bitterer than a thousand years of fire ! " 

John Hay. 



DEATH AND THE YOUTH. 

" Not yet, the flowers are in my path, 

The sun is in the sky ; 
Not yet, my heart is full of hope, 

I cannot bear to die. 

"Not yet, I never knew till now 
How precious life could be ; 

My heart is full of love, Death ! 
I cannot come with thee ! " 

But Love and Hope, enchanted twain, 
Passed in their falsehood by ; 

Death came again, and then lie said, 
" I 'm ready now to die ! " 

LETITIA ELIZABETH I,ANDON. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



271 



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FEAGMENTS. 

Fragility of Love. 

There lives within the very flame of love 
A kind of wick or snufF that will abate it. 

Hamkt, Act iv. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

The heart ! — Yes, I wore it 

As sign and as token 
Of a love that once gave it, 

A vow that was spoken ; 
But a love, and a vow, and a heart, 

Can be broken. 

Hearts. A. A. PROCTER. 

A love that took an early root, 
And had an early doom. 

TJte Devil 's Progress. T. K. HERVEY. 



False Hope. 

Hope tells a flattering tale, 
Delusive, vain, and hollow, 

Ah, let not Hope prevail, 
Lest disappointment follow. 

The (Jjuversal Songster. 



MISS WROTHER. 



Inconstancy of Man. 

Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more, 

Men were deceivers ever ; 
One foot in sea and one on shore ; 

To one thing constant never. 

Mitch Ada about Nothing, Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

There is no music in a voice 

That is but one, and still the same ; 
Inconstancy is but a name 

To fright poor lovers from a better choice. 

Shepherd's Holiday. J. RUTTER. 

The fraud of men w^as ever so 
Since summer first was leafy. 

Muck Ado about Nothing, Act ii. Sc 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

heaven ! were man 
But constant, lie were perfect : that one eri'or 
Fills him with faults. 

Two GeiMcDun 0/ Verona, Act v. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 



Inconstancy of Woman. 

There are three things a wise man will not trust 
The wind, the sunshine of an April day. 
And Avoman's plighted faith. 



Who trusts himself to woman or to waves 
Should never hazard what he fears to lose. 

Governor 0/ Cypriis. OLDMIXON. 

Away, away — you 're all the same, 
A fluttering, smiling, jilting throng ! 
0, by my soul, I burn with shame. 
To think I 've been your slave so long ! 

T. MOORE. 



The Disappointed Heap.t. 

The cold — the changed — perchance the dead 

— anew, 
The mourned, the loved, the lost — too many ! — 

yet how few ! 

Ckilde Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 

Do not drop in for an after-loss. 
Ah, do notjM'hen my heart hath scaped this sorrow, 
Come in the rearward of a conquered woe ; 
Give not a windy night a rainy morrow, 
To linger out a purposed overthrow. 

SotllietXC. SHAKESPEARE. 

I have not loved the world, nor the world me. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iii. BYRON. 

At threescore winters' end I died, 

A cheerless being, sole and sad ; 
The nuptial knot I never tied. 

And wish my father never had. 



Prom the Greek. 



COWPER'S Trans. 



Alas ! the breast that inl}'- bleeds 
Hath naught to dread from outward blow : 
Who falls from all he knows of bliss 
Cares little into what abyss. 

The Giaour. BYRON. 



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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



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EESIGNATION. 

Thkre is no flock, however watched and tended, 

But one dead lamb is there ! 
There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended, 

But has one vacant chair ! 

The air is full of farewells to the dying, 

And mournings for the dead ; 
The heart of Rachel, for her children crying, 

Will not be comforted ! 

Let us be patient ! These severe afflictions 

Not from the ground arise, 
But oftentimes celestial benedictions 

Assume this dark disguise. 

We see but dimly through the mists and vapors ; 

Amid these earthly damps 
What seem to us but sad, funereal tapers 

May be heaven's distant lamps. 

There is no Death ! What seems so is transition : 

This life of mortal breath 
Is but a suburb of the life elysian, 

Whose portal we call Death. 

She is not dead, — the child of our affection, — 

But gone unto that school 
Where she no longer needs our poor protection, 

And Christ himself doth rule. 

In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion, 

By guardian angels led. 
Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution, 

She lives whom we call dead. 

Day after day we think what she is doing 

In those bright realms of air ; 
Year after year, her tender steps pursuing. 

Behold her grown more fair. 

Thus do we walk with her, and keep unbroken 

The bond which nature gives, 
Thinking that our remembrance, though un- 
spoken, 

May reach her where she lives. 

Not as a child shall we again behold her ; 

For when with raptures wild 
In our embraces we again enfold lier. 

She Avill not be a child : 



But a fair maiden, in her Father's mansion. 

Clothed with celestial grace ; 
And beautiful with all the soul's expansion 

Shall we behold her face. 

And though, at times, impetuous with emotion 

And anguish long suppressed. 
The swelling heart heaves moaning like the ocean, 

That cannot be at rest, — 

We will be patient, and assuage the feeling 

We may not wholly stay ; 
By silence sanctifying, not concealing, 

The grief that must have way. 

Henry wadsworth Longfellow. 



BURIED TO-DAY. 

BuRiF.D to-day. 

When the soft green buds are bursting out, 
And up on the south-wind comes a shout 

Of village boys and girls at play 

In the mild spring evening gray. 

Taken away. 

Sturdy of heart and stout of limb. 
From eyes that drew half their light from 
him, 

And put low, low underneath the clay. 

In his spring, — on this spring day. 

Passes aM'ay, 

All the pride of boy -life begun, 

All the hope of life yet to inn ; 
Who dares to question when One saith "Nay." 
IMurmur not, — only pray. 

Enters to-day 

Another body in churchyard sod, 
Another soul on the life in God. 

His Christ was buried — and lives alway : 

Trust Him, and go your way. 

Dinah Maria Mulock Craik. 



GRIEF FOR THE DEAD. 

HEAjiTS that never cease to yearn ! 

brimming tears tliat ne'er are dried ! 
The dead, though they depart, return 

As though thev had not died ! 



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273 



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The living are the only dead ; 

The dead live, — nevermore to die ; 
And often, when we mourn them fled, 

They never were so nigh ! 

And though they lie beneath the waves, 
Or sleep within the churchyard dim, 

(Ah ! through how many different graves 
God's children go to him !) — 

Yet every grave gives uj) its dead 
Ere it is overgrown Avith grass ; 

Then why should hopeless tears be shed, 
Or need we cry, " Alas " ? 

Or why should Memory, veiled with gloom, 
And like a sorrowing mourner craped, 

Sit weeping o'er an empty tomb. 
Whose captives have escaped ? 

'T is but a mound, — and will be mossed 
Whene'er the summer grass appears ; 

The loved, though wept, are never lost ; 
We onl)' lose — our tears ! 

Nay, Hope may whisper with the dead 
By bending forward where they are ; 

But Memory, with a backward tread, 
Communes with them afar. 

The joys we lose are but forecast. 

And we shall And them all once more ; 

We look behind us for the Past, 

Bat lo ! 'tis all before ! 

Anonymous. 



LINES 

TO THE MEMORY OF " ANNIE," WHO DIED AT MILAN, 
JUNE 6. i860. 

** Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou ? whom seek- 
est thou ? She, supposing: liim to be the jjardener, saith unto him, 
sir, if thou have borne liim hence, tell me where thou hast laid 
him.' —John xx. 15. 

In the fair gardens of celestial peace 
Walketli a gardener in meekness clad ; 

Fair are the flowers that wreathe his dewy locks. 
And his mysterious eyes are sweet and sad. 

Fair are tlie silent foldings of his robes, 
Falling with saintly calmness to his feet ; 

And when he walks, each floweret to his will 
With living pulse of sweet accord doth beat. 

Every green leaf thrills to its tender heart, 
In the mild summer radiance of his eye ; 

No fear of storm, or cold, or bitter frost. 

Shadows the flowerets when their sun is nisch. 



And all our pleasant haunts of earthly love 
Are nurseries to those gardens of the air ; 

And his far-darting eye, with starry beam, 
Watching the growing of his treasures there. 

We call them ours, o'erwept with selfish tears, 
O'erwatched with restless longings night and 
day ; 

Forgetful of the high, mysterious right 

He holds to bear our cherished plants away. 

But when some sunny spot in those bright fields 
Needs the fair presence of an added flower, 

Down sweeps a starry angel in the night : 
At morn the I'ose has vanished from our bower. 

Where stood our tree, our flower, there is a grave ! 

Blank, silent, vacant ; but in worlds above. 
Like a new star outblossomed in the skies. 

The angels hail an added flower of love. 

Dear friend, no more upon that lonely mound, 
Strewed with the red and yellow autumn leaf, 

Drop thou the tear, but raise the fainting eye 
Beyond the autumn mists of earthly grief. 

Thy garden rosebud bore within its breast 
Those mysteries of color, warm and bright. 

That the bleak climate of this lower sphere 
Could never waken into form and light. 

Yes, the sweet Gardener hath borne her hence. 
Nor must thou ask to take her thence away ; 

Thou shalt behold her, in some coming hour, 
Full blossomed in his fields of cloudless day. 

HARRIET BEECHER STOWE. 



FOOTSTEPS OF ANGELS. 

When the hours of day are numbered, 

And the voices of the night 
Wake the better soul that slumbered 

To a holy, calm delight, — 

Ere the evening lamps are lighted. 
And, like phantoms grim and tall, 

Shadows from the fitful firelight 
Dance upon, the parlor wall ; 

Then the forms of the departed 

Enter at the open door, — ■ 
The beloved ones, the true-hearted, 

Come to visit me once more : 

He, the young and strong, who cherished 
Noble longings for the strife. 

By the roadside fell and perished, 
Weary with the mai'ch of life ! 



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POEMS OF THE AEEECTIONS. 



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They, the holy ones and weakly, 
AVho the cross of suffering bore, 

Folded their pale hands so meekly, 
Spake with us on earth no more ! 

And with them the being beauteous 
Who iinto my youth was given, 

More than all things else to love me, 
And is now a saint in heaven. 

With a slow and noiseless footstep, 

Gomes that messenger divine, 
Takes the vacant chair beside me. 

Lays her gentle hand in mine ; 

And she sits and gazes at me 

With those deep and tender eyes. 

Like the stars, so still and saint-like, 
Looking downward from the skies. 

Uttered not, yet comprehended, 
Is the spirit's voiceless prayer. 

Soft rebukes, in blessings ended, 
Breathing from her lips of air. 

0, though oft depressed and lonely, 

All my fears are laid aside 
If I but remember only 

Such as these have lived and died ! 

Henry wadsworth Longfellow. 



IS 



THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES. 

I HAVE had playmates, I have had companions. 
In my days of childhood, in my joyful school- 
days ; 
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. 

I have been laughing, I have been carousing. 
Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cro- 
nies ; 
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. 

I loved a Love once, fairest among women : 
Closed are her doors on me, I must not see her, — 
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. 

I have a friend, a kinder friend has no man . 
Like an ingrate, I left my friend abruptly ; 
Left him, to muse on the old familiar faces. 

Ghost-like I paced round the haunts of my child- 
hood, . 
Earth seemed a desert I was bound to traverse. 
Seeking to find the old familiar faces. 



Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother. 
Why wert not thou born in my father's dwelling ? 
So might we talk of the old familiar faces. 

How some they have died, and some they have 

left me. 
And some are taken from me ; all are departed ; 
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. 

CHARLES LAMB. 



THEY ARE ALL GONE. 

They are all gone into the world of light, 

And I alone sit lingering here ! 
Their very memory is fair and bright, 
And my sad thoughts doth clear ; 

It glows and glitters in my cloudy breast. 
Like stars upon some gloomy grove, — 
Or those faint beams in which this hill is drest 
After the sun's remove. 

I see them walking in an air of glory. 

Whose light doth trample on my days, — 
My days which are at best but dull and hoary. 
Mere glimmering and decays. 

holy hope ! and high humility, — 

High as the heavens above ! 
These are your walks, and you have showed them 
me 
To kindle my cold love. 

Dear, beauteous death, — the jewel of the just, — 

Shining nowhere but in the dark ! 

What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust. 

Could man outlook that mark ! 

He that hath found some fledged bird's nest may 
know, 
At first sight, if the bird be flown ; ' 

But what fair dell or grove he sings in now. 
That is to him unknown. 

And yet, as angels in some brighter dreams 

Call to the soul when man doth sleep. 
So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted 
themes. 
And into glory peep. 

If a star were confined into a tomb. 

Her captive flames must needs burn there. 
But when the hand that locked her up gives room. 
She '11 shine through all the sphere. 

Father of eternal life, and all 

Created glories under thee ! 
Resume thy spirit from this world of thrall 
Into true liberty. 



^ 




WHITTIER'S HOME AT AMESBURY. 

(Birthplace at Haverhill.) 
" A7id sweet Jiomes nestle in these dales ^ 
A nd j>erch along these wooded swells, 
A nd, blest beyond A readmit vales, 

They hear the sound of Sabbath bells." 



BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



275 



ra 



Eitlier disperse these mists, which blot and fill 

My perspective still as they pass ; 
Or else remove me hence unto that hill 
Where I shall need no glass. 



HENRY VAUGHAN. 



THE FUTURE LIFE. 

How shall I know thee in the sphere which keeps 
The disembodied spirits of the dead, 

When all of thee that time could wither sleeps 
And perishes among the dust we tread ? 

For I shall feel the sting of ceaseless pain 
If there I meet thy gentle presence not ; 

Nor hear the voice I love, nor read again 
In thy serenest ej^es the tender thought. 

Will not thy own meek heart demand me there ? 

That heart whose fondest tlirobs to me were 
given ; 
My name on earth was ever in thy praj^er. 

And wilt thou never utter it in heaven ? 

In meadows fanned by heaven's life-breathing 
wind. 

In the resplendence of that glorious sphere. 
And larger movements of the unfettered mind. 

Wilt thou forget the love that joined us here ? 

The love that lived through all the stormy past, 
And meekly witli my harsher natui-e bore, 

And deeper grew, and tenderer to the last, 
Shall it expire with life, and be no more ? 

A happier lot than mine, and larger light. 

Await thee there ; for thou hast bowed thy will 

In cheerful homage to the rule of right, 
And lovest all, and renderest good for ill 

For me, the sordid cares in which I dwell. 
Shrink and consume my heart, as heat the 
scroll ; 

And wrath has left its scar — that fire of hell 
Has left its frightful scar upon my soul. 

Yet though thou wear'st the glory of the sky, 
Wilt thou not keep the same beloved name. 

The same fair thoughtful brow, and gentle eye, 
Lovelier in heaven's sweet climate, yet the 
same ? 

Shalt thou not teach me, in that calmer home, 
The wisdom that I learned so ill in this — 

The wisdom which is love — till I become 
Thy fit companion in that land of bliss ? 

William Cullen Bryant. 



THE ANGEL OF PATIENCE. 

A FREE PARAPHRASE OF THE GERMAN. 

To weary hearts, to mourning homes, 
God's meekest Angel gently comes : 
No power has he to banish pain. 
Or give us back our lost again ; 
And yet in tenderest love our dear 
And heavenly Father sends him here. 

There 's quiet in that Angel's glance. 

There 's rest in his still countenance ! 

He mocks no grief with idle cheer. 

Nor wounds with words the mourner's ear ; 

But ills and woes he may not cure 

He kindly trains us to endure. 

Angel of Patience ! sent to calm 
Our feverish brows with cooling palm ; 
To lay the storms of hope and fear. 
And reconcile life's smile and tear ; 
The throbs of wounded pride to still. 
And make our own our Father's will ! 

thou who mournest on thy waj;-. 
With longings for the close of day ; 
He walks with thee, that Angel kind, 
And gently whispers, " Be resigned : 
Bear up, bear on, the end shall tell 
The dear Lord ordereth all things well !" 

John Greenleaf Whittiek. 



THE FIRST SNOW-FALL. 

The snow had begun in the gloaming. 

And busily all the night 
Had been heaping field and highway 

With a silence deep and white. 

Everj' pine and fir and hemlock 
Wore ermine too dear for an earl. 

And the poorest twig on the elm-tree 
Was ridged inch deep with pearl. 

From sheds new-roofed with Carrara 
Came Chanticleer's uuiffled crow. 

The stiff rails were softened to swan's-down. 
And still fluttered down the snow. 

I stood and watched by the window 

The noiseless work of the sky. 
And the sudden flurries of snow-birds. 

Like brown leaves whirling by. 

I thought of a mound in sweet Auburn 
Where a little headstone stood ; 

How the flakes were folding it gently, 
As did robins the babes in the wood. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Up spoke our own little Mabel, 

Saying, "Father, who makes it snow?" 

And 1 told of the good All-father 
Who cares for us here below. 

Again I looked at the snow-fall, 

And thought of the leaden sky- 
That arched o'er our first great sorrow, 

When that mound was heaped so high. 

I remembered the gradual patience 
That fell from that cloud like snow. 

Flake by flake, healing and hiding 
The scar of our deep-plunged woe. 

And again to the child I whispered, 

"The snow that husheth all. 
Darling, the merciful Father 

Alone can make it fall ! " 

Then, with eyes that saw not,' I kissed her; 

And she, kissing back, could not know 
That my kiss was given to her sister. 

Folded close under deepening snow. 

James Russeli, Lowell. 



THE REAPER AND THE FLOWERS. 

TiiEPiE is a Reaper whose name is Death, 

And, with his sickle keen, 
He reaps the bearded grain at a breath, 

And the flowers that grow between. 

"Shall 1 have naught that is fair?" saith he ; 

' ' Have naught but the bearded grain ? 
Though the breath of these flowers is sweet to me, 

I will give them all back again." 

He gazed at the flowers with tearful eyes, 

He Ivissed their drooping leaves ; 
It was for the Lord of Paradise 

He bound them in his sheaves. 

"My Lord has need of these flowerets gay,'" 

The Reaper said, and smiled ; 
"Dear tokens of the earth are they, 

Where he was once a child. 

"They shall all bloom in fields of light. 

Transplanted bj^ my care, 
And saints, upon their garments white, 

These sacred blossoms weai\" 

And the mother gave, in tears and jDain, 

The flowers she most did love ; 
She knew she should find them all again 

In the fields of light above. 



0, not in cruelt}% not in wrath, 

The Reaper came that day ; 
T was an angel visited the green ^arth, 

And took the flowers away. 

HENKY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 



OVER THE RIVER. 

OvEK the river they beckon to me. 

Loved ones who 've crossed to the farther side. 
The gleam of their snowy robes I see. 

But their voices are lost in the dashing tide. 
There 's one with ringlets of sunny gold. 

And eyes the reflection of heaven's own blue ; 
He crossed in the twilight gray and cold. 

And the pale mist hid him from mortal view. 
We saw not the angels who met him there, 

The gates of the city we could not see : 
Over the river, over the river, 

My brother stands waiting to welcome me. 

Over the river the boatman pale 

Carried another, the household pet ; 
Her brown curls waved in the gentle gale. 

Darling Minnie ! I see her yet. 
She crossed on her bosom her dimpled hands, 

And fearlessly entered the phantom bark ; 
We felt it glide from the silver sands, 

And all our sunshine grew strangely dark ; 
We know she is safe on the farther side, 

Where all the ransomed and angels be : 
Over the river, the mystic river, 

My childhood's idol is waiting for me. 

For none return from those quiet shores, 

Who cross with the boatman cold and pale ; 
We hear the dip of the golden oars. 

And catch a gleam of the snowy sail ; 
And lo ! they have passed from our yearning 
hearts, 

They cross the stream and are gone for aye. 
We may not sunder the veil apart 

That hides from our vision the gates of day ; 
We only know that their barks no more 

May sail with us o'er life's stormy sea ; 
Yet somewhere, I know, on the unseen shore. 

They watch, and beckon, and wait for me. 

And I sit and think, when the sunset's gold 

Is flushing river and hill and shore, 
I shall one day stand by the water cold, 

And list for tlie sound of the boatman's oar ; 
I shall watch for a gleam of the flapping sail, 

I shall hear the boat as it gains the strand, 
I shall pass from sight with the boatman pale, 

To the better shore of the spirit land. 



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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



017T — 



Til 



I shall know the loved who have gone before, 
And joyfully sweet will the meeting be, 

When over the river, the peaceful river, 
The angel of death shall carry me. 

NANCY WOODBURY PRIEST. 



THE TWO WAITINGS. 



Deak hearts, you were waiting a year ago 

For the glory to be revealed ; 
You were wondering deeply, with bated breath, 

What treasure the days concealed. 

0, would it be this, or would it be that ? 

Would it be girl or boy ? 
Would it look like father or mother most ? 

And what should you do for joy ? 

And then, one day, when the time was full. 

And the spring was coming fast, 
Tlie trembling veil of the body was rent. 

And you saw your baby at last. 

Was it or not what you had dreamed ? 

It was, and yet it was not ; 
But 0, it was better a thousand times 

Than ever you wished or thought. 



And now, dear hearts, voir are waiting again. 
While the spring is coming fast ; 

For the baby that wna a future dream 
Is now a dream of the past : 

A dream of sunshine, and all that 's sweet ; 

Of all that is pure and bright ; 
Of eyes that were blue as the sky by day. 

And as soft as the stars by night. 

Yon are Avaiting again for the fulness of time. 

And the glory to be revealed ; 
You are wondering deeply with aching hearts 

What treasure is now concealed. 

0, will she be this, or will she be that ? 

And what will there be in her face 
That will tell you sure that she is yovir own. 

When you meet in the heavenly place ? 

As it was before, it will be again, 
Fashion your dream as you will ; 

When the veil is rent, and the glory is seen. 
It will more than your liope fuliil. 

John v/hite Chadwick. 



FOR CHARLIE'S SAKE. 

The night is late, the house is still ; 

The angels of the hour fulhl 

Their tender ministries, and move 

From couch to couch in cares of love. 

They drop into thy dreams, sweet wife. 

The happiest smile of Charlie's life, 

And lay on baby's lips a kiss, 

Fresh from his angel-brother's bliss ; 

And, as they pass, they seem to make 

A strange, dim hymn, " For Charlie's sake." 

My listening heart takes up the strain, 
And gives it- to the night again. 
Fitted with words of lowly praise. 
And patience learned of mournful days, 
And memories of the dead child's ways. 
His will be done, His will be done ! 
Who gave and took away my son, 
In "the far land" to shine and sing 
Before the Beautiful, the King, 
Who every day doth Christmas make, 
All starred and belled for Charlie's sake. 

For Charlie's sake I will arise ; 

I will anoint me where he lies. 

And change my raiment, and go in 

To the Lord's house, and leave my sin 

Without, and seat me at his board. 

Eat, and be glad, and praise the Lord. 

For wherefore should I fast and weep, 

And sullen moods of mourning keep ? 

I cannot bring him back, nor he. 

For any calling, come to me. 

The bond the angel Death did sign, 

God sealed — for Charlie's sake, and mine. 

I 'm very poor — this slender stone 

Marks all the narrow held I own ; 

Yet, ])atient husljandman, I till 

With faith and prayers, that precious hill, 

Sow it with penitential pains, 

And, hopeful, wait the latter rains ; 

Content if, after all, the spot 

Yield barely one forget-me-not — • 

Whether or figs or thistles make 

M)' crop, content for Charlie's sake. 

I have no houses, builded well — 

Only that little lonesome cell. 

Where never romping plaj'inates come, 

Nor bashful sweethearts, cunning-dumb — 

An April burst of girls and boys, 

Their rainbowed cloud of glooms and joys 

I'orn with tlieir songs, gone with their toys ; 

Nor ever is its stillness stirred 

By purr of cat, or chirp of bird. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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Or mother's twilight legend, told 
Of Horner's pie, or Tiddler's gold, 
Or fairy hobbling to the door, 
Red-cloaked and weird, banned and poor, 
To bless the good child's gracious eyes, 
The good child's wistful charities, 
And crippled changeling's hunch to make 
Dance on his crutch, for good child's sake. 

How is it with the child ? 'T is well ; 

Nor would I any miracle 

Might stir my sleeper's tranquil trance, 

Or plague his painless countenance : 

I would not any seer might place 

His staff on my immortal's face. 

Or lip to lip, and eye to eye, 

Charm back his pale mortality. 

No, Shunamite ! I would not break 

God's stillness. Let them weep who wake. 

For Charlie's sake my lot is blest : 
No comfort like his mother's breast, 
No praise like hers ; no charm expressed 
In fairest forms hath half her zest. 
For Charlie's sake this bird 's caressed 
That death left lonely in the nest ; 
For Charlie's sake my heart is dressed. 
As for its birthday, in its best ; 
For Charlie's sake we leave the rest 
To Him who gave, and who did take, 
And saved us twice, for Charlie's sake. 

JOHN WILLIAMSON PALMER. 



e 



"ONLY A YEAR." 

One year ago, — a ringing voice, 

A clear blue ej^e, 
And clustering curls of sunny hair, 

Too fair to die. 

Only a year, — no voice, no smile. 

No glance of eye. 
No clustering curls of golden hair. 

Fair but to die ! 

One year ago, — what loves, what schemes 

Far into life ! 
What joyous hopes, what high resolves, 

What generous strife ! 

The silent picture on the wall, 

The burial-stone 
Of all that beauty, life, and joy, 

Remain alone ! 

One year, — one year, — one little year, 

And so much gone ! 
And yet the even flow of life 

Moves calmly on. 



The grave grows green, the flowers bloom fair, 

Above that head ; 
No sorrowing tint of leaf or spray 

Says he is dead. 

No pause or hush of merry birds 

That sing above 
Tells us how coldly sleeps below 

The form we love. 

Where hast thou been this year, beloved ? 

What hast thou seen, — - 
What visions fair, what glorious life, 

Where thou hast been ? 

The veil ! the veil ! so thin, so strong ! 

'Twixt us and thee ;. 
The mystic veil ! when shall it fall, 

That we may see ? 

Not dead, not sleeping, not even gone, 

But present still, 
And waiting for the coming hour 

Of God's sweet will. 

Lord of the living and the dead. 

Our Saviour dear ! 
We lay in silence at thy feet 

This sad, sad year. 

HARRIET BEECHER STOWE. 



MY CHILD. 

I CAXNOT make him dead ! 

His fair sunshiny head 
Is ever bounding round my study chair ; 

Yet when my eyes, now dim 

With tears, I turn to him. 
The vision vanishes, — he is not there ! 

I walk my parlor floor. 

And, through the open door, 
I hear a footfall on the chamber stair ; 

I 'm stejiping toward the hall 

To give the boy a call ; 
And then bethink me that — he is not there ! 

I thread the crowded street ; 

A satchelled lad I meet, 
With the same beaming eyes and colored hair ; 

And, as he 's running by. 

Follow him with my eye, 
Scarcely believing that — he is not there ! 



I know his foce is hid 
Under the colnn lid ; 
Closed are his eyes ; cold is his forehead fair 



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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



279 



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My hand that marble felt ; 
O'er it in prayer I knelt ; 
Yet my heai-t whisx^ers that — he is not there ! 

I cannot make him dead ! 

When passing by the bed, 
So long watched over with parental care, 

My spirit and my eye 

Seek him inquiringly, 
Before the thought comes, that — he is not there ! 

When, at the cool gray break 

Of day, from sleep I wake. 
With my first breathing of the morning air 

My soul goes up, with joy, 

To Him who gave my boy ; 
Then comes the sad thought that — he is not 
there ! 

When at the day's calm close, 

Before we seek repose, 
I 'm with his mother, offering up our prayer ; 

Whate'er I may be saying, 

I am in spirit praying 
For our boy's spirit, though — he is not there ! 

Not there ! — Where, then, is he ? 

The form I used to see 
Was but the raiment that he used to wear.. 

The grave, that now doth press 

Upon that ca,st-off' dress, 
Is but his wardrobe locked ; — he is not there ! 

He lives ! — In all the past 

He lives ; nor, to the last. 
Of seeing him again will I despair ; 

In dreams I see him now ; 

And, on his angel brow, 
I see it written, ' ' Thou shalt see me there ! " 

Yes, we all live to God ! 

Father, thy chastening rod 
So help us, thine afflicted ones, to bear, 

That, in the spirit land, 

Meeting at thy right hand, 
*T will be our heaven to find that — he is there ! 

JOHN PIERPONT. 



CASA WAPPY. 

THE CHILD'S PET NAME, CHOSEN BY HIMSELF. 

And hast thou sought thy heavenly home, 

Our fond, dear boy, — 
The realms where sorrow dare not come, 

Where life is joy ? 
Pure at thy death as at thy birth. 
Thy spirit caught no taint from earth ; 
Even by its bliss we mete our dearth, 
Casa Wappy ! 



Despair was in our last farewell. 

As closed thine eye ; 
Tears of our anguish may not tell 

When thou didst die ; 
Words may not paint our grief for thee ; 
Sighs are but bubbles on the sea 
Of our unfathomed agony ; 
Casa Wappy ! 

Thou wert a vision of delight, 

To bless us given ; 
Beauty embodied to our sight, 

A tj'pe of heaven ! 
So dear to us thou wert, thou art 
Even less thine own self, than a part 
Of mine, and of thy mother's heart, 
Casa Wappy ! 

Thy bright, brief day knew no decline, 

'T was cloudless joy ; 
Sunrise and night alone were thine. 

Beloved boy ! 
This moon beheld thee blithe and gay ; 
That found thee prostrate in decay ; 
And ere a third shone, clay was clay, 
Casa Wappy ! 

Gem of our hearth, our household pride, 

Earth's undefiled. 
Could love have saved, thou hadst not died, 

Our dear, sweet child ! 
Humbly we bow to Fate's decree ; 
Yet had we hoped that Time should see 
Thee mourn for us, not us for thee, 
Casa Wappy ! 

Do what I may, go where I will, 

Thou meet'st my sight ; 
There dost thou glide before me still, — 

A form of light ! 
I feel thy breath upon my cheek — 
I see thee smile, 1 hear thee speak — 
Till 0, my heart is like to break, 
Casa Wappy ! 

Methinks thou smil'st before me now. 

With glance of stealth ; 
The hair thrown back from thy full brow 

In buoyant health : 
I see thine eyes' deep violet light. 
Thy dimpled cheek carnationed bright. 
Thy clasping arms so round and white, 
Casa Wappy ! 

The nursery shows thy pictured wall. 

Thy bat, thy bow. 
Thy cloak and bonnet, club and ball ; 

But where art thou ? 



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280 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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ta 



A corner holds thine empty chair, 
Thy playthings idly scattered there, 
But speak to us of our despair, 
Casa Wappy ! 

Even to the last thy every -word — 

To glad, to grieve — 
"Was sweet as sweetest song of bird 

On summer's eve ; 
In outward beauty undecayed, 
Death o'er thy spirit cast no shade, 
And like the rainbow thou didst fade, 
Casa "Wappy ! 

We mourn for thee when blind, blank night 

The chamber fills ; 
"We pine for thee when morn's first light 

Reddens the hills : 
The sun, the moon, the stars, the sea, 
All — to the wallflower and wild pea — 
Are changed ; w-e saw the world through thee, 
Casa "\^''appy ! 

And though, perchance, a smile may gleam 

Of casual mirth. 
It doth not own, whate'er may seem, 

An inward birth ; 
"W'e miss thy small step on the stair ; 
"We miss thee at thine evening prayer ; 
All day we miss tliee, — everywhere, — 
Casa Wappy ! 

Snows muffled earth when thou didst go. 

In life's spring-bloom, 
Down to the appointed house below, — 

The silent tomb. 
But now the green leaves of the tree, 
The cuckoo, and "the busy bee," 
Return, — but with them bring not thee, 
Casa Wappy ! 

'T is so ; but can it be — • while flowers 

Revive again — 
Man's doom, in death that we and ours 

For aye remain ? 
0, can it be, that o'er the grave 
The grass renewed should yearly wave, 
Yet God forget our child to save ? — 
Casa Wappy ! 

It cannot be ; for were it so 

Thus man could die, 
life were a mockery, thought were woe, 

And truth a lie ; 
Heaven were a coinage of the brain ; 
Religion frenzy, virtue vain, 
And all our hopes to meet again, 
Casa Wappy ! 



Then be to us, dear, lost child ! 

W^ith beam of love, 
A star, death's uncongenial wild 

Smiling above ! 
Soon, soon thy little feet have trod 
The skyward path, the seraph's road, 
That led thee back from man to God, 
Casa Wappy ! 

Yet 't is sweet balm to our despair, 

Fond, fairest boy, 
That heaven is God's, and thou art there, 

With him in joy ; 
There past are death and all its woes ; 
There beauty's stream forever flows ; 
And pleasure's day no sunset knows, 
Casa WajDpy ! 

Farewell, then — for a while, farewell, — 

Pride of my heart ! 
It cannot be that long we dwell, 

Thus torn apart. 
Time's shadows like the shuttle flee , 
And dark howe'er life's night may be, 
Beyond the grave I '11 meet with thee, 
Casa Wappy ! 

David Macbeth Moir. 



THE MERRY LARK. 

The merry, merry lark was up and singing. 

And the hare was out and feeding on the lea, 
And the merry, merry bells below were ringing, 

When my child's laugh rang through me. 
Now the hare is snared and dead beside the 
snowyard, 

And the lark beside the dreary winter sea. 
And my baby in his cradle in the churchyard 

Waiteth there until the bells bring me. 

CHARLES KINGSLEV. 



THE MORNING-GLORY. 

We wreathed about our darling's head 

The morning-glory bright ; 
Her little face looked out beneath 

So full of life and light, 
So lit as with a sunrise, 

That we could only say, 
" She is the morning-glory true. 

And her poor types are they." 

So always from that happy time 
We called her by their name. 

And very fitting did it seem, — 
For sure as morning came, 



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Behind her cradle bars she smiled 

To catch the first faint ray, 
As from the trellis smiles the flower 

And opens to the day. 

But not so beantiful they rear 

Their airy cups of blue, 
As turned her sweet eyes to the light. 

Brimmed with sleep's tender dew ; 
And uot so close their tendrils fine 

Round their supports are thrown. 
As those dear arms whose outstretched plea 

Clasped all hearts to her own. 

We used to think how she had come. 

Even as comes the flower, 
The last and perfect added gift 

To crown Love's morning hour ; 
And how in her was imaged forth 

The love we could not say, 
As on the little dewdrops round 

Shines back the heart of day. 

We never could have thought, God, 

That she must wither up. 
Almost befoi'e a day was flown, 

Like the morning-glory's cup ; 
We never thought to see her droop 

Her fair and noble head, 
Till she lay stretched before our eyes, 

Wilted, and cold, and dead ! 

The morning-glory's blossoming 

Will soon be coming round, — 
We see their rows of heart-shaioed leaves 

Upspringing from the ground ; 
The tender things the winter killed 

Renew again tlieir birth, 
But the glory of our morning 

Has passed away from earth. 

Eaith ! in vain our aching eyes 

Stretch over thy green plain ! 
Too harsh thy dews, too gross thine air, 

Her spirit to sustain ; 
But up in groves of Paradise 

Full surely we shall see 
Our morning-glory beautiful 

Twine round our dear Lord's knee. 

Maria White Lowell. 



ARE THE CHILDREN AT HOME? 

Each day, Avhen the glow of sunset 

Fades in the western sky, 
And the wee ones, tired of playing. 

Go tripping lightly by, 



I steal away from my husband, 

Asleep in his easy-chair. 
And watch from the open doorway 

Their faces fresh and fair. 

Alone in the dear old homestead 

That once was full of life. 
Ringing with girlish laughter, 

Echoing boyish strife. 
We two are waiting together ; 

And oft, as the shadows come. 
With tremulous voice he calls me, 

" It is night ! are the children home ?' 

" Yes, love ! " I answer him gently, 

" They 're all home long ago ; " — 
And I sing, in my quivering treble, 

A song so soft and low. 
Till the old man drops to slumber, 

With his head upon his hand, 
And I tell to myself the number 

At home in the better land. 

At home, where never a sorrow 

Shall dim their eyes with teai-s ! 
Where the smile of God is on them 

Through all the summer years ! 
I know, — yet ni}' arms are empty, 

That fondly folded seven. 
And the mother heart within mo 

Is almost starved for heaven. 

Sometimes, in the dusk of evening, 

I only shut my eyes. 
And the children are all about me, 

A vision from the skies : 
The babes whose dimpled fingers 

Lost the way to my breast. 
And the beautiful ones, the angels, 

Passed to the world of the blest. 

With never a cloud upon them, 

1 see their radiant brows ; 
Jly boys that I gave to freedom, — 

The red sword sealed their vows ! 
In a tangled Southern forest. 

Twin brothers bold and brave, 
They fell ; and the flag they died for, 

Thank God ! floats over their grave. 

A breath, and the vision is lifted 

Away on wings of light. 
And again we two are together. 

All alone in the night. 
They tell me his mind is failing, 

But I smile at idle fears ; 
He is only back with the children, 

In the dear and peaceful years. 



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And still, as the summer sunset 

Fades away in the west, 
And the wee ones, tired of playing, 

Go trooping home to rest, 
My husband calls from his corner, 

" Say, love, have the cliildren come ?" 
And I answer, with eyes uplifted, 

" Yes, dear ! they are all at home." 

MARGARET E. M. SANGSTER. 



BABY SLEEPS. 

" She is not dead, but sleepeth." — LUKE viii. 52. 

The baby wept ; 
The mother took it from the nurse's arms, 
And hushed its fears, and soothed its vain alarms, 

And baby slept. 

Again it weeps, 

And God doth take it from the mother's arms. 

From present griefs, and future unknown harms. 

And baby sleeps. 

Samuel Hinds. 



GO TO THY REST. 

Go to thy rest, fair child ! 
Go to thy dreamless bed, 
"While yet so gentle, undetiled, 
With blessings on thy head. 

Fresh roses in thy hand, 
Buds on thy pillow laid. 
Haste from this dark and fearful land, 
Where Howers so c|uickly fade. 

Ere sin has seared the breast, 
Or sorrow waked the teai-. 
Rise to thy throne of changeless rest. 
In yon celestial sphere ! 

Because thy smile was fair, 
Thy lip and eye so bright, 
Because thy loving cradle-care 
Was such a dear delight, 

Shall love, with weak embrace, 
Thy upward wing detain ? 
No ! gentle angel, seek thy place 
Amid the cherub train. 

LVDIA HUNTLEY SICOURNEY. 



THE WIDOW'S MITE. 

A WIDOW — she had only one ! 
.A puny and decrepit son ; 

But, day and night, 
Though fretful oft, and weak and small, 
A loving child, he was her all — 

The Widow's Mite. 



The Widow's Mite — ay, so sustained, 
She battled onward, nor complained, 

Though friends were fewer : 
And while she toiled for daily fare, 
A little crutch upon the stair 

Was music to her. 

I saw her then, — and now I see 

That, though resigned and cheerful, she 

Has sorrowed much : 
She has, He gave it tenderly. 
Much faith ; and carefully laid by, 

The little crutch. 

FREDERICK LOCKER. 



"THEY ARE DEAR FISH TO ME." 

The farmer's wife sat at the door, 

A pleasant sight to see ; 
And blithesome were the wee, wee bairns 

That played around her knee. 

When, bending 'neath her heavy creel, 

A poor fish-wife came b}', 
And, turning from the toilsome road, 

Unto the door drew nigh. 

She laid her burden on the green, 

And spread its scaly store ; 
With trembling hands and pleading words 

She told them o'er and o'er. 

But lightly laughed the young guidwife, 
" We 're no sae scarce o' cheer ; 

Tak' up your creel, and gang your ways, — 
I '11 buy nae fish sae dear." 

Bending beneath her load again, 

A weary sight to see ; 
Right sorely sighed the poor fish-wife, ' 

" They are dear fish to me ! 

" Our boat was oot ae fearfu' night. 
And when the storm blew o'er, 

My husband, and my three brave sons, 
Lay corpses on the shore. 

" I 've been a wife for thirty years, 

A childless widow thi'ce ; 
I maun buy them now to sell again, — 

They are dear fish to me ! " 

The farmer's wife turned to the door, — 

What was 't upon her cheek ? 
What was tliere rising in her breast, 

That then she scarce could speak ? 



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She thought upon her ain guidnian, 

Her lightsome laddies three ; 
The woman's words had pierced her heart, — 

"They are dear fish to me ! " 

"Come back," she cried, with quivering voice, 

And pity's gathering tear ; 
" Come in, come in, my poor woman, 

Ye 're kindly welcome here. 

" I kentna o' your aching heart, 

Your weary lot to dree ; 
" I '11 ne'er forget your sad, sad words : 

' They are dear fish to me ! ' " 

Ay, let the happy-hearted leai'n 

To pause ere they deny 
The meed of honest toil, and think 

How much their gold may buy, — 

How much of manhood's wasted strength, 

What woman's misery, — 
What breaking hearts might swell the cry : 

" They are dear fish to me ! " 

ANONYMOUS. 



CORONACH. 

FROM "'THE LADY OF THE LAKE," CANTO III. 

He is gone on the mountain, 

He is lost to the forest. 
Like a summer-dried fountain 

When our need was the sorest. 
The font, reappearing, 

From the rain-drops shall borrow, 
But to us comes no cheering, 

To Duncan no morrow ". 

The hand of the reaper 

Takes the ears that are hoaiy ; 
But the voice of the weeper 

Wails manhood in glory. 
The autumn winds rushing 

Waft the leaves that are searest, 
But our flower was in flushing 

When blighting was nearest. 

Fleet foot on the correi, 

Sage counsel in cumber, 
Red hand in the foray. 

How sound is thy slumber ! 
Like the dew on the mountain. 

Like the foam on the river. 
Like the bubble on the fountain, 

Thou art gone, and forever ! 

Sir Walter scott. 



MOTHER AND POET. 

TURIN, —AFTER NEWS FROM GAETA. 1861. 

This was Laura Savio of Turin, a poetess and patriot, whose 
sons were Icilled at Ancona and Gaeta. 

Dead ! one of them shot by the sea in the east. 
And one of them shot in the west by the sea. 
Dead ! both my boys ! When you sit at the 
feast. 
And are wanting a great song for Italy free, 
Let none look at me ! 

Yet 1 was a poetess only last year, 

And good at my art, for a woman, men said. 
But this woman, this, who is agonized here. 

The east sea and west sea rhyme ou in her head 
Forever instead. 

What art can a woman be good at ? O, vain ! 

What art is she good at, but hurting her breast 
With the milk teeth of babes, and a smile at the 
pain ? 
Ah, boys, how you hurt ! you were strong as 
you pressed. 
And I proud by that test. 

What art 's for a woman ! To hold on her knees 
Both darlings ! to feel all their arms round her 
throat 
Cling, struggle a little ! to sew by degrees 

And 'broider the long-clothes and neat little 
coat ! 
To dream and to dote. 

To teach them ... It stings there. I made them 
indeed 
Speak plain the word "country," I taught 
them, no doubt. 
That a country 's a thing men should die for at 
need. 
I prated of liberty, rights, and about 
The tyrant turned out. 

And when their eyes flashed ... my beautiful 
eyes ! . . . 
I exulted ! nay, let them go forth at the wheels 
Of the guns, and denied not. — But then the 
surprise. 
When one sits quite alone ! — Then one weeps, 
then one kneels ! 
— God ! how the house feels ! 

At first happy news came, in gay letters moiled 
With my kisses, of camp-life, and glory, and 
how 
They both loved me, and soon, coming home to 
be spoiled. 
In return would fan off" every fly from my brow 
With their green laurel-bough. 



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Then was triumph at Turin. " Ancona was free ! " 

And some one came out of the cheers in the 

street 

With a face pale as stone, to say something to me. 

— My Guido was dead ! — I fell down at his feet, 

While they cheered in the street. 

I bore it ; — friends soothed me : my grief looked 
sublime 
As the ransom of Italy. One boy remained 
To be leant on and walked with, recalling the 
time 
When the first grew immortal, while both of 
us strained 
To the height he had gained. 

And letters still came, — shorter, sadder, more 
strong, 
Writ noAv but in one hand. " I was not to 
faint. 
One loved me for two . . . would be with me ere- 
long : 
And ' Viva Italia ' he died for, our saint. 
Who forbids our complaint." 

j My Nanni would add "he was safe, and aware 
Of a presence that turned oft" the balls . . . v/as 
imprest 
It was Guido himself, who knew what I could 
bear. 
And how 't was impossible, quite dispossessed. 
To live on for the rest." 

On which without pause up the telegraph line 
Swept smoothly the next news from Gaeta : — 
" Shot. 
Tell his mother." Ah, ah, "his," "their" moth- 
er; not "mine." 
No voice says "my mother" again to me. 
What"! 
You think Guido forgot ? 

Are souls straight so happy that, dizzy with 
heaven, 
They drop earth's affections, conceive not of 
woe ? 
I think not. Themselves were too lately for- 
given 
Through that love and sorrow which reconciled 
so 
The above and below. 

Christ of the seven wounds, who look'dst 
through the dark 
To the face of tliy mother ! consider, I pray, 
How we common mothers stand desolate, mark, 
AVhose sons, not being Chi'ists, die with eyes 
turned away, 
And no last word to say ! 



Both boys dead ! but that 's out of nature. We all 
Have been patriots, yet each house must always 
keep one. 
'T were imbecile hewing out roads to a wall. 
And when Italy 's made, for what end is it 
done 
If we have not a son ? 

Ah, ah, ah ! when Gaeta 's taken, what then ? 
When the fair wicked queen sits no more at 
her sport 
Of the fire-balls of death crashing souls out oi 
men ? 
When your guns at Cavalli with final retort 
Have cut the game short, — 

When Venice and Rome keep their new jubilee, 
When your flag takes all heaven for its white, 
green, and red. 
When j'ou have your country from mountain to 
sea. 
When King Victor has Italy's crown on his 
head, 
(And I have my dead, ) 

What then ? Do not mock me. Ah, ring your 
bells low. 
And burn your lights faintly ! • — My country 
is there. 
Above the star pricked by the last peak of snow. 
My Italy 's there, — with my brave civic pair, 
To disfranchise despair. 

Forgive me. Some women bear children in 
strength, 
And bite back the cry of their pain in self- 
scorn. 
But the birth-pangs of nations will wring us at 
length 
Into such w'ail as this ! — and we sit on forlorn 
When the man-child is born. 

Dead ! one of them shot by the sea in the west. 
And one of them shot in the east by the sea ! 
Both ! both my boys ! — If in keeping the feast 
You want a great song for your Italy free, 
Let none look at me ! 

Elizabkth Barrett Brovvninc. 



£& 



EVELYN HOPE. 

Beautiful Evelyn Hope is dead ! 

Sit and watch by her side an hour. 
That is her book-shelf, this her bed ; 

She plucked that piece of geranium-flower, 
Beginning to die too, in the glass. 

Little lias yet been changed, I think ; 
Tlie shutters are shut, — no light may pass 

Save two long rays through the hinge's chink. 



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Sixteen years old when she died ! 

Perhaps she had scai'cely heard ray name, — 
It was not her time to love ; beside, 

Her life had many a hope and aim, 
Dnties enough and little cares ; 

And now was (]uiet, now astir, — 
Till God's hand beckoned unawares, 

And the sweet white brow is all of her. 

Is it too late, then, Evelyn Hope ? 

What ! your soul was pure and true ; 
The good stars met in your horoscope, 

Made you of spirit, fire, and dew ; 
And just because I was thrice as old, 

And our paths in the world diverged so wide. 
Each was naught to each, must I be told ? 

We were fellow-mortals, — naught beside " 

No, indeed ! for God above 

Is great to grant as mighty to make. 
And creates the love to reward the love ; 

I claim you still, for my own love's sake ! 
Delayed, it may be, for more lives yet, 

Through worlds I shall traverse, not a few ; 
Much is to learn and much to forget 

Ere the time be come for taking you. 

But the time will come — at last it will — 

When, Evelyn Hope, what meant, I shall say, 
In the lower earth, — in the years long still, — 

That body and soul so pure and gay ? 
Why your hair was amber 1 shall divine. 

And your mouth of your own geranium's 
red, ^ 
And what you would do with me, in fine. 

In the new life come in the old one's stead. 

I have lived, I shall say, so much since then, 

Given up myself so many times. 
Gained me the gains of various men, 

Ean sacked the ages, spoiled the climes ;'' 
Yet one thing — one — in my soul's full scope, 

Either I missed or itself missed me, — 
And I want and find you, Evelyn Hope ! 

What is the issue ? let us see ! 

I loved you, Evelyn, all the while ; 

My heart seemed full as it could hold, — 
There was place and to spare for the frank young 
smile, 
And the red young mouth, and the hair's 
young gold. 
So, hush ! I will give you this leaf to keep ; 
See, I shut it inside the sweet, cold hand. 
There, that is our secret ! go to sleep ; 

You will wake, and remember, and understand. 
Robert Browning. 



HESTER. 

When maidens such as Hester die. 
Their place ye may not well supply, 
Though ye among a thousand try. 
With vain endeavor. 

A month or more hath she been dead, 
Yet cannot I by force be led 
To think upon the wormy bed 
And her together. 

A springy motion in her gait, 
A rising step, did indicate 
Of pride and joy no common rate. 
That flushed her spirit ; 

I know not by what name beside 
I shall it call ; — if 't was not pride, 
It was a joy to that allied. 
She did inherit. 

Her parents held the Quaker rule. 
Which doth the human feeling cool ; 
But she was trained in nature's school. 
Nature had blessed her. 

A waking eye, a prying mind, 
A heart that stirs, is hard to bind ; 
A hawk's keen sight ye cannot blind, — 
Ye could not Hester. 

My sprightly neighbor, gone before 
To that unknown and silent shore ! 
Shall we not meet as heretofore 
Some summer morning. 

When from thy cheerful eyes a ray 

Hath struck a bliss upon the day, — 

A bliss tliat would not go away, — 

A sweet forewarning ? 

Charles Lamb. 



ANNABEL LEE. 

It was many and many a year ago. 

In a kingdom by the sea. 
That a maiden lived, whom you may know 

By the name of Annabel Lee ; 
And this maiden she lived with no other thought 

Than to love, and be loved by me. 

I was a child and she was a child. 

In this kingdom by the sea ; 
But we loved with a love that was more than 
love, 

I and my Annabel Lee, — 
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven 

Coveted her and me. 



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And this was the reason that long ago, 

In this kingdom by the sea, 
So that her high-born kinsmen came, 

And bore her away from me. 
To shut her up in a sepulchre. 

In this kingdom by the sea. 

The angels, not so happy in heaven, 

Went envying her and me. 
Yes ! that was the reason (as all men know) 

In this kingdom by the sea. 
That the wind came out of the cloud by night. 

Chilling and killing my Aimabel Lee. 

But our love it was stronger by far than the love 

Of those who were older than we. 

Of many far wiser than we ; 
And neither the angels in heaven above. 

Nor the demons down under the sea. 
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul 

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee. 

For the moon never beams without bringing me 
dreams 
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee, 
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright ej^es 

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee. 
And so, all the night-tide I lie down by the side 
Of my darling, my darling, my life, and my 
bride, 
In her sepulchre there by the sea. 
In her tomb by the sounding sea. 

Edgar Allan Poe. 



t 



HIGH-TIDE ON THE COAST OF LIN- 
COLNSHIRE. 

[TIME, 1571.] 

The old mayor climbed the belfry tower. 
The ringers rang by two, by three ; 

" Pull ! if ye never pulled before ; 

Good ringers, pull your best," quoth he. 

" Play uppe, play uppe, Boston bells ! 

Ply all your changes, all your swells ! 
Play uppe The Brides of Enclerhy ! " 

Men say it was a " stolen tyde," — 
The Lord that sent it, he knows all. 

But in myne ears doth still abide 
The message that the bells let fall ; 

And there was naught of strange, beside 

The flights of mews and peewits pied, 
By millions crouched on the old sea-wall. 



I sat and spun within the doore ; 

My thread brake off, I raised myne eyes : 
Tlie level sun, like ruddy ore. 

Lay sinking in the barren skies ; 



And dark against day's golden death 
She moved where Lindis wandereth, — 
My Sonne's faire wife, Elizabeth. 

"Cusha! CushaJ Cusha ! " calling, 
Ere the early dews were falling, ] 
Farre away I heard her song. 
" Cusha ! Cusha ! " all along ; 
Where the reedy Lindis floweth, 

Floweth, floweth. 
From the meads where melick groweth, 
Faintly came her milking-song, 

" Cusha ! Cusha ! Cusha ! " calling, 
" For the dews will soone be falling ; 
Leave your meadow grasses mellow, 

Mellow, mellow ! 
Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow ! 
Come uppe, Whitefoot ! come uppe, Lightfoot ! 
Quit the stalks of parsley hollow, 

Hollow, hollow ! 
Come uppe. Jetty ! rise and follow ; 
From the clovers lift your head ! 
Come uppe, Whitefoot ! come uppe, Lightfoot ! 
Come uppe, Jetty ! rise and follow, 
Jetty, to the milking-shed." 

If it be long — nj, long ago — 

When I beginne to think howe long, 

Againe I hear the Lindis flow. 

Swift as an arrowe, sharpe and strong ; 

And all the aire, it seemeth mee. 

Bin full of floating bells (sayth shee), 

That ring the tune of Enderby. 

Alle fresh the level pasture lay. 
And not a shadowe mote be seene. 

Save where, full fyve good miles away. 
The steeple towered from out the greene. 

And lo ! the great bell farre and wide 

Was heard in all the country side 

That Saturday at eventide. 

The swannerds, where their sedges are, 
Moved on in sunset's golden breath ; 

The shepherde lads I heard afarre. 
And my Sonne's wife, Elizabeth ; 

Till, floating o'er the gi-assy sea. 

Came doM^ne that kyndly message free. 

The Brides of Mavis Enderby. 

Then some looked uppe into the sky, 

And all along where Lindis flows 
To where the goodly vessels lie, 

And where the lordly steeple shows. 
They sayde, " And why should this thing be. 
What danger lowers by land or sea ? 
They ring the tune o{ Enderby. 



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" For evil news from Mablethorpe, 
Of pyrate galleys, warping down, — 

For shippes ashore beyond the scorpe, 

They have not spared to wake the towne ; 

But while the west bin red to see, 

And storms be none, and pyrates flee, 

Why ring The Brides of Enderby ? 

I looked without, and lo ! my Sonne 

Came riding downe with might and main ; 

He raised a shout as he drew on. 
Till all the welkin rang again : 

"Elizabeth ! Elizabeth!" " 

(A sweeter woman ne'er drew breath 

Than my Sonne's wife, Elizabeth. ) 

" The olde sea-wall (he cryed) is downe ! 

The rising tide comes on apace ; 
And boats adrift in yonder towne 

Go sailing irppe the market-place ! " 
He shook as one that looks on death : 
" God save you, mother ! " straight he sayth ; 
" Where is my wife, Elizabeth ? " 

"Good Sonne, where Lindis winds away 
With her two bairns I marked her long ; 

And ere yon bells beganne to play. 
Afar I heard her milking-song." 

He looked across the grassy sea, 

To right, to left, Ho, Enderbij ! 

They rang The Brides of Enderby. 

With that he cried and beat his breast ; 

For lo ! along the river's bed 
A mighty eygre reared his crest. 

And uppe the Lindis raging sped. 
It swept with thunderous noises loud, — 
Shaped like a curling snow-white cloud, 
Or like a demon in a shroud. 

And rearing Lindis, backward pressed. 

Shook all her trembling bankes amaine ; 
Then madly at the eygre's breast 

Flung uppe her weltering walls again. 
Then bankes came downe with ruin and rout, - 
Then beaten foam flew round about, — 
Then all the mighty floods were out. 

So farre, so ftist, the eygre drave, 
The heart had hardly time to beat 

Before a shallow seething wave 
Sobbed in the grasses at oure feet : 

The feet had hardly time to flee 

Before it brake against the knee, — 

And all the world was in the sea. 

Upon the roofe we sate that night ; 

The noise of bells went sweejnng by ; 
I marked the lofty beacon light 

Stream from the church-iower, red and high, — 



A lurid mark, and dread to see ; 
And awsome bells they were to mee. 
That in the dark rang Enderby. 

They rang the sailor lads to guide, 

From roofe to roofe who fearless rowed ; 

And I, — my sonne was at my side, 
And yet the ruddy beacon glowed ; 

And yet he moaned beneath his breath, 

' ' 0, come in life, or come in death ! 

lost ! my love, Elizabeth ! " 

And didst thou visit liim no more ? 

Thou didst, thou didst, my daughter deare ! 
The waters laid thee at his doore 

Ere yet the early dawn was clear : 
Thy pretty bairns in fast embrace. 
The lifted sun shone on thy face, 
Downe drifted to thy dwelling-place. 

That flow strewed wrecks about the grass, 
That ebbe swept out the flocks to sea, — 

A fatal ebbe and flow, alas ! 

To manye more than myne and mee ; 

But each will mourne his own (she sayth) 

And sweeter woman ne'er drew breath 

Than my Sonne's wife, Elizabeth. 

1 shall never hear her more 
By the reedy Lindis shore, 

" Cusha ! Cusha ! Cusha ! " calling, 
Ere the early dews be falling ; 
I shall never hear her song, 
" Cusha ! Cusha ! " all along, 
Where the sunny Lindis floweth, 

Goeth, floweth, 
From the meads where melick groweth, 
Where the water, winding down, 
Onward floweth to the town. 

I shall never see her more, 

Where the reeds and rushes quiver, 

Shiver, quiver. 
Stand beside the sobbing river, — - 
Sobbing, throbbing, in its falling. 
To the sandy, lonesome shore ; 
I shall never hear her calling, 
" Leave your meadow grasses mellow, 

Mellow, mellow ! 
Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow ! ' 
Come uppe, Whitefoot ! come uppe, Lightfoot ! 
Quit your pipes of parsley hollow. 

Hollow, hollow ! 
Come uppe, Lightfoot ! rise and follow ; 

Lightfoot ! AVhitefoot ! 

From your clovers lift the head ; 

Come uppe. Jetty ! follow, follow. 

Jetty, to the inilking-shed ! " 

Jean- In'Gelow. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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TO MARY IN HEAVEN. 

(Composed by Burns, in September, 1789, on the anniversary of 
tlie day on which lie heard of the death of his early love, Mary 
Campbell.] 

Thou lingering star, with lessening ray, 

That lov'st to greet the early morn, 
Again thou usher'st in the day 

My Mary from my soul was torn. 
Mary ! dear departed shade ! 

Where is thy place of blissful rest ? 
See'st thou thy lover lowly laid ? 

Hearst thou the groans that rend his breast ? 

That sacred hour can I forget, — 

Can I forget the hallowed grove, 
Where by the winding Ayr we met 

To live one day of parting love ? 
Eternity will not efface 

Those records dear of transports past ; 
Thy image at our last embrace ; 

Ah ! little thought we 't was our last ! 

Ayr, gurgling, kissed his pebbled shore, 

O'erhung with wild woods, thickening green ; 
The fragrant birch, and hawthorn hoar. 

Twined amorous round the raptured scene ; 
The flowers sprang wanton to be prest. 

The birds sang love on every spray, — 
Till soon, too soon, the glowing west 

Proclaimed the speed of winged day. 

Still o'er these scenes my memory wakes. 

And fondly broods with miser care ! 
Time but the impression stronger makes, 

As streams their channels deeper wear. 
My Mary ! dear departed shade ! 

Where is thy place of blissful rest ? 
See'st thou thy lover lowly laid ? 

Hearst thou the groans that rend his breast ? 
ROBERT Burns. 



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0, SNATCHED AWAY IN BEAUTY'S 
BLOOM ! 

0, .SNATCHED away in beauty's bloom. 
On thee shall press no ponderous tomb ; 
But on thy turf shall roses rear 
Their leaves, the earliest of the year. 
And the wild cypress wave in tender gloom : 

And oft by yon blue gushing stream 
Shall Sorrow lean her drooping head. 
And feed deep thought with many a dream, 
And lingering pause and lightly tread ; 
Fond wretch ! as if her step disturbed the dead 



Away ! we know that tears are vain. 
That death nor heeds nor hears disti-ess : 
Will this unteach us to complain ? 
Or make one mourner weep the less ? 
And thou, who tell'st me to forget. 
Thy looks are wan, thine eyes are wet. 

Lord Byron. 



THY BRAES WERE BONNY. 

Thy braes were bonny. Yarrow stream ! 

When first on them I met my lover ; 
Thy braes how dreary, Yarrow stream ! 

When now thy waves his body cover. 

Forever now, Yarrow Stream ! 

Thou art to me a stream of sorrow ; 
For never on thy banks shall I 

Behold my love, the flower of Yarrow. 

He promised me a milk-white steed. 

To bear me to his father's bowers ; 
He promised me a little page. 

To 'squire me to his father's towers ; 
He promised me a v^■edding-ring, — 

The wedding-day was fixed to-morrow ; 
Now he is wedded to his grave, 

Alas, his watery grave, in Yarrow ! 

Sweet were his words when last we met ; 

My passion I as freely told him ! 
Clasped in his arms, I little thought 

That I should nevermore behold him ! 
Scarce was he gone, I saw his ghost ; 

It vanished with a shriek of sorrow ; 
Thrice did the water- wraith ascend. 

And gave a doleful groan through Yarrow. 

His mother from the window looked 

With all the longing of a mother ; 
His little sister weeping walked 

The greenwood path to meet her brother. 
They sought him east, they sought him west, 

They sought him all the forest thorough ; 
They only saw the cloud of night. 

They only heard the roar of Yarrow ! 

No longer from thy window look. 

Thou hast no son, thou tender mother ! 

No longer walk, thou lovely maid ; 

. Alas, thou hast no moi'e a brother ! 

No longer seek him east or west, 

And search no more the forest thorough ; 

For, wandering in the night so dark. 
He fell a lifeless corse in Yarrow. 



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The tear shall never leave my cheek, 

No other youtli shall be my marrow ; 
I '11 seek thy body in the stream, 
And then with thee I '11 sleep in Yarrow. 

JOHN LOGAN. 



DOUGLAS, DOUGLAS, TENDER AND 
TRUE. 

CouLT) ye come back to me, Douglas, Douglas, 

In the old likeness that 1 knew, 
I would be so faithful, so loving, Douglas, 

Douglas, Douglas, tender and true. 

Never a scornful word should grieve ye, 
I 'd smile on ye sweet as the angels do ; — 

Sweet as your smile on me shone ever, 
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true. 

0, to call back the days that are not ! 

My eyes were blinded, your words were few : 
Do you know the truth now up in heaven, 

Douglas, Douglas, tender and true ? 

I never was worthy of you, Douglas ; 

Not half worthy the like of you : 
Now all men beside seem to me like shadows — 

I love you, Douglas, tender and true. 

Stretch out your hand to me, Douglas, Douglas, 
Drop forgiveness from heaven like dew ; 

As I lay my ?ieart on your dead heart, Douglas, 
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true. 

Dinah Maria Mulock Craik. 



I& 



FIRST SPRING FLOWERS. 

I AM watching for the early buds to wake 

Under the snow : 
From little beds the soft white covering take, 

And, nestling, lo ! 

They lie, with pink lips parted, all aglow ! 

darlings ! open wide your tender eyes ; 

See ! I am here — 
Have been here, Avaiting under winter skies 

Till you appear — 

You, just come up from where lie lies so near. 

Tell me, dear flowers, is he gently laid. 

Wrapped round from cold ; 
Has spring about him fair green garments made. 

Fold over fold ; 

Arc sweet things growing with him in the 
mould ? 



Has he found quiet resting-place at last, 

After the tight ? 
What message did he send me, as you passed 

Him in the night, 

Eagerly pushing upward toward the light ? 

I will not pluck you, lest Ids hand should be 

Close clasping you : 
These slender hbres which so cling to me 

Do grasp liim too — 

What gave these delicate veins their blood- 
re'd hue ? 

One kiss I press, dear little bud, half shut. 

On your sweet eyes ; 
For when the April rain falls at your foot, 
And April sun yearns downward to your root 

From soft spring skies, 

It, too, may reach him, where he sleeping lies. 
Mary Woolsey Howland. 



MINSTREL'S SONG. 

0, SING unto my roundelay ! 

0, drop the briny tear with me ! 
Dance no more at holiday ; 
Like a running river be. 
My love is dead, 
Gone to his decith-hed. 
All under the willoio-tree. 

Black his hair as the winter night. 
White liis neck as the summer snow, 

Ruddy his face as the morning light ; 
Cold he lies in the grave below. 
My love is dead, etc. 

Sweet his tongue as the throstle's note ; 

Quick in dance as thought can be ; 
Deft his tabor, cudgel stout ; 

0, he lies by the willow-tree ! 
My love is dead, etc. 

Hark ! the raven flaps his wing 

In the briered dell below ; 
Hark ! the death-owl loud doth sing 

To the nightmares as they go. 
My love is dead, etc. 

See ! the white moon shines on high ; 

Whiter is my true-love's shroud, 
AVhiter than the morning sky. 

Whiter than the evening cloud. 
My love is dead, etc. 

Here, ujjon my true-love's grave 
Shall the barren flowers be laid, 

ISTor one holy saint to save 
All the coldness of a maid. 
My love is dead, etc. 



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POEMS or THE AFFECTIONS. 



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With my hands I '11 bind the briers 

Round his holy corse to gre ; 
Ouphant fairy, light your fires ; 

Here my body still shall be. 
My love is dead, etc. 

Come, with acorn-cup and thorn, 
Drain my heart's blood away ; 

Life and all its good I scorn, 
Dance by night, or feast by day. 
ihj love is dead, etc. 

Water- witches, crowned with reytes, 

Bear me to your lethal tide. 
I die ! I come ! my true-love waits. 

Thus the damsel spake, and died. 

Thomas chatterton. 



SELECTIONS FROM "IN MEMORIAM. 

[ARTHUR HENRY HALLAM, OB. 1833.] 
GRIEF UNSPEAKABLE. 

I SOJIETIMES hold it half a sin 
To put in words the grief 1 feel : 
For words, like Nature, half reveal 

And half conceal the Soul within. 

But, for the unquiet heart and brain, 
A use in measured language lies ; 
The sad mechanic exercise, 

Like dull narcotics, numbing pain. 

In words, like weeds, I '11 wrap me o'er, 
Like coarsest clothes against the cold ; 
But that large grief which these enfold 

Is given in outline and no more. 

DEAD, IN A FOREIGN LAND. 

Fair ship, that from the Italian shore 
Sailest the placid ocean -plains 
With my lost Arthur's loved remains, 

Spread thy full wings, and waft him o'er. 

So draw him home to those that mourn 
In vain ; a favorable speed 
Ruffle thy mirrored mast, and lead 

Through prosperous floods his holy ui'U. 

All night no ruder air perplex 

Thy sliding keel, till Phosphor, bright 
As our pure love, through early light 

Shall glimmer on the dewy decks. 

Sphere all your lights around, above ; 

Sleep, gentle heavens, before the prow ; 

Sleep, gentle winds, as he sleeps now, 
My friend, the brother of my love ; 



My Arthur, whom I shall not see 
Till all my widowed race be run ; 
Dear as the mother to the son. 

More than my brothers are to me. 

THE PEACE OF SORROW. 

Calm is the morn without a sound. 
Calm as to suit a calmer grief. 
And only through the faded leaf 

The chestnut pattering to the ground : 

Calm and deep peace on this high wold 
And on these dews that drench the furze. 
And all the silvery gossamers 

That twinkle into green and gold : 

Calm and still light on yon great plain 
That sweeps with all its autumn bowers, 
And crowded farms and lessening towers,' 

To mingle with the bounding main : 

Calm and deep peace in this wide air, 
These leaves that redden to the fall ; 
And in my heart, if calm at all. 

If any calm, a calm despair : 

Calm on the seas, and silver sleep, 

And waves that sway themselves in rest. 
And dead calm in that noble breast 

Which heaves but with the heaving deep. 

TIME AND ETERNITY. 

If Sleep and Death be truly one, 
And every spirit's folded bloom 
Through all its intervital gloom 

In some long trance should slumber on ; 

L^nconscious of the sliding hour. 
Bare of the body, might it last. 
And silent traces of the past 

Be all the color of the flower : 

So then were nothing lost to man ; 

So that still garden of the souls 

In many a flgured leaf enrolls 
The total world since life began ; 

And love will last as jjure and whole 
As when he loved me here in Time, 
And at the spiritual prime 

Rewaken with the dawning soul. 

PERSONAL RESURRECTION. 

That each, who seems a separate whole. 
Should move his rounds, and fusing all 
The skirts of self again, should fall 

Remerging in the general Soul, 



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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



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Is faith as vague as all unswcet : 
Eternal form shall still divide 
The eternal soul from all b^'side ; 

And I shall know him when we meet : 

And we shall sit at endless feast, 
Enjoying each the other's good : 
What vaster dream can hit the mood 

Of Love on earth ? He seeks at least 

Upon the last and sharpest height, 
Before the spirits fade away, 
Some landing-place to clasp and say, 

" Farewell ! We lose ourselves in light. 



SPIRITUAL COMPANIONSHIP. 

How pure at heart and sound in head. 

With what divine affections bold, 

Should be the man wliose thought would hold 
An hour's communion with the dead. 

In vain shalt thou, or any, call 
The sjtirits from their golden dajr, 
Except, like them, thou too canst say^ 

My spirit is at peace with all. 

They haunt the silence of the breast. 

Imaginations calm and fair. 

The memory like a cloudless air. 
The conscience as a sea at rest : 

But when the heart is full of din. 
And doubt beside the portal waits, 
They can but listen at the gates, 

And hear the household jar within. 

Do we indeed desire the dead 

Should still be near us at our side ? 
Is there no baseness we would hide ? 

No inner vileness that we dread ? 

Shall he for whose applause I strove, 
I had such reverence for his blame, 
See with clear eye some hidden shame, 

And I be lessened in his love ? 

I wrong the grave with fears untrue : 
Shall love be blamed for want of faith ? 
There nmst be wisdom with great Death : 

The dead shall look me through and through. 

Be near us when we climb or fall : 
Ye watch, like God, the rolling houi-s 
With larger other eyes than ours, 

To make allowance for us all. 



[&^ 



DEATH IN life's PRIME. 

So many worlds, so much to do, 
So little done, such things to be. 
How know I what had need of thee ? 

I'or thou wert strong as thou wert true. 

The fame is (|uenched that I foresaw, 
The head hath missed an earthly wreath 
I curse not nature, no, nor death ; 

For nothing is that errs from law. 

We pass ; the path that each man trod 
Is dim, or will be dim, with weeds : 
What fame is left for human deeds 

In endless age ? It rests with God. 

hollow wTaith of dying fame. 

Fade wholly, while the soul exults. 
And self-enfolds the large results 

Of force that would have forged a name. 



THE POET S TRIBUTE. 

What hope is here for modern rhyme 
To him who turns a musing eye 
On songs, and deeds, and lives, that lie 

Foreshortened in the tract of time ? 

These mortal lullabies of pain 

May bind a book, may line a box. 
May serve to curl a maiden's locks : 

Or when a thousand moons shall wane 

A man upon a stall may find, 

And, passing, turn the page that tells 
A grief, then changed to something else, 

Sung by a long-forgotten mind. 

But what of that ? My darkened ways 
Shall ring with music all the same ; 
To breathe my loss is more than fame. 

To utter love more sweet than praise. 

Alfred Tennyson. 



THE PASSAGE. 

Many a year is in its grave 
Since I crossed this restless wave 
And the evening, fair as ever. 
Shines on ruin, rock, and river. 

Then in this same boat beside. 
Sat two comrades old and tried, — 
One with all a father's truth, 
One with all the fire of youth. 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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ft 



One on earth in silence wrought, 
And his grave in silence sought ; . 
But the younger, brighter form 
Passed in battle and in storm. 

So, whene'er I turn mine ej^e 

Back upon the days gone by, 

Saddening thoughts of friends come o'erme, 

Friends that closed their course before me. 

But what binds us, friend to friend, 
But that soul with soul can blend ? 
Soul-lihe were those hours of yore ; 
Let us walk in soul once more. 

Take, boatman, thrice thy fee, 

Take, I give it willingly ; 

For, invisible to thee, 

Spirits twain have crossed with me. 

From the German of LUDWIG UHLAND. 
Translation of Sarah Austen. 



HOME THEY BROUGHT HER WARRIOR 
DEAD. 

FROM "THE PRINCESS." 

Home they brought her warrior dead : 
She nor swooned, nor uttered cry ; 

All her maidens, watching, said, 
"She must weexj or she will die." 

Then they praised him, soft and low, 
Called him worthy to be loved, 

Truest friend and noblest foe ; 
Yet she neither spoke nor moved. 

Stole a maiden from her place. 

Lightly to the warrior stept. 
Took the face-cloth from the face ; 

Yet she neither moved nor wept. 

Rose a nurse of ninety years. 
Set his child upon her knee, — - 

Like summer tempest came her tears, 
"Sweet my child, I live for thee." 

ALFRED TENNYSON. 



LAMENT OF THE IRISH EMIGRANT. 

I 'm sittin' on the stile, Mary, 

Where we sat side hy side 
On a bright May mornin' long ago, 

AVhen first you were my bride ; 
The corn was springin' fresh and green, 

And the lark sang loud and high ; 
And the red was on your lij), Mary, 

And the love-light in your eye. 



The place is little changed, Mary ; 

The day is bright as then ; 
The lark's loud song is in my ear, 

And the corn is green again ; 
But I miss the soft clasp of your hand. 

And your breath, warm on my cheek ; 
And I still keep list'nin' for the words 

You nevermore will speak. 

'T is but a step down yonder lane. 

And the little church stands near, — 
The church v.'hei-e we were wed, Mary ; 

1 see the spire from here. 
But the graveyard lies between, Mary, 

And my step might break your rest, — 
For I 've laid you, darling, down to sleep, 

With your baby on your breast. 

I 'm very lonely now, Mary, 

For the poor make no new frieud.s ; 
But, 0, they love the better still 

The few our Father sends ! 
And you were all I had, Mary, — 

My blessin' and my pride ; 
There 's nothing left to care for now, 

Since my poor Mary died. 

Yours was the good, brave heart, Mary, 

That still kept hoping on, 
When the trust in God had left my soul. 

And my arm's young strength was gone ; 
There was comfort ever on your lip. 

And the kind look on your brow, — 
I bless you, Mary, for that same. 

Though you caniiot hear me now. 

I thank you for the patient smile 

When your heart was fit to break, — 
When the hunger-pain was gnawin' there, 

And you hid it for my sake ; 
I bless you ibr the pleasant word,. 

When your heart was sad and sore, — 
0, I 'm thankful you are gone, Mary, 

Where grief can't reach you more ! 

I 'm bid din' you a long farewell. 

My Mary — kind and true ! 
But I '11 not forget you, darling, 

In the land I 'm goin' to ; 
They say there 's bread and work for all, 

And the sun shines always there, — 
But I '11 not forget old Ireland, 

Were it fifty times as fair ! 

And often in those grand old woods 

I 'II sit, and shut my eyes. 
And my heart will travel back again 

To the place where Mary lies ; 



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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



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And 1 '11 think I see the little stile 

Wlieie we sat side by side, 
And the spriiigin'corn, and the bright May morn, 

When tirst you were my bride. 

Helen Selina Sheridan, Lady Dufferin. 



THE KING OF DENMARK'S RIDE. 

WoKD was brought to the Danish king 

(Hurry!) 
That the love of his heart lay suffering, 
And pined for the comfort his voice would bring; 

(0, ride as though you were Hying !) 
Better he loves each golden curl 
On the brow of that Scandinavian girl 
Than his rich crown jewels of ruby and pearl : 
And his rose of the isles is dying ! 

Thirt_y nobles saddled with speed ; 

(Hurry!) 
Each one mounting a gallant steed 
Which he kept for battle and days of need ; 

(0, ride as though j'ou were Hying !) 
Spurs were struck in the foaming flank ; 
AVorn-out chargei's staggered and sank ; 
Bridles were slackened, and girths were burst ; 
But ride as they would, the king rode first, 
Eor his rose of the isles lay dying ! 

His nobles are beaten, one by one ; 

(Hurry!) 
They have fainted, and faltered, and homeward 

gone ; 
His little fair page now follows alone. 

For strength and for courage trying ! 
The king looked back at that faithful ciiild ; 
Wan was the face that answering smiled ; 
They passed the drawbridge with clattering din. 
Then he dropped ; and only the king rode in 
Where his rose of the isles lay dying ! 

The king blew a blast on his bugle horn ; 

(Silence !) 
No answer came ; but faint and forlorn 
An echo returned on the cold gray morn, 

Like the breath of a spirit sighing. 
The castle portal stood grimly wide ; 
None welcomed the king from that weary ride ; 
For dead, in the light of the dawning day, 
The pale sweet form of the welcomer lay, 
Who had yearned for his voice while dying ! 

The panting steed, with a drooping crest, 

Stood weary. 
The king returned from her chamber of rest, 
The thick sobs choking in his breast : 



And, that dumb companion eying. 
The tears gushed forth which he strove to check 
He bowed his liead on his charger's neck : 
" O steed, that every nerve didst strain, 
Dear steed, our ride hath been in vain 
To the halls where my love lay dying I " 

Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton. 



THE BARON'S LAST BANQUET. 

O'ei; a low couch the setting sun 

Had thrown its latest ray, 
Where in his last strong agony 

A dying warrior lay, — 
The stern old Baron Rudiger, 

Whose frame had ne'er been bent 
By wasting pain, till time and toil 

Its iron strength had spent. 

" They come around- me here, and say 

My days of life are o'er. 
That I shall mount my noble steed 

And lead my band no more ; 
They come, and to my beard they dare 

To tell me now, that I, 
Their own liege lord and master born, — 

That I — ha ! ha ! — must die. 

" And what is Death ? I 've dared him oft 

Before the Paynim spear, — 
Think ye he 's entered at my gate, 

Has come to seek me here ? 
I 've met him, faced him, scorned him, 

When the fight w'as raging hot, — 
I '11 try his might — I '11 brave his power ; 

Defy, and fear him not. 

" Ho ! sound the tocsin from my tower, — 

And fire the culverin, — 
Bid each retainer arm with speed, — 

Call every vassal in ; 
Up with my banner on the wall, — 

The banquet-board prepare, — ■ 
Throw wide the portal of my hall, 

And bring my armor there ! " 

A hundred hands were busy then, — 

The banquet forth was spread, — ■ 
And rung the heavy oaken floor 

AVith many a martial tread, 
While from the rich, dark tracery 

Along the vaulted wall. 
Lights gleamed on harness, plume, and spear. 

O'er the proud old Gothic hall. 

Fast hurrying through the outer gate, 

The mailed i-etainers poured, 
On through the portal's frowning arch, 

And thronired around the board. 



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While at its head, within his dark, 

Carved oaken chair of state, 
Armed cap-a-pie, stern Eudiger, 

Witli girded falchion, sate. 

" Fill every beaker np, my men, 

Pour forth the cheering wine ; 
There 's life and strength in every drop, — 

Thanksgiving to the vine ! 
Are ye all there, my vassals true ? — ■ 

Mine eyes are waxing dim ; — ■ 
Fill round, my tried and fearless ones, 

Each goblet to the brim. 

" Ye 're there, but yet I see ye not. 

Draw forth each trusty sword, — ■ 
And let me hear your faithful steel 

Clash once around my board : 
I hear it faintly : — Louder yet ! — 

What clogs my heavy breath ? 
Up, all, — and shout for Rudiger, 

' Defiance unto Death ! ' " 

Bowl rang to bowl, — steel clanged to steel, 

And rose a deafening cry 
That made the torches Hare around, 

And shook the flags on high : — 
' ' Ho ! cravens, do ye fear him ? — 

Slaves, traitors ! have ye flown ? 
Flo ! cowards, have ye left me 

To meet him here alone ? 

"Biit /defy him : — let him come ! " 

Down rang the massy cup. 
While from its sheath the ready blade 

Came flashing half-way up ; 
And, with the black and heavy plumes 

Scarce trembling on his head, 

There, in his dark, carved, oaken chair, 

Old Rudiger sat, dead. 

Albert G. Greene. 



FAREWELL TO THEE, ARABY'S 
DAUGHTER. 

FROM " THE FIRE-WORSHIPPERS." 

Farewell, — farewell to thee, Araby's daughter ! 

(Thus warbled a Peri beneath the dark sea ;) 
No pearl ever lay under Oman's green water 

More pure in its shell than thj' spirit in thee. 

0, fan- as the sea-flower close to thee growing. 
How light was thy heart till love's witchery 
came. 
Like the wind of the south o'er a summer lute 
blowing. 
And hushed all its music and withered its frame ! 



But long, upon Araby's green sunny highlands, 
Shall maids and their lovers remember the 
doom 
Of her who lies sleeping among the Pearl Islands, 
With naught but the sea-star to light up her 
tomb. 

And still, when the merry date-season is bi:rning. 
And calls to the palm-groves the young and 
the old. 

The happiest there, from their pastime returning 
At sunset, will wee]j when thy story is told. 

The young village maid, when with flowers she 
dresses 

Her dark-flowing hair for some festival day, 
Will think of thy fate till, neglecting her tresses, 

She mournfully turns from the mirror away. 

Nor shall Iran, beloved of her hero, forget thee, — 

Though tyrants watch over her tears as they 

start, 

Close, close by the side of that hero she '11 set thee, 

Embalmed in the innermost shrine of her 

heart. 

Farewell ! — be it ours to embellish thy pillow 
With everything beauteous that grows in the 
deep ; 

Each flower of the rock and each gem of the billow 
Shall sweeten thy bed and illumine thy sleep. 

Around thee shall glisten the loveliest amber 
That ever the sorrowing sea-bird has wept ; 

With many a shell, in whose hollow-wreathed 
chamber, 
We, Peris of ocean, by moonlight have slept. 

We '11 dive where the gardens of coral lie dark- 
ling. 
And plant all the rosiest stems at thy head ; 
We '11 seek where the sands of the Caspian are 
sparkling, 
And gather their gold to strew over thy bed. 

Farewell ! — farewell ! — until pity's sweet foun- 
tain 
Is lost in the hearts of the fair and the brave. 
They '11 weep for the Chieftain who died on that 
mountain. 
They '11 weep for the Maiden who sleeps in the 

wave. 

Thomas Moore. 



o- 



GRIEF. 

FROM " HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK," ACT I. SC. 2. 

Queen. Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color 
off, 
And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark. 
Do not, forever, with thy veiled lids 



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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



295 



-Eh 



U 



Seek for thy noble father in the dust : 

Thou know'st 't is common, — all that live must 

die, 
Passing through nature to eternity. 

Hamlet. Ay, madam, it is common. 

Queen-. If it be. 

Why seems it so particular with thee ? 

Haji. Seems, madam ! nay, it is ; I know not 
seems. 
'T is not alone my inky cloak, good mother, 
Nor customary suits of solemn black, 
Nor windy suspiration of forced breath, 
No, nor the fruitful river in the eye, 
Nor the dejected havior of the visage, 
Together with all forms, modes, shows of grief. 
That can denote me trulj' : these, indeed, seem, 
For they are actions that a man might play : 
But I have that within, which passeth show ; 
These, but the ti'appings and the suits of woe. 

Shakespeare. 



TO DEATH. 

Methinks it were no pain to die 
On such an eve, when such a sky 

O'er-canopies the west ; 
To gaze my fill on yon calm deep. 
And, like an infant, fall asleep 

On Earth, my mother's breast. 

There 's peace and welcome in yon sea 
Of endless blue tranquillity : 

These clouds are living things : 
I trace their veins of liquid gold, 
I see them solemnly unfold 

Their soft and Heecy wings. 

These be the angels that convey 
Us weary children of a day — 

Life's tedious nothing o'er — - 
"Where neither passions come, nor woes, 
To vex the genius of repose 

On Death's majestic shore. 

No darkness there divides the sway 
With startling dawn and dazzling day ; 

But gloriously serene 
Are the interminable plains : 
One fixed, eternal sunset reigns 

O'er the wide silent scene. 

I cannot doff all human fear ; 
I know thy greeting is severe 

To this poor shell of clay : 
Yet come, Death ! thy freezing kiss 
Emancipates ! thy rest is bliss ! 

I would I were away ! 

From the German of GLUCK. 



NOW AND AFTERWARDS. 

" Two hands upon the breast, and labor is past." 

RUSSIAN PROVERB. 

"Two hands upon the breast, 

And labor 's done ; 
Two pale feet crossed in rest, — 

The race is won ; 
Two eyes with coin-weights shut, 

And all tears cease ; 
Two lips where grief is mute, 

Anger at peace : " 
So pray we oftentimes, mourning our lot ; 
God in his kindness answereth not. 

' ' Two hands to work addrest 

Aye for his praise ; 
Two feet that never rest 

Walking his ways ; 
Two eyes that look above 

Through all their tears ; 
Two lips still breathing love, 

Not wrath, nor fears : " 
So pray we afterwaixls, low on our knees ; 
Pardon those erring prayers ! Father, hear these ! 

DlNAII MARIA MULOCK CRAIK. 



REST. 



I LAY me down to sleep, 

With little care 
Whether my waking find 

Me hei-e, or there. 

A bowing, burdened head 

That only asks to rest, 
Unquestioning, upon 

A loving breast. 

My good right-hand forgets 

Its cunning now ; 
To march the weary march 

I know not how. 

I am not eager, bold. 

Nor strong, — all that is past ; 
I am ready not to do. 

At last, at last. 

My half-day's work is done, 

And this is all my part, — 
I give a patient God 

My patient heart ; 

And grasp his banner still, 
Though all the blue be dim ; 

These stripes as well as stars 
Lead after him. 

MARY WOOLSEV HOWLAND. 



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296 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



■a 



BEYOND THE SMILING AND THE 
WEEPING. 

Beyonp the smiling and the weeping 

I sliall be soon ; 
Beyond the waking and the sleeping, 
Beyond the sowing and the reaping, 
I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home ! 
Sweet liope ! 
Lord, tarry not, hut come. 

Beyond the blooming and the fading 

I shall be soon ; 
Beyond the shining and the shading, 
Beyond the hoping and the dreading, 

I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home ! etc. 

Beyond the rising and the setting 

I shall be soon ; 
Beyond the calming and the fretting, 
Beyond remembering and forgetting, 

I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home ! etc. 

Beyond the gathering and the strowing 

I shall be soon ; 
Beyond the ebbing ami the flowing, 
Beyond the coming and the going, 

I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home ! etc. 

Beyond the parting and the meeting 

I shall be soon ; 
Beyond the farewell and the greeting, 
Beyond this pulse's fever beating, 

I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home ! etc. 

Beyond the frost chain and the fever 

I shall be soon ; 
Bej'ond the rock waste and the river, 
Beyond the ever and the never, 
I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home ! 
S2vcet hope ! 
Lord, tarry not, but come. 

HORATIUS BONAR. 



u- 



THE LAND 0' THE LEAL. 

I 'm wearing awa', Jean, 

Like snaw when it 's thaw, Jean ; 

I 'm wearing awa' 

To the land o' the leal. 
There 's nae sorroAV there, Jean, 
There 's neither cauld nor care, Jean, 
The day is aye fair 

In the land o' the leal. 



Ye were aye leal and true, Jean ; 
Yonr task 's ended noo, Jean, 
And I '11 welcome yon 

To the land o' the leal. 
Our bonnie bairn 's there, Jean, 
She was baith guid and fair, Jean : 
0, we grudged her right sair 

To the land o' the leal ! 

Then dry that tearfn' e'e, Jean, 
My soul langs to be free, Jean, 
And angels wait on rne 

To the land o' the leal ! 
Now fare yc weel, iny ain Jean, 
This warld's care is vain, Jean ; 
We '11 meet and aye be fain 
In the land o' the leal. 

Carolina, Baroness Nairne. 



SOFTLY WOO AWAY HER BREATH. 

Softly woo away her breath. 

Gentle death ! 
Let her leave thee with no strife. 

Tender, mournful, murmuring life ! 
She hath seen her happy day, — 

She hath had her bud and blossom ; 
Now she pales and shrinks away. 

Earth, into thy gentle bosom ! 

She hath done her bidding here, 

Angels dear ! 
Bear her perfect soul above. 

Seraph of the skies, — sweet love ! 
Good she was, and fair in youth ; 

And her mind was seen to soar, 
And her heart was wed to ti'uth : 
Take her, then, forevermore, — 
Forever — cvei'more, — 
t Bkvan Waller Procter (Barry Cornwall). 



ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. 

' lam dying, Esjypt, dying." — SHAKESPEARE'S Antony and 
Cleopatra, Act iv. Sc. 13. 

I AM dying, Egypt, dying. 

Ebbs the crimson life-tide fast, 
And the dark Plutonian shadows 

Gather on the evening blast ; 
Let thine arms, Queen, enfold me, 

Hush thy sobs and bow thine ear ; 
Listen to the great heart-secrets. 

Thou, and thou alone, must hear. 



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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



297 



■a 



Though my scarred and veteran legions 

Bear their eagles high no more, 
And my wrecked and scattered galleys 

Strew dark Actium's fatal shore, 
Though no glittering guards surround me, 

Prompt to do their master's will, 
I must perish like a Roman, 

Die the great Triumvir still. 

Let not Caesar's servile minions 

Mock the lion thus laid low ; 
'T was no foeman's arm that felled him, 

'T was his own that struck the blow : 
His who, pillowed on thy bosom, 

Turned aside from glory's raj^, 
His who, drunk with thy caresses. 

Madly threw a world away. 

Should the base plebeian rabble 

Dare assail my name at Rome, 
"Where my noble spouse, Octavia, 

Weeps within her widowed home. 
Seek her ; say the gods bear witness — ■ 

Altars, augurs, circling wings — 
That her blood, with mine commingled. 

Yet shall mount the throne of kings. 

As for thee, star-eyed Egyptian ! 

Glorious sorceress of the Nile ! 
Light the path to Stygian horrors 

With the splendors of thy smile. 
Give the C<esar crowns and arches, 

Let his brow the laurel twine ; 
I can scorn the Senate's triumphs. 

Triumphing in love like thine. 

I ain dying, Egypt, dying ; 

Hark ! the insiilting foeman's cry. 
They are coming — quick, my falchion ! 

Let me front them ere I die. 
A.h ! no more amid the battle 

Shall my heart exulting swell ; 
Isis and Osiris guard thee ! 

Cleopatra — Rome — farewell ! 

William Haines Lytle. 



SOLILOQUY 01^ DEATH. 

FROM ''HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK," ACT III. SC. I. 

Hamlet. To be, or not to be, — that is the 
question : — • 
Whether 't is nobler in the mind to .suffer 
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, 
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, 
And, by opposing, end them ? — To die, to 
sleep ; — 



No more ; and, by a sleep, to say we end 
The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks 
That flesh is heir to, — 'tis a consummation 
Devoutly to be wished. To die, — to sleep ; — 
To sleep ! perchance to dream : — aj^, there 's the 

rub ; 
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, 
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil. 
Must give us pause : there 's the respect 
That makes calamity of so long life ; 
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time. 
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's con- 
tumely, 
The pains of despised love, the law's delay, 
The insolence of office, and the spurns 
That patient merit of the unworthy takes. 
When he himself might his quietus make 
With a bare bodkin ? who would fardels bear. 
To grunt and sweat under a weary life. 
But that the dread of something after death, — 
The undiscovered countrj^ from whose bourn 
No traveller returns, — puzzles the will, 
And makes us rather bear those ills we have, 
Than fly to others that we know not of ? 
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all ; 
And thus the native hue of resolution 
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought ; 
And enterprises of great pith and moment, 
With this regard, their currents turn awry. 
And lose the name of action. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



THE TWO MYSTERIES. 

f " In the middle of the room, in its white coffin, lay the dend 
child, the nephew of the poet. Near it, in a sjreat chair, sat Walt 
Whitman, surrounded by little ones, and holding a beautiful little 
girl on his lap. She looked wonderiniijly at the spectacle of death, 
and then inquiringly into the old man's face, ' You don't know 
what it is, do you, my dear ? ' said lie, and added, ' We don't, 
either.' "] 

We know not what it is, dear, this sleep so deep 

and still ; 
The folded hands, the awful calm, the cheek so 

pale and chill ; 
The lids that will not lift again, though we may 

call and call ; 
The strange white solitude of peace that settles 

over all. 



We know not what it means, deai', this desolate 

heart-pain ; 
This dread to take our daily way, and, walk in 

it again ; 
We know not to what other .sphere the loved 

who leave us go, 
Nor wliy we 're left to wonder still, nor why we 

do not know. 



W 



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298 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



-a 



But tliis we know : Our loved and dead, if they 

should eonie this day — 
Should come and ask us, " What is life ? " not 

one of us could say. 
Life is a mystery, as deep as ever death can be ; 
Yet, 0, how dear it is to us, this life we live 

and see ! 

Then might they say — these vanished ones — 

and blessed is the thought, 
" So death is sweet to ns, beloved ! though we 

may show you naught ; 
We may not to the quick reveal the mystery of 

death — 
Ye cannot tell us, if ye would, the mystery of 

breath." 

Tlie child who enters life comes not with knowl- 
edge or intent, 

So those who enter death must go as little chil- 
dren sent. 

Nothing is known. But I believe that God is 
overhead ; 

And as life is to the living, so death is to the 

dead. 

Mary Mapes Dodge. 



THE SECRET OF DEATH. 

" She is dead ! " they said to him ; " come away ; 
Kiss her and leave her, — thy love is clay ! " 

They smoothed her tresses of dark brown hair ; 
On her forehead of stone they laid it fair ; 

Over her eyes that gazed too much 
They drew the lids with a gentle touch ; 

With a tender touch they closed up well 
The sweet thin lips that had secrets to tell ; 

About her brows and beautiful face 
They tied her veil and her marriage-lace, 

And drew on her white feet her white silk shoes — 
Which were the whitest no eye could choose ! 

And over her bosom they crossed her hands. 
" Come away ! " they said; " God understands ! " 

And thei'e was silence, and nothing there 
But silence, and scents of eglantere, 

And jasmine, and roses, and rosemary ; 

And they said, "As a lady should lie, lies she." 

And they held their breath till they left the room, 
AVith a shudder, to glance at its stillness and 
ifloom. 



But he who loved her too well to dread 
The sweet, the stately, the beautiful dead. 

He lit his lamp and took the key 

And turned it. Alone again — he and she ! 

He and she ; but she would not speak. 
Though he kissed, in the old place, the quiet 
cheek. 

He and she ; yet she would not smile. 
Though he called her the name she loved era- 
while. 

He and she ; still she did not move 
To an}' one passionate whisper of love. 

Then he said : "Cold lips, and breasts without 

breath. 
Is there no voice, no language of death, 

" Dumb to the ear and still to the sense, 
But to heart and to soul distinct, intense ? 

" See now ; I will listen with soul, not ear ; 
What was the secret of dying, dear ? 

" Was it the infinite wonder of all 
That you ever could let life's flower fall ? 

" Or was it a greater marvel to feel 
The perfect calm o'er the agony steal ? 

" Was the mii'acle greater to find how deep 
Beyond all dreams sank downward that sleep ? 

" Did life roll back its records, dear, 

And show, as they say it does, past things clear ? 

And was it the innermost heart of the bliss 
To find out so, what a wisdom love is ? 

" perfect dead ! dead most dear, 
I hold the breath of my soul to hear ! 

" I listen as deep as to horrible hell. 

As high as to heaven and you do not tell. 

" There must be pleasure in dying, sweet, 
To make you so placid from head to feet ! 

" I would tell you, darling, if I were dead, 
And 't were your hot tears upon my broA\- shed, — 

"I would saj', though the angel of death had laid 
His sword on my lips to keep it unsaid. 

"You should not ask vainlj', with streaming eyes, 
Which of all death's was the chiefest surprise, 



m- 



"The very strangest and suddenest thing 
Of all the surprises that dyhig must bring." 



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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



299 



r^ 



Ah, foolish world ! 0, most kind dead ! 
Though he told me, who will believe it was said '•. 

Who will believe that he heard her say, 
AVith a sweet, soft voice, in the dear old way : 

" The utmost wonder is this, — I hear, 

And see you, and love you, and kiss you, dear ; 

"And am }^our angel, who was your bride, 
And know that, though dead, I have never died." 

Edwin .\r.\old. 



ONLY THE CLOTHES SHE AVORE. 

There is the hat 
AVitli the blue veil thrown 'round it, just as they 

found it, 
Spotted and soiled, stained and all spoiled — 

Do you recognize that ? 

The gloves, too, lie there. 
And in them still lingers the shape of her fingers. 
That some one has pressed, perhaps, and caressed, 

So slender and fair. 

There arc the shoes, 
AVith their long silken laces, still beai'ing traces, 
To the toe's dainty tip, of the mud of the slip, 

The slime and the ooze. 

There is the dress. 
Like the blue veil, all dabbled, discolored, and 

drabbled — 
This you should know without doubt, and, if so. 

All else you may guess. 

There is the shawl, 
AA''ith the striped border, hung next in order. 
Soiled hardly less than the white muslin dress. 

And — that is all. 

Ah, here is a ' ng 
AVe were forgetting, with a pearl setting ; 
There was only this one — name or date i — none ? 

A frail, pretty thing ; 

A keepsake, maybe, 
The gift of another, perhaps a brother, 
Or lover, who knows ? him her heart chose, 

Or was she heart-free ? 

Does the hat there, 
AA'itli the blue veil around it, the same as they 

found it, 
Summon up a fair face with just a trace 

Of gold in the hair ? 



Or does the shawl. 
Mutely appealing to some hidden feeling, 
A form, young and slight, to your mind's sight 

Clearly recall < 

A month now has passed. 
And her sad history remains yet a mystery. 
But these we keep still, and shall keep them until 

Hope dies at last. 

AVas she a prey 
Of some deep sorrow clouding the morrow, 
Hiding from view the sky's happy blue ? 

Or was there foul play ? 

Alas ! who may tell ? 
Some one or other, perhaps a fond mother, 
May recognize these when her child's clothes she 
sees ; 
lien — will it be well ? 

N. G. Shepherd. 



FOR ANNIE. 

Thank Heaven ! the crisis, — 

The danger is past, 
And the lingering illness 

Is over at last, — 
And the fever called " Living" 

Is conquered at last. 

Sadly, I know, 

I am shorn of my strength, 
And no muscle I move 

As I lie at full length, — 
But no matter ! — I feel 

I am better at length. 

And I rest so composedly 

Now, in my bed. 
That any beholder 

Might fancy me dead, — 
Might start at beholding me, 

Thinking me dead. 

The moaning and groaning. 
The sighing and sobbing. 

Are qiiieted now, 

AVith that horrible throbbing 

At heart, — ah, that horrible, 
Horrible throbbing ! 

The sickness, the nausea. 

The pitiless pain, 
Hav€ ceased, with the fever 

That maddened my brain, — 
AA''ith the fever called "Living" 

That burned in my brain. 



^ 



tm 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



-Si 



u- 



And 0, of all tortures 

That torture the worst 
Has abated, — the terrible 

Torture of thirst 
For the naphthaline river 

Of Passion accurst ! 
I have drunk of a water 

That quenches all thirst, 

Of a water that flows. 

With a lullaby sound, 
From a spring but a very few 

Feet under ground, — 
From a cavern not very far 

Down under ground. 

And ah ! let it never 

Be foolishly said 
That my room it is gloomy 

And narrow my bed ; 
For man never slept 

In a different bed, — 
And, to sleep, you must slumber 

In just such a bed. 

My tantalized spirit 

Here blandly reposes, 
Forgetting, or never 

Regretting, its roses, — 
Its old agitations 

Of myrtles and roses : 

For now, while so quietly 

Lying, it fancies 
A holier odor 

About it, of pansies, — ■ 
A rosemary odor. 

Commingled with pansies, 
With rue and the beautiful 

Puritan pansies. 

And so it lies happily, 

Bathing in many 
A dream of the truth 

And the beauty of Annie, — 
Drowiled in a bath 

Of the tresses of Annie. 

She tenderly kissed me, 

She fondly caressed. 
And then 1 fell gently 

To sleep on her breast, — 
Deeply to sleep 

From the heaven of her breast. 

When the light was extinguished, 

She covered me warm. 
And she prayed to the angels 

To keep me from harm, — 
To the queen of the angels 

To shield me from harm. 



And I lie so composedly 

Now in my bed, 
(Knowing her love,) 

That you fancy me dead ; — 
And I rest so contentedly 

Now in my bed, 
(With her love at my breast,) 

That you fancy me dead, — 
That you shudder to look at me, 

Thinking me dead : 

But my heart it is brighter 

Than all of the many 
Stars in the sky ; 

For it sparkles with Annie, — 
It glows with the light 

Of the love of my Annie, 
With the thought of the light 

Of the eyes of my Annie. 

EDGAR Allan Poe. 



THE FAIREST THING IN MORTAL 
EYES. 

Addressed to his deceased wife, who died in childbed at the age 
of twenty-two. 

To make my lady's obsequies 

My love a minster wrouglit. 
And, in the chantry, service there 

Was sung by doleful thought ; 
The tapers were of burning sighs, 

That light and odor gave : 
And sorrows, painted o'er with tears, 

Enlumined her grave ; 
And round about, in quaintest guise, 
Was carved : "Within this tomb there lies 
The fairest thing in mortal eyes." 

Above her lieth spread a tomb 

Of gold and sapphires blue : 
The gold doth show her blessedness. 

The sapphires mark her true ; 
For blessedness and truth in her 

Were livelily portrayed, 
When gracious God with both his hands 

Her goodly substance made. 
He framed her in such wondrous wise, 
She was, to speak without disguise, 
The fairest thing in mortal eyes. 

No more, no more ! my heart doth faint 

When I the life recall 
Of her who lived so free from taint, 

So virtuous deemed by all, — 

That in herself was so complete 

I think that she was ta'en 
By God to deck his paradise, 

And with his saints to reign ; 



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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH. 



301 



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Wliom \vliilu on earth each one did prize 
Tlie fairest tiling in mortal eyes. 

But naught our tears avail, or cries ; 

All soon or late in death shall sleep ; 

Nor living wight long time may keep 
The fairest thing in mortal eyes. 

From tlie French of CHARLES DUKE OF ORLEANS. 
Translation of I-lF.NRY FR,\NCIS C.\RV. 



^ 



SONNET. 

The funeral sermon was on the text, " The Master is come, am! 
calleth for thee ■' (John xi. 28). 

Rise, said the Master, come unto the feast ; — 
She heard the call, and rose with willing feet ; 
But thinking it not otherwise than meet 
For such a bidding to put on her best, 
She is gone from us for a few short hours 
Into her bridal closet, there to wait 
For the unfolding of the palace-gate, 
That gives her entrance to the blissful bowers. 
We liave not seen her yet, though we have been 
Full often to her chamber-door, and oft 
Have listened underneath the postern green, 
And laid fresh flowers, and whispered short and 

soft; 
But she hath made no answer, and the day 
From the clear west is fading fast away. 

Henry Alford. 



FEAR NO MORE THE HEAT 0' THE 

SUN. 
:proji "cyjibeline," act iv. sc. 2. 

Fear no more the heat o' the sun, 
Nor the furious winter's rages ; 

Thou thy worldly task hast done. 
Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages : 

Golden lads and girls all must. 

As chimney-sweepers, come to dust. 

Fear no more the frown o' the great, 
Thou art past the tyrant's stroke ; 

Care no more to clothe, and eat ; 
To thee the reed is as the oak : 

The sceptre, learning, physic, must 

All follow this and come to dust. 

Fear' no more the lightning flash 
Nor the all-dreaded thunder-stone ; 

Fear not slander, censure rash ; 
Thou hast finished joy and moan : 

All lovers young, all lovers nmst 

Consign to thee, and come to dust. 

Shakespeare. 



DEATH THE LEVELLER. 

These verses are said to have "chilled the heart" of Olive 
Cromwell. 

The glories of our blood and state 

Are shadows, not substantial things ; 
There is no armor against fate ; 
Death lays his icy hand on kings : 
Sceptre and crown 
]\Iust tumble down, 
And in the dust be equal made 
AVith the poor crooked scythe and spade. 

Some men with swords may reap the field, 
And plant fresh laurels where they kill ; 
But their strong nerves at last must yield ; 
They tame but one another still : 
Early or late, 
Thej' stoop to fate. 
And must give up their murmuring breath, 
When thej-, pale captives, creep to death. 

The garlands wither on j'our brow. 

Then boast no more your mighty deeds ; 
Upon death's purple altar now 

See where the victor-victim bleeds : 
Your heads must come 
To the cold tomb ; 
Only the actions of the just 
Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust. 

James Shirley. 



SIC VITA.* 

Like to the falling of a star. 
Or as the flights of eagles are. 
Or like the fresh spring's gaudy hue, 
Or silver drops of morning dew. 
Or like a wind that chafes the flood. 
Or bubbles which on water stood, — 
E'en such is man, whose borrowed light 
Is straight called in, and paiil to-night. 
The wind blows out, the bubble dies. 
The spi'ing entombed in autumn lies. 
The dew dries up, the star is shot, 
The flight is past, — and man forgot ! 

Hlnky Klnc. 



VIRTUE IMMORTAL. 

Sweet Day, so cool, so calm, so bright. 
The bridall of the earth and slvie ; 
The dew shall weep thj^ fall to-night ; 
For thou must die. 



* Fields and Whipple, in their admirable Faintly Library of 
Britzsti Poets, a.<\i\ tlie following note: "This poem, of which 
there are nine imitations, is claimed for Francis Beaumont by some 
authorities." 






[&t 



02 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



^a 



Sweet Rose, whose hue angrie and brave 
Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye, 
Thy root is ever in its grave. 

And thon must die. 

Sweet S]")ring, full of sweet dayes and roses^ 
A box where sweets compacted lie. 
Thy musick shows ye have your closes, 
And all must die. 

Onely a sweet and vertiious soul, 
Like seasoned timber, never gives ; 
But, though the whole world turn to coal, 
Then chiefly lives. 

George Herbert. 



I& 



0, WHY SHOULD THE SPIRIT OF 
MORTAL BE PROUD i. 

The following poem was a particular favorite with Abraham 
Lincoln. It was first shown to him when a j'oun.g man by a friend, 
and afterwards he cut it from a newspaper and learned it by heart. 
He said to a friend, " I would ffive a great deal to know who wrote 
it, but have never been able to ascertain." He did afterwards 
learn the name of the author. 

0, WHY should the spirit of mortal be proud ? 
Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast-flying cloud, 
A fla.sh of the lightning, a break of the wave. 
He passeth from life to his rest in the grave. 

The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade. 
Be scattered around, and together be laid ; 
As the young and the old, the low and the high. 
Shall crumble to dust and together shall lie. 

The infant a mother attended and loved, 
The mother that infant's afleetion who proved, 
The father that mother and infant Avho blest, — 
Each, all, are away to that dwelling of rest. 

The maid on whose brow, on whose cheek, in 

whose eye. 
Shone beauty and pleasure, — her triumphs are by ; 
And alike from the minds of the living erased 
Are the memories of mortals who loved her 

and praised. 

The head of the king, that the sceptre hath 

borne ; 
The brow of the priest, that the mitre hath 

worn ; 
The ej'e of the sage, and the heart of the brave, — 
Are hidden and lost in the depths of the grave. 

The peasant, whose lot was to sow and to reap ; 
The herdsman, who climbed with his goats up 

the steep ; 
Tlie beggar, who wandered in search of his 

bread, — 
Have faded away like tlie grass that we tread. 



So the multitude goe.s, like the flower or weed. 
That withers away to let others succeed ; 
So the multitude comes, even those we behold. 
To repeat every tale that has often been told. 

For we are the same our fathers have been ; 
We see the same sights our fathers have seen ; 
We drink the same stream, we see the same sun, 
And run the same course our fathers have ruii. 

The thoughts we are thinking our fathers did 

think ; 
From the death we are shrinking our fathers did 

shrink ; 
To the life we are clinging our fathers did cling. 
But it speeds from us all like the bird on the wing. 

They loved, — but the story we cannot unfold ; 
They scorned, — but the heart of the haughty is 

cohl ; 
They grieved, — but no wail from their slumbers 

will come ; 
They joyed, — but the tongue of their gladness 

is dumb. 

They died, — ah ! they died ; — we, things that 

are now, 
That walk on the turf that lies over their broAv, 
And make in their dwelling a transient abode, 
Meet the things that they met on their pilgrim- 
age road. 

Yea, hope and despondency, pleasure and pain, 
Are mingled together in sunshine and rain : 
And the smile and the tear, and the song and 

the dirge. 
Still follow each other like surge upon surge, 

'T is the wink of an eye ; 't is the draught of a 

breath 
From the blossom of health to the paleness of 

death. 
From the gilded saloon to tlie bier and the shroud ; 
0, why should the spirit of mortal bo proud ? 

WiLLi.'VM Knox. 



MAN'S MORTALITY. 

Like as the damask rose you see, 
Or like the blossom on the tree. 
Or like the dainty flower in May, 
Or like the morning of the day, 
Or like the sun, or like the shade, 
Or like the gourd which Jonas had, — 
E'en such is man ; whose thread is spun, 
Drawn out, and cut, and so is done. — 



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50 



The rose withers, the blossom blasteth, 
Tlie llower fades, the morning hasteth, 
The sun sets, the shadow flies. 
The gourd consumes, — and man he dies ! 

Like to the grass that 's newly sprung. 
Or like a tale that 's new begun, 
Or like the bird that's here to-day, 
Or like the pearled dew of May, 
Or like an hour, or like a span. 
Or like the singing of a. swan, — 
E'en such is man ; who lives by breath, 
Is here, now there, in life and death. — 
The grass withers, the tale is ended. 
The bird is flown, the dew 's ascended. 
The hour is short, the span is long, 
The swan's near death, — man's life is done ! 
Simon Wastell. 



IF THOU WILT EASE THINE HEART. 



If thou wilt ease thine heart 
Of love, and all its smart, — 
Then sleep, dear, sleep ! 
And not a sorrow 

Hang any tear on your eyelashes ; 

Lie still and deep, 
Sad soul, until the sea-wave washes 
The rim o' the sun to-morrow, 
In eastern sky. 

But wilt thou cure thine heart 
Of love, and all its smart, — 

Then die, dear, die ! 
'T is deeper, sweeter, 

Than on a rose bank to lie dreaming 

With folded eye ; 
And then alone, amid the beaming 
Of love's stars, thou 'It meet her 
In eastern sky. 

Thomas Lovell Beddoes. 



B- 



A PICTURE OF DEATH. 

FROM " THE GIAOUR." 

He who hath bent him o'er the dead 
Ere the first day of death is lied, 
The first dark day of nothingness, 
The last of danger and distress, 
(Before Decay's effacing fingers^ 
Have swept the lines where beauty lingers, ) 
And marked the mild angelic air. 
The rapture of repose, that 's there, 



The fixed yet tender traits that streak 
The languor of the placid cheek. 
And — but for that sad shrouded eye. 
That fires not, wins not, weeps not now, 
And but for that chill, changeless brow. 
Where cold Obstruction's apathy 
Appalls the gazing mourner's heart. 
As if to him it could impart 
The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon ; 
Yes, but for these and these alone. 
Some moments, ay, one treacherous hour, 
He still might doubt the tyrant's power ; 
So fair, so calm, so softly sealed, 
The first, last look by death revealed ! 
Such is the aspect of this shore ; 
'T is Greece, but living Greece no more ! 
So coldly sweet, so deadly fair. 
We start, for soul is wanting there. 
Hers is the loveliness in death. 
That parts not quite with parting breath ; 
But beauty with that fearful bloom. 
That hue which haunts it to the tomb, 
Expression's last receding ray, 
A gilded halo hovering round decay. 
The farewell beam of Feeling past away ; 
Spark of that flame, perchance of heavenly birth, 
Which gleams, but warms no more its cherished 
earth ! 



LIFE. 



" Animula, vagula, blandula." 

Life ! I know not what thou art. 
But know that thou and I must part ; 
And when, or how, or where we met 
I own to me 's a secret yet. 
But this I know, when thou art fled. 
Where'er they lay these limbs, this head, 
No clod so valueless shall be. 
As all that then remains of me. 
0, whither, whither dost thou fly, 
Where bend unseen thy trackless course. 

And in this strange divorce, 
Ah, tell where I must seek this compound I ? 

To the vast ocean of empyreal flame. 
From whence thy essence came. 
Dost thou thy flight pursue, when freed 
From matter's base encumbering weed ? 
Or dost thou, hid from sight. 
Wait, like some spell-bound knight. 
Through blank, oblivious years the appointed 

hour 
To break thy trance and reassume thy power ? 
Yet canst thou, without thought or feeling be ? 
0, say what art thou, when no more thou 'rt thee ? 



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POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



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life ! we 've been long together 
Thi'ongh pleasant and through cloudy weather ; 
'T is hard to part when friends are dear, — 
Perhaps 't will cost a sigh, a tear ; 
Then steal away, give little warning, 
Choose thine own time ; 
Say not Good Night, — but in some brighter 
clime 
Bid me Good Morning. 

ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD. 



B- 



THE HUSBAND AND WIFE'S GRAVE. 

Husband and wife ! no converse now ye hold, 
As once ye did in your young days of love, 
On its alarms, its anxious hours, delays, 
Its silent meditations and glad hopes, 
Its fears, impatience, quiet sympathies ; 
Nor do ye speak of joy assured, and bliss 
Full, certain, and possessed. Domestic cares 
Call you not now together. Earnest talk 
On what your children may be moves you not. 
Ye lie in silence, and an awful silence ; 
Not like to that in which ye rested once 
Most happy, — silence eloquent, when heart 
With heart lield speech, and your mysterious 

frames, 
Harmonious, sensitive, at every beat 
Touched the soft notes of love. 

A stillness deep. 
Insensible, unheeding, folds you round, 
And darkness, as a stone, has sealed you in ; 
Away from all the living, here ye rest, 
In all the nearness of the narrow tomb. 
Yet feel ye not each other's presence now ; — 
Dread fellowship ! — together, yet alone. 

Is this thy prison-house, thy grave, then, Love ? 
And doth death cancel the great bond that holds 
Commingling spirits ? Are thoughts that know 

no bounds, 
But, self-inspired, rise upward, searching out 
The Eternal Mind, the Father of all thought, — 
Are they become mere tenants of a tomb ? — 
Dwellers in darkness, who the illuminate realms 
Of uncreated light have visited, and lived ? — • 
Lived in the dreadful splendor of that throne 
Which One, with gentle hand the veil of flesh 
Lifting that hung 'twixt man and it, revealed 
In glory ? — throne before which even now 
Our souls, moved by prophetic power, bow down 
Rejoicing, yet at their own natures awed ? — 
Souls that thee know by a mysterious sense, 
Thou awful, unseen Presence, — are they 

quenched ? 
Or burn they on, hid from our mortal eyes 
By that bright day which ends not ; as the sun 



His robe of light flings round the glittering stars ? 

And do our loves all perish with our frames ? 
Do those that took their root and put forth buds, 
And then soft leaves unfolded in the warmth 
Of mutual hearts, grow up and live in beauty. 
Then fade and fall, like fair, unconscious flowers ? 
Are thoughts and passions that to the tongue 

give speech. 
And make it send forth winning harmonies, 
That to the cheek do give its living glow, 
And vision in the eye the soul intense 
With that for which there is no utterance, — 
Are these the body's accidents, no more ? 
To live in it, and when that dies go out 
Like the burnt taper's flame ? 

listen, man ! 
A voice within us speaks the startling word, 
" Man, thou shalt never die ! " Celestial voices 
Hymn it around our souls ; according harps, 
By angel fingers touched when the mild stars 
Of morning sang together, sound forth still 
The song of our great immortality ; 
Thick-clustering orbs, and this our fair domain, 
The tall, dark mountains and the deep-toned seas, 
Join in this solemn, universal song. 

listen, ye, our spirits ! drink it in 
From all the air ! 'T is in the gentle moonlight ; 
Is floating in day's setting glories ; Night, 
Wrapped in her sable robe, with silent step 
Comes to our bed and breathes it in our ears ; — 
Night and the dawn, bright day and thoughtful 

eve. 
All time, all bounds, the limitless expanse, 
As one vast mystic instrument, are touched 
By an unseen, living Hand, and conscious chords 
Quiver with joy in this great jubilee. 
The dying hear it ; and, as sounds of earth 
Grow dull and distant, wake their passing souls 
To mingle in this heavenly harmony. 

Why is it that I linger round this tomb ? 
What holds it ? Dust that cumbered those I 

' mourn. 
They shook it off", and laid aside earth's robes. 
And put on those of light. They 're gone to dwell 
In love, —their God's and angels' ! Mutual love. 
That bound them here, no longer needs a speech 
For full communion ; nor sensations strong, 
Within the breast, their prison, strive in vain 
To be set free, and meet their kind in joy. 
Changed to celestials, thoughts that rise in each 
By natures new impart themselves, though silent. 
Each quickening sense, each throb of holy love, 
Affections sanctified, and the full glow 
Of being, which expand and gladden one, 
By union all mysterious, thrill and live 
In both immortal frames ; — sensation all. 



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ra 



And tliought, pervading, mingling sense and 

thought ! 
Ye paired, yet one ! wrapt in a consciousness 
Twofold, yet single, — this is love, this life ! 
Why call we, then, the square-built monument. 
The upright column, and the low-laid slab 
Tokens of death, memorials of decay ? 
Stand in this solemn, still assembly, man. 
And learn thy proper nature ; for thou seest 
In these sliaped stones and lettered tables figures 
Of life. Then be they to thy soul as those 
Which he who talked on Sinai's mount with God 
Brought to the old Judeans, — types are these 
Of thine eternity. 

I thank thee. Father, 
That at this simple grave on which the dawn 
Is breaking, emblem of that day which hath 
No close, thou kindly unto my dark mind 
Hast sent a sacred light, and that away 
From this green liillock, whither I had come 
In sorrow, thou art leading me in joy. 

Richard Henry Dana. 



GREENWOOD CEMETERY. 

How cahn they sleep beneath the shade 

Who once were weary of the strife. 
And bent, like us, beneath the load 
Of human life ! 

The willow hangs with sheltering grace 

And benediction o'er their sod. 
And Nature, hushed, assures the soul 
They rest in God. 

weary hearts, what rest is here, 

From all that curses yonder town ! 
So deep the peace, I almost long 
To lay me down. 

For, oh, it will be blest to sleejD, 

Nor dream, nor move, that silent night, 
Till wakened in immortal strength 
And heavenly light ! 

Crajimond Kennedy. 



1& 



GOD'S-ACRE. 

I LIKE that ancient Saxon phrase which calls 
The burial-ground God's-Acre ! It is just ; 

It consecrates each grave within its walls, 

And breathes a benison o'er the sleeping dust. 

God's-Acre ! Yes, that blessed name imparts 
Comfort to those who in the grave have sown 

The seed that they had garnered in their hearts, 
Their bread of life, alas ! no more their own. 



Into its furrows shall we all be cast. 

In the sure faith that we shall rise again 

At the great harvest, when the archangel's blast 
Shall winnow, like a fan, the chalf and grain. 

Then shall the good stand in immortal bloom. 
In the fair gai'dens of tliat second birth ; 

And each briglit blossom nungle its perfume 
With that of flowers which never bloomed on 
earth. 

With thy rude ploughshare. Death, turn up the 
sod, 
And spread the furrow foi' the seed we sow ; 
This is the field and Acre of our God, 

This is the place where human hai'vests grow ! 
Henry avadsnyorth Lonctellow. 



ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY 
CHURCHYARD. 

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day ; 

The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea ; 
The ploughman homeward plods his weaiy way, 

And leaves the world to darkness and to me. 

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the 
sight. 

And all the air a solemn stillness holds. 
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight. 

And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds ; 

Save that, from yonder ivy-mantled tovrer, 
The moping owl does to the moon complain 

Of such as, wandering near her seci-et bower, 
Molest her ancient, solitary reign. 

[Hark ! how the holy calm that breathes around 
Bids every fierce tumultuous passion cease ; 

In still small accents wliispering from the ground 
The grateful earnest of eternal peace.]* 

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade. 
Where heaves the turf in manj^ a mouldering 
heap. 

Each in his narrow cell forever laid. 

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. 

The breezy call of incense-breathing morn. 
The swallow twittering from the straw-built 
shed, 

The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn, 
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed. 

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn, 
Or busy housewife ply her evening care 

No children run to lisp their sire's return. 
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share. 

• Removed by the author from the orig-inal poem. 



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Oft did the haiTest to their sickle yiekl, 

Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke ; 

How jocund did they drive their team afield ! 
How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy 
stroke ! 

Let not ambition mock their useful toil, 
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure ; 

Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile 
The short and simple annals of the poor. 

The boast of heraldry-, tlie pomp of power, 
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave, 

Await alike the inevitable hour ; 

The paths of glory lead but to the grave. 

Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault, 
If memory o'er their tomb no trophies raise. 

Where, through the long-drawn aisle and fretted 
vault. 
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise. 

Can storied urn, or animated bust. 

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath ? 
Can honor's voice provoke the silent dust, 

Or iiattery soothe the dull, cold ear of death ? 

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid 

Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire ; 

Hands that the rod of empire might have swayed, 
Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre ; 

But knowledge to their eyes her ample page, 
Piich witli the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll ; 

Chill penury repressed their noble rage. 
And froze the genial current of the soul. 

Full many a gem of purest ray serene 

The dai'k, unfathomed caves of ocean bear ; 

Full many a flower is born to blush unseen. 
And waste its sweetness on the desert air. 

Some village Hampden, that, with dauntless 
breast, 

The little tyrant of his fields withstood ; 
Some mute, inglorious Milton here may I'est ; 

Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood. 

The applause of listening senates to command, 
The threats of pain and ruin to despise, 

To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land. 

And read their history in a nation's eyes, 

Their lot forbade : nor circumscribed alone 
Their growing virtues, but their crimes con- 
fined ; 

Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne, 
And shut the gates of mercy on maidcind ; 



The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide, 
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame, 

Or heap the shrine of luxury and pride 
With incense kindled at the muse's flame. 

Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife. 
Their sober wishes never learned to stray ; 

Along the cool, sequestered vale of life 

They kept the noiseless tenor of their way. 

Yet even these bones from insult to protect. 
Some frail memorial still erected nigh, 

With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture 
decked, 
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh. 

Their name, their years, spelt by the unlettered 
muse. 

The place of fame and elegj'' supply ; 
And many a holy text around she strews, 

That teach the rustic moralist to die. 

For who, to dumb forgetfulness a Jirey, 
This pleasing, anxious being e'er resigned. 

Left the warm precincts of the cheerful daj', 
Nor cast one longing, lingering look behind ? 

On some fond breast the parting soul relies. 
Some pious drops the closing eye requires ; 

E'en from the tomb the voice of Nature cries, 
E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires. 

For thee, who, mindful of the uirhonored dead, 
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate ; 

If chance, bj^ lonely contemplation led. 
Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate, 

Haply some hoary-headed swain may say : — • 
" Oft have we seen him, at the peep of dawn, 

Brushing with hasty steps the dews away, 
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn. 

" There at the foot of yonder nodding beech. 
That wreathes its old, fantastic roots so high, 

His listless length at noontide would he stretch. 
And pore upon the brook that babbles by. 

" Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn, 
Muttering his wayward fancies, he would rove ; 

Now drooping, woful-wan, like one forlorn, 
Or crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless 
love. 

" One morn I missed him on the customed hill, 
Along the heath, and near his favorite tree ; 

Another came, — nor yet beside the rill. 
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he ; 



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" Tlie next, with dirges due, in sad array, 
Slow through the church-way path we saw him 
borne ; — 

Approach and read (for thoii canst read) the laj^ 
Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn," 

THE EPITAPH. 

Here rests his head upon the hap of earth, 
A youth to fortune and to fame unknown ; 

Fair science frowned not on his humble birth, 
And melancholy marked him for her own. 

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere ; 

Heaven did a recompense as largely send ; 
He gave to misery (all he had) a tear, 

He gained from heaven ('twas all he wished) 
a friend. 

No further seek his merits to disclose. 

Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, — • 

(There they alike in trembling hope repose, '> 
The bosom of his Father and his God. 

Thomas Gray. 



INSCRIPTION ON MELROSE ABBEY. 

The earth goes on the earth glittering in gold, 
The earth goes to the earth sooner than it wold ; 
The earth builds on the earth castles and towers. 
The earth says to the earth — All this is ours. 



THANATOPSIS. 

To him who, in the love of Nature, holds 
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks 
A various language : for his gayer hours 
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile 
And eloquence of beauty ; and she glides 
Into his darker musings with a mild 
And healing sympathy, that steals away 
Tiieir sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts 
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight 
Over thy spirit, and sad images 
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall. 
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house, 
j\Iake thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart. 
Go forth under the open sky, and list 
To Nature's teachings, while from all around — 
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air — 
Comes a still voice : — Yet a few days, and thee 
The all-beholding sun shall see no more 
In all his course ; nor yet in the cold ground. 
Where thj'^ pale foi'm was laid, with many tears. 
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist 
Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall 
claim 



Thy growth, to be resolved to earth agaizi ; 
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up 
Thine individual being, shalt thou go 
To mix forever with the elements ; 
To be a brotlier to the insensible rock, 
And to the .sluggish clod, which the rude swain 
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak 
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy rnouhl. 

Yet not to thine eternal resting-place 
Shalt thou retire alone, — nor couldst thou wish 
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down 
With patriarchs of the infant world, — with 

kings. 
The powerful of the earth, — the wise, the good. 
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past, 
All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills, 
Rock-ribbed, and ancient as the sun ; the vales 
Stretching in pensive quietness between ; 
The venei'able woods ; rivers that move 
In majesty, and the complaining brooks, 
That make the meadows green ; and, poured 

round all. 
Old ocean's gray and melancholy waste, — 
Are but the solemn decorations all 
Of the great tomb of man ! The golden sun. 
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven, 
Are shining on the .sad abodes of death. 
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread 
The globe are but a handful to the tribes 
That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings 
Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness. 
Or lose th3'self in the continuous woods 
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound 
Save his own dashings, — j'^et the dead are there I 
And millions in those solitudes, since first 
The flight of years began, have laid theni down 
In their last sleep, — the dead reign there alone ! 
So shalt thou rest ; and what if thou withdraw 
In silence from the living, and no friend 
Take note of thy departure ? All that breathe 
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh 
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care 
Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase 
His favorite phantom ; yet all these shall leave 
Their mirth and their employments, and shall 

come 
And make their bed with thee. As the long train 
Of ages glide away, the sons of men — 
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes 
In the full strength of yeai-s, matron and maid, 
And the sweet babe, and the graj^-headed man — 
Shall, one by one, be gathered to thy side 
By those who in their turn .shall follow them. 

So live, that when thy summons comes to join 
The innumerable caravan that moves 
To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take 
His chamber in the silent halls of death, 



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Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night, 
Scourged to liis dungeon, but, sustained and 

soothed 
By an unfeltei'ip.g trust, approach thy grave 
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 



I& 



THE COMMON" LOT. 

Once, in the flight of ages past. 

There lived a Man ; — and who was he ? 
— Mortal ! howe'er thy lot be cast, 

That Man resembled thee. 

Unknown the region of his birth, 

The land in which he died unknown : 

His name has perished from the earth. 
This truth survives alone : — 

That joy and grief, and hope and fear, 
Alternate triumphed in his breast : 

His bliss and woe — a smile, a tear ! 
— Oblivion hides the rest. 

The bounding pulse, the languid limb. 
The changing spirit's rise and fall, — 

AVe know that these were felt by him, 
For these are felt by all. 

He suffered, — but his pangs are o'er ; 

Enjoyed, — but his delights are fled ; 
Had friends, — his friends are now no more ; 

And foe3, — his foes are dead. 

He loved, but whom lie loved, the grave 
Hath lost in its unconscious womb : 

0, she was fair, — but naught could save 
Her beauty from the tomb. 

He saw whatever thou hast seen ; 

Encountered all that troubles thee ; 
He v/as — whatever thou hast been ; 

He is — what thou shalt be. 

The rolling seasons, daj^ and night, 

Sun, moon, and stars, the earth and main, 

Erewhile his portion, life and light, 
To him exist in vain. 

The clouds and sunbeams, o'er his eye 
That once their shades and glorj'' threw. 

Have left in yonder silent sky 
No vestige where they flew. 

The annals of the human race. 

Their ruins, since the world began, 

Of Jiim afl'ord no other trace 

Than this, — There lived a max. 

JAMRS MONTCOMHRV. 



. FRAGMENTS. 

The Lot of Max. 
Death calls ye to the crowd of common men. 

Cupid and Death. T. SHIRLEY. 

A worm is in the bud of youth. 
And at the root of age. 

stanzas snbjoiitedto a BzU of Mortality. COWPER. 

The tall, the wise, the reverend head 
Must lie as low as ours. 

A Fimeral Thought, Book ii. Hymti 63. WATTS. 

Comes at the last, and with a little pin 
Bores through his castle wall, and — farewell 
king ! 

Richard II., Act iii. 5c. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

And though mine arm should conrpier twenty 

worlds. 
There 's a lean felloAv beats all conquerors. 



Old Fortnnatiis. 



T. DEKKER. 



Each matin bell, the Baron saith. 
Knolls us back to a world of death. 

Chrislabel, Partn. S. T. COLERIDGE. 

Do not forever with thy veiled lids 

Seek for thy noble father in the dust : 

Thou know'st, 't is common ; all that live must 

die. 
Passing through nature to eternity. 

Hatnlct, Act\. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

While man is growing, life is in decrease ; 
And cradles rock us nearer to the tomb. 
Our birth is nothing but our death begun. 

Ni.i:ht ThouglUs, Night v. DR. E. YOUXG. 

Our days begin with trouble here. 

Our life is but a span. 
And cruel death is always near. 

So frail a thing is nran. 

. v^/ Nctv England Primer. 

Leaves have their time to fall, 
And flowers to wither at the North-wind's breath, 

And stars to set ; — but all. 
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, Deatli ! " 

The Hour 0/ Death. MRS. HEMAXS. 

The race of yore 
Who danced our infancy upon their knee, 
And told our marvelling boyhood legends store. 
Of strange adventures happed by land or sen. 
How are they blotted from the things that be ! 

Lady of the La/ce. SCOTT. 



a 



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FRAGMENTS. 



309 



r^ 



Some lie beneath the churchyard stone, 
And some before the speaker. 

School ami Schoot/cllows. W. M. Praed. 

One, that was a woman, sir ; but, rest her soul, 
she 's dead. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

How fast has brother followed brother, 
From sunshine to the sunless land ! 



Exteinfofi liffusio 



itpon the Death of James Ho<:^^. 

AVORDSWORTH. 



The slender debt to nature's quickly paid, 
Discharged, perchance, with greater ease than 
made. 

Emblems, Book ii. 13. F. QUARLES. 

With mortal crisis doth portend 
My days to appropinque an end. 

Hudibras, Par! i. Cant iii. BUTLER. 

This fell sergeant, death, 
Is strict in his arrest. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. s. SHAKESPEARE. 

"VVe cannot hold mortality's strong hand. 

X''"£r John, Act iv. Sc. 2, SHAKESPEARE. 



Early Death. 

Happy they ! 
Thrice fortunate ! who of that fragile mould, 
The precious porcelain of human clay. 
Break with the first fall. 

Don jfuan. Cant. iv. BVRON. 

Hark ! to the hurried question of despair : 
"Wliere is my child?" an echo answers, - 
" Where ? " 

Bride 0/ Abydos, Cant. ii. BYRON. 

Oh ! when a Mother meets on high 

The Babe she lo.st in infancy, 
Hath she not then, for pains and fears, 

The day of woe, the watchful night, 

For all her sorrow, all her tears, 

An over-pajnnent of delight ? 



Curse 0/ Kehama, Cant. x. 



R. SOUTHEV. 



What, all my pretty chicken.s, and their dam. 
At one fell swoop ? 

Macbclli, .-let iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Tjoveliest of lovely things are the)', 
On earth that soonest pa.ss away. 
The rose that lives its little hour 
Is ]irized beyond the sculptured flower. 

A .Scene on the Banks of the Hudson. W. C. BRYANT. 

Thy leaf has peri.shed in the green. 

In Memoriani, Ixxiv. TENNYSON. 



An untimely grave. 

On the Duke of Buckingham. 



Death's Choice. 



Death loves a shining mark, i 

Nis-ht Thoushts. Night v. 

Death aims with fouler spite 
At fairer marks. 

Divine Poems. 



signal blow. 

Dr. e. Young. 



F. QUARLES. 



The good die first, 
And they whose hearts are dry as summer dust 
Burn to the socket. 

The Excursion, Book i. WORDSWORTH. 



The ripest fruit first falls. 

Richard II ., Act ii. Sc. i. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Death-Beds. 

The chamber where the good man meets his fate 

Is, privileged beyond the common walk 

Of virtuous life, quite in the verge of heaven. 

Night Thoughts, Night v.. DR. E. YOUNG; 

Of no distemper, of no blast he died, 
But fell like autumn fruit that mellowed long ; 
Even wondered at, because he dropt no sooner. 
Fate seemed to wind him up for fourscore j'ears ; 
Yet freshly ran he on ten winters more : 
Till, like a clock worn out with eating time. 
The wheels of weary life at last stood still. 

CEdipus, Act iv. Sc. i. Dryden. 

ISTothing in his life 
Became him like the leaving it ; he died, 
As one that had been studied in his death, 
To throw away the dearest thing he owed, 
As 't were a careless trifle. 

Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

To die is landing on some silent shore, 
Where billows never break, nor tempests roar ; 
Ere well we feel the friendly stroi:e, 't is o'er. 

The Dispensary, Cant iii. S. GARTH. 

And, like a passing thought, she fled 
In light away. 

The Vision. BURNS 

He was exhaled ; his great Creator drew, 
His spirit, as the sun the morning dew. 

On the Death o/a very Voung CenttematL. DR^■DE^'. 

Why .should v/e faint and fear to live alone, 
Since all alone, so Heaven has willed, wo die, 

Nor even the tenderest heart, and next our own, 
Knows half the reasons why we .smile and sigi;. 

The Christian Year: XXIV. Sunday afer Trinity. Keble. 



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310 



POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS. 



-a 



Cnt oft" even in the blossoms of my sin, 
Unhouseled, disappointed, unaneled ; 
No reckoning made, but sent to my account 
With all ray imperfections on my head. 

Haynlei, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

A death-bed 's a detector of the heart : 
Here tired dissimulation drops her mask, 
Tlirough life's grimace that mistress of the scene ; 
Here real and apparent are the same. 

Night ThoicgMs, Night ii. DR. E. YOUNG. 

The tongues of dying men 
Enforce attention, like deep harmony : 
When Avords are scarce, they 're seldom spent in 

vain ; 
For they breathe truth that breathe their woi'ds 

in pain. 

Richard II., Actn. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Death and Sleep. 

Death, so called, is a thing that makes men weep,- 
And yet a third of life is passed in sleep. 

Don Juan. BYRON. 

Let no man fear to die ; we love to sleep all, 
And death is but the sounder sleep. 

Humorous Lieutenant. F. BEAUJIONT. 

Sleep is a death ; make me try 
By sleeping what it is to die. 
And as gently lay my head 
On my grave as now my bed. 



Religio Medici, Part ii. Sec. 12. 



Sir T. Browne. 



Let guilt, or fear. 
Disturb man's rest, Cato knows neither of them 
Indifferent in his choice, to sleep or die. 

Cato. ADDISON. 



I& 



Fear of Death. 

I fear to die . . . 

For oh ! it goes against the mind of man 

To be turned out from its warm wonted home, 

Ere yet one rent admits the winter's chill. 

Rayner. JOANNA BAILLIE. 

The sense of death is most in apprehension ; 
And the poor beetle, that we tread upon. 
In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great 
As when a giant dies. 

Measure for Measure, Act m. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Cowards die many times before their deaths ; 
The valiant never taste of death but once. 

Julius Ccesar, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Of all the wonders that I yet have heard, 

It seems to me most strange that men should 

fear ; 
Seeing that death, a necessary end. 
Will come when it will come. 

Julius Ccesar, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Death — Conventional and N.a.ti7kal. 
Hark ! from the tombs a doleful sound. 

A Funeral Thought, Book ii. Hymn 63. WATTS. 

Whatever crazy sorrow saith, 

No life that breathes with human breath 

Has ever truly longed for death. 

Ttvo Voices. TENNYSON. 

I fled, and cried out Death ! 
Hell trembled at the hideous name, and sighed 
From all her caves, and back resounded Death. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON. 

Before mine e3^es in opposition sits 
Grim Death, my son and foe. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON. 

Imagiuation's fool, and error's wretch, 
Man makes a death which nature never made ; 
Then on the point of his own fancy falls ; 
And feels a thousand deaths, in fearing one. 

Night Thoughts. DR. E. YOUNG. 

So mayst thou live, till like ripe fruit thou drop 
Into thy mother's lap. 

Paradise Lost, Book xi. MiLTON. 



The Grave. 
Let 's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs. 

. . . nothing can we call our own but death, 
And that small model of the barren earth 
Which .serves as paste and cover to our bones. 
For heaven's .sake, let us sit upon the ground, 
And tell sad stories of the death of kings. 

Richard //., Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

The Grave, dread thing ! 
Men shiver when thou 'rt named ; Nature, ap- 
palled. 
Shakes oft' her wonted firmness. 

The Grave. R. BLAIR. 

Cruel as death, and hungry as the grave. 

The Seasons: Winter. THOMSON. 

Brave Percy, fare thee well ! 
Ill-weaned ambition, how much art thou shrunk : 
When that this body did contain a spirit, 
A kingdom for it was too small a bound ; 
But now, two paces of the vilest earth 
Is ro(^n enough. 

Henry VL, Part I. Act v. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



311 



■^-a 



How loved, liow honored once, avails thee not. 

To whom related, or by whom begot ; 

A heap of dust alone remains of thee ; 

'T is all thou art, and all the proud shall he ! 

To tlic Memory of an Unfortunate Lady. POPE. 

The bad man's death is horror ; but the just 
Keejis something of his glory in the dust. 

Castara. W. HAUINGTON. 

And from his ashes may be made 
The violet of his native land. 

//: jVetiioriam, xviii. TENNYSON. 



Lay her i' the earth ; 
And from her fair and unpolluted flesh 
May violets spring ! 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Sweets to the sweet : farewell. 

I hoped thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's 

wife : 
I thought thy bride-bed to have decked, sweet 

maid, 
And not t' have strewed thy grave. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE, 

May no rude hand deface it. 
And its forlorn Mc jacet ! 

Ellen Irwin. WORDSWORTH. 



The Peace of Death. 
Rest, rest, perturbed spirit ! 



llatnUt, Act i, Sc. 5. 



SHAKESPEAREi 



G 



Here lurks no treason, here no envy swells. 
Here grow no damned grudges ; here are no 

storms, 
No noise, but silence and eternal sleep. 

Titus Andronicus, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

He gave his honors to the world again, 

His blessed part to heaven, and slept in peace. 

Henry VI H., Act. \v.Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Better be wdth the dead , 
Whom we to gain our peace have sent to peace, 
Than on tire toi'ture of the mind to lie 
In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave ; 
After life's fitful fever, he sleeps well ; 
Treason has done his worst : nor steel, nor poison. 
Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing, 
Can touch him further ! 

Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Here may the storme-bett vessell safely ryde ; 
This is the port of rest from troublous toyle, 
The worlde's sweet inn from paine and wearisome 
turmoyle. 

Faery Queenc. SPENSER. 



Longing for Death. 

Friend to the wretch whom every friend forsakes, 
I woo thee. Death ! 

Death. B. POKTIIUS. 

Death ! to the happy thou art terrible. 
But how the wretched love to think of thee, 
thou true comforter, the friend of all 
Who have no friend beside. 

Joan of .-Ire. R. SOUTHE'i-. 

0, that this too, too solid flesh would melt, 
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew ; 
Or that the Everlasting had not fixed 
His canon 'gainst self-slaughter. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

I hear a voice you cannot hear, 
Which says I must not stay, 

T see a hand you cannot see, 
Which beckons nie away. 



Colin and Lucy. 



T. TICKELL. 



Good-by, proud world ! I 'm going home : 
Thou art not my friend, and I 'm not thine. 

Good-By. EMERSON. 

But an old age serene and bright, 
And lovely as a Lapland night, 
Shall lead thee to thy grave. 

To a Young Lady. WORDSWORTH. 



After Death. 

The wisest men are glad to die ; no fear 
Of death can touch a true philosopher. 
Death sets the soul at liberty to fly. 

Cotitinuation of Litcan. T. Mav. 

Alas ! for love, if thou art all. 
And naught beyond, Earth ! 

The Graves of a Household. 

'T is not the whole of life to live : 
Nor all of death to die. 

Tlie Issites of Life and Death. 



MRS. HemanS. 



J. MONTGOMERY. 



Since heaven's eternal year is thine. 

Elegy on Mrs. Killegrew, 

MounxiNG. 

'T is better to have loved and lost. 
Than never to have loved at all. 



Tennyson. 



Those that he loved so long and sees no more, 
Loved and still loves, — not dead, but gone be- 
fore, — 
He gathers round him. 

Human Life. ROGERS. 



i 



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312 



POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS. 



n 



I cannot but remember .sucli things -were, 
That were most precious to me. 

Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Give sorrow words ; the grief that does not speak 
Whispers the o'er-fraught heart, and bids it break. 

Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Praising what is lost 
Makes the reniembran(;e dear. 

Alt's H'eU that Ends IVM, Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

"\Ve bear it ealml}', though a ponderous woe, 
And still adore the hand that gives the blow. 

Ferscs to his Friend under Affliction. J. POIMFRE r. 

He first deceased ; she for a little tried 

To live without him, liked it not, and died. 

upon the Death o/Sir Albert Morton' i 

Speak me fair in death. 

Merchant 0/ Venice, Aet'iv. Sc. i. 



V/i/e. 

Sir H. wotton. 



SHAKESPEARE. 

Patch grief with proverbs. 

Muck Ado About Nothi7iz, Act v. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 



Poor Jack, farevi-ell ! 
I conld have better spared a better man. 

Henry IV., Part I. Act v. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

So may he rest : his faults lie gently on him ! 

Henry VUI., Activ. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE, 

The very cypress droops to death — 
Dark tree, still sad when others' grief is fled, 
The only constant mourner o'er the dead. 

The Giaour. BYRON. 

They truly mourn, that mourn without a wit- 
ness. 

Mirza. R. BARON, 

What though no friends in sable weeds appear, 
Grieve for an hour, perhaps, then mourn a year, 
And bear about the mockery of woe 
To midnight dances and the public shov; ! 

To the Memory 0/ an Unfortunate Lady. POPE. 

He mourns the dead who lives as they desire. 

Night Thoughts,.Night ij, DR. E. YOUNG. 



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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



RETROSPECTION. 



FROM "THE PRINCESS.' 



Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean. 
Tears from the depth of some divine despair 
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes. 
In looking on the happy autumn fields, 
And thinking of the days that are no more. 

Eresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, 
That brings our friends up from the under world ; 
Sad as the last which reddens over one 
That sinks with all we love below the verge, — 
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more. 

Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns 
The earliest pipe of half-awakened birds 
To dying ears, when unto dying eyes 
The casement slowly grows a glimmering square ; 
So sad, so strange, the days that are no more. 

Dear as remembered kisses after death. 
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned 
On lips that are for others ; deep as love. 
Deep as first love, and wild with all regret, — 
Death in Life, the days that are no more. 

ALFRED Tennyson. 



BREAK, BREAK, BREAK. 

Break, break, break, 

On thy cold gray stones, sea ! 
And I would that my tongue could utter 

The thoughts that arise in me. 



well for the fisherman's boy 

That he shouts with his sister at play ! 
well for the sailor lad 

That he sings in his boat on the bay ! 

And the stately ships go on, 
To the haven under the hill ; 

But for the touch of a vanished hand, 
And the sound of a voice that is still ! 



Break, break, break. 

At the foot of thy crags, sea ! 
But the tender grace of a day that is dead 

Will never come back to me. 

Alfred Tennyson. 



MOAN, MOAN, YE DYING GALES. 

Moan, moan, ye dying gales ! 
The saddest of your tales 

Is not so sad as life ; 
Nor have you e'er began 
A theme so wild as man. 

Or with such sorrow rife. 

Fall, fall, tliou withered leaf ! 
Autumn sears not like grief. 

Nor kills such lovely Mowers ; 
More terrible tlie storm. 
More mournful the deform, 

When dark misfortune lowers. 

Hush ! hush ! thou trembling lyre. 
Silence, ye vocal choir. 

And thou, mellifluous lute. 
For man soon breathes his last, 
And all his hope is past. 

And all his nmsic mute. 

Then, when the gale is sighing, 
And when the leaves are dying. 

And when the song is o'er, 
0, let us think of those 
Whose lives are lost in woes, 

Whose cup of grief runs o'er. 

henuy Neele. 



HENCE, ALL YE VAIN DELIGHTS. 

FROM "THE NICE VALOUR," ACT III. SC. 3. 

Hence, all ye vain delights, 
As short as are the nights 

Wherein you spend your folly ! 
There's naught in this life sweet. 
If man were wise to see 't 
But only melancholy, 
0, sweetest melancholy ! 



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316 



POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



-n 



Welcome, folded .arms, and lixed eyes, 
A sigh that piercing mortifies, 
A look that 's fastened to the ground, 
A tongue chained up without a sound ! 

Fountain-heads and pathless groves, 

Places which pale passion loves ! 

Moonlight walks, when all the fowls 

Are warmly housed save bats and owls ! 

A midnight bell, a parting groan ! 

These are the sounds we feed upon ; 

Then stretch our bones in a still gloomy valley : 

Nothing's so dainty sweet as lovely melancholy. 

JOHN FLETCHER. 



BLOW, BLOW, THOU WINTER WIND. 

FROM "AS YOU LIKE IT," ACT 11. SC. 7. 

Blow, blow, thou winter wind, 
Thou art not so unkind 

As man's ingratitude ; 
Thy tooth is not so keen, 
Because thou art not seen, 

Although thy breath be rude. 
Heigh-ho ! sing heigh-ho ! unto the green holly ; 
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere 
folly : 
Then, heigh-ho, the holly ! 
This life is most jolly ! 

Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky, 
Thou dost not bite so nigh 

As benefits forgot : 
Though thou the waters warp. 
Thy sting is not so sharp 

As friend remembered not. 
Heigh-ho ! sing heigh-ho ! unto the green holly : 
Most friendshi]) is feigning, most loving mere 
folly : 
Then, heigh-ho, the holly ! 
This life is most jolly ! 

SHAKESPEARE. 



U 



SAD IS OUR YOUTH, FOR IT IS EVER 
GOING. 

S(VD is our youth, for it is ever going, 

Crumbling away beneath our very feet ; 

Sad is our life, for onwsird it is flowing 

In current un perceived, because so fleet ; 

Sad are our hopes, for they were sweet in sow- 
ing. — 

But tares, self-sown, have overtopped the wheat ; 

Sad are our joys, for they were sweet in blow- 
ing, — 

And still, 0, still their dying breath is sweet ; 



And sweet is youth, although it hath bereft us 
Of that which made our childhood sweeter still ; 
And sweet is middle life, for it hath left us 
A nearer good to cure an older ill ; 
And sweet are all things, when we learn to prize 

them, 
Not for their sake, but His who grants them or 

denies them ! 

Aubrey De vere. 



ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE. 

Written in the spring of 1819, when suiTering from physical de- 
pression, the precursor of his death, which happened soon after. 

My heart aches, and a drows}' numbness pains 
My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk. 
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains 

One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk : 
'T is not through envy of thy happy lot. 
But being too happy in thy happiness, — 
That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees. 
In some melodious plot 
Of beechen green, and shadows numberless, 
Singest of Summer in full-throated ease. 



for a draught of vintage, that hath been 

Cooled a long age in the deep delved earth, 
Tasting of Flora and the country-green, 

Dance, and Proven5al song, and sunburnt 
mii'th ! 
for a beaker full of the warm South, 
Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene, 
With beaded bubbles winking at the brim, 
And purple-stained mouth, — 
That I might drink, and leave the world un- 
seen. 
And with thee fade away into the forest dim : 

Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget 

M''hat thou among the leaves hast never known. 
The weariness, the fever, and the fret 

Here, where men sit and hear each other groan ; 
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs. 
Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and 
dies ; 
Where but to think is to be full of sorrow 
And leaden-eyed despairs. 
Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes. 
Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow. 

Away ! away ! for I will fly to thee. 

Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards. 

But on the viewless wings of Poesy, 

Though the dull brain perplexes and retards : 



5] 



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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



:^r^ 



;;ii7 



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Alieady with tliee ! tender is the night, 

And Imply tlie Queen-Moon is on her throne, 
Clustered around by all her starry Fays ; 
But here there is no light, 
Save what from heaven is with the breezes 
blown 
Through verdurous glooms and winding 
mossy ways. 

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet, 

Nor what soft incense liangs upon the boughs. 
But in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet 

Wherewith the seasonable month endows 
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild ; 
White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine ; 
Fast-fading violets covered up in leaves ; 
And mid-May's eldest child. 
The coming musk-rose, full of dewj' wine. 
The murmurous haunt of flies on summer 



Darkling I listen ; and for many a time 

I have been half in love with easeful Death. 
Called him soft names in many a mused rhyme. 

To take into the air my quiet breath ; 
Now, more than ever, seems it rich to die. 
To cease upon the midnight, with no pain. 
While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad, 
In siTch an ecstasjr ! — 
Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in 
vain — - 
To thy high requiem become a sod. 

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird ! 

No hungry generations tread thee down ; 
The voice I hear this passing night was heard 

In ancient daj^s by emperor and clown : 
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path 
Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for 
home, 
She stood in tears amid the alien corn ; 
The same that oft-times hath 
Charmed magic casements opening on the foam 
Of peiilous seas, in faery lands forlorn. 

Forlorn ! the verj^ word is like a bell, 

To toll me back from thee to my sole self ! 
Adieu ! the Fancy cannot cheat so well 
As she is famed to do, deceiving elf. 
Adieu ! adieu ! thy plaintive anthem fades 
Past the near meadows, over the still stream. 
Up the hillside ; and now 't is buried deep 
In the next valley-glades : 
Was it a vision or a waking dream ? 

Fled is that music : — do I wake or sleep ? 
John Keats. 



THE SUN IS WARM, THE SKY IS CLEAR. 

STANZAS WRITTEN IN DEJECTION NEAR NAPLES. 

The sun is warm, the sky is clear, 
The waves are dancing fast and bright, 
Blue isles and snowy mountains wear 
The purple noon's transparent light : 
The breath of the moist air is light 
Around its unexpanded buds ; 
Like many a voice of one delight, — 
The winds', the birds', the ocean-floods', — 
The City's voice itself is soft like Solitude's. 



I see the Deep's untrampled floor 
With green and purple sea-weeds strown ; 
I see the waves upon the shore 
Like light dissolved in star-showers thrown : 
I sit upon the sands alone ; 
The lightning of the noontide ocean 
Is flashing round me, and a tone 
Arises from its measured motion, — 
How sweet, did any heart now share in my 
emotion ! 

Alas ! I have nor hope nor health, 
Nor peace within nor calm around, 
Nor that Content surpassing wealth 
The sage in meditation found, 
And walked with inward glory crowned, — 
Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure. 
Others I see whom these surround ; 
Smiling they live, and call life pleasure ; 
To me that cup has been dealt in another measure. 

Yet now despair itself is mild 
Even as the winds and waters are ; 
I could lie down like a tired child. 
And weep away the life of care 
Which I have borne, and yet must bear. 
Till death like sleep might steal on me. 
And I might feel in the warm air 
My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea 
Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony. 
PERCY Bysshe Shelley. 



ROSALIE. 

0, POUR upon my soul again 
That sad, unearthly strain 

That seems from other worlds to 'plain ! 

Thus falling, falling from afar. 

As if some melancholy star 

Had mingled with her light her sighs, 
And dropped them from the skies. 



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318 



POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



ft 



No, never came from aught below 

This melody of woe, 
That makes my heart to overflow, 
As from a thousand gushing springs 
Unknown before ; that with it brings 
This nameless light — if light it be — 

That veils the world I see. 

For all I see around me wears 

The hue of other spheres ; 
And something blent of smiles and tears 
Comes from the very air I breathe. 
0, nothing, sure, the stars beneath, 
Can moiild a sadness like to this, — 

So like angelic bliss ! 

So, at that dreamy hoiir of day, 
When the last lingering ray 

Stops on the highest cloud to play, — 

So thought the gentle Rosalie 

As on her maiden revery 

First fell the strain of him who stole 
In music to her soul. 

Washington Allston. 



t& 



A DOUBTING HEART. 

Where are the swallows fled ? 

Frozen and dead 
Perchance upon some bleak and stormy shore. 
doubting heart ! 
Far over purple seas 
They wait, in sunny ease, 
The balmy southern breeze 
To bring them to their northern homes once more. 

Why must the flowers die ? 

Prisoned they lie 
In the cold tomb, heedless of tears or rain. 
doubting heart ! 
They only sleep below 
The soft white ermine snow 
While winter winds shall blow, 
To breathe and smile upon you soon again. 

The sun has hid its ra5''S 

These many days ; 

Will drear}' hours neVer leave the earth ? 

doubting heart ! 

The stormy clouds on high 

Veil the same sunny sky 

That soon, for spring is nigh, 

Shall wake the summer into golden mirth. 

Fair hope is dead, and light 

Is quenched in night ; 



What sound can break the silence of despair ? 
dorrbting heart ! 
The sky is overcast, 
Yet stars shall rise at last, 
Brighter for darkness past, 
And angels' silver voices stir the air. 

Adelaide Anne Procter. 



OFT IN THE STILLY NIGHT. 

Oft in the stilly night. 

Ere slumber's chain has bound me, 
Fond Memory brings the light 
Of other days around me : 
The smiles, the tears, 
Of boyhood's years. 
The words of love then spoken ; 
The eyes that shone, 
Now dimmed and gone, 
The cheerful hearts now broken. 
Thus in the stilly night. 

Ere slumber's chain has bound me, 
Sad Memory brings the light 
Of other days around me. 

When I remember all 

The friends so linked together 
I 've seen around me fall, 

Like leaves in wintry weather, 
I feel like one 
W^ho treads alone 
Some banquet-liall deserted, 
Whose lights ai'C fled. 
Whose garlands dead. 
And all but he departed. 
Thus in the stilly night. 

Ere slumber's chain has bound me, 
Sad Memory brings the light 
Of other days around me. 

Thomas Moore. 



MY SHIP. 

Down to the wharves, as the sun goes down. 
And the daylight's tumult and dust and din 

Are dying away in the busy town, 
I go to see if my ship comes in, 

I gaze far over the quiet sea. 
Rosy with sunset, like mellow wine, 

Where ships, like lilies, lie tranquilly, 
Many and fair, — but I see not mine. 

I question the sailors every night 
Who over the bulwarks idly lean, 

Noting the sails as they come in sight, — 
" Have you seen my beautiful ship come in ? ' 



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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



''>19 — 



" Whence does she come ? " they ask of me ; 

"Who is her master, and what her name?" 
And they smile upon me pityingly 

When my answer is ever and ever the same. 

0, mine was a vessel of strength and truth, 
Her sails were white as a young lamb's fleece, 

She sailed long since from the port of Youth, — 
Her master was Love, and her name was Peace. 

And like all beloved and beauteous things, 
She faded in distance and doubt away, — 

With onlj' a tremble of snowy wings 
She floated, swan-like, adown the bay, 

Carrying with her a precious freight, — 
All I had gathered by years of pain ; 

A tempting prize to the pirate, Fate, — 
And still 1 watch for her back again : — 



Watch from the earliest morning light 
Till the pale stars grieve o'er the dying 

To catch the gleam of her canvas white 
Among the islands which gem the bay. 



day. 



But she comes not yet, — she will never come 
To gladden my eyes and my spirit more ; 

And my heart grows hopeless and faint and dumb, 
As I wait and wait on the lonesome shore, 

Knowing that tempest and time and storm 
Have wrecked and shattered my beauteous bark ; 

Rank sea-weeds cover her wasting form, 

And her sails are tattered and stained and dark. 

But the tide comes up, and the tide goes down. 
And the daylight follows the night's eclipse, — 

And still with the sailors, tanned and brown, 
I wait on the wharves and watch the ships. 

And still with a patience that is not hope, 
For vain and empty it long hath been, 

I sit on the rough shore's rocky slope, 
And watch to see if ni}' ship comes in. 

Elizabeth Akers Allen (Florence Percy). 



c& 



AFAR IN THE DESERT. 

Afar in the desert I love to ride, 
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side : 
When the sorrows of life the soul o'ercast. 
And, sick of the present, I cling to the past ; 
When the eye is sufl"used with regretful tears. 
From the fond recollections of former years ; 
And shadows of things that have long since fled 
Flit over the brain, like the ghosts of the dead, — 



Bright visions of glory that vanished too soon , 

Day-dreams, that departed ere manhood's noon ; 

Attachments bj^ fate or falsehood reft ; 

Companions of early days lost or left ; 

And my native land, whose magical name 

Thrills to the heart like electric flame ; 

The home of my childhood ; the haunts of my 

prime ; 
All the passions and scenes of that rapturous 

time 
When the feelings were young, and the world 

^■as new. 
Like the fresh bowers of Eden imfoldingto view ; 
All, all now forsaken, forgotten, foregone ! 
And I, a lone exile remembered of none, 
My high aims abandoned, my good acts undone. 
Aweary of all that is under the sun, — 
With that sadness of heart which no stranger 

may scan, 
I fly to the desert afar from man. 

Afar in the desert I love to lide. 
With the silent Biish-boy alone bj"- my side ! 
When the wild turmoil of this wearisome life, 
With its scenes of oppression, corruption, and 

strife, 
The proud man's frown, and the base man's fear, 
The scorn er's laugh, and the suff'erer's tear. 
And malice, and meanness, and falsehood, and 

folly. 
Dispose me to musing and dark melancholy ; 
When my bosom is full, and my thoughts are 

high. 
And my soul is sick with the bondman's sigh, — 
0, then there is freedom, and joy, and pride, 
Afar in the desert alone to ride ! 
There is rapture to vault on the champing steed. 
And to bound away with the eagle's speed, 
W^ith the death-fraught firelock in my hand, — 
The only law of the Desert Land ! 

Afar in the desert I love to ride. 

With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side, 

Away, away from the dwellings of men. 

By the wild deei''s haunt, by the buffalo's glen ; 

P)y valleys remote where the oribi plays. 

Where the gnu, the gazelle, and the hartebeest 

graze. 
And the kudu and eland unhunted recline 
By the skirts of gray forest o'erhung with w'ild 

vine ; 
Where the elephant browses at peace in his wood. 
And the river-horse gambols irnscared in the 

flood. 
And the mighty rhinoceros wallows at will 
In the fen where the wild ass is drinking his fill. 
Afar in the desert I love to ride. 
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side, 



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POEMS OF SORROW xVND ADVERSITY. 



*n 



O'er the brown karroo, where the bleating cry 
Of the springbok's fawn sounds plaintively ; 
And the timorous ([uagga's shrill whistling neigh 
Is heard by the fountain at twilight gray ; 
Where the zebra wantonly tosses his mane, 
AVith wild hoof scouring the desolate plain ; 
And the fleet-footed ostrich over the waste 
Speeds like a horseman who travels in haste, 
Hieing away to the home of her rest, 
AVhere she and her mate have scooped their 

nest, 
Far hid from the pitiless plunderer's view 
In the pathless depths of the parched karroo. 

Afar in the desert I love to ride. 

With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side. 

Away, away, in the wilderness vast 

Where the white man's foot hath never passed, 

And the quivered Coranna or Bechuan 

Hath rarely crossed with his roving clan, — 

A region of emptiness, howling and drear. 

Which man hath abandoned from famine and 

fear ; 
Which the snake and the lizard inhabit alone, 
With the twilight bat from the yawning stone ; 
Where grass, nor herb, nor shrub takes root. 
Save poisonous thorns that pierce the foot ; 
And the bitter-melon, for food and drink. 
Is the pilgrim's fare by the salt lake's brink ; 
A region of drought, where no river glides, 
Nor rippling brook with osiered sides ; 
Where sedgy pool, nor bubbling fount. 
Nor tree, nor cloud, nor misty mount. 
Appears, to refresh the aching eye ; 
But the barren earth and the bui-ning sky, 
And the blank horizon, round and round. 
Spread, — void of living sight or sound. 
And here, while the night-winds round me sigh. 
And the stars burn bright in the midnight sky. 
As I sit apart by the desert stone, 
Like Elijah at Horeb's cave, alone, 
" A still small voice " comes through the wild 
(Like a father consoling his fretful child), 
Which banishes bitterness, wrath, and fear, 
Saying, — Man is distant, but God is near ! 

Thomas pringle. 



t& 



THE WORLD. 

The World 's a bubble, and the Life of Man 

Less than a span : 
In his conception wretched, from the womb, 

So to the tomb ; . 
Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years 

With cares and fears. 
Who then to frail mortality shall trust. 
But limns on water, or but writes in dust. 



Yet whilst with sorrow here we live opprest, 

What life is best ? 
Courts are but only superficial schools 

To dandle fools : 
The rural parts are turned into a den 

Of savage men : 
And where 's a city from foul vice so free. 
But may be term'd the worst of all the three ? 

Domestic cares afflict the husband's bed. 

Or pains his head : 
Those that live single, take it for a curse, 

Or do things worse : 
Some would have children : those that have 
them, moan 

Or wish them gone : 
What is it, then, to have or have no wife. 
But single thraldom, or a double strife ? 

Our own affection still at home to please 

Is a disease : 
To cross the seas to any foreign soil, 

Peril and toil : 
Wars with their noise affright us ; when they 
cease. 

We are worse in peace ; — 
What then remains, but that we still should cry 
For being born, or, being born, to die ? 

FRANCIS, LORD Bacon. 



LOVE NOT. 

Love not, love not, ye hapless sons of clay ! 
Hope's gayest wreaths are made of earthly flow- 

ei's, — 
Things that are made to fade and fall aw^ay 
Ere they have blossomed for a few short hours. 
Love not ! 

Love not ! the thing ye love may change ; 
The rosy lip may cease to smile on you, 
The kindly-beaming eye grow cold and strange. 
The heart still warmly beat, yet not be true. 
Love not ! 

Love not ! the thing you love may die, — 
May perish from the gay and gladsome earth ; 
The silent stars, the blue and smiling sky, 
Beam o'er its grave, as once upon its birth. 
Love not ! 

Love not ! warning vainly said 
In present hours as in years gone by ! 
Love flings a halo round the dear ones' head. 
Faultless, immortal, till they change or die. 
Love not ! 
caroline elizabeth sheridan. 
(Hon. Mrs. Norton. 



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POEMS OP SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



521 



r^ 



SAMSON" ON HIS BLINDNESS. 

FROM " SAMSON ACONISTES." 

LOSS of sight, of thee I most complain ! 
Blind among enemies, 0, worse than chains, 
Dnngeon, or beggary, or decrepit age ! 
Light, tlie prime work of God, to me is extinct, 
And all her various objects of delight 
Annulled, which might in part my grief have 

eased. 
Inferior to the vilest now become 
Of man or worm ; the vilest here excel me : 
They creep, yet see ; I, dark in light, exposed 
To dailjr fraud, contempt, abuse, and wrong, 
Within doors or without, still as a fool, 
In pover of others, never in my own ; 
Scarce half I seem to live, dead more than half. 
dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon, 
Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse, 
Without all hope of day ! 



FROM "PARADISE LOST." 

eve's lament. 

BOOK XI. 

unexpected stroke, worse than of death ! 
Must I thus leave thee, Paradise ? thus leave 
Thee, native soil ! these happy walks and shades. 
Fit haunt of gods ; where I had hope to spend, 
Quiet, though sad, the respite of that day 
That must be mortal to us both ? flowers. 
That never will in other climate grow. 
My earl}' visitation, and my last 
At even, which I bred up with tender hand 
From the first opening bud, and gave ye names ! 
AVho now shall rear ye to the sun, or rank 
Your tribes, and water from the ambrosial fount ? 
Thee, lastly, nuptial bower ! by me adorned 
With what to sight or smell was sweet, from thee 
How shall I part, and whither wander down 
Into a lower world, to this obscure 
And wild ? how shall we breathe in other air 
Less pure, accustomed to immortal fruits ? 

EVE TO ADAM. 

BOOK XI. 

With sorrow and heart's distress 
Wearied, I fell asleep. But now lead on ; 
In me is no delay ; with thee to go, 
Is to stay here ; without thee here to stay, 
Is to go hence unwilling ; thou to me 
Art all things under heaven, all places thou, 
Who for my wilful crime art banished hence. 
This further consolation, yet secure, 
I carry hence ; though all by me is lost, 
Such favor I unworthj^ am vouchsafed, 
By me the promised Seed shall all restore. 



THE departure FROM PARADISE. 



In either hand the hastening angel caught 
Our lingering parents, and to the eastern gate 
Led them direct, and down the cliff as fast 
To the subjected plain ; then disappeared. 
They, looking back, all the eastern side beheld 
Of Paradise, so late their happy seat, 
Waved over by that flaming brand ; the gate 
With dreadful faces thronged and fiery arms. 
Some natural tears they diopt, but wiped them 

soon ; 
The world was all before them, where to choose 
Their place of rest, and Providence their guide. 
They, hand in hand, with wandering steps and 

slow, 
Through Eden took their solitary way. 



WOLSEY'S FALL. 

FROJI "HENRY VIII.," ACT III. SC. 2. 

Farewell, a long farewell, to all my greatness ! 
This is the state of man : to-day he puts forth 
The tender leaves of hope ; to-morrow blossoms, 
And bears his blushing honors thick upon him: 
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost ; 
And — when he thinks, good easy man, full surely 
His greatness is a ripening — nips his root. 
And then he falls, as I do. I have ventured. 
Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders. 
This manj' summers in a sea of glory ; 
But far beyond my depth : my high-blown pride 
At length broke under me ; and now has left me. 
Weary and old with service, to the mercy 
Of a rude stream, that must forever hide me. 
Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye : 
I feel my heart new opened. 0, how wretched 
Is that poor man that hangs on princes' favors ! 
There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to. 
That sweet aspect of princes, and their ruin. 
More pangs and fears than wars or women have : 
And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer, 
Never to hope again. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



WOLSEY'S ADVICE TO CROMWELL. 

FROM "HENRY VIII.," ACT III. SC. 2. 

Cromwell, I did not think to shed a tear 
In all my miseries; but thou hast forced me. 
Out of thy honest truth, to play the Avoman. 
Let 's dry our eyes : and thus far hear me, Crom- 
well ; 
And — when I am forgotten, as I shall be, 
And sleep in dull, cold marble, where no mention 



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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



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Of me more must be heard of — say, I taught thee, 
Say, Wolsey — that once trod the Avays of glory, 
And sounded all the depths and shoals of honor — 
Found thee a way, out of his wreck, to rise in ; 
A sure and safe one, though thy master missed it. 
Mark but my fall, and that that ruined me. 
Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition : 
By that sin fell the angels ; how can man, then. 
The image of his Maker, hope to win by 't ? 
Love thyself last : cherish those hearts that hate 

thee : 
Corruption wins not more than honesty. 
Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace. 
To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not : 
Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's. 
Thy God's, and truth's ; then if thou fall'st, 

Cromwell ! 
Thou fall'st a blessed martyr. 
Serve the king ; and — pr'ythee, lead me in : 
There take an inventory of all I have, 
To the last ]3enny ; 't is the king's : my robe, 
And my integrity to heaven, is all 
1 dare now call mine own. Cromwell, Crom- 
well ! 
Had I but served my God with half the zeal 
I served my king, he would not in mine age 
Have left me naked to mine enemies ! 

Shakespeare, 



THE LATE SPRING. 

She stood alone amidst the April fields, — 

Brown, sodden fields, all desolate and bare. 
"The s^jring is late," she said, "the faithless 
spring. 
That should have come to make the meadows 
fair. 

"Their sweet South left too soon, among the 

trees 
■ The birds, bewildered, flutter to and fro ; 
For them no green boughs wait, — their memories 
Of last year's April had deceived them so. " 

She watched the homeless birds, the slow, sad 
spring. 
The barren fields, and shivering, naked trees. 
"Thus God has dealt with me, his child," she 
said ; 
"I wait my spring-time, and am cold like 
these. 

" To them will come the fulness of their time ; 
Their spring, though late, will make the mead- 
ows fair ; 
Shall I, who wait like them, like them be blessed ? 
I am his own, — doth not my Father care ? " 
Louise Chandler Moulton. 



A LAMENT. 

WORLD ! Life ! Time ! 
On whose last steps I climb, 

Trembling at that where I had stood before ; 
When will return the glory of your prime ? 
No more, — nevermore ! 

Out of the day and night 
A joy has taken flight : 

Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar 
Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight 
No more, — nevermore ! 

Percy Bysshe Shelley. 



"WHAT CAN AN OLD MAN DO BUT 
DIE?" 

Spring it is cheery, 

Winter is dreary, 
Green leaves hang, but the brown must fly ; 

When he 's forsaken. 

Withered and shaken. 
What can an old man do but die ? 

Love will not clip him, 

Maids will not lip iim, 
Matid and Marian pass him by; 

Youth it is sunny, 

Age has no honey, — 
What can an old man do but die ? 

June it was joll}', 

for its folly I 
A dancing leg and a laughing eye ! 

Youth may be silly, 

Wisdom is chilly, — 
What can an old man do but die ? 

Friends they are scanty, 

Beggars are plenty. 
If he has followers, I know why ; 

Gold 's in his clutches 

( Buying him crutches !) — 
What can an old man do but die ? 

Thomas Hood. 



WHEN SHALL WE ALL MEET AGAIN? 



When shall we all meet again ? 
When shall we all meet again I 
Oft shall glowing hope expire, 
Oft shall wearied love retire, 
Oft shall death and sorrow reign, 
Ere we all shall meet asrain. 



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POEMS or SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



32:3 



ra 



Though ill distant lands we sigh, 
Parched beneath a hostile sky ; 
Thoiigh the deep between lis rolls, 
Friendship shall unite our souls. 
Still in Fancy's rich domain 
Oft shall we all meet again. 

When the dreams of life are fled, 
When its wasted lamps are dead ; 
When in cold oblivion's shade, 
Beauty, power, and fame are laid ; 
Where immortal spirits reign, 
There shall we all meet again. 

Anonymous. 






THE LAST LEAF. 

I SAAV him once before, 
As he passed by the door ; 

And again 
The pavement-stones resound 
As he totters o'er the ground 

With his cane. 

They say that in his prime. 
Ere the pruning-knife of time 

Cut him down. 
Not a better man was found 
By the crier on his round 

Through the town. 

But now he walks the streets, 
And he looks at all he meets 

So forlorn ; 
And he shakes his feeble head, 
That it seems as if he said, 

"They are gone." 

The mossy marbles rest 

On the lips that he has pressed 

In their bloom ; 
And the names he loved to hear 
Have been carved for many a year 

On the tomb. 

My grandmamma has said — ■ 
Poor old lady ! she is dead 

Long ago — 
That he had a Roinan nose. 
And his cheek was like a rose 

Li the snow. 

But now his nose is thin. 
And it rests upon his chin 

Like a staff ; 
And a crook is in his back. 
And a melancholy crack 

In his lausrh. 



I know it is a sin 
For me to sit and grin 

At him here, 
But the old three-cornered hat, 
And the breeches, — and all that, 

Are so queer ! 

And if I should live to be 
The last leaf upon the tree 

In the spring. 
Let them smile, as I do now, 
At the old foi'saken bough 

Where I cling. 

Oliver Wendell Holmes. 



THE APPROACH OF AGE. 

FROM " TALES OF THE HALL." 

Six years had passed, and fortj' ere the six. 
When Time began to play his usual tricks : 
The locks once comely in a virgin's sight. 
Locks of pure brown, displayed the encroaching 

white ; 
The blood, once fervid, now to cool began, 
And Time's strong pressure to subdue the man. 
I rode or walked as I was wont before. 
But now the bounding spirit was no more ; 
A moderate pace would now my body heat, 
A walk of moderate length distress my feet. 
I showed my stranger guest those hills sublime, 
But said, "The view is poor, we need not climb." 
At a friend's mansion I began to dread 
The cold neat parlor and the gay glazed bed ; 
At home I felt a more decided taste. 
And must have all things in my order placed. 
I ceased to hunt ; my horses ]ileased nie less, — 
My dinner more ; I learned to play at chess. 
I took my dog and gun, but saw the brute 
AVas disappointed that I did not shoot. 
My morning walks I now coirlcl bear to lose. 
And blessed the shower that gave me not 

choose. 
In fact, I felt a languor stealing on ; 
The active arm, the agile hand, were gone ; 
Small daily actions into habits grew. 
And new dislike to forms and fashions new. 
I loved my trees in order to dispose ; 
I numbered peaches, looked how stocks arose ; 
Told the same story oft, — in short, began to prose. 

GEORGE CKAKBE. 

— ♦ — 
OLD. 

By the wayside, on a mossy stone, 
Sat a hoary pilgrim, sadly musing ; 

Oft I marked hini sitting there alone, 
All the landscape, like a page, perusing-; 
Poor, unknown, 

By the wayside, on a mossy stone. 



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24 



POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSIIT. 



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Q- 



Buckled knee and shoe, and broad -brimmed hat ; 

Coat as ancient as the form 't was fokling ; 
Silver buttons, queue, and crimped cravat ; 

Oaken staff his feeble hand upholding ; 
There he sat ! 
Buckled knee and shoe, and broad-brimmed hat. 

Seemed it pitiful he should sit there, 
No one sympathizing, no one heeding, 

None to love him for his thin gray hair. 
And the furrows all so mutely pleading 
Age and care : 

Seemed it pitiful he should sit there. 

It was summer, and we went to school, 
Dapper country lads and little maidens ; 

Taught the motto of the " Dunce's Stool," — 

Its grave import still my fancy ladens, — 

" Here 's a fool !" 

It was summer, and we went to school. 

When the stranger seemed to mark our play. 
Some of us were joyous, some sad-hearted, 

I remember well, too well, that day ! 
Oftentimes the tears unbidden started, 
Would not stay 

When the stranger seemed to mark our play. 

One sweet spirit broke the silent spell, 
0, to me her name was always Heaven ! 

She besought him all his grief to tell, 
(I was then thirteen, and she eleven,) 
Isabel ! 

One sweet spirit broke the silent spell. 

"Angel," said he sadly, "I am old ; 

Earthly hope no longer hath a morrow ; 
Yet, why I sit here thou shalt be told." 

Then his eye betrayed a pearl of sorrow, 
Down it rolled ! 
"Angel," said he sadly, " I am old. 

" I have tottered here to look once more 
On the pleasant scene where I delighted 

In the careless, happy days of yore. 

Ere the garden of my heart was blighted 
To the core : 

I have tottered here to look once more. 

' ' All the ])icture now to me how dear ! 

E'en this gray old rock where I am seated, 
Is a jewel worth my journey here ; 

Ah that such a scene must be completed 
With a tear ! 
All the picture now to me how dear ! 

"Old stone school-house ! it is still the same ; 

There 's the very step I so oft mounted; 
There's the window creaking in its frame. 

And the notches that I cut and counted 



For the game. 
Old stone school-house, it is still the same. 

' ' In the cottage yonder I was born ; 

Long my happy home, that humble dwelling ; 
There the tields of clover, wheat, and corn ; 

There the spring with limpid nectar swelling ; 
Ah, forlorn ! 
In the cottage yonder I was born. 

" Those two gateway sycamores you see 
Then were planted just so far asunder 

That long well-pole from the path to free, 

And the wagon to pass safely under ; 

Ninety-three ! 

Those two gateway sycamores you see. 

" There 's the orchard where we used to climb 
When iny mates and I were boys together, 

Thinking nothing of the flight of time, 

Fearing naught but work and rainy Aveather ; 
Past its prime ! 

There 's the orchard where we used to climb. 

" There the rude, three-cornered chestnut-rails. 
Round the pasture where the flocks were graz- 
ing. 
Where, so sly, I used to watch for quails 
In the crops of buckwheat we were raising ; 
Traps and trails ! 
There the rude, three-cornered chestnut-rails. 

" There 's the mill that ground our yellow grain ; 

Pond and river still serenely flowing ; 
Cot there nestling in the shaded lane. 

Where the lily of my heart was blowing, — 
Mary Jane ! 
There 's the mill that ground our yellow grain. 

" There 's the gate on which I used to SAving, 
Brook, and bridge, and barn, and old red 
stable ; 
But alas ! no more the morn shall bring 
That dear group around my father's table ; 
Taken wing ! 
There 's the gate on which I used to swing. 

" I am fleeing, — all I loved have fled. 

Yon green meadow was our place for playing ; 
That old tree can tell of sweet things said 

When around it Jane and I were straying ; 
She is dead ! 
I am fleeing, — all I loved have fled. 

" Yon white spire, a pencil on the sky, 
Tracing silentlj'- life's changeful story, 

So familiar to my dim old eye, 

Points me to seven that are now in glory 
There on high ! 

Yon white spire, a pencil on the sky. 



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POEMS OF SOKKOW AND ADVERSITY. 






" Oft the aisle of that old church we trod, 
Guided thither by an angel mother ; 

Now she sleeps beneath its sacred sod ; 
Sire and sisters, and my little brother. 
Gone to God ! 

Oft the aisle of that old church we trod. 

" There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways ; 

Bless the holy lesson ! — but, ah, never 
Shall I hear again those songs of praise. 

Those sweet voices silent now forever ! 

Peaceful days ! 

There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways. 

" There my Mary blest me with her hand 
When our souls drank in the nuptial blessing, 

Ere she liastened to the spirit-land. 

Yonder turf her gentle bosom pressing ; 
Broken band ! 

There my Mary blest me with her hand. 

" I have come to see that grave once more. 
And the sacred place where we delighted, 

Where we worshipped, in the days of yore, 
Ere the garden of my heart was blighted 
To the core ! 

I have come to see that grave once more, 

" Angel," said he sadly, " I am old ; 

Earthly ho2)e no longer hath a morrow. 
Now, why 1 sit here thou hast been told." 

In his eye another pearl of sorrow, 
Down it rolled ! 
"Angel," said he sadly, "I am old." 

By the wayside, on a mossy stone, 

Sat the hoary pilgrim, sadly musing ; 
Still I marked him sitting there alone. 
All the landscape, like a page, perusing ; 
Poor, unknown ! 
By the wayside, on a mossy stone. 

Ralph Hoyt. 



^ 



HOME, WOUNDED. 

Wheel me into the sunshine. 

Wheel me into the shadow. 

There must be leaves on the woodbine, 

Is the king-cup crowned in the meadow ? 

Wheel me down to the meadow, 

Down to the little river. 

In sun or in shadow 

I shall not dazzle or shiver, 

I shall be happy anywhere, 

Every breath of the morning air 

Makes me throb and (^[uiver. 



Stay wherever you will. 

By the mount or under the hill. 

Or down by the little river : 

Stay as long as you please. 

Give me only a bud from the trees, 

Or a blade of grass in morning dew, 

Or a cloudy violet clearing to blue, 

I could look on it forever. 

Wheel, wheel through the sunshine, 
Wheel, wheel through the shadow ; 
There must be odors round the pine, 
There must be balm of breathing kine, 
Somewhere down in the meadow. 
Must I choose ? Then anchor me there 
Beyond the beckoning poplars, where 
The larch is snooding her Howery hair 
With wreaths of morning shadow. 

Among the thickest hazels of the brake 

Perchance some nightingale doth shake 

His feathers, and the air is full of song ; 

In those old days when I was young and strong, 

He used to sing on yonder garden tree. 

Beside the nursery. 

Ah, I remember how I loved to wake. 

And find him singing on the self-same bough 

(1 know it even now) 

Where, since the flit of bat. 

In ceaseless voice he sat, 

Trying the spring night over, like a tune, 

Beneath the vernal moon ; 

And while I listed long. 

Day rose, and still he sang. 

And all his stauchless song. 

As something falling unaware. 

Fell out of the tall trees he sang among. 

Fell ringing down the ringing morn, and rang, — 

Eang like a golden jewel down a golden stair. 

My soul lies out like a basking hound, — 

A hound that dreams and dozes ; 

Along my life my length I lay, 

I fill to-morrow and yesterday, 

I am warm with the suns that have long since 

set, 
I am warm with the summers that are not yet. 
And like one who dreams and dozes 
Softly afloat on a sunny sea, 
Two worlds are whispering over me. 
And there blows a wind of roses 
From the backward shore to the shore before, 
From the shore before to the backward shore, 
And like two clouds that meet and pour 
Each through each, till core in core 
A single self reposes, 
The nevermore with the evermore 
Above me mingles and closes ; 



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As my soul lies out like the basking hound, 

And wherever it lies seems happy ground, 

And when, awakened by some sweet sound, 

A dreamy eye uncloses, 

I see a blooming world around, 

And I lie amid primroses, — 

Years of sweet primroses. 

Springs of fresh primroses, 

Springs to be, and springs for me 

Of distant dim primroses. 

0, to lie a-dream, a-dream, 

To feel I may dream and to know you deem 

My work is done forever. 

And the palpitating fever. 

That gains and loses, loses and gains, 
And beats the hurrying blood on the brunt of a 
thousand pains, 

Cooled at once by that blood-let 

Upon the parapet ; 
And all the tedious tasked toil of the difficult 
long endeavor 

Solved and quit by no more fine 

Than these limbs of mine. 

Spanned and measured once for all 

By that right-hand I lost, 

Bought up at so light a cost 

As one bloody fall 

On the soldier's bed. 

And three days on the ruined wall 

Among the thirstless dead. 

0, to think my name is crost 

From duty's muster-roll ; 

That I may slumber though the clarion call. 

And live the joy of an embodied soul 

Free as a liberated ghost. 

0, to feel a life of deed 

Was emptied out to feed 

That fire of pain that burned so brief awhile, — 

That fire from which I come, as the dead come 

Forth from the irreparable tomb. 

Or as a martyr on his funeral pile 

Heaps up the burdens other men do bear 

Through years of segregated care, 

And takes the total load 

Upon his shoulders broad. 

And steps from earth to God. 

0, to think, through good or ill. 
Whatever I am you '11 love me still ; 
0, to think, though dull I be, 
You that are so grand and free, 
You that are so bright and gay. 
Will pause to hear me when I will, 
As though my head were gay ; 
A single self reposes, 



The nevermore with the evermore 

Above me mingles and closes ; 

As my soul lies out like the basking hound, 

And wherever it lies seems happy ground, 

And when, awakened by some sweet sound, 

A dreamy eye uncloses, 

I see a blooming world around. 

And I lie amid primroses, — • 

Years of sweet primroses. 

Springs of fresh primroses, 

Springs to be, and springs for me 

Of distant dim prinn-oses. 

0, to lie a-dream, a-dream. 

To feel I may dream and to know you deem 

My work is done forever, 

And the palpitating fever, 

Tliat gains and loses, loses and gains, 

And she, 

Perhaps, even she 

May look as she looked when I knew her 

In those old days of childish sooth. 

Ere my boyhood dared to woo her. 

I will not seek nor sue her. 

For I 'm neither fonder nor truer 

Than wlien she slighted my lovelorn youth. 

My giftless, graceless, guinealess truth. 

And I only lived to rue her. 

But I '11 never love another. 

And, in spite of her lovers and lands. 

She shall love me yet, my brother ! 

As a child that holds by his mother. 

While his mother speaks his praises. 

Holds with eager hands. 

And ruddy and silent stands 

In the ruddy and silent daisies, 

And hears her bless her boy, 

And lifts a wondering joy. 

So I '11 not seek nor sue her, 

But I '11 leave my glory to woo her, 

And I '11 stand like a child beside, 

And from behind the purple pride 

I'll lift my eyes unto her, 

And I shall not be denied. 

And you will love her, brother dear. 

And perhaps next year you '11 bring me here 

All through the balmy April tide. 

And she will trip like spring by my side. 

And be all the birds to my ear. 

And here all three we '11 sit in the sun. 

And see the Aprils one by one, 

Primrosed Aprils oh and on. 

Till the floating prospect closes 

In golden glimmers that rise and rise. 

And perhaps are gleams of Paradise, 

And perhaps too far for mortal eyes, 



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New springs of fresli primroses, 
Springs of earth's primroses, 
Springs to be, and springs for me 
Of distant dim primroses. 



SIDNEY DOBELL. 



FAREWELL, LIFE. 

WRITTEN DURING SICKNESS, APRIL, 1843. 

Farewell, life ! my senses swim. 
And the world is growing dim ; 
Thronging shadows cloud the light, 
Like the advent of the night, — 
Colder, colder, colder still, 
Upward steals a vapor chill ; 
Strong the earthy odor grows, — 
I smell the mould above the rose ! 

Welcome, life ! the spirit strives ! 
Strength returns and hope revives ; 
Cloudy fears and shapes forlorn 
Fly like shadows at the morn, — 
O'er the earth there comes a bloom ; 
Sunny light for sullen gloom. 
Warm perfume for vapor cold, — 
I smell the rose above the mould ! 

Thomas Hood. 



THE MAY QUEEN". 

You must" wake and call me early, call me early, 

mother dear ; 
To-morrow '11 be the happiest time of all the glad 

new-year, — 
Of all the glad new-year, mother, the maddest, 

merriest day ; 
For I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 

There's many a black, black eye, they say, but 

none so bright as mine ; 
There's Margaret and Mary, there's Kate and 

Caroline ; 
But none so fair as little Alice in all the land, 

they say : 
So I 'm to be Qxieen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 

I sleep so sound all night, mother, that I shall 

never wake, 
If you do not call me loud when the day begins 

to break ; 
But I'must gather knots of flowers and buds, 

and garlands gay ; 
For I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 



As I came up the valley, whom think ye should 

I see 
But Robin leaning on the bridge beneath the 

hazel-tree ? 
He thought of that sharp look, mother, I gave 

hiin yesterday, — 
But I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 

He thought I was a ghost, mother, for I was all 

in white ; 
And I ran by him without speaking, like z Hash 

of light. 
They call me cruel-hearted, but I care not what 

they say, 
For I 'in to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 

They say he 's dying all for love, — but that can 
never be ; 

They say his heart is breaking, mother, — what 
is that to me ? 

There 's many a bolder lad '11 woo me any sum- 
mer day ; 

And I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 
be Queen o' the May. 

Little Effie shall go with me to-morrow to the 

green, 
And you '11 be there, too, mother, to see me made 

the Queen ; 
For the shepherd lads on every side '11 come from 

far away ; 
And I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 

The honeysuckle round the porch has woven its 

wavy bowers, 
And by the meadow-trenches blow the faint sweet 

cuckoo-flowers ; 
And the wild marsh-marigold shines like lire in 

swamps and hollows gray ; 
And I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 

The night-winds come and go, mother, upon the 

meadow-grass. 
And the happy stars above them seem to brighten 

as they pass ; 
There will not be a drop of rain the whole of the 

livelong day ; 
And I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 

All the valley, mother, 'II be fresh and green and 

still. 
And the cowslip and the crowfoot are over all the 

hill, 



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And the rivulet in the flowery dale '11 merrily 

glance and play, 
For I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, 1 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 

So you must wake and call me early, call nie 

early, mother dear ; 
To-morrow '11 be the happiest time of all the glad 

new-year ; 
To-morrow '11 be of all the year the maddest, 

merriest day, 
For I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to 

be Queen o' the May. 



NEW- YEARS EVE. 

If you 're waking, call me early, call me early, 
mother dear, 

For I would see the sun rise upon the glad new- 
year. 

It is the last new-year that I shall ever see, — 

Then you may lay me low i' the mould, and think 
no more of me. 

To-night I saw the sun set, — he set and left 

behind 
The good old year, the dear old time, and all my 

peace of mind ; 
And the new-year 's coming up, mother ; but I 

shall never see 
The blossom on the blackthorn, the leaf upon 

the tree. 

Last May we made a crown of flowers ; we had 

a merry day, — 
Beneath the hawthorn on the green they made 

me Queen of May ; 
And we danced about the May-pole and in the 

hazel copse, 
Till Charles's Wain came out above the tall white 

chimney-tops. 

There 's not a flower on all the hills, — the frost 

is on the pane ; 
I only wish to live till the snowdrops come 

again. 
I wish the snow would melt and the sun come 

out on high, — 
I long to see a flower so before the day I die. 

The building rook '11 caw from the windy tall 
elm-tree, 

And the tufted plover pipe along the fallow 
lea, 

And the swallow '11 come back again with sum- 
mer o'er the wave. 

But I shall lie alone, mother, within the mould- 
ering grave. 



Upon the chancel-casement, and upon that grave 

of mine, 
In the early, early morning the summer sun '11 

shine, 
Before the red cock crows from the farm upon 

the hill, — 
When you are warm -asleep, mother, and all the 

world is still. 

When the flowers come again, mother, beneath 

the waning light 
You '11 never see me more in the long gray fields 

at night ; 
When from the dry dark wold the summer airs 

blow cool 
On the oat -grass and the sword-grass, and the 

bulrush in the pool. 

You '11 bury me, my mother, just beneath the 

hawthorn shade. 
And you '11 come sometimes and see me where I 

am lowly laid. 
I shall not forget you, mother ; I shall hear you 

when you pass. 
With your feet above my head in the long and 

pleasant grass. 

I have been wild and wayward, but you '11 for- 
give me now ; 

You '11 kiss me, my own mother, upon my cheek 
and brow ; 

Nay, nay, you must not weep, nor let your grief 
be wild ; 

You should not fret for me, mother — you have 
another child. 

If I can, I '11 come again, mother, from out my 

resting-place ; 
Though you '11 not see me, mother, I shall look 

upon your face ; 
Though I cannot speak a word, I shall hearken 

what you say. 
And be often, often with you when you think 

I 'm far away. 

Good night ! good night ! when I have said good 

night forevermore. 
And you see me carried out from the threshold 

of the door, 
Don 't let Effie come to see me till my grave be 

growing green, — 
She '11 be a better child to you tlian ever I have 

been. 

She '11 find my garden tools upon the granaiy 

floor. 
Let her take 'em — they are hers ; I shall never 

sarden more. 



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But tell her, when I 'm gone, to train the rose- 
bush that I set 

About the i)arlor window and the box of migno- 
nette. 

Good night, sweet mother ! Call me before the 
day is born. 

All night I lie awake, but I fall asleep at morn ; 

But I would see the sun rise upon the glad new- 
year, — 

So, if you "re waking, call me, call me early, 
mother dear. 



CONCLUSION. 

1 THOUGHT to pass away before, and yet alive I 

am ; 
And in the fields all round I hear the bleating of 

tlie lamb. 
How sadly, 1 remember, rose the morning of the 

year ! 
To die before the snowdrop came, and now the 

violet "s here. 

0, sweet is the new violet, that comes beneath 

the skies ; 
And sweeter is the young lamb's voice to me that 

cannot rise ; 
And sweet is all the land about, and all the 

flowers that blow ; 
And sweeter far is death than life, to me that 

long to go. 

It seemed so hard at first, mother, to leave the 

blessed sun. 
And now it seems as hard to stay ; and j'et. His 

will be done ! 
But still 1 think it can't be long before I find 

release ; 
And that good man, the clergyman, has told me 

words of peace. 

0, blessings on his kindly voice, and on his 

silver hair ! 
And blessings on his whole life long, until he 

meet me there ! 
O, blessings on his kindly heart and on his silver 

head ! 
A thousand times I blest him, as he knelt beside 

my bed. 

He taught me all the mercy, for he showed me 

all the sin ; 
Now, though my lamp was lighted late, there 's 

One will let me in. 
Nor would I now be well, mother, again, if that 

could be ; 
F)r my desire is but to pass to Him that died 

for me. 



O- 



I did not hear the dog howl, mother, or the 

death-watch beat, — ■ 
There came a sweeter token when the night and 

morning meet ; 
But sit beside my bed, mother, and put your 

hand in mine, 
And Effie on the other side, and I will tell the 

sign. 

All in the wild March-morning I heard the 

angels call, — 
It was when the moon was setting, and the dark 

was over all ; 
The trees began to whisper, and the wind began 

to roll. 
And in the wild March-morning I heard them 

call my soul. 

For, lying broad awake, I thought of you and 

Effie dear ; 
I saw you sitting in the house, and I no longer 

here ; 
With all my strength I prayed for both, — and 

so I felt resigned. 
And up the valley came a swell of music on the 

wind. 

I thought that it was fancy, and I listened in my 

bed; 
And then did something speak to me, — I know 

not what was said ; 
For great delight and shuddering took hold of all 

my mind, 
And up the valley came again the music on the 

wind. 

But you were sleeping ; and I said, " It 's not 

for them, — it 's mine ; " 
And if it comes three times, I thought, I take it 

for a sign. 
And once again it came, and close beside the 

window-bars ; 
Then seemed to go right up to heaven and die 

among the stars. 

So now I think my time is near ; I trust it is. 
I know 

The blessed music went that way my soul will 
have to go. 

And for myself, indeed, I care not if I go to- 
day ; 

But Effie, you must comfort her when I am past 
away. 

And say to Robin a kind word, and tell him not 

to fret ; 
There 's many a worthier than I, w'ould make 

him hajjpy yet. 



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If I had lived — I cannot tell — -I might have 

been his wife ; 
But all these things have ceased to be, with my 

desire of life. 

0, look ! the sun begins to rise ! the heavens are 

in a glow ; 
He shines upon a hundred fields, and all of them 

I know. 
And there I move no longer now, and there his 

light may shine, — 
Wild flowers in the valley for other hands than 

mine. 

0, sweet and strange it seems to me, that ere 

this day is done 
The voice that now is speaking may be beyond 

the sun, — 
Forever and forever with those just souls and 

true, • — 
And what is life, that we should moan ? why 

make we such ado ? 

Forever and forever, all in a blessed home, 
And there to wait a little while till you and Effie 

come, — 
To lie within the light of God, as I lie upon your 

breast, — 

And the wicked cease from troubling, and the 

weary are at rest. 

ALFRED Tennyson. 



t& 



THE FEMALE CONVICT. 

She shrank from all, and her silent mood 
Made her wish only for solitude : 
Her eye sought the ground, as it could not brook. 
For innermost shame, on another's to look ; 
And the cheerings of comfort fell on her ear 
Like deadliest words, that were curses to hear ! — 
She still was young, and she had been fair ; 
But weather-stains, hunger, toil, and care, 
That frost and fever that wear the heart. 
Had made the colors of youth depart 
From the sallow cheek, save over it came 
The burning flush of the spirit's shame. 

They were sailing over the salt sea-foam, 
Ear from her country, far from her home ; 
And all she had left for her friends to keep 
Was a name to hide and a memory to weep ! 
And her future held forth but the felon's lot, — 
To live forsaken, to die forgot ! 
She could not weep, and .she could not pray, 
But she wasted and withered from day to day, 
Till you might have counted each sunken vein, 
When her wrist was prest by the iron chain ; 
And sometimes I thought her large dark eye 
Had the glisten of red insanity. 



She called me once to her sleeping- place, 

A strange, wild look was upon her face, 

Her eye flashed over her cheek so white. 

Like a gravestone seen in the pale moonlight. 

And she spoke in a low, unearthly tone, — 

The sound from mine ear hath never gone ! — 

" I had last night the loveliest dream : 

My own land shone in the summer beam, 

I saw the lields of the golden grain, 

1 heard the reaper's harvest strain ; 

There stood on the hills the green pine-tree. 

And the thrush and the lark sang merrily. 

A long and a weary way I had come ; 

But 1 stopped, methought, by mine own sweet 

home. 
I stood by the hearth, and my father sat there, 
With pale, thin face, and snow-white hair ! 
The Bible lay open upon his knee. 
But he closed the book to welcome me. 
He led me next where my mother lay, 
And together we knelt by her grave to pray, 
And heard a hymn it was heaven to hear, 
For it echoed one to my young days dear. 
This dream has waked feelings long, long since 

fled, s 

And hopes which I deemed in my heart were 

dead ! 
— We have not spoken, but still I have hung 
On the Northern accents that dwell on thy 

tongue. 
To me they are music, to me they recall 
The things long hidden by Memory's pall ! 
Take this long curl of yellow hair. 
And give it my father, and tell him my prayer. 
My dying prayer, was for him." .... 

Next day 
Upon the deck a coffin lay ; 
They raised it up, and like a dirge 
The heavy gale swept over the surge ; 
The corpse was cast to the wind and wave, — 
The convict has found in the green sea a grave. 
Letitia Elizabeth Landon. 



THE DREAMER. 

FROM " PDEJSS BY A SEAMSTRESS. 

Not in the laughing bowers. 
Where by green swinging elms a pleasant shade 
At summer's noon is made, 

And where swift-footed hours 
Steal the rich breath of enamored flowers. 
Dream I. Nor where the golden glories be. 
At sunset, laving o'er the flowing sea ; 
And to pure eyes the faculty is given 
To trace a smooth ascent from Earth to Heaver. ! 



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Not on a couch of ease, 
With all the appliances of joy at hand, — 
Soft light, sweet fragrance, beauty at command ; 
Viiinds that might a godlike palate please. 
And music's soul-creative ecstasies, 
Dream I. Nor gloating o'er a wide estate, 
Till the full, self-complacent heart elate, 
Well satisfied with bliss of mortal birth, 
Sighs for an immortality on Eavth ! 

But where the incessant din 
Of iron hands, and roar of brazen throats, 
Join their unmingled notes, 

While the long summer day is pouring in, 
Till day is gone, and darkness doth begin. 
Dream I, — as in the corner where I lie. 
On wintry nights, just covered from the sky ! — 
Such is my fate, — and, barren though it seem, 
Yet, thou blind, soulless scorner, yet I dream ! 

And yet I dream, — 
Dream what, were men more just, I might have 

been ; 
How strong, how fair, how kindly and serene, 
Glowing of heart, and glorious of mien ; 
The conscious crown to Nature's blissful scene, 
In just and equal brotherhood to glean. 
With all mankind, exhaustless pleasure keen, — 

Such is my dream ! 

And yet I dream, — 
I, the despised of fortune, lift mine eyes, 

Bright with the lustre of integrity, 
In unappealing wretchedness, on high, 
And the last rage of Destiny defy ; 
Resolved alone to live, — alone to die. 

Nor swell the tide of human misery ! 

And yet I dream, — 
Dream of a sleep where dreams no more shall 

come. 
My last, my first, my only welcome home ! 
Rest, unbeheld since Life's beginning stage, 
Sole remnant of my glorious heritage, 
Unalienable, I shall find thee yet. 
And in thy soft embrace the past forget ! 

Thus do I dream ! 

Anonymous. 



'A ROUGH RHYME ON A ROUGH 
MATTER. 

THE ENGLISH GAME LAWS. 

The merry brown hares came leaping 

Over the crest of the hill. 
Where the clover and corn lay sleeping, 

Under the moonlight still. 



Leaping late and early. 

Till under their bite and their tread, 
The swedes, and the wheat, and the barley 

Lay cankered, and trampled, and dead. 

A poacher's widow sat sighing 

On the side of the white chalk bank. 

Where, under the gloomy fir-woods, 
One spot in the lea throve rank. 

She watched a long tuft of clover, 

Where rabbit or hare never ran, 
For its black sour haulm covered over 

The blood of a niurdered man. 

She thought of the dark plantation. 

And the hares, and her husband's blood, 

And the voice of her indignation 
Rose up to the throne of God : 

" I nm long past'wailing and whining, 

I have wept too much in my life : 
I 've had twenty years of pining 

As an EngljsTi laborer's wife. 

" A laborer in Christian England, 
Where they cant of a Saviour's name, 

And yet waste men's lives like the vermin's, 
For a few more brace of game. 

"There's blood on your new foreign shrubs, 
squire, 

There 's blood on your pointer's feet ; 
There 's blood on the game you sell, squire, 

And there 's blood on the game you eat. 

"You have sold the laboring man, squire, 

Both "body and soul to shame, 
To pay for your seat in the House, squire, 

And to pay for the feed of your game. 

" You made him a poacher yourself, squire, 
When you 'd give neither work nor meat. 

And your barley-fed hares robbed the garden 
At our starving children's feet ; 

" When, packed in one reeking chamber, 
Man, maid, mother, and little ones lay ; 

While the rain pattered in on the rotten bride-bed. 
And the walls let in the day ; 

"When we lay in the burning fever. 

On the mud of the cold clay floor, 
Till you parted us all for three months, squire, 

At the cursed workhouse door. 

" We quarrelled like bmtes, and who wonders ? 

What self-respect could we keep. 
Worse housed than your hacks and your pointere, 

Worse fed than your hogs and your sheep ? 



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"Our daughters, with base-born babies, 
Have wandered away in their sliame ; 

If your misses had slept, squire, where tliej'' did, 
Your misses might do the same. 

" Can your lady patch hearts that are breaking, 

Witli handfuls of coals and rice. 
Or by dealing out Manuel and sheeting 

A little below cost price ? 

"You may tire of the jail and the workhouse, 
And take to allotments and schools. 

But you 've run up a debt that will never 
Be repaid us by penny-club rules, 

"In the season of shame and sadness, 

In the dark and dreary day, 
"When scrofula, gout, and madness 

Are eating your race away ; 

"When to kennels and liveried varlets 
You have cast your daughters' bread. 

And, worn out with liquor and harlots, 
Your heir at your feet lies dead ; 

"When your youngest, the mealy-mouthed 
rector. 

Lets your soul rot asleep to the grave. 
You will find in your God tlie protector 

Of the freeman you fancied your slave." 

She looked at the tuft of clover. 
And wept till her heart grew light ; 

And at last, when her passion was over, 
Went wandering into the night. 

But the merry brown hares came leaping 

Over the uplands still. 
Where the clover and corn lay sleeping 

On the side of the white chalk hill. 

Charles Kingsley. 



MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN.* 



When chill November's surly blast 

Made fields and forests bare, 
One evening, as I wandered forth 

Along the banks of Ayr, 
I spied a man whose aged step 

Seemed weary, worn with care ; 
His face was furrowed o'er with years, 

Aiul hoary was his hair. 



* Gilbert Burns, the brother of the poet, says : " He (Burns) used 
to remark to me tliat he could not well conceive a more mortifying 
picture of human life than a man s.ekinp; work. In casting about 
in his mind how this sentiment might be brouglit forward, the elegy. 
Mail ■Wits made to mourn, was composed. ' 



" Young stranger, w-hither wanderest thou ?' 

Began the reverend sage ; 
"Does thirst of wealth thy step constrain, 

Or youthful, pleasures rage '\ 
Or haply, prest with cares and woes, 

Too soon thou hast began 
To wander forth, with me, to mourn 

The miseries of man ! 

"The sun that overhangs yon moors, 

Outspreading far and wide. 
Where imndreds labor to support 

A haughty lordling's pride, — 
I 've seen yon wearj' winter sun 

Twice forty times return ; 
And evei-y lime has added proofs 

That man was made to mourn. 

" man, while in thy early years, 

How prodigal of time ! 
Misspending all thy precious hours, 

Thy glorious youthful prime ! 
Alternate follies take the sway : 

Licentious passions burn ; 
Which tenfold force gives Nature's law, 

That man was made to mourn. 

" Look not alone on youthful prime. 

Or manhood's active might ; 
Man then is useful to his kind. 

Supported in his right ; 
But see him on the edge of life, 

With cares and sorrows worn. 
Then age and want, ill-matched pair ! 

Show man was made to mourn. 

" A few seem favorites of fate. 

In pleasure's lap carest ; 
Yet think not all the rich and great 

Are likewise truly blest. 
But, 0, what ci'owds in every land 

Are wretched and forlorn ! 
Through weary life this lesson learn, — 

That man was made to mourn. 

" Many and sharp the numerous ills. 

Inwoven with our frame ! 
More pointed still we make ourselves, 

Regret, remorse, and shame ! 
And man, whose heaven-erected face 

The smiles of love adorn, 
Man's inhumanity to man 

Makes countless thousands mourn ! 

" Sec yonder poor, o'erlabored wight. 

So abject, mean, and vile, 
Who begs a brother of the earth 

To give him leave to toil ; 



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And see his lordly fellow-worm 

The poor petition spurn, 
Unmindful, 't!iou<5li a weeping wife 

And helpless offspring mourn. 

" If I 'm designed yon lordling's slave. 

By Nature's law designed, — 
Why was an independent wish 

E'er planted in my mind ? 
If not, why am 1 subject to 

His cruelty or scorn ? 
Or why has man the will and power 

To make his fellow mourn ? 

" Yet let not this too much, my son, 

Disturb thy youthful breast : 
This partial view of humankind 

Is surely not the last ! 
The poor, oppressed, honest man 

Had never, sure, been born. 
Had there not been some recompense 

To comfort those that mourn ! 

" Death ! the poor man's dearest friend, 

The kindest and the best ! 
Welcome the hour my aged limbs 

Are laid with thee at rest ! 
The great, the wealthy, fear thy blow. 

From pomp and pleasure torn ; 
But 0, a blest relief to those 

That weary-laden mourn ! " 

ROBERT BURNS. 



ta 



LOSSES. 

Upon the white sea-sand 

There sat a pilgrim band, 
Telling the losses that their lives had known ; 

While evening waned away 

From breezy cliff and bay. 
And the strong tides went out with weary moan. 

One spake, with quivering lip, 

Of a fair freighted ship. 
With all his household to the deep gone down ; 

But one had wilder woe -^ 

For a fair face, long ago 
Lost in the darker depths of a great town. 

There were who mourned their youth 

With a most loving ruth. 
For its brave hopes and memories ever green ; 

And one upon the west 

Turned an eye that would not rest. 
For far-off hills whereon its joy had been. 

Some talked of vanished gold. 
Some of proud honors told, 
Some spake of friends that were their trust no 
}nore ; 



And one of a green grave 
Beside a foreign wave. 
That made him sit so lonely on the shore. 

But when their tales were done, 

There spake among them one, 
A stranger, seeming from all sorrow free : 

"Sad losses have ye met, 

But mine is heavier yet ; 
For a believing heart hath gone from me." 

" Alas ! " these pilgrims said, 

" For the living and the dead — 
For fortune's cruelty, for love's sure cross, 

For the wrecks of land and sea ! 

But, however it came to thee, 
Thine, stranger, is life's last and heaviest loss." 

Frances Brown. 



TWO WOMEN. 

The shadows lay along Broadway, 

'T was near the twilight-tide. 
And slowly there a lady fair 

Was walking in her pride. 
Alone walked she ; but, viewlessly, 

Walked spirits at her side. 

Peace charmed the street beneath lier feet, 

And Honor charmed the air ; 
And all astir looked kind on her, 

And called her good as fair, — 
For all God ever gave to her 

She kept with chary care. 

She kept with care her beauties rare 

From lovers warm and true, 
For her heart was cold to all but gold. 

And the rich came not to woo, — 
But honored well are charms to sell 

If priests the selling do. 

Now walking there was one more fair, — 

A slight girl, lily-pale ; 
And she had unseen company 

To make the spirit quail, — 
'Twixt Want and Scorn she walked forlorn, 

And nothing could avail. 

No mercy now can clear her brow 
For this world's pea(;e to pray ; 

For, as love's wild prayer dissolved in air. 
Her woman's heart gave way ! — 

But the sin forgiven by Christ in heaven 
By man is cursed alway ! 

NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS 



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LONDON CHURCHES. 

I STOOD, one Sunday morning, 
Before a laige clmrch door. 
The congregation gatliered, 
And carriages a score, — 
From one out stepped a lady 
I oft had seen before. 

Her hand was on a prayer-book, 
And held a vinaigrette ; 
The sign of man's redemption 
Clear on the book was set, —^ 
But above the Cross there glistened 
A golden Coronet. 

For her the obsequious beadle 
The inner door flung wide ; 
Lightly, as up a ball-room, 
Her footsteps seemed to glide, — 
There might be good thoughts in her, 
For all her evil pride. 

But after her a woman 
Peeped wistfully within. 
On whose wan face was graven 
Life's hardest discipline, — 
The trace of the sad trinity 
Of weakness, pain, and sin. 

The few free-seats were crowded 
Where she could rest and pray ; 
With her worn garb contrasted 
Each side in fair array, — 
"God's house holds no poor sinners," 
She sighed, and crept awa}'. 

RICHAKD MONCKTON MiLNES. 
(LORD HOUGHTON.) 



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BEAUTIFUL SNOW. 

THE snow, the beautiful snow, 
Filling the sky and the earth below ! 
Over the house-tops, over the street. 
Over the heads of the people you meet, 
Dancing, 

Flirting, 

Skimming along. 
Beautiful snow ! it can do nothing wrong. 
Flying to kiss a fair lady's cheek ; 
Clinging to lips in a frolicsome freak ; 
Beautiful snow, from the heavens above, 
Puie as an angel and fickle as love ! 

O the snow, the beautiful snow ! 

How the flakes gather and laugh as they go ! 



Whirling about in its maddening fun, 
It plays in its glee with every one. 
Chasing, 

Laughing, 

Hurrying by. 
It lights up the face and it sparkles the eye ; 
And even the dogs, with a bark and a bound, 
Snap at the crystals that eddy around. 
The town is alive, and its heart in a glow. 
To welcome the coming of beautiful snow. 



How the wild crowd go swaying along, 
Hailing each other with humor and song ! 
How the gay sledges like meteors flash by, — 
Bright for a moment, then lost to the eye ! 
Ringing, 

Swinging, 

Dashing they go 
Over the crest of the beautiful snow : 
Snow so pure when it falls from the sky. 
To be tram[)led in mud by the crowd rushing by ; 
To.|)e trampled and tracked by the thousands of 

»■' feet 
Till it blends with the horrible filth in the street. 



Once I was pure as the snow, — but I fell : 
Fell, like the snow-flakes, from heaven — to hell ; 
Fell, to be tramped as the filth of the street : 
Fell, to be scofled, to be spit on, and beat. 
Pleading, 
Cursing, 

Dreading to die. 
Selling my soul to whoever would buy. 
Dealing in sliame for a morsel of bread. 
Hating the living and fearing the dead. 
Merciful God ! have 1 fallen so low ? 
And yet I was once like this beautiful snow ! 



4 



Once I was.fair as the beautiful suow. 

With an eye like its crystals, a heart like its 

glow ; 
Once I was loved for my innocent grace, — 
Flattered and sought for the charm of my face. 
Father, 

Mother, 

Sisters all, 
God, and myself, I have lost by my fall. 
The veriest wretch that goes shivering by 
Will' take a wide sweep, lest 1 wander too nigh ; 
For;of all that is on or about me, 1 know 
There is nothing that 's pure but the beautiful 
snow. 

How strange it should be that this beautiful 
snow 
I Should fall on a sinner with nowhere to go ! 



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How strange it would be, when the night comes 

again, 
If the snow and the ice struck my desiderate brain ! 
Fainting, 

Freezing, 

Dying alone, 
Too wicked for pra}'er, too weak for my moan 
To be heard in the crash of the crazy town. 
Gone mad in its joy at the snow's coming down ; 
To lie and to die in my terrible woe, 
With a bed and a shroud of the beautiful snow ! 
James W. Watson. 



czu 



THE BRIDGE OF SIGHS. 

■• Drowned I drowned ! " — HAMLET. 

One more \nifortunate, 
AVeary of breath, 
Rashly importunate, 
Gone to her death ! 

Take her up tenderly, 
Lift her with care ! 
Fashioned so slenderly. 
Young, and so fair ! 

Look at her garments 
Clinging like cerements, 
Whilst the wave constantly 
Drips from her clothing ; 
Take her up instantly, 
Loving, not loathing ! 

Touch her not scornfully ! 
Think of her mournfully, 
Gently and humanly, — 
Not of the stains of her ; 
All that remains of her 
Now is pure womanly. 

Make no deep scrutiny 
Into her mutiny, 
Rash and undutiful ; 
Past all dishonor. 
Death has left on her 
Only the beautiful. 

Still, for all slips of hers, — 
One of Eve's family, — 
Wipe those poor lips of hers, 
Oozing so clammily. 
Loop up her tresses 
Escaped from the comb, — 
Hei' fair auburn tresses, — 
Wliilst wonderment guesses 
Where was her home ? 



Who was her father ? 
Who was her mother ? 
Had she a sister ? 
Had she a brother ? 
Or was there a dearer one 
Still, and a nearer one 
Yet, than all other ? 

Alas ! for the rarity 
Of Christian charity 
Under the sun ! 
0, it was pitiful ! 
Near a whole city full, 
Home she had none. 

Sisterly, brotherly, 
Fatherly, motherly 
Feelings had changed, — 
Love, by harsh evidence. 
Thrown from its eminence ; 
Even God's providence 
Seeming estranged. 

Where the lamps quiver 
So far in the river. 
With many a light 
From window and casement, 
From garret to basement, 
She stood, with amazement, 
Houseless by night. 

The bleak wind of March 
Made her tremble and shiver ; 
But not the dark arch. 
Or the black flowing river ; 
Mad from life's history, 
Glad to death's mystery, 
Swift to be hurled — 
Anywhere, anywhere 
Out of the world ! 

In she plunged boldly, — 
No matter how coldly 
The rough river ran — 
Over the brink of it ! 
Picture it — think of it, 
Dissolute man ! 
Lave in it, drink of it, 
Then, if you can ! 

Take her up tenderly, 
Lift her with care ! 
Fashioned so slenderly, 
Young, and so fair ! 

Ere her limbs, frigidly, 
Stiffen too rigidly, 
Decently, kindly. 



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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



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Smooth and compose them ; 
And her eyes, close them, 
Staring so blindly ! 
Dreadfully staring 
Through muddy impurity, 
As when with the daring 
Last look of despairing 
Fixed on futurity. 

Perishing gloomily, 
Spurred by contumely. 
Cold inhumanity, 
Burning insanity, 
Into her rest ! 
Cross her hands humbly. 
As if pi-aying dumbly. 
Over her breast ! 

Owning her weakness, 
Her evil behavior, 
And leaving, with meekness, 
Her sins to her Saviour ! 

THOMAS HOOD. 



t& 



ON WOMAN. 

FROM "THE VICAR OF WAKEFIELD." 

When lovely woman stoops to folly. 
And finds too late that men betra}'', 

What charm can soothe her melancholy ? 
What art can wash her guilt away ? 

The only art her guilt to cover, 
To hide her shame from every eye, 

To give repentance to her lover, 
And wrmg his bosom, is — to die. 

Oliver Goldsmith. 



THE LITTLE MATCH-GIRL. 

Little Gretchen, little Gi'etchen wanders up and 

down the street ; 
The snow is on her yellow hair, the frost is on 

her feet. 
The rows of long, dark houses without look cold 

and damp, 
By the struggling of the moonbeam, by the 

flicker of the lamp. 
The clouds ride fast as horses, the wind is from 

the north. 
But no one cares for Gretchen, and no one look- 

eth forth. 
Within those dark, damp houses are merry faces 

bright. 
And happy hearts are watching out the old year's 

latest night. 



With the little box of matches she could not sell 

all day, 
And the thin, tattered mantle the wind blows 

every way. 
She clingeth to the railing, she shivers in the 

gloom, — 
There are parents sitting snugly by the firelight 

in the loom ; 
And children with grave faces are whispering one 

another 
Of presents for the New Year, for father or for 

mother. 
But no one talks to Gretchen, and no one hears 

her speak ; 
No breath of little whisperers comes warmly to 

her cheek. 

Her home is cold and desolate ; no smile, no food, 

no fire, 
But children clamorous for bread, and an im- 
patient sire. 
So she sits down in an angle where two great 

houses meet. 
And she curleth up beneath her for warmth her 

little feet ; 
And she looketh on the cold wall, and on the 

colder sky, 
And wonders if the little stars are bright fires 

up on high. 
She hears the clock strike slowly, up high in a 

church-tower. 
With such a sad and solemn tone, telling the 

midnight hour. 

She remembered her of stories her mother used 

to tell. 
And of the cradle-songs she sang, when summer's 

twilight fell. 
Of good men and of angels, and of the Holy 

Child, 
Who was cradled in a manger when winter was 

most wild ; 
Who was jioor, and cold, and hungry, and deso- 
late and lone ; 
And she thought the song had told her he was 

ever with his own, 
And all the poor and hungry and forsaken ones 

were his, — 
" How good of him to look on me in such a place 

as this ! " 

Colder it grows and colder, but she does not feel 

it now. 
For the pressure on her bosom, and the weight 

upon her brow ; 
But she struck one little match on the wall so 

cold and bare, 



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That slio might look around her, and see if he 
was there. 

The single match was kindled ; and, by the light 
it threw, 

It seemed to little Maggie that tlie wall was rent 
in two. 

And she could see the room within, the room all 
warm and light. 

With the fire-glow red and blazing, and the ta- 
pers burning bright. 

And kindred there were gathered round the table 
richly spread. 

With heaps of goodly viands, red wine, and pleas- 
ant bread. 

She could smell the fragrant odor ; she could 
hear them talk and play ; 

Then all was darkness once again — the match 
had burned awa}'. 

She struck another hastily, and now she seemed 
to see, 

W'ithin the same warm chamber a glorious Christ- 
mas-tree. 

The branches all were laden down with things 
that children yiiize ; 

Bright gifts for boy and maiden they showed be- 
fore her eyes. 

And she almost seemed to touch them, and to 
joiu the welcome shout ; 

Then darkness fell around her, for the little 
match was out. 

Another, yet another, she has tried, — they will 

not light ; 
Then all her little store she took, and struck 

with all her might. 
And the whole [)]ace around her was lighted 

with the glare : 
And lo ! there hung a little Chihl before her in 

the air ! 
There were blood-drops on his forehead, a spear- 
wound in his side, 
And cruel nail-prints in his feet, and in his hands 

spread wide. 
And he looked upon her gently, and she felt that 

he had known 
Pain, hunger, cold, and sorrow, — ay, equal to 

her own. 

And he pointer! to the laden board and to the 

Chiistmas-tree, 
Then up to the cold sky, and said, "Will 

Gretchen come with me ? " 
The poor child felt her pulses fail, she felt her 

eyeballs swim. 
And a ringing sound w'as in her ears, like her 

dead mother's hymn : 



And she folded both her thin white hands and 
turned fiom that bright board, 

And from the golden gifts, and said, " With thee, 
with thee, Lord ! " 

The chilly winter morning breaks up in the dull 

skies 
On the city wrapt in vapor, on the spot where 

Gretchen lies. 
In her scant and tattered garments, with her 

back against the wall. 
She sitteth cold and rigid, she answers to no 

calk 
They lifted her np fearfully, and shuddered as 

they said, 
" It was a bitter, bitter night ! the child is frozen 

dead." 
The angels sang their greeting for one more re- 
deemed from sin ; 
Men said, " It was a bitter night ; would no one 

let her in ? " 
And they shivered as they spoke of her, and 

sighed : they could not see 
How much of hap[iiness there was after that 

miser}'. 

From the Danish of Hans Christian Andersen. 



THE SONG OF THE SHIRT. 

With fingers weary and worn, 

With eyelids heavy and i-ed, 
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags. 

Plying her needle and thread, — 
Stitch ! stitch ! stitch ! 
In jjoverty, hunger, and diit ; 

And still with a voice of dolorous pitch 
She sang the " Song of the Shirt ! " 

" Work ! work ! work 

While the cock is crowing aloof ! 
And work — work — work 

Till the stars shine through the roof 
It 's, 0, to be a slave 

Along with the barbarous Turk, 
Where woman has never a soul to save, 

If this is Christian work ! 

" Work — work — work 

Till the brain begins to swim ! 
Work — work — work 

Till the eyes are heavy and dim ! 
Seam, and gusset, and hand. 

Band, and gusset, and seam, — 
Till over the buttons 1 fall asleep, 

And sew them on in a dream ! 



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" men with sisters dear ! 

men with mothers and wives ! 
It is not linen you 're wearing out, 

But human creatures' lives ! 
Stitch — stitch — stitch, 

In poverty, hunger, and dirt, — 
Sewing at once, with a double thread, 

A shroud as well as a shirt ! 

" But why do I talk of death, — 

That phantom of grisly bone ? 
I hardly fear his terrible shape. 

It seems so like my own, — 
It seems so like my own 

Because of the fasts I keep ; 
God ! that bread should be so dear, 

And flesh and blood so cheap ! 

" Work — work — work ! 

My labor never flags ; 
And what are its wages ? A bed of straw, 

A crust of bread — • and rags, 
That shattered roof — and this naked floor — 

A table — a broken chair — 
And a wall so blank my shadow I thank 

For sometimes falling there ! 

" Work — work — work 

From weary chime to chime ! 
Work — • work — work 

As prisoners work for crime ! 
Band, and gusset, and seam, 

Seam, and gusset, and band, — 
Till the heart is sick and the brain benumbed, 

As well as the weary hand. 

" Work — work — work 

In the dull December light ! 
And work — work — work 

When the weather is warm and bright ! 
While underneath the eaves 

The brooding swallows cling, 
As if to show me their sunny backs. 

And twit me with the Spring. 

" 0, but to breathe the breath 

Of the cowslip and primrose sweet, — 
With the sky above my head. 

And the grass beneath my feet ! 
For only one short hour 

To feel as I used to feel, 
Before I knew the woes of want 

And the walk that costs a meal ! 

" 0, but for one short hour, — 

A respite, however brief ! 
No blessed leisure for love or hope, 

But only time for grief ! 



A little weeping would ease my heart ; 

But in their briny bed 
My tears must stop, for every drop 

Hinders needle and thread ! " 

With fingers weary and worn. 

With eyelids heavy and red, 
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags. 

Plying her needle and thread, — 
Stitch ! stitch ! stitch ! 

In poverty, hunger, and dirt ; 
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch — 
Would that its tone could reach the rich ! — 

She sang this " Song of the Shirt ! " 

Thomas Hood. 



GIVE ME THREE GRAINS OF CORN, 
MOTHER. 



THE IRISH FAMINE. 



Give me three grains of corn, mother, — 

Only three grains of corn ; 
It will keep the little life I have 

Till the coming of the morn. 
I am dying of hunger and cold, mother, — 

Dying of hunger and cold ; 
And half the agony of such a death 

My lips have never told. 

It has gnawed like a wolf, at my heart, mother, — 

A wolf that is fierce for blood ; 
All the livelong day, and the night beside. 

Gnawing for lack of food. 
I dreamed of bread in my sleep, mother, 

And the sight was heaven to see ; 
I awoke with an eager, famishing lip, 

But you had no bread for me. 

How could I look to you, mother, — 

How could I look to you 
For bread to give to your starving boy. 

When you were starving too ? 
For I read the famine in your cheek. 

And in your eyes so wild, 
And I felt it in your bony hand. 

As you laid it on your child. 

The Queen has lands and gold,'mother, — 

The Queen has lands and gold. 
While you are forced to your empty breast 

A skeleton babe to hold, ■ — 
A babe that is dying of want, mother. 

As I am dying now, 
With a ghastly look in its sunken eye, 

And famine upon its brow. 



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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



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"What lias poor Ireland done, motlier, — 

What has poor Ireland done, 
That the world looks on, and sees us starve, 

Perishing one by one ? 
Do the men of England care not, mother, — 

The great men and the high, — 
For the suff'ering sons of Erin's isle, 

Whether they live or die '/ 

There is many a brave heart here, mother. 

Dying of want and cold, 
While only across the Channel, mother, 

Are many that roll in gold ; 
There are rich and proud men there, mother, 

With wondrous wealth to view. 
And the bread they fling to their dogs to-night 

Would give life to me and you. 

Come nearer to my side, mother. 

Come nearer to my side. 
And hold me fondly, as you held 

My father when he died ; 
Quick, for I cannot see you, mother, 

My breath is almost gone ; 
Mother ! dear mother ! ere I die. 

Give me three grains of corn. 

AMELIA BLANDFORD EDWARDS. 



LORD ULLIN'S DAUGHTER. 

A CHIEFTAIN, to the Highlands bound, 
Cries, " Boatman, do not tarry ! 

And I '11 give thee a silver pound, 
To row us o'er the ferry." 

" Now who be ye, would cross Lochgyle, 
This dark and stormy water ? " 

" 0, I 'm the chief of Ulva's isle, 
And this Lord UUin's daughter. 

" And fast before her father's men 
Three days we 've fled together. 

For should he find us in the glen, 
My blood would stain the heather. 

" His horsemen hard behind us ride ; 

Should they our steps discover. 
Then who will cheer my bonny bride 

When they have slain her lover ? " 

Out spoke the hardy Highland wight, 
" I '11 go, my chief, — I 'm ready : — 

It is not for your silver bright ; 
But for your winsome lady : 

" And by my word ! the bonny bird 

In danger shall not tarry : 
So, though the waves are raging white, 

I '11 row you o'er the ferry." 



By this the storm grew loud apace. 

The water-wraith was shrieking ; 
And in the scowl of heaven each face 

Grew dark as they were speaking. 

But still as wilder blew the wind, 

And as the night grew drearer, 
Adown the glen rode armed men, 

Their trampling sounded nearer. 

" 0, haste thee, haste ! " the lady cries, 
" Though tempests round us gather ; 

I '11 meet the raging of the skies. 
But not an angry father." 

The boat has left a stormy land, 

A stormy sea before her, — 
When, 0, too strong for human hand, 

The tempest gathered o'er her. 

And still they rowed amidst the roar 

Of waters fast prevailing : 
Lord Ullin reached that fatal shore, 

His wrath was changed to wailing. 

For sore dismayed, through storm and shade. 

His child he did discover : 
One lovely hand she stretched for aid. 

And one was round her lover. 

"Come back ! come back ! " he cried in grief, 

"Across this stormy water : 
And I '11 forgive your Highland chief. 

My daughter ! — my daughter ! " 

'T was vain ; — the loud waves lashed the shore, 

Return or aid preventing ; 

The waters wild went o'er his child, 

And he was left lamenting. 

THOMAS Campbell. 



THE MANIAC. 

Stay, jailer, stay, and hear my woe ! 

She is not mad who kneels to thee ; 
For what I 'm now too well I know, 

And what I was, and what should be. 
I '11 rave no more in proud despair ; 

My language shall be mild, tliough sad ; 
But yet I firmly, truly swear, 

/ am not viad, I am not mad ! 

My tyrant husband forged the tale 

Which chains me in this dismal cell ; 
My fate unknown my friends bewail, — 

jailer, haste that fate to tell ! 
0, haste my father's heart to cheer ! 

His heart at once 't will grieve and glad 
To know, though kept a captive here, 

/ am not mad, I am not mad ! 



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He smiles in scorn, and turns the kej' ; 

He quits tlie grate ; I knelt in vain ; 
His giinimeriug lamp still, still 1 see, — 

'T is gone ! and all is gloom again. 
Cold, Litter cold ! — No warmtli ! no light ! 

Life, all thy comforts once 1 had ; 
Yet here I 'm chained, this freezing night. 

Although not mad ; no, no, — not mad ! 



'T is sure some dream, some vision vain ; 

What ! /, the child of rank and wealth, - 
Am / the wretch who clanks this chain, 

Bereft of freedom, friends, and health ? 
Ah ! while I dwell on blessings fled. 

Which nevermore my heait must glad. 
How aches my heart, how burns my head ; 

But 't is not mad ; no, 't is not mad 1 



Hast thou, my child, forgot, ere this, 

A mother's face, a mother's tongue ? 
She '11 ne'er forget your parting kiss, 

Nor round her neck how fast you clung ; 
Nor how with her you sued to stay ; 

Nor how that suit your sire forViade ; 
Nor how — 1 '11 drive such thoughts away ! 

They '11 make me mad, they '11 make me mad ! 



His rosy lips, how sweet they smiled ! 

His mild blue eyes, how bright they shone ! 
None ever bore a lovelier child, 

And art thou now forever gone ? 
And must 1 never see thee more. 

My pretty, pretty, pretty lad ? 
I will be iree ! unbar the door ! 

/ avx not inad ; I am not mad ! 



0, hark ! what mean those yells and cries ? 

His chain some furious madman breaks ; 
He conies, — 1 see his glaring eyes ; 

Now, now, my dungeon -grate he shakes. 
Help ! Help ! — He 's gone ! — 0, fearful woe, 

Such screams to hear, such sights to see ! 
My brain, my brain, — 1 know, I know 

I am not mad, but soon shall be. 



Yes, soon ; — for, lo you ! while I speak, — 

Mark how yon demon's eyeballs glare ! 
He sees me ; now, with dreadful shriek, 

He whirls a serpent high in air. 
Horror ! — the reptile stiikes his tooth 

Deep in my heart, so crushed and sad ; 
Ay, laugh, ye fiends ; — I feel the truth ; 

Your task is done, — 1 'm jiad ! 1 'm wad ! 
Matthew Gregory Lew:s. 



THE BEGGAR. 

Pity the sorrows of a poor old man ! 

Whose trembling limbs have borne him to 
your dooi'. 
Whose days are dwindled to the shortest span, 

0, give relief, and Heaven will bless your store. 

These tattered clothes mj' poA'erty bespeak. 
These hoary locks proclaim my lengthened 
years ; 

And many a furrow in my gi'ief-worn cheek 
Has been the channel to a stream of tears. 

Yon house, erected on the rising ground, 

With tempting aspect drew me from my road, 

For plenty there a residence has found, 
And grandeur a magnificent abode. . " 

(Hard is the fate of the infirm and poor !) 
Here craving for a morsel of their bread, 

A pampered menial drove me from the door. 
To seek a shelter in a humbler shed. 

0, take me to your hospitable dome. 

Keen blows the wind, and piercing is the cold ! 

Short is my passage to the friendly tomb. 
For I am poor and miserably old. 

Should I reveal the source of every grief. 
If soft humanity e'er touched your breast. 

Your hands would not withhold the kind relief, 
And tears of pity could not be repressed. 

Heaven sends misfortunes, — why should we 
repine '•. 
'T is Heaven has brought me to the state you 
see : 
And your condition may be soon like mine, 
The child of sorrow and of misery. 

A little farm was my paternal lot. 

Then, like the lark, I sprightly hailed the 
morn ; 
But ah ! oppression forced me from my cot ; 

My cattle died, and blighted was iny corn. 

My daughter, — once the comfort of my age ! 

Lured bj' a villain from her native home, 
Is cast, abandoned, on the world's wild stage, 

And doomed in scanty poverty to roam. 

My tender wife, — sAvcet soother of my care ! — 
Struck with sad anguish at the stern decree, 

Fell, — lingering fell, a victim to despair, 
And left the world to wretchedness and me. 



4? 



&- 



POEMS OP SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



541 



ra 



Pity the sorrows of a poor old man ! 

Whose trenililing limbs have borne him to 
your door, 
Whose days are dwindled to the shortest span, 

0, give relief, and Heaven will bless your store. 

THOMAS Moss. 



FOR A' THAT AND A' THAT. 

Is there for honest poverty 

Wha hangs his head, and a' that ? 
The coward slave, wc pass him by ; 

We dare be poor for a' that. 
For a' that, and a' that. 

Our toil 's obscure, and a' that ; 
The rank is but the guinea's stamp, — 

The man 's the gowd for a' that. 



What though on hamely fare we dine, 

Wear hoddin gray, and a' that ? 
Gie fools their silks, and knaves their wine, 

A man 's a man for a' that. 
For a' that, and' a' that. 

Their tinsel show, and a' that ; 
The honest man, though e'er sae poor, 

Is king o' men for a' that. 



Ye see yon birkie ca'd a lord, 

AVha struts, and stares, and a' that, - 
Though iiundreds worship at his word, 

He 's but a coof for a' that ; 
For a' that, and a' that, 

His riband, star, and a' that; 
The man of independent mind, 

He looks and laughs at a' that. 



A prince can mak a belted knight, 

A marquis, duke, and a' that ; 
But an honest inan 's aboon his might, — 

Guid faith, he maunna fa' that ! 
For a' that, and a' that ; 

Their dignitii^s, and a' that, 
The pith o' sense, and pride o' worth, 

Are higher ranks than a' that. 

Then let us i)ray that come it may, — 

As come it will for a' that, — 
That sense and wortli, o'er a' the earth, 

May bear the gree, and a' that. 
For a' that, and a' that, 

It 'h comhig yet, for a' that, — 
When man to man, the warld o'er, 

Shall brothers be for a' that ! 

Robert Burns. 



THE PAUPER'S DEATH-BED. 

TiiEAD softly, — bow the head, — 

In reverent silence bow, — 
No passing-bell doth toll, 
Yet an immortal soul 

Is passing now. 

Stranger ! however great. 

With lowly reverence bow ; 
There 's one in tliat poor shed — 
One by that paltry bed — 

Greater than thou. 

Beneath that beggar's roof, 

Lo ! Dciith dotli keep his state. 

Enter, no crowds attend ; 

Enter, no guards defend 
This palace gate. 

That pavement, damp and cold. 

No smiling courtiers tread ; 
One silent woman stands, 
Lifting with meagre hands 

A dying head. 

No mingling voices sound, — • 

An infant wail alone ; 
A sob suppressed, — again 
That short deep gasp, and then — 

The parting groan. 

change ! wondrous change ! 

Burst are the prison bars, — 
This moment, there, so low. 
So agonized, and now, — 

Beyond the stars. 

change ! stupendous change ! 

There lies the soulless clod ; 
Tlie sun eternal breaks, 
The new immortal wakes, — 

Wakes with his God ! 

CAROLINE ANNE BOWLES SOUTHEY. 



THE PAUPER'S DRIVE. 

There 's a grim one-horse hearse in a jolly round 

trot, — 
To the churchyard a pauper is going, I wot ; 
The road it is rough, and the hearse has no 

springs ; 
And hark to the dirge which the mad driver sings ; 
liaUlc Ids bones over the stones! 
He 's onlij a 2MU1>c'i' whom ■noLodi/ oicns ! 

0, where are the mourners ? Alas ! there are none ; 
He has left not a gap in the world, now he 's 
gone, — 



■g 



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342 



POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



a 



Not a tear in the eye of child, woman, or man ; 
To the grave with his carcass as fast as you can : 

Rattle his hones over the stones! 

He 's only a pauper whom nobody owns ! 

"What a jolting and creaking and splashing and 

din ! 
The whip, how it cracks ! and the wheels, how 

they spin ! 
How the dirt, right and left, o'er the hedges is 

hurled ! 
The pauper at length makes a noise in the world ! 
Rattle his bones over the stones ! 
He 's only a pauper whom nobody owns! 

Poor pauper defunct ! he has made some approach 
To gentility, now that he 's stretched in a coach ! 
He's taking a drive in his carriage at last ; 
But it will not be long, if he goes on so fast: 

Rattle Jiis hones over tlie stones ! 

He 's only a pauper ichom nobody owns ! 

You bumpkins ! who stare at your brother con- 
veyed. 
Behold what respect to a cloddy is paid ! 
And be joyful to think, when by death you 're 

laid low, 
You 've a chance to the grave like a gemman to 
go ! 
Rattle Jiis bones over the stones ! 
He 's only a pauper whom nobody owns ! 

But a truce to this strain ; for my soul it is sad, 
To think that a heart in humanity clad 
Should make, like the brute, such a desolate end, 
And depart from the light without leaving a 
friend ! 

Bear soft Iiis hones over the stones ! 

Though a paiq}er, he 's one wJiom his Malier 

yet owns ! 

Thomas Noel. 



I& 



OVER THE HILL TO THE POOR-HOUSE. 

Over the hill to the poor-house I 'm trudgin' my 

weary way — 
I, a woman of seventy, and only a trifle gray — 
I, who am smart an' chipper, for all the years 

I 've told. 
As many another woman that 's only half as old. 

Over the hill to the poor-house — I can't quite 

make it clear ! 
Over the hill to the poor-house — it seems so 

horrid queer ! 
Many a step I 've taken a-toilin' to and fro. 
But this is a sort of journey I never thought 

to go. 



What is the use of heapin' on me a pauper's 

shame ? 
Am I lazy or crazy ? am I blind or lame ? 
True, I am not so supple, nor yet so awful stout ; 
But charity ain't no favor, if one can live without. 

I am willin' and anxious an' ready any day 

To work for a decent livin', an' pay my honest 

way; 
For I can earn my victuals, an' more too, I '11 be 

bound, 
If anybody only is willin' to have me round. 

Once I was young an' han'some — I was, upon 

my soul — 
Once my cheeks was roses, my eyes as black as 

coal ; 
And I can't remember, in them days, of hearin' 

people say. 
For any kind of a reason, that I was in their way. 

'T ain't no use of boastin', or talkin" over free. 
But many a house an' home was open then to 

me ; 
Many a han'some offer I had from likely men, 
And nobody ever hinted that I was a burden 

then. 

And when to John I was married, sure he was 

good and smart. 
But he and all the neighbors would own I done 

my part ; 
For life was all before me, an' I was young an' 

strong. 
And I worked the best that I could in tryin' to 

get along. 

And so we worked together : and life was hard, 

but gay, 
"With now and then a baby for to cheer us on our 

way ; 
Till we had half a dozen, an' all growed clean 

an' neat. 
An' went to school like others, an' had enough 

to eat. 

So we worked for the child'rn, and raised 'em 

every one ; 
"Worked for 'em summer and winter, just as we 

ought to 've done ; 
Only perhaps we humored 'em, which some good 

folks condemn, 
But every couple's child'rn 's a heap the best to 

them. 

Strange how much we think of our blessed little 



I 'd have died for my daughters, I 'd have died 
for my sons ; 



--BP 



[&^ 



POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



"to '— -* 



And God he made that rule of love ; but when I went to live with Susan, but Susan's house we 



we 're old and gray, 
I 've noticed it sometimes somehow fails to work 
the other way. 

Strange, another thing : when our boys an' girls 

was grown, 
And when, exceptin' Charlej'', they 'd left us 

there alone ; 
When John he nearer an' nearer come, an' dearer 

seemed to be, 
The Lord of Hosts he come one day an' took him 

away from me. 

Still I was bound to struggle, an' never to cringe 

or fall — 
Still I worked for Charley, for Charley was now 

my all ; 
And Charley was pretty good to me, with scarce 

a word or frown. 
Till at last he went a-courtin', and brought a wife 

from town. 

She was somewhat dressy, an' had n't a pleasant 

smile — 
She was quite conceity, and carried a heap o' 

style ; 
But if ever I tried to be friends, I did with her, 

I know ; 
But she was hard and proud, an' I could n't make 

it go. 

She had an edication, an' that was good for 

her ; 
But when she twitted me on mine, 't was carryin' 

things too fur ; 
An' I told her once, 'fore company (an' it almost 

made her sick), 
That I never swallowed a grammar, or 'et a 'rith- 

metic. 

So 't was only a few days before the thing was 

done — 
They was a family of themselves, and I another 

one ; 
And a very little cottage one family will do, 
But I never have seen a house that was big 

enough for two. 

An' I never could speak to suit her, never could 

please her ej'e, 
An' it made me independent, an' then I did n't 

try ; 

But I was terribly staggered, an' felt it like a 

blow, 
When Charley turned ag'in me, an' told me I 

could so. 



small. 
And she was always a-hintin' how snug it was 

for us all ; 
And what with her husband's sisters, and what 

with child'rn three, 
'T was easy to discover that there was n't room 

for me. 

An' then I went to Thomas, the oldest son I 've 

got, 
For Thomas's buildings 'd cover the half of an 

acre lot ; 
But all the child'rn was on me — I could n't 

stand their sauce — 
And Thomas said I need n't think I was comin' 

there to boss. 

An' then I wrote to Rebecca, my girl who lives 

out West, 
And to Isaac, not far from her — some twenty 

miles at best ; 
And one of 'em said 't was too warm there for 

any one so old. 
And t' other had an opinion the climate was too 

cold. 

So they have shirked and slighted me, an' shifted 

me about — 
So they have well-nigh soured me, an' M^ore my 

old heart out ; 
But still I 've borne up pretty well, an' was n't 

much put down. 
Till Charley went to the poor-master, an' put me 

on the town. 

Over the hill to the poor-house — my child'rn 

dear, good by ! 
Many a night I 've watched you when only God 

was nigh ; 
And God '11 judge between us ; but I will al'ays 

pray 
That you shall never suffer the half I do to-day. 
Will M. Carleton. 



THE BLIND BOY. 

0, SAY, what is that thing called Light, 

Which I must ne'er enjoy ? 
What are the blessings of the sight, 

0, tell your poor blind boy ! 

You talk of wondrous things you see, 
You say the sun shines bright ; 

I feel him warm, but how can he 
Or make it day or night ? 



^ 



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344 



POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



'*~Q} 



B- 



My day or night myself I make 

Whene'er I sleep or play ; 
And could I ever keep awake 

With me 't were always day. 

With heavy sighs I often hear 

You mourn my hapless woe ; 
But sure with patience I can bear 

A loss I ne'er can know. 

Then let not what I cannot have 

My cheer of mind destroy : 
Whilst thus I sing, I am a king, 

Although a poor blind boy. 

COLLEY ClBBER. 



THE EAINY DAY. 

Thb day is cold, and dark, and dreary ; 
It rains, and the wind is never weary ; 
The vine still clings to the mouldeiing wall, 
But at every gust the dead leaves fall. 
And the day is dark and dreary. 

My life is cold, and dark, and dreary ; 
It rains, and the wind is never weary ; 
My thoughts still cling to the mouldering Past, 
But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast, 
And the days are dark and dreary. 

Be still, sad heart ! and cease repining ; 
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining ; 
Tliy fate is the common fiite of all. 
Into each life some rain must fall, 
Some days must be dark and di'earj'. 

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 



THE END OF THE PLAY. 

The play is done, — the curtain drops, 

Slow falling to the prompter's bell ; 
A moment yet the actor stops, 

And looks around, to say farewell. 
It is an irksome word and task ; 

And, wlien he 's laughed and said his say, 
He shows, as he removes the mask, 

A face that 's anything but gay. 

One word, ere yet the evening ends, — 

Let 's close it with a parting rhyme ; 
And pledge a hand to all yoirng friends. 

As flits the merry Christmas time ; 
On life's wide scene you, too, have parts 

That fate erelong shall bid you play ; 
Good night ! — with honest, gentle hearts 

A kindly greeting go alway ! 



Good night ! — I 'd say the griefs, the joys, 

Just liinted in this mimic page, 
Tlie triumphs and defeats of boys, 

Are but repeated in our age ; 
I 'd say your woes were not less keen, 

Your hopes more vain, than those of men, — 
Your pangs or pleasures of fifteen 

At forty-five played o'er again. 

I 'd say we suffer and we strive 

Not less nor more as men than boys, — 
With grizzled beards at forty-five. 

As erst at twelve in corduroys ; 
And if, in time of sacred youth, 

We learned at home to love and pray, ■ 
Pray Heaven that early love and truth 

May never wholly pass away. 

And in the world, as in the school, 

I W say how fate may change and shift, — 
The prize be sometimes with the fool, 

The race not always to the swift : 
The strong may yield, the good may fall, 

The great man be a vulgar clown. 
The knave be lifted over all, 

The kind cast pitilessly down. 

Who knows the inscrutable design ? 

Blessed be He who took and gave ! 
Why should your mother, Cluirles, not mine, 

Be weeping at her darling's grave? 
We bow to Heaven that willed it so, 

That darkly rules the fate of all, 
That sends the respite or the blow, 

That 's free to give or to recall. 

This crowns his feast with wine and wit, — 

Who bi'ought him to that mirth and state ? 
His betters, see, below him sit. 

Or hunger hopeless at the gate. 
Who bade the mu<l from Dives' wheel 

To spurn the rags of Lazarus ? 
Come, brother, in that dust we 'II kneel, 

Confessing Heaven that ruled it thus. 

So each shall mourn, in life's advance. 

Dear hopes, dear friends, untimely killed ; 
Shall grieve for many a forfeit cliance 

And longing passion unfulfilled. 
Amen ! — whatever fate be sent, 

Pray God the heart may kindly glow, 
Although the head with cares be bent, 

And whitened with the winter snow. 

Come wealth or want, come good or ill, 
Let young and old accept their part, 

And bow before the awful will. 
And bear it with an honest heart. 



^ 



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FRAGMENTS. 



■TTrn 



Who misses, oi' who wins the prize, — 
Go, lose or conquer as you can ; 

])Ut if you fail, or if you rise. 
Be each, pray God, a gentleman. 

A gentleman, or old or young ! 

(Bear kindly with my humble laj^s ;) 
The sacred chorus first was sung 

Upon the tirst of Christmas days ; 
The shepherds heard it overhead, — 

The joyful angels raised it then : 
Glory to Heaven on high, it said, 

And peace on earth to gentle men ! 

My song, save this, is little worth ; 

I laj' the weary pen aside. 
And wish you health and love and mirth, 

As fits the solemn Christmas-tide. 
As fits the holy Christmas birth. 

Be this, good friends, our carol still, — 
Be peace on earth, be peace on earth, 

To men of gentle will. 

WILLIAM Makepeace Thackeray. 



FEAGMENTS. 

The Lot of Mankind. 

Never morning wore 
To evening, but some heart did break. 

In Mcmoriam, vi. TENNYSON. 

Daughter of Jove, relentless power, 

Thou tamer of the human breast. 
Whose iron scourge and torturing hour 

The bad affright, afflict the best ! 

Hymn to Ad'oersity. T. GRAY. 

suffering, sad humanitj'^ ! 
ye afflicted ones, who lie 
Steeped to the lips in misery, 
Longing, and yet afraid to die, 
I'atient, though sorely tried ! 

Tim GobUt 0/ Li/e. I,ONGFHI.LOW. 

When sorrows come, they come not single spies. 
But in battalions. 

Hamlet, Actiw. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

One woe doth tread upon another's heel 
So fast they follow. 

Hamlet, Act iv. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

Woes cluster ; rare are solitary woes ; 

They love a train, they tread each other's heel. 

Night Thoughts, Night \\\. DR. E. YOUNG. 



life ! tliou art a galling load. 
Along a rough, a weary road, 
To wretches such as I ! 

Despondency. BURNS. 

A man I am, crossed with adversity. 

T-dio Gentlemen 0/ t-'erona. Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEAUM. 

A wretched soul, bruised with adversity. 

Comedy 0/ Errors, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Sympathy and Scorn. 
He jests at scars, that never felt a wound. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

No one is so accursed by fate, 
No one so utterly desolate, 

But some heart, though unknown, 

Eesponds unto his own. 

Endymion. LONGFELLOW. 

What precious drops are those. 
Which silently each other's track pursue, 
Bright as young diamonds in their infant dew ? 

Conquest 0/ Granada, Part //. Act iii. Sc. 1. Dryden'. 

'T is all men's office to speak patience 
To those that wring under the load of sorrow. 
But no man, virtue, nor sufficiency. 
To be so moral when he shall endure 
The like himself. 

:\Iuch Ado about Nothing, Act v. Sc. i, SH.^KESPE.\Rr.. 

Every one can master a grief, but he that has it. 

.Much Ado about Nothing, Act iii. Sc. 2. SH.AKESPEAR 1;. 

One writ with me in sour misfortune's book I 

Romeo and Juliet, ^Ict v. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARL. 



Press not a falling man too far. 

King Henry I ■HI., Act iii. Sc. 2. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Of all the griefs that harass the distrest. 
Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest. 

London. DR. S. JOHNSON. 



D1.SAPP01NTED Ambition. 

Here I and sorrows sit ; 
Here is my throne ; bid kings come bow to it. 

K"'S John, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown, 
And put a barren sceptre in my gripe. 
Thence to be wrenched with an unlineal hand. 
No son of mine succeeding. 

Macbeth, .4ctm.Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

And be these juggling fiends no more believed, 
That palter with us in a double sense ; 
That Iceep the Avord of promise to our ear. 
And break it to our hope. 

Macbeth, Act v. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 



■3 



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346 



POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



-^ 



And my large kingdom for a little grave, 
A little little grave, an obscure gi-ave. 

King Richard //., Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Thrice he assayed, and thrice in spite of scorn 
Tear.s, such as angels weep, burst forth. 

Paradise Lost, Boofc i. MiLTON'. 

WoLSEY. I have touched the highest point of 
all my greatness. 
And from that full meridian of my glory, 
1 haste now to my setting : I shall fall 
Like a bright exhalation in the evening, 
And no man see me more. 

King- Henry VIH., Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

An old man, broken with the storms of state. 
Is come to la}'- his weary bones among ye ; 
Give him a little earth for charity ! 

King Henry yUL, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees 
Is left this vault to brag of. 

Macbeth, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Woiild-Weariness. 
I 'ghi to be a-weary of the sun. 

Macbeth, Act v. Sc. 5. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



God ! God ! 
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable 
Seem to me all the uses of this world ! 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Man delights not me ; no, nor woman neither. 

Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



The Memory of Sorrows. 
Sorrows remembered sweeten present joy. 

The Course of Tijne, Book i. POLLOK. 

The hues of bliss more brightly glow, 
Chastised by sabler tints of woe. 

Ode on the Pleasure arising from Vicissitude. T. GRAY. 

Weep no more, nor sigh, nor groan, 
Sorrow calls no time that 's gone : 
Violets plucked, the sweetest rain 
Makes not fresh nor grow again. 

The Queen of Corinth, Act iii. Sc. 2. J. FLETCHER. 



The MEMonY of Joys. 

No greater grief than to remember days 
Of joy when misery is at hand. 

Jnferno, Cant. v. DANTE. 

Of joys departed, 
Not to return, how painful the remembrance ! 

The Grave. R. liLAIR. 



He that is stricken blind cannot forget 
The precious treasure of his eyesight lost. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

0, who can hold a fire in his hand 

By thinking on the frosty Caucasus ? 

Or cloy the hungry edge of appetite 

By bare imagination of a feast i 

Or wallow naked in December snow. 

By thinking on fantastic Summer's heat ? 

0, no ! the apprehension of the good 

Gives but the greater feeling to the worse. 

Hing Richard //., Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Bad News. 

Yet the first bringer of unwelcome news 
Hath but a losing office ; and his tongue 
Sounds ever after as a sullen bell, 
Remembered knolling a departed friend. 

King Henry IV., Part II. Act i. Sc. i. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



tB- 



Varied Misery. 
A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man. 

i:i?ig Lear, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Eating the bitter bread of banishment. 

King Richard II., Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

For suiferance is the badge of all our tribe. 

Merchant of Venice, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE, 

Lord of himself, — that heritage of woe ! 

Lara, Cant. i. BYRON. 

Lord of thy presence, and no land beside. 

King John, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

0, I could i)lay the woman with mine eyes. 
And braggart with my tongue ! 

Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Moping melancholy, 
And moonstruck madness. 

Paradise Lost, Book xi. Ml ETON. 

0, let not women's weapons, water-drops, 
Stain my man's cheeks. 

King Lear, Act ii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

The little dogs and all. 
Tray, Blanch, and Sweet-heart, see, they bark 
at me. 

King Lear, Act iii. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE. 

Vex not his ghost : 0, let him pass : he hates 

him, 
That would upon the rack of this tough world 
Stretch him out longer. 

King Lear, Act v. Sc. iii. SHAKESPEARE. 

In durance vile here nmst I wake and weep, 
And all my frowzy couch in sorrow steep. 

Epistle f>-om Usopus to Maria. BURNS. 



& 



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FRAGMENTS. 






547 



Consolation in Adversity. 

Cheered up himself with ends of verse, 
And sayings of philosophers. 

Hudibras, Part I. Cant. iii. BUTLER. 

On Fortune's cap we are not the very button. 

Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

I am not merr}'^ ; but I do beguile 
The thing 1 am, by seeming otherwise. 

Othello, Act ii. Sc. t. SHAKESPEARE. 

Heaven is not always angry when he strikes. 
But most chastises those whom most he likes. 

; 'erses to his Friend wider Affliction. J. POMFRET. 

The weariest and most loathed worldly life. 
That age, ache, penury, and imprisonment 
Can lay on nature, is a paradise 
To what we fear of death. 

Measure for Measure, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

While there 's life there 's hope, he cried. 

The Sick Man and the .Inr^cl. J. GAY. 



Loss OF Property. 

Who goeth a borrowing 
Goeth a sorrowing. 



Five Hundred Points of Good Hiisba 



tdry : yjene's Abstract. 

T. TUSSER. 



You take my house when you do take the prop 
That doth sustain my house ; j'ou take my life 
When you do take the means whereby I live. 

Merchant of l^enice, .4ct iv. 5c. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

The loss of wealth is loss of dirt. 

As sages in all times assert ; 

The happy man 's without a shirt. 



Be Merry, Friends, 



J. Hevwoou. 



If ever you have looked on better days ; 

If ever been where bells have knolled to church. 

As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

We have seen better days. 

Tiinon of .-It hens, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

My pride fell with my fortunes. 

As You Like It. Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



The High and the Low. 
He that is down needs fear no fall. 

Pilgrim's Progress, Part/I. BUNYAN. 

I am not now in fortune's power ; 
He that is down can fall no lower. 

Hudibras, Part I. Cant. iii. BUTLER. 

Their feet through faithless leather met the dirt, 
And oftener changed their principles than shirt. 

Epistle to Mr. Pope. E. YOUNG. 



'T is better to be lowly born, 
And range with humble livers in content, 
Than to be perked up in a glistering grief, 
And wear a golden sorrow. 

King Henry VIII., Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Yes, child of suffering, thou may'st well be sure. 
He who ordained the Sabbath loves the poor ! 

Urania. O. W. HOLMES. 

As if Misfortune made the throne her seat, 
And none could be unhappy but the great. 

The Fair Penitent : Prologue. N. ROWE. 

None think the great unhappy, but the great. 

LoTieof Fame, Satire \. DR. E. YOUNG. 



Hope in Misery. ' 

The wretch condemned with life to part, 

Still, still on hope relies ; 
And every pang that rends the heart 

Bids expectation rise. 

The Captivity, Act ii. COLDS.MITH. 

The worst is not 
So long as we can say, This is the icorst. 

King Lear, ,4ct\v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

The miserable have no other medicine. 
But only hope. 

Measure for Measure, Act Hi. Sc. r. SHAKESPEARE. 

Macb. Canst thou not minister to a mind 
diseased. 
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow. 
Raze out the written troubles of the brain, 
And with some sweet oblivious antidote 
Cleanse the stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff. 
Which weighs upon the heart ? 

DocT. Therein the patient 

Must minister to himself. 

Macbeth, Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Briefness of Joys. 

What though my winged hours of bliss have been, 
Like angel-visits, few and far between. 

Pleasures of Hope, Part II. „ T.CAMPBELL. 

How fading are the joys we dote upon ! 

Like apparitions seen and gone ; 

But those which soonest take their flight 
Are the most exquisite and strong ; 

Like angels' visits, short and bright. 
Mortality 's too weak to bear them long. 

The Parting. J. NORRIS. 



Despair. 

I am one, my liege, 
Whom the vile blows and buffets of the world 
Have so incensed, that I am reckless Avhat 
I do to spite the world. 

Macbeth, Actm.Sc.2. SHAKESPEARE 



1^ 



iSr. 



48 



POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY. 



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How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is 
To have a thankless child ! 

A7«i' Lear, Act i. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

0, that way madness lies ; let me shnn that ; 
iSfo more of that. 

Kins Lear, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

I would that I were low laid in my grave ; 
I am not worth this coil that 's made for me. 

King John, Act il Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

I am a tainted wether of the flock. 

Merchant of Ve7iice, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

No words suffice the secret soul to show, 
For truth denies all eloq^uence to woe. 

The Corsair, Cant. iii. BYRON. 

"Where peace 
And rest can never dwell, hope never comes, 
That conies to all. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MILTON. 

The strongest and the fiercest spirit 
That fought in heaven, now fiercer by despair. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON'. 



Resignation. 

But hushed be every thought that springs 
From out the bitterness of things. 

Addressed to Sir G. H. B. WORDSWORTH. 

'T is impious in a good man to be sad. 

Nisht Thoughts, Night \\. DR. E. YOUNG. 



Heaven a Refuge for the Wretched. 

Who ne'er his bread in sorrow ate, 

Who ne'er the mournful midnight hours 

Weeping upon his bed has sate, 

He knows you not, ye Heavenly Powei's. 

Hyperion, Book i, : Motto : from Goethe's It^iUiehn Meis'er. 

LONGFELLOW. 

In man's most dark extremity 
Oft succor dawns from Heaven. 

The Lord of the Isles, Cant. \. SCOTT. 

The path of sorrow, and that path alone. 
Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown. 

To an Afflicted Protestant Lady. Co\\'PHR. 

Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your 

anguish — 
Earth has no sorrow that Heaven cannot heal. 

Sacred Songs : Come, ye Disconsolate. MOORE. 



The Uses of Adversity. 

Sweet are the uses of adversity, 

Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous. 

Wears yet a precious jewel in his head. 

As You Like It, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

He that lacks time to mourn, lacks tune to mend. 
Eternity mourns that. 'T is an ill cure 
For life's worst ills, to have no time to feel them. 
Where sorrow 's held intrusive and turned out. 
There wisdom will not enter, nor true power. 
Nor aught that dignifies humanity. 

Philip yan .drteiielde. Part I. Acti. Sc. 5. H. TAYLOR. 

The good are better made by ill. 
As odors crushed are sweeter still. 

Jacqueline. ■ S. ROGERS. 

As aromatic plants bestow 
No spicy fragrance while they grow ; 
But, crushed or trodden to the ground, 
Difi'use their balmy sweets around. 

The Captivity, Act i. GOLDSMITH. 

As sunshine, broken in the rill. 
Though turned astray, is sunshine still. 

Fire ll'orshippers. MOORE. 

Tho' losses and crosses 

Be lessons right severe. 

There 's wit there, ye '11 get there, 

Ye '11 find nae otherwhere. 

Epistle to Davie. BURNS. 

By adversity are wrought 
The greatest works of admiration. 
And all the fair e.xamjiles of renown 
Out of distress and misery are grown. 

Oh the F.arl of Southampton. S. DANIEL. 

More safe I sing with mortal voice, unchanged 
To hoarse or mute, though fallen on evil days, 
On evil days though fallen, and evil tongues. 

Paradise Lost, Book vii. MILTON. 

Calamity is man's true touchstone. 

Four Plays in One: The Triumph of Honor, Sc. r. 

BEAUMONT and FLliTCHER. 

Like a ball that bounds 
According to the force with which 't was thrown. 
So in affliction's violence, he that 's wise 
The niore he 's cast down will the higher rise. 

Microcosmos. NABB. 

0, fear not in a world like this, 
And thou shalt know erelong, — 

Know how .sublime a thing it is 
To sufi'cr and be strong. 

The Light of Stars. LONGFELLOW. 



B- 



^ 



p- ^ 



ipi Ci! f^CH. (I0mm^ if^^^^t^ f^) cM7kc^irof-r 



^iL\lh0i4-- 







^y 







^ : ^ 



iS- 



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POEMS OF RELIGION. 



L 



THE CELESTIAL COUNTRY. 

The poem De Cotite^nptu Mundi was written in dactylic hexam- 
eter Latin verse by Bernard de Morlaix, Monlv of Ouni, who lived 
in the earlier half of the twelfth century. It contained three thou- 
sand lines divided into three books. The poem commences : — 

Hora novissima. tempora pessima 

Sunt, vigilemus. 
Ecce minaciter imminet arbiter 

Ille supremus. 
Imminet. imminet et mala terminet, 

.-Equa coronet, 
Recta remuneret, anxia liberet, 

.'Hthera donet, 
Auferat aspera duraque pondera 

Mentes onustre 
Sobria muniat, improba puniat, 

Utraque juste. 

Which have been rendered : — 

Hours of the latest ! times of the basest I 

Our vigil before us ! 
Judgment eternal of Being supernal ^ 

Now hanging o"er us ! 
Evil to terminate, equity vindicate, 

Cometh the Kingly ; 
Righteousness seeing, anxious hearts freeing. 

Crowning each singly. 
Bearing life's weariness, tasting life's bitterness. 

Life as it nmst be, 
Th' righteous retaining, sinners arraigning, 

Judging all justly. 

The translation following is of a portion of the poem distin- 
guished by the sub-title " Laus Patri^ CCELESTIS. " 

The world is very evil, 

The times are waxing late ; 
Be .sober and keep vigil, 

The Judge is at the gate, — 
The Judge that comes in mercy, 

The Judge that comes with might, 
To terminate the evil, 

To diadem the right. 
When the just and gentle Monarch 

Shall summon from the tomb, 
Let man, the guilty, tremble. 

For Man, the God, shall doom ! 

Arise, arise, good Christian, 

Let right to wrong succeed ; 
Let penitential sorrow 

To heavenly gladness lead, — • 
To the light that hath no evening, 

That knows nor moon nor sun, 
The light so new and golden, 

The light that is but one. 



And when the Sole- Begotten 

Shall render up once more 
The kingdom to the Father, 

Whose own it was before. 
Then glory yet unheard of 

Shall shed abroad its ray, 
Resolving all enigmas. 

An endless Sabbath-day. 

For thee, dear, dear Country ! 

Mine eyes their vigils keep ; 
For very love, beholding 

Thy happy name, they weep. 
The mention of thy glory 

Is unction to the breast. 
And medicine in sickness. 

And love, and life, and rest. 

one, only Mansion ! 

Paradise of Joy, 
Where tears are ever banished, 

And smiles have no alloy ! 
Beside thy living waters 

All plants are, great and small, 
The cedar of the forest. 

The hyssop of the wall ; 
With jaspers glow thy bulwarks. 

Thy streets with emeialds blaze, 
The sardius and the topaz 

Unite in thee their rays ; 
Thine ageless walls are bonded 

With amethyst unpriced ; 
Thy Saints build up its fabric, 

And the corner-stone is Chki.st. 

The Cross is all thy splendor, 

The Crucified thy praise ; 
His laud and benediction 

Thy ransomed people raise : 
"Jesus, the Gem of Beauty. 

True God and Man," they sing, 
"The never-failing Garden, 

The ever-golden Ring ; 
The Door, the Pledge, the Husband, 

The Guardian of his Court ; 
The Day-star of Salvation, 

The Porter and the Port ! " 



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[fi — 



POE.MS Oi' KELIGION. 



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tfr- 



Thou hast mo shore, fair ocean ! 

Thou hast no time, bright day ! 
Dear fountain of refreshment 

To pilgrims far away ! 
Upon the Rock of Ages 

They raise thy holy tower ; 
Thine is the victor's laurel, 

And thine the golden dower ! 

Thou feel'st in mystic rapture, 

Bride that know'st no guile, 
The Prince's sweetest kisses, 

The Prince's loveliest smile ; 
Unfading lilies, bracelets 

Of living pearl thine own ; 
The Lamb is ever near thee, 

The Bridegroom tliine alone. 
The Crown is he to guerdon, 

The Buckler to protect, 
And he himself the Mansion, 

And he the Architect. 

The only art thou needest — 

Thanksgiving for thy lot ; 
The only joy thou seekest — 

The Life where Death is not. 
And all thine endless leisure, 

In sweetest accents, sings 
The ill that was thy merit, 

The wealth that is thy King's ! 

Jerusalem the golden, 

With milk and honey blest. 
Beneath thy contemj^lation 

Sink heart and voice oppressed. 
I know not, I know not. 

What social joys are there ! 
What radiancy of glory, 

AVliat light beyond comjjare ! 

And when I fain would sing them, 
My sy)irit fails and faints ; 

And vainly would it image 
The assembly of the Saints. 

They stand, those halls of Zion, 

Conjubilant with song. 
And bright with many an angel, 

And all the martyr throng ; 
The Prince is ever in them, 

The daylight is serene ; 
The pastures of the Blessed 

Are decked in glorious sheen. 

There is the Throne of David, 
And there, from care released. 

The song of them that triumph. 
The shout of them that feast ; 



And they who, with their Leader, 
Have conquered in the fight, 

Forever and forever 

Are clad in robes of white ! 

holy, placid harp-notes 

Of that eternal hynm ! 
sacred, sweet reflection. 

And peace of Seraphim ! 
thirst, forever ardent, 

Yet evermore content ! 
true peculiar vision 

Of God cunctipotent ! 
Ye know the many mansions 

For many a glorious name. 
And divers retributions 

That divers merits claim ; 
For midst the constellations 

That deck our earthly sky. 
This star than that is brighter — 

And so it is on high. 

Jerusalem the glorious ! 

The glory of the Elect ! 
dear and future vision 

That eager hearts expect ! 
Even now by faith I see thee, 

Even here thy walls discern ; 
To thee my thoughts are kindled, 

And strive, and pant, and 3'earn. 

Jerusalem the only. 

That look'st from heaven below, 
In thee is all my glory. 

In me is all my woe ; 
And though my body may not, 

M3' spirit seeks thee fain, 
Till flesh and earth return me 

To earth and flesh again. 

none can tell thy bulwarks, 

How gloriously they rise ! 
Jione can tell thy capitals 

Of beautiful device ! 
Th}' loveliness oppresses 

All human thought and heart ; 
And none, peace, Zion, 

Can sing thee as thou art ! 

Kew mansion of new people, 

Whom God's own love and light 
Promote, increase, make holy, 

Identify, unite ! 
Thou City of the Angels ! 

Thou City of the Lord ! 
Whose everlasting music 

Is the glorious decachord ! 



^ 



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POEMS OF llELIGION. 



^^^T^ 



And there the band of Prophets 

United praise ascribes, 
And there the twelvefold chorus 

Of Israel's ransomed tribes. 
The lily-beds of virgins, 

The roses' martyr-glow, 
The cohort of the Fatliers 

Who kept the faith below. 

And there the Sole-Begotten 

Ij Lord in regal state, — 
He, Judah's mystic Lion, 

He, Lamb Immaculate. 
fields that know no sorrow ! 

state that fears no strife ! 

princely bowers ! land of flowers ! 

realm and home of Life ! 

Jerusalem, exulting 
On that securest shore, 

1 hope thee, wish thee, sing thee, 
And love thee evermore ! 

I ask not for my merit, 

1 seek not to deny 
My merit is destruction, 

A child of wrath am I ; 
But yet with faith I venture 

And hope upon my waj^ ; 
For those perennial guerdons 

I labor night and day. 

The best and dearest Father, 
Who made me and who saved, 



Bore with me in defilement, 

And from defilement laved. 
When in his strength I struggle, 

For very joy I leap. 
When in my sin 1 totter, 

I weep, or try to weep : 
Then grace, sweet grace celestial, 

Shall all its love display. 
And David's Eoyal Fountain 

Purge every sin away. 

mine, mj' golden Zion ! 

O lovelier far than gold, 
With laurel-girt battalions. 

And safe victorious fold ! 
sweet and blessed Country, 

Shall I ever see thy face ? 

sweet and blessed Country, 
Shall I ever win thy grace ? 

1 have the hope within me 

To comfort and to bless ! 
Shall I ever win the piize itself ? 
tell me, tell me. Yes ! 

Exult ! dust and ashes ! 

The Lord shall be thy part ; 
His only, his forever, 

Thou shalt be, and thou art ! 
Exult, dust and ashes ! 

The Lord shall be thy part ; 
His only, his forever. 

Thou shalt be, and thou art ! 

From the Latin of BERNARD DE MORLAIX. 
Translation of JOHN MASON NEALE. 



DIES IR.E. 



[A Latin poem by THOMAS OF CeLANO (a Neapolitan village), about A. D. 1250. Perhaps no poem has been more frequently 
translated. A German collector published eighty-seven versions in German. Dr. Coles, of Newark, N. J., has made thirteen. Se\en 
are given in the " Seven Great Hymns of the Mediaeval Church," Randolph & Co., N. Y. The version here given preserves the 
measure of the original.] 



Dies IR^, dies ILLA, dies tribltlatiojlis et anffiisticz, dies ca- 
la>nitatzs et viiserice, dies teneb^-arinn et cati^inis, dies nelntlcs et 
turbntis dies ticbcE et cLcingoris super civitiltis niitnitas^ et super 
auiTiclos excelsos ! — Sophonias i. 15, 16. 



Dies irse, dies ilia ! 
Solvet sfficlum in favilla. 
Teste David cum Sybilla. 



That day, a day of wrath, a day o/trouble and distress, a 
day of 'wasteness and desolation, ci day 0/ darkness and gloomi- 
ness, a day 0/ clouds and thick darkness, a day 0/ the trumpet 
and alarm against the fenced cities, ajid against the high tow- 
ers ! — Zephaniah i. 15, 16. 

Day of vengeance, without morrow ! 
Earth shall end in flame and sorrow. 
As from Saint and Seer we borrow. 



Quantus tremor est futurus, 
Quaudo Judex est venturus, 
Cuncta stricte discussurus ! 



Ah ! what terror is impending. 
When the Judge is seen descending, 
And each secret veil is rending ! 



t. 



Tuba mirum spargens sonum 
Per sepulcra regionum, 
Coget omnes ante thronum. 



To the throne, the trumpet sounding. 
Through the sepulchres resounding, 
Summons all, with voice astounding. 



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54 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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Mors stiipebit, et natura, 
Quum resurget creatura, 
Judicanti responsura. 

Liber scriptus proferetur, 
In quo totum continetur, 
Unde mundus judicetur. 

Judex ergo cum sedebit, 
Quidquid latet, apparebit : 
Nil iimltum remanebit. 

Quid sum, miser ! tunc dicturus, 
Quern patronum rogaturus, 
Quum vix Justus sit securus ? 

Rex tremendpe majestatis, 
Qui salvandos salvas gratis, 
Salva me, fons pietatis ! 

Recerdare, Jesu pie. 
Quod sum causa tuae vise ; 
Ne me perdas ilia die ! 

Qucierens me, sedisti lassus, 
Redemisti, crucem passus : 
Tantus labor non sit cassus ! 

Juste Judex ultionis, 
Donum fac remissionis 
Ante diem rationis ! 

Ingemisco tanquam reus, 
Culpa rubet vultus meus ; 
Supplicauti parce, Deus ! 

Qui Mariani absolvisti, 
Et latronem exaudisti, 
Milii quo(iue spem dedisti. 

Preces meffi non sunt digns, 
Sed tu bonus fac benigne 
Ne perenni cremer igne ! ^ 

Inter oves locum pniesta, ' 
Et ab hffidis me sequestra, 
Statuens in parte dextra, 

Confutatis maledictis, 
Plammis acribus addictis, 
Voca me cum benedictis ! 

Oro supplex et acclinis. 
Cor contritum ([uasi cinis, 
Gere curam mei finis ! 

Lacrymosa dies ilia, 
Qua resurget ex favilla 
Judicandus homo reus ; 
Huie ergo parce, Deus ! 

THOIIAS A CELANO. 



Death and Nature, mazed, are quaking, 
When, the grave's long slumber breaking, 
Man to judgment is awaking. 

On the written Volume's pages. 
Life is shown in all its stages — 
Judgment-record of past ages. 

Sits the Judge, the raised arraigning, 
Darkest mysteries explaining. 
Nothing unavenged remaining. 

"What shall I then say, unfriended. 

By no advocate attended, 

When the just are scarce defended ? 

King of majesty tremendous. 
By thy saving grace defend us. 
Fount of pity, safety send us ! 

Holy Jesus, meek, forbearing, 

For my sins the death-crown wearing. 

Save me, in that da}', despairing ! 

Worn and -weary, thou hast sought me ; 
By thy cross and passion bought me — 
Spare the hope thy labors brought me ! 

Righteous Judge of retribiition, 
Give, give me absolution 
Ere the day of dissolution ! 

As a guilty culprit groaning. 
Flushed my face, my errors owning. 
Hear, God, my spirit's moaning ! 

Thou to Mary gav'st remission, 
Heard'st the dying thief's petition, 
Bad'st me hope in my contrition. 

In my prayers no grace discerning, 

Yet on me thy favor turning. 

Save my soul from endless burning ! 

Give me, when thy sheep confiding 
Tliou art from the goats dividing, ; 
On thy right a place abiding ! 

When the wicked are confounded, 
And by bitter flames surrounded, 
Be my joyful pardon sounded ! 

Prostrate, all my guilt discerning. 
Heart as though to ashes turning ; 
Save, save me from the burning ! 

Day of weeping, when from ashes 
Man shall rise mid lightning flashes, — 
Guilt}', trembling with contrition, 
Save him, Father, from perdition ! 

John A. Dix. 



SI 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



rn 



STABAT MATER DOLOROSA. 



fA Latin poem, vyritten in the thirteenth century by JACOPONE, a Franciscan friar, of Umbria. Of this and tlie two preceding poems 
Dr Neale says : ■•The V, Contanptu is the most lovely, the Die, Iru the most sublime, and the Stabat Mater the most pathetic of 
mediosval poems. J poi-i^-lh,, ui 



Stabat Mater dolorosa 
Juxta cruceni laeryinosa, 

Dum pendebat filius ; 
Cujus aniinain gementem, 
Contristatam et dolentem, 

Pertransivit gladius. 

quam tristis et afflicta, 
Fuit ilia benedicta 

Mater nnigeniti, 
Qufe moerebat et dolebat, 
Pia mater, dum videbat 

Nati poenas inclyti ! 

Qnis est homo qui non fleret, 
Cliristi matrem si videret 

In tanto supplicio ? 
Quis non posset contristari 
Piam matrem eontemplari 

Dolentem cum filio ? 

Pro peccatis suae gentis, 
Yidit Jesum in tormentis, 

Et Magellis subditum. 
Vidit suum dulcem natum, 
Morientem, desolatum, 

Dum emisit spiritum. 

Eia mater, fons amoris, 
Me sentire vim doloris 

Fac, ut tecum lugeam. 
Fac ut ardeat cor meum 
In amando Christum Deum, 

Ut illi complaceam. 

Sancta Mater, istud agas, 
Crucifixi fige plagas 

Cordi meo valide. 
Tui nati vulnerati. 
Tarn dignati pro me j^ati, 

Poenas mecum divide. 

Fac me vere tecum Here, 
Crucifixo condolere, 

Donee ego vixero ; 
Juxta crucem tecum stare, 
Et tibi me sociare 

In planctu desidero. 

Virgo virginum prseclara, 
]\Iihi jam non sis amara ; 

Fac me tecum plangere ; 
Fac ut i)ortem Christi mortem, 
Passionis fac consortem, 

Et plagas recolere. 



Stood the afflicted mother weejiing, 
Near the cross her station keejung 

Whereon hung her Son and Lord ; 
Through whose spirit sympathizing, 
Sorrowing and agonizing, 

Also passed the cruel sword. 

Oh ! how mournful and distressed 
Was that favored and most blessed 

Mother of the only Son, 
Trembling, grieving, bosom heaving, 
While perceiving, scarce believing. 

Pains of that Illustrious One ! 

Who the man, who, called a brother. 
Would not weep, saw he Christ's mother 

In such deep distress and wild ? 
Who could not sad tribute render 
Witnessing that mother tender 

Agonizing with her child ? 

For his people's sins atoning. 
Him she saw in torments groaning, 

Given to the scourger's rod ; 
Saw her darling offspring dying, 
Desolate, forsaken, crying. 

Yield his spirit up to God. 

Make me feel thy sorrow's power. 
That with thee I tears may shower, 

Tender mother, fount of love ! 
Make my heart with love unceasing 
Burn toward Christ the Lord, that pleasing 

I may be to him above. 

Holy mother, this be granted, 

That the slain one's wounds be planted 

Firmly in my heart to bide. 
Of him wounded, all astounded — 
Depths unbounded for me sounded — 

All the pangs with me divide. 

Make me weep with thee in union ; 
With the Crucified, communion 

In his grief and suffering give ; 
Near the cross, with tears unfailing, 
I would join thee in thy wailing 

Here as long as I shall live. 

Maid of maidens, all excelling ! 
Be not bitter, me repelling ; 

Make thou me a mourner too ; 
Make me bear about Christ's dying, 
Share his passion, shame defying ; 

All his wounds in me renew. 



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356 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



^a 



Fac me plagis vulnerari, 
Cruce hac inebriari, 

Et cruore filii ; 
Inflammatus et accensus, 
Per te, Virgo, sim defensus 

In die judicii. 

Fac me cruce custodiri, 
Morte Christi prsemuniri, 

Confoveri gratia. 
Quando corpus morietur, 
Fac ut animte donetur 

Paradisi gloria. 



FRA JACOPONE. 



Wound for wound be there created ; 
With the cross intoxicated 

For thy Son's dear sake, I pray — 
May I, fired with pure affection, 
Virgin, have tlirough thee protection 

In tlie solemn Judgment Day. 

Let me by the cross be warded, 
By the death of Christ be guarded, 

Nourished by divine supplies. 
When the body death hath riven, 
Grant that to the soul be given 

Glories bright of Paradise. 

Abraham Coles. 



[This hymn was written i 
ranlc to the Dies /m.1 



VENI SANCTE SPIRITUS. 

. the tenth century by ROBERT II., the gentle son of HUGH Capet. It is often mentioned as second 



t&^ 



Vent, Sancte Spiritus, 
Et emitte coelitus 
Lucis tuae radium. 

Veni, pater pauperum, 
Veni, dator munerum, 
Veni, lumen cordium. 

Consolator optime, 
Dulcis hospes animse, 
Dulce refrigerium. 

In labore requies, 
In iestu temperies, 
In fletu solatium. 

lirx beatissiraa ! 
Reple cordis intima, 
Tuorum hdelium. 

Sine tuo numine, 
Nihil est in homine. 
Nihil est innoxium. 

Lava quod est sordidum, 
Riga quod est aridum, 
Sana quod est saucium. 

Flecte quod est rigiduni, 
Fove quod est frigiduni, 
Rege quod est devium. 

Da tuis fidelibus, 
In te confidentibus. 
Sacrum septenarium ; 

Da virtutis meritum, 
Da salutis exitum, 
Da perenne gaudium ! 

ROBERT II. OF France. 



Come, Holy Ghost ! thou fire divine ! 
From highest heaven on us down shine ! 
Comforter, be thy comfort mine ! 

Come, Father of the poor, to earth ; 
Come, with thy gifts of precious worth ; 
Come, Light of all of mortal birth ! 

Thou rich in comfort ! Ever blest 

The heart where thou art constant guest, 

Who giv'st the heavy-laden rest. 

Come, thou in whom our toil is sweet. 
Our shadow in the noonday heat, 
Before whom mourning flieth fleet. 

Bright Sun of Grace ! thy sunshine dart 
On all who cry to thee apart, 
And fill with gladness every heart. 

Whate'er without thy aid is wrought, 
Or skilful deed, or wisest thought, 
God counts it vain and merely naught. 

cleanse us that we sin no more. 
O'er parched souls thy waters pour ; 
Heal the sad heart that acheth sore. 

Thy will be ours in all our ways ; 
O melt the frozen with thy rays ; 
Call home the lost in error's maze. 

And grant us. Lord, who cry to thee, 
And hold the Faith in unit}"^. 
Thy precious gifts of charity ; 

That we may live in holiness, 
And find in death our happiness, 
And dwell with thee in lasting bliss ! 

CATHARINE WlNKWORTU. 



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POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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VENI CREATOR SPIRITUS. 



[Tliis hymn, one of the most important in the service of the Latin Church, has been sometimes attributed to the Empeuop. 
Charlemagne. The better opinion, liowever, inclines to POPE GRhGORY 1., called the Great, as the author, and fixes its ori;,'i]i 
somewhere in the sixtli century.J 



Veni, Creator Spiritus, 
Mentes tuorum visita, 
Imple superna gratia, 
QutB tu creasti pectora. 



Creator Spirit, by whose aid 

The world's foundations first were laid, 

Come visit every pious niind, 

Come pour thy joys on human kind ; 

From sin and sorrow set us free. 

And make thy temples worthy thee. 



Qui diceris Paraclitus, 
Altissimi donum Dei, 
Pons vivus, ignis, caritas, 
Et spiritalis unctio. 



source of uncreated light, 
The Father's promised Paraclete ! 
Thrice holy fount, thrice holy fire. 
Our hearts with heavenly love inspire ; 
Come, and thy sacred unction bring, 
To sanctify us while we sing. 



Tu septiformis munere, 
Dextrse Dei tu digitus 
Tu rite promissum Patris, 
Sermone ditaiis guttura. 



Plenteous of grace, descend from high, 

Rich in thy seven-fold energy ! 

Thou strength of his almighty hand, 

Whose power does heaven and earth command ! 

Proceeding Spirit, our defence. 

Who dost the gifts of tongues dispense, 

And crown'st thy gift with eloquence ! 



Accende lumen sensibiis, 
Infunde amorem cordibus, 
Infirma nostri corporis 
Virtute firmans perpeti. 



Refine and purge our earthly parts ; 
But, 0, inflame and fire our hearts ! 
Our frailties help, our vice control, 
Submit the senses to the soul ; 
And when rebellious they are grown, 
Then lay thy hand and hold 'em down. 



Hostem repellas longius, 
Pacemque clones protinus 
Ductore sic to praevio 
Vitemus omne noxium. 



Chase from our minds the infernal foe, 
And peace, the fruit of love, bestow ; 
And, lest our feet should step astraj', 
Protect and guide us on the way. 



Per te seiamus da Patrem, 
Noscamus atque Filium ; 
Te utriusque Spiritum 
Credamus omni tempore. 



Make us eternal truths receive, 
And practise all that we believe ; 
Give us thyself, that we may see 
The Father and the Son by thee. 



Deo Patri sit gloria 
Et Filio c|ui a mortuis 
Surrexit, ac Paraclito, 
In sseculorum ssecula. 

St. Gregory the Great. 



Immortal honor, endless fame, 
Attend the Almighty Father's name ; 
The Saviour Son be glorified, 
Who for lost man's redemption died ; 
And equal adoration be. 
Eternal Paraclete, to thee. 

JOHN DRVDEV. 



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POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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THE NEAV JERUSALEM. 

MOTHER dear, Jerusalem, 

When shall I come to thee ? 
"When shall my sorrows have an end, — 

Thy joys when shall I see ? 

happy harbor of God's saints ! 

sweet and pleasant soil ! 
In thee no sorrow can be found, 

Nor grief, nor care, nor toil. 

No dimly cloud o'ershadows thee. 
Nor gloom, nor darksome night ; 

But every soul shines as the sun, 
For God himself gives light. 

Thy walls are made of precious stone, 

Thy bulwarks diamond-square. 
Thy gates are all of orient pearl, — , 

God ! if I were there ! 

my sweet home, Jerusalem ! 

Thy joys when shall I see ? — 
The King sitting upon thy throne, 

And thy felicity ? 

Thy gardens and thy goodly walks 

Continually are green, 
Where grow such sweet and pleasant flowers 

As nowhere else are seen. 

Quite through the streets with pleasing sound 

The Hood of life doth flow ; 
And on the banks, on every side. 

The trees of life do grow. 

These trees each month yield ripened fruit ; 

Forevermore they spring, 
And all the nations of the earth *■ 

To thee their honors bring. 

Jerusalem, God's dwelling-place 
Full sore 1 long to see ; 

that my sorrows had an end. 
That I might dwell in thee ! 

1 long to see Jerusalem, 
The comfort of us all ; 

For thou art fair and beautiful, -— 
None ill can thee befall. 

No candle needs, no moon to shine, 

No glittering star to light ; 
For Christ the King of Righteousness 

Forever shineth bright. 

0, passing happy were my state, 
Might I be worthy found 



To wait upon my God and King, 
His praises there to sound ! 

Jerusalem ! Jerusalem ! 

Thy joys fain would I see ; 
Come quickly, Lord, and end my grief, 

And take me home to thee ! 

DAVID DICKSON. 



LITANY. 

Saviour, when in dust to thee 
Low we bend the adoring knee ; 
When, repentant, to the skies 
Scarce we lift our weeping eyes, — 
O, by all thy pains and woe 
Suffered once for man below, 
Bending from thy throne on high, 
Hear our solemn litany ! 

By thy helpless infant years ; 
By thy life of want and tears ; 
By thy days of sore distress 
In the savage wilderness ; 
By the dread mysterious hour 
Of the insulting tempter's power, — 
Turn, 0, turn a favoring eye. 
Hear our solemn litany ! 

By the sacred griefs that wept 
O'er the grave where Lazarus slept ; 
By the boding tears that flowed 
Over Salem's loved abode ; 
By the anguished sigh that told 
Treachery lurked within thy fold, — 
From thy seat above the sky 
Hear our solemn litany ! 

By thine hour of dire despair ; 
By thine agony of prayer ; 
By the cross, the nail, the thorn. 
Piercing spear, and torturing scorn ; 
By the gloom that veiled the skies 
O'er the dreadful sacrifice, — 
Listen to our humble cry. 
Hear our solemn litany ! 

By thy deep expiring groan ; 

By the sad sepulchral stone ; 

By the vault whose dark abode 

Held in vain the rising God ; 

O, from earth to heaven restored. 

Mighty, reascended Lord, — 

Listen, listen to the cry 

Of our solemn litany ! 

SIR Robert Grant 



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POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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THE HOLY SPIRIT. 

In the hour of my distress, 
When temptations me oppress, 
And when I my sins confess, 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When I lie within my bed, 
Sick at heart, and sick in liead. 
And with doubts discomforted. 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When the house doth sigh and weep, 
And the workl is drowned in sleep, 
Yet mine eyes the watch do keep, 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When the artless doctor sees 
No one hope but of his fees. 
And his skill runs on the lees, 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When his potion and his pill 
Has or none or little skill, 
Meet for nothing but to kill, — 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When the passing-bell doth toll, 
And the Furies, in a shoal, 
Come to fright a parting soul. 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When the tapers now burn blue, 
And the comforters are few, 
And that number more than true, 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When the priest his last hath prayed, 
And I nod to what is said 
Because my speech is now decayed, 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When, God knows, I 'm tost about 
Either with despair or doubt. 
Yet before the glass be out, 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When the tempter me pursu'th 
With the sins of all my youth, 
And half damns me with untruth, 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When the flames and hellish cries 
Fright mine ears, and fright mine eyes, 
And all terrors me surprise. 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

When the judgment is revealed. 
And that opened which was sealed, — 
When to thee 1 have appealed, 
Sweet Spirit, comfort me ! 

Robert Herrick. 



DESIRE. 

Tiiou, who dost dwell alone ; 
Thou, who dost know thine own ; 
Thou, to whom all are known, 
From the cradle to the grave, — 
Save, 0, save ! 

From the world's temptations ; 
From tribulations ; 
From that tierce anguish 
Wherein we languish ; 
From that torpor deep 
Wherein we lie asleep, 
Heavy as death, cold as the grave, — 
Save, 0, save ! 

When the soul, growing clearer. 
Sees God no nearer ; 
When the soul, mounting higher. 
To God conies no nigher ; 
But the arch-fiend Pride 
Mounts at her side. 
Foiling her high emprize. 
Sealing her eagle eyes. 
And, when she fain would soar. 
Makes idols to adore ; 
Changing the pure emotion 
Of her high devotion, 
To a skin-deep sense 
Of her own eloquence ; 
Strong to deceive, strong to enslave, ^ 
Save, 0, save ! 

From the ingrained fashion 
Of this earthly nature 
That mars thy creature ; 
From grief, that is but passion ; 
From mirth, that is but feigning ; 
From tears, that bring no healing ; 
From wild and weak complaining ; — 
Thine old strength revealing, 
Save, 0, save ! 

From doubt, where all is double. 
Where wise men are not strong ; 
Where comfort turns to trouble ; 
Where just men suffer wrong ; 
Where sorrow treads on joy ; 
Where sweet things soonest cloy ; 
Where faiths are built on dust ; 
Where love is half mistrust. 
Hungry, and barren, and sharp as the sea 
0, set us free ! 

0, let the false dream fly 
Where our sick souls do lie. 
Tossing continually. 



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60 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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0, ■where thy voice doth come, 
Let all doubts be dumb ; 
Let all words be mild ; 
All strife be reconciled ; 
All pains beguiled. 
Light bring no blindness ; 
Love no uukindness ; 
Knowledge no ruin ; 
Fear no undoing, 
From the cradle to the grave, — 
Save, 0, save ! 

MATTHEW ARNOLD. 



MY GOD, I LOVE THEE. 

My God, I love thee ! not because 

I liope for heaven thereby ; 
Nor because thoSe who love thee not 

Must burn eternally. 

Thou, my Jesus, thou didst me 

Upon the cross embrace ! 
For me didst bear the nails and spear, 

And manifold disgrace, 

And griefs and torments numberless, 

And sweat of agony. 
Yea, death itself, — and all for one 

That was thine euenij^. 

Then why, blessed Jesus Christ, 

Should 1 not love thee well ? 
Not for the hope of winning heaven, 

Nor of escaping hell ; 

Not with the hope of gaining aught, 

Not seeking a reward ; 
But as thyself hast loved me, 

everlasting Lord ! 

E'en so T love thee, and will love, 
And in thy praise will sing, — 

Solely because thou art my God, 
And my eternal King. 

From tlie Lntin of ST I'RANCIS XAVIER. 
Translation of EDWARD CASWALL. 



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DROP, DEOP, SLOW TEARS. 

Drop, drop, slow tears, 

And bathe those beauteous feet 
Which brought from heaven 

The news and Prince of peace ! 
Cease not, wet eyes. 

His mercies to entreat ; 
To cry for vengeance 

Sin doth never cease ; 



In your deep floods 

Drown all my faults and fears ; 
Nor let his eye 

See sin but through my tears. 

Phineas Fletcher. 



DARKNESS IS THINNING. 

Darkness is thinning ; shadows are retreating ; 
Morning and light are coming in their beauty ; 
Suppliant seek we, with an earnest outcry, 
God the Almighty ! 

So that our Master, having mercy on us. 
May repel languor, may bestow salvation. 
Granting us. Father, of thy loving-kindness 
Glory hereafter ! 

This, of his mercy, ever blessed Godhead, 
Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit, give its, — 
Whom thi'ough the wide world (celebrate forever 
Blessing and glory ! 

From the Latin of ST. GREGORY THE GREAT. 
Translation of JOHN MASON NEALE. 



DELIGHT IN GOD. 

I LOVE, and have some cause to love, the earth, — 
She is my Maker's creature, therefore good ; 

She is my mother, for she gave me birth ; 
She is my tender nurse, she gives me food : 
But what 's a creature, Lord, compared with 

thee? 
Or what 'a my mother or my nurse to me ? 

I love the air, — lier dainty sweets refresh 

My drooping soul, and to new sweets invite 
me ; 
Her shrill-mouthed choir sustain me with their 
flesh. 
And with their polyphonian notes delight me : 
But what 's the air, or all the sweets that she 
Can bless my soul withal, compared to thee l 

I love the sea, — she is my fellow-creature. 
My careful purveyor ; she provides me store ; 

She walls me round ; she makes my diet greater ; 
She wafts my treasure from a foreign shore : 
But, Lord of oceans, when compared with thee. 
What is the ocean or her wealth to me ? 

To heaven's high city I direct my journey. 

Whose spangled suburbs entertain mine eye ; 
Mine eye, by contemplation's great attorney, 
Transcends the crystal ])avement of the sky ■ 
But what is heaven, great God, compared to 

thee ? 
Without thy presence, heaven 's no heaven to 
me. 



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POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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■Without thy presence, earth gives no refection ; 

Without thy presence, sea attbrds no treasure ; 
Without thy presence, air 's a rank infection ; 

Without thy presence, heaven 's itself no 
pleasure : 

If not possessed, if not enjoyed in thee, 

What 's earth, or sea, or air, or heaven to me ? 

The highest honors that the v^orld can boast 
Are subjects far too low for my desire ; 

The brightest beams of glory are, at most, 
But dying sparkles of thy living fire ; 
The loudest flames that earth can kindle be 
But nightly glow-worms, if compared to thee. 

Without thy presence, wealth is bags of cares ; 
Wisdom but folly ; joy, disquiet — sadness ; 
Friendship is treason, and delights are snares ; 
Pleasures but pain, and mirth but pleasing 

madness ; 
Without thee, Lord, things be not what they be, 
Nor have their being, when compared with 
thee. 

In having all things, and not thee, what have I ? 

Not having thee, what have my labors got ? 
Let me enjoy but thee, what further crave I ? 
And having thee alone, what have I not ? 
I wish nor sea nor land ; nor would I be 
Possessed of heaven, heaven unpossessed of 
thee ! 

Francis Quarles. 



L 



THE PILGRIMAGE. 

GlYE me my scallop-shell of quiet, 
My staff of faith to walk upon, 

My scrip of joy, immortal diet, 
My bottle of salvation, 

My gown of glory, hope's true gauge ; 

And thus I '11 take my pilgrimage ! 

Blood must be my body's balmer, 
No other balm will there be given ; 
Whilst my soul, like quiet palmer, 
Travelleth towards the land of Heaven, 
Over the silver moimtains 
Where spring the nectar fountains : 

There will I kiss 

The bowl of bliss, 
And drink mine everlasting fill 
Upon every milken hill. 
My soul will be a-dry before. 
But after, it will thirst no more. 

TJien by that happy, blissful day, 
More peaceful pilgrims I shall see, 
That have cast off their rags of clay, 
And walk apparelled fresh like me. 



I '11 take them first 

To quench their thirst, 
And taste of nectar's suckets 

At those clear wells 

Where sweetness dwells 
Drawn up by saints in crystal buckets. 

And when our bottles and all we 

Are filled with immortality. 

Then the blest paths we '11 travel, 

Strewed with rubies thick as gravel, — ■ 

Ceilings of diamonds, sapphire floors. 

High walls of coral, and pearly bowers. 

From thence to Heaven's bribeless hall. 

Where no corrupted voices brawl ; 

No conscience molten into gold. 

No forged accuser, bought or sold. 

No cause deferred, no vain-spent journej', 

For there Christ is the King's Attorney ; 

Who pleads for all without degrees, 

And he hath angels, but no fees ; 

And when the grand twelve-million jury 

Of our sins, with direful fury, 

'Gainst our souls black verdicts give, 

Christ pleads his death, and then we live. 

Be thou my speaker, taintless pleader, 

Fnblotted lawyer, ti'ue proceeder ! 

Thou giv'st salvation even for alms, — 

Not with a bribed lawyer's palms. 

And this is mine eternal plea 

To Him that made heaven, earth, and sea, 

That, since my flesh must die so soon. 

And want a head to dine next noon. 

Just at the stroke when my veins start and spread, 

Set on my soul an everlasting head : 

Then am I, like a palmer, fit 

To tread those blest paths which before I writ. 

Of death and judgment, heaven and hell, 
Who oft doth think, must needs die well. 

SIR WALTER Raleigh. 



A TRUE LENT. 

Is this a fast, — to keep 
The larder lean. 
And clean 
From fat of veals and sheep ? 

Is it to quit the dish 

Of flesh, yet still 
To fill 
The platter high Avith fish? 

Is it to fast an hour. 
Or ragg'd to go, 
Or show 
A downcast look, and sour ? 



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362 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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No ! 't is a fast to dole 

Thy sheaf of wheat. 
And meat, 
Unto the hungry soul. 

It is to fast from strife, 
From old debate 
And hate, — 
To circumcise thy life. 

To show a heart giief-rent ; 
To starve thy sin, 
Not bin, — 
And that 's to keep thy Lent. 

ROBERT HERRICK. 



BRIEFS. 



WATEE. TURNED INTO WINE. 

The conscious water saw its God and blushed. 

THE widow's mites. 

Two mites, two drops, yet all her house and land, 
Fall from a steady heart, though trembling hand : 
The other's wanton wealth foams high, and brave ; 
The other cast away, she only gave. 

"two went IIP TO THE TEMPLE TO PRAY." 

Two went to pray ? 0, rather say, 
One went to brag, the other to pray ; 

One stands up close and treads on high, 
Where the other dares not lend his eye ; 

One nearer to God's altar trod, 
The other to the altar's God. 

RICHARD CRASHAW. 



B 



A PASSAGE IN THE LIFE OF ST. 
AUGUSTINE. 

Long pored St. Austin o'er the sacred page, 

And doubt and darkness overspread his mind ; 
On God's mysterious being thought the Sage, 

The Triple Person in one Godhead joined. 

The more he thought, the harder did he find 
To solve the various doubts which fast arose ; 

And as a ship, caught by imperious wind, 
Tosses where chance its shattered body throws, 
So tossed his troubled soul, and nowhere found 
repose. 

Heated and feverish , then he closed his tome, 
And went to wander by the ocean-side, 

Where the cool breeze at evening loved to come. 
Murmuring responsive to the murmuring tide ; 



An"d as Augustine o'er its margent wide 
Strayed, deeply pondering the puzzling theme, 

A little child before him he espied : 
In earnest labor did the urchin seem, 
Working with heart intent close by the sounding 
stream. 

He looked, and saw the child a hole had scooped, 

Shallow and narrow in the shining sand, 
O'er which at work the laboring infant stooped, 

Still pouring water in with busy hand. 

The saint addressed the child in accents bland : 
"Fair boy," quoth he, ' ' I pray what toil is thine ? 

Let me its end and purpose understand." 
The boy replied : ' ' An easy task is mine, 
To sweep into this hole all the wide ocean's brine." 

" foolish boy ! " the saint exclaimed, " to hope 
That the broad ocean in that hole should lie ! " 
"0 foolish saint!" exclaimed the boy; "thy 
scope 
Is still more hopeless than the toil I ply. 
Who think' st to comprehend God's nature high 
In the small compass of thine human wit ! 

Sooner, Augustine, sooner far, shall I 
Confine the ocean in this tiny pit, 
Than finite minds conceive God's nature in- 
finite ! " 

Anonymous. 



I WOULD I 



WERE AN EXCELLENT 
DIVINE. 



I would I were an excellent divine 

That had the Bible at my fingers' ends ; " 

That men might hear out of this mouth of mine 
How God doth make his enemies his friends ; 

Rather than with a thundering and long prayer 

Be led into presumption, or despair. 

This would I be, and would none other be. 
But a religious servant of my God ; 

And know there is none other God but he, 
And willingly to suffer mercy's rod, — 

Joy in his grace, and live but in his love, 

And seek my bliss but in the world above. 

And I would frame a kind of faithful prayer, 
For all estates within the state of grace, 

That careful love might never know despair, 
Nor servile fear might faithful love deface ; 

And this would I both day and night devise 

To make my humble spirit's exercise. 

And I would read the rules of sacred life ; 

Persuade the troirbled soul to patience ; 
The husband care, and comfort to the wife, 

To child and servant due obedience ; 
Faith to the friend, and to the neighbor peace, 
That love might live, and quarrels all might cease 



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Prayer for the health of all that are diseased, 
Confession unto all that are convicted, 

And patience unto all that are displeased. 
And comfort unto all that are afflicted, 

And mercy unto all that have offended. 

And grace to all, that all may be amended. 

Nicholas Breton. 



ADAM'S MORNING HYMN IN PARADISE. 

FROM " PARADISE LOST," BOOK V. 

These are thy glorious works, Parent of good, 
Almighty, thine this universal frame, 
Thus wondrous fair ; thyself how wondrous then ! 
Unspeakable, who sitt'st above these heavens 
To us invisible, or dimly seen 
In these thy lowest works ; yet these declare 
Thy goodness beyond thought, and power divine. 
Speak, ye who best can tell, ye sons of light. 
Angels ; for ye behold him, and with songs 
And choral symphonies, day without night, 
Circle his throne rejoicing ; ye in Heaven, 
On earth join, all ye creatures, to extol 
Him first, him last, him midst, and without end. 
Fairest of stars, last in the train of night, 
If better thou belong not to the dawn. 
Sure pledge of day, that crown'st the smiling morn 
With thy bright circlet, praise him in thy sphere. 
While day arises, that sweet hour of prime. 
Thou sun, of this great world both eye and soul, 
Acknowledge him thy greater ; sound his praise 
In thy eternal course, both when thou climb'st. 
And when high noon hast gained, and when thou 

fall'st. 
Moon, that now meets the orient sun, now fliest. 
With the fixed stars, fixed in their orb that flies. 
And ye five other wandering fires that move 
In mystic dance not without song, resound 
His praise, who out of darkness called up light. 
Air, and ye elements, the eldest birth 
Of Nature's womb, that in quaternion run 
Perpetual circle, multiform, and mix 
And nourish all things, let your ceaseless change 
Vary to our great Maker still new praise. 
Ye mists and exhalations, that now rise 
From hill or steaming lake, dusky or gray, 
Till the sun paint your fleecy skirts with gold. 
In honor to the world's great Author rise. 
Whether to deck with clouds the uncolored sky. 
Or Avet the thirsty earth with falling showers. 
Rising or falling, still advance his praise. 
His praise, ye winds, that from four quarters blow. 
Breathe soft or loud ; and wave your tops, ye pines. 
With every plant, in sign of worship wave. 
Fountains, and ye that warble, as ye flow. 
Melodious murmurs, warbling tune his i^raise. 
Join voices, all ye living souls ; ye birds. 



That singing up to Heaven-gate ascend, 

Bear on your wings and in your notes his praise. 

Ye that in waters glide, and ye that walk 

The earth, and stately tread, or lowly creep. 

Witness if I be silent, morn or even, 

To hill or valley, fountain or fresh shade. 

Made vocal by my song, and taught his praise. 

Hail, universal Lord ! be bounteous still 

To give us only good ; and if the night 

Have gathered aught of evil, or concealed, 

Disperse it, as now light dispels the dark. 

MILTON. 



PRAISE. 

To write a verse or two is all the praise 
That I can raise ; 
Mend my estate in any way'es, 
Thou shalt have more. 

I go to church ; help me to wings, and I 
Will thither flie ; 
Or, if I mount unto the skie, 
I will do more. 

Man is all weaknesse : there is no such thing 
As Prince or King : 
His arm is short ; yet with a sling 
He may do more. 

A herb destilled, and drunk, may dwell next doore. 
On the same floore. 
To a brave soul : Exalt the poore, 
They can do more. 

0, raise me then ! poore bees, that work all day. 
Sting my delay. 
Who have a work, as well as they. 
And much, much more. 

George Herbert. 



UP HILL. 

Does the road wind up hill all the way ? 

Ves, to the very end. 
Will the day's journey take the whole long day ? 

From morn to night, my friend. 

But is there for the night a resting-place ? 

A roof for tvhen the slow dark hours begin. 
May not the darkness hide it from my face ? 

You cannot miss that inn. 

Shall I meet other wayfarers at night ? 

Those who have gone before. 
Then must I knock, or call when just in sight ? 

They will not heei) ijou standing at that door. 



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POEMS OF EELIGION. 



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Shall I find comfort, travel-sore and weak ? 

Of labor yon shall find the sum. 
Will there be beds for me and all who seek ? 

Yea, beds for all who come. 

CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI. 



B- 



THE PILLAR OF THE CLOUD. 

Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom. 

Lead thou me on ! 
The night is dark, and I am far from home, — 

Lead thou me on ! 
Keep thou my feet ; 1 do not ask to see 
The distant scene, — one stei) enough for me. 

I was not ever thus, nor prayed that thou 

Shouldst lead me on : 
I loved to choose and see my path, but now 

Lead thou me on ! 
I loved the garish day, and, spite of fears, 
Pride ruled my will : remember not past years. 

So long thy power hath blessed me, sure it still 

Will lead me on ; 
O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till 

The night is gone ; 
And with the morn those angel faces smile 
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile. 
John Henry Newman. 



FROM "THE CHURCH PORCH." 

Thou whose sweet youth and early hopes enhance 
Thy rate and price, and mark thee for a treasure. 
Hearken unto a Verser, who may chance 
Rhyme thee to good, and make a bait of pleasure : 
A verse may find him who a sei'mon flies 
And turn delight into a sacrifice. 

When thou dost purpose aught (within thy 
power). 

Be sure to doe it, though it be but small ; 

Constancie knits the bones, and make us stowre, 

When wanton pleasures beckon us to thrall. 

Who breaks his own bond, forfeiteth himself : 
What nature made a ship, he makes a shelf. 

By all means use sometimes to be alone. 

Salute thyself : see what thy soul doth wear. 

Dare to look in thy chest ; for 't is thine own ; 

And tumble up and down what thou find'st there. 
Who cannot rest till he good fellows finde, 
He breaks up house, turns out of doores his 
minde. 



In clothes, cheap handsomenesse doth bear the 

bell. 
Wisdome 's a trimmer thing than shop e'er gave. 
Say not then, This with that lace will do well ; 
But, This with my discretion will be brave. 

Much curiousnesse is a perpetual wooing ; 

Nothing, with labor ; folly, long a doing. 

When once thy foot enters the church, be bare. 
God is more there than thou ; for thou art there 
Only by his permission. Then beware. 
And make thyself all reverence and fear. 

Kneeling ne'er spoiled silk stockings ; quit 
thy state ; 

All equal are Avithin the church's gate. 

Resort to sermons, but to prayers most : 
Praying 's the entl of preaching. 0, be drest ! 
Stay not for th' other pin : why thou hast lost 
A joy for it worth worlds. Thus hell doth jest 
Away thy blessings, and extremely flout thee. 
Thy clothes being fast, but thy soul loose 
about thee. 

Judge not the preacher ; for he is thy judge : 
If thou mislike him, thou conceiv'st him not. 
God calleth preaching folly. Do not grudge 
To pick out treasures from an earthen pot. 

The worst speak something good :. if all 

want sense, 
God takes a text, and preacheth Pa-ti-ence. 
George Herbert. 



ART THOU WEARY? 

Art thou weary, art thou languid. 
Art thou sore distressed ? 

"Come to me," saitli One, "and coming, 
Be at rest." 

Hath he marks to lead me to him, 

If he be my Guide ? 
" In his feet and hands are wound-prints, 

And his side." 

Is there diadem, as monarch. 

That his brow adorns ? 

"Yea, a crown, in very suretj'^, 
But of thorns." 

If I find him, if I follow. 

What his guerdon here ? 

' ' Many a sorrow, many a labor. 
Many a tear." 

If I still hold closely to him. 

What hath he at last ? 

"Sorrow vanquished, labor ended, 
Jordan passed." 



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If I ask him to receive me, 

Will he say me nay ? 
" Not till earth, and not till heaven 

Pass away." 

Finding, following, keeping, struggling, 

Is he snre to bless I 
" Saints, apostles, prophets, martyrs, 

Answer, Yes." 

From the Latin of ST. STEPHEN THE SABAITE. 
Translation of JOHN IVtASON NEALE. 



TO HEAVEN APPROACHED A SUFI 
SAINT. 

To heaven approached a Sufi Saint, 
From groping in the darkness late, 

And, tapping timidly and faint. 
Besought admission at God's gate. 

Said God, " Who seeks to enter here ? " 
" 'T is I, dear Friend," the Saint replied, 

And trembling much with hope and fear. 
" If it be tJiou, without abide." 

Sadly to earth the poor Saint turned. 
To bear the scourging of life's rods ; 

But aye his heart within him yearned 
To mix and lose its love in God's. 

He roamed alone through weary years, 
By cruel men still scorned and mocked, 

Until from faith's pure fires and tears 
Again he rose, and modest knocked. 

Asked God, "Who now is at the door ?" 

"It is thj^self, beloved Lord," 
Answered the Saint, iu doubt no more, 

But clasped and rapt in his reward. 

From the Persian of DSCHELLALEDDIN RUMI. 
Translation of WILLIAM R. ALGER. 



e 



THE DYING CHRISTIAN TO HIS SOUL. 

Vital spark of heavenly flame ! 
Qiut, quit this mortal frame ! 
Trembling, hoping, lingering, flying, 
0, the pain, the bliss of dying ! 
Cease, fond nature, cease thy strife, 
And let ine languish into life ! 

Hai'k ! they whisper ; angels say, 
Sister spirit, come away ! 
AVhat is this absorbs me quite ? 
Steals my senses, shuts my sight. 
Drowns my si)irits, draws my breath ? 
Tell me, my soul, can this be death ? 

The world recedes ; it disappears !. 
Heaven opens on my eyes ! my eai's 



With sounds seraphic ring : 
Lend, lend your wings ! I mount ! I fly ! 
Grave ! where is thy victory ? 
Death ! where is thy sting ? 

Alexander Pope. 
♦ 

PRAYER. 

God ! though sorrow be my fate. 
And the world's hate 

For my heart's faith pursue me, 
My peace they cannot take away ; . 
From day to day 

Thou dost anew imbue me ; 
Thou art not far ; a little while 
Thou hid'st thy face, with brighter smile 

Thy father-love to show me. 

Lord, not my will, but thine, be done ; 
If I sink down 

When men to terrors leave me. 
Thy father-love still warms my breast ; 
All 's for the best ; 

Shall man have power to grieve me. 
When bliss eternal is my goal. 
And thou the keeper of my soul. 

Who never will deceive me ? 

Thou art my shield, as saith the Word. 
Christ Jesus, Lord, 

Thou standest pitying by me. 
And lookest on each grief of mine 
And if 't were thine : 

What, then, though foes may try me. 
Though thorns be in my path concealed ? 
World, do thy worst ! God is my shield ! 

And will be ever nigh me. 

Translated from MARY, QUEEN OF HUNGARY. 



THE MARTYRS' HYMN. 

Flung to the heedless winds, 

Or on the waters cast. 
The martyrs' ashes, watched, 

Shall gathered be at last ; 
And from that scattered dust, 

Around us and abroad, 
Shall spring a plenteous seed 

Of witnesses for God. 

The Father hath received 

Their latest living breath ; 
And vain is Satan's boast 

Of victory in their death ; 
Still, still, though dead, they speak, 

And, trumpet-tongued, proclaim 
To many a wakening land 

The one availing name. 

From the German of MARTIN LUTHER. 
Translation of W. J. FOX. 



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POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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THE EIGHT OF FAITH. 

[The author of this poem, one of the victims of the persecuting 
Henry VIII., was burnt to death at Smithfield in 1546, It was made 
and sung by her while a prisoner in Newgate,] 

Like as the armed Kniglite, 
Appointed to the fiehle, 
With this world wil I iight, 
And faith shal be my shiMe. 

■ Faith is that weapon stronge, 
Which wil not faile at nede ; 
My foes therefore amonge. 
Therewith wil I procede. 

As it is had in strengthe, 
And forces of Christes waye, 
It wil prevaile at lengthe, 
Though all the devils saye naye. 

Faithe of the fathers olde 
Obtained right witness, 
Which makes me verye bolde 
To fear no woiides distress. 

I now rejoice in harte, 
And hojie bides me do so ; 
For Christ wil take my part. 
And ease me of my wo. 

Thou sayst, Lord, whoso knocke, 
To them wilt thou attende ; 
Undo, therefore, the locke. 
And thy stronge power sende. 

More enemies now I have 
Than heeres upon my head ; 
Let them not me deprave. 
But fight thou in my steade. 

On thee my care I cast. 
For all their cruell spight ; 
I set not by their hast, 
For thou art my delight. 

I am not she that list 
My anker to let fall 
For every drislinge mist ; 
My shippe's substancial. 

Not oft I use to Wright 
In prose, nor yet in ryme ; 
Yet wil I shewe one sight, 
That I sawe in my time : 

I sawe a royall throne, 
Where Justice shulde have sitte ; 
But in her steade was One 
Of moody cruell witte. 



Absorpt was rightwisness, 
As by the raginge floude ; 
Sathan, in his excess, 
Sucte up the guiltlesse bloude. 

Then thought I, — Jesus, Lorde, 
When thou shalt judge us all, 
Harde is it to recorde 
On these men what will fall. 

Yet, Lorde, I thee desire, 
For that they doe to me, 
Let them not taste the hire 
Of their iniquitie. 



Anne Askewe. 



ON HIS BLINDNESS. 

When I consider how my light is spent 

Ere half my clays, in this dark world and wide, 
And that one talent, which is death to hide. 
Lodged with me useless, though my soul more 
bent 

To serve therewith my Maker, and present 
My true account, lest he returning chide ; 
"Doth God exact day-labor, light denied ? " 
I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent 

That murmur, soon replies, " God doth not need 
Either man's work or his own gifts ; who best 
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best : his 
state 

Is kingly ; thousands at his bidding speed, 
And post o'er land and ocean without rest ; 
They also serve who only stand and wait." 

Milton. 



SAID I NOT SO? 

Said I not so, — that I would sin no more ? 

Witness, my God, I did ; 
Yet I am run again upon the score : 

My faults cannot be hid. 

What shall I do ? — make vows and break them 
still ? 

'T will be but labor lost ; 
My good cannot prevail against mine ill : 

The business will be crost. 

0, say not so ; thou canst not tell what strength 
Thy God may give thee at the length. 

Eenew thy vows, and if thou keep the last, 
Thy God will pardon all that 's past. 

Vow while thou canst ; while thou canst vow, 
thou mayst 
Perhaps perform it when thou thinkest least. 



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Thy God liatli not denied thee all, 
Whilst he permits thee but to call. 
Call to thy God for grace to keep 
Thy vows ; and if thou break them, weep. 
Weep for thy broken vows, and vow again : 
Vows made with tears cannot be still in vain. 
Then once again 
I vow to mend my ways ; 

Lord, say Amen, 
And thine be all the praise. 

GEORGE HERBERT. 



HEAVEN. 

BEAUTEOUS God ! micircumscribed treasure 
Of an eternal pleasure ! 
Thy throne is seated far 
Above the highest star, 
Where thou preparest a glorious place, 
Within the brightness of thy face, 
For every spirit 
To inherit 

That builds his hopes upon thy merit, 
And loves thee with a holy charity. 
What ravished heart, seraphic tongue, or eyes 
Clear as the morning rise. 
Can speak, or think, or see 
That bright eternity. 

Where the great King's transparent throne 
Is of an entire jasper stone ? 
There the eye 
0' the chrysolite, 
And a sky 

Of diamonds, rubies, chrysoprase, — 
And above all thy holy face, — 
Makes an eternal charity. 
When thou thy jewels up dost bind, that day 
Remember us, we pray, — 
That where the beryl lies. 
And the crystal 'bove the skies, 
There thou mayest appoint us place 
Within the brightness of thy face, — 
And our soul 
In the scroll 

Of life and blissfulness enroll, 
That we may praise thee to eternity. Allelujah ! 

Jeremy Taylor. 
*— 

"ROCK OF AGES." 

" Such hymns are never forgotten. They cling to us through our 
whole life. We carry them with us upon our journey. We sing 
them in the forest. The workman follows the plough with sacred 
songs. Children catch them, and singing only for the joy it gives 
them now, are yet laying up for all their life food of the sweetest 
joy.' —Henry Ward Beecher. 

" Rock of ages, cleft for me," 
Thoughtlessly the maiden sung. 

Fell tlie words unconsciously 

From her girlish, gleeful tongue ; 



Sang as little children sing ; 

Sang as sing the birds in June ; 
Fell the words like light leaves down 

On the current of the tune, — 
" Rock of ages, cleft for me. 

Let me hide myself in thee." 

" Let me hide myself in thee : " 

Felt her soul no need to hide, — 
Sweet the song as song could be, 

And she had no thought beside ; 
All the words unheedmgly 

Fell from lips irntouched by care. 
Dreaming not that they might be 

On some other lips a prayer, — 
" Rock of ages, cleft for me, 

Let me hide myself in thee." 

" Rock of ages, cleft for me," 

'T was a woman sung them now, 
Pleadingly and prayerfully ; 

Every word her heart did know. 
Rose the song as storm-tossed bird 

Beats with weary wing the air, 
Every note with sorrow stirred. 

Every syllable a prayer, — 
" Rock of ages, cleft for me. 
Let me hide myself in thee." 

" Rock of ages, cleft for me," — 

Lips grown aged sung the hymn 
Trustingly and tenderly. 

Voice grown weak and eyes grown dim, — 
" Let me hide myself in Thee." 

Trembling though the voice and low, 
Rose the sweet strain peacefully 

Like a river in its flow ; 
Sung as only they can sing 

Who life's thorny path have passed ; 
Sung as only they can sing 

Who behold the promised rest, — 
" Rock of ages, cleft for me, 

Let me hide myself in thee." 

" Rock of ages, cleft for me," 

Sung above a coffin lid ; 
Underneath, all restfully, 

All life's joys and sorrows hid. 
Nevermore, storm-tossed soul ! 

Nevermore fronr wind or tide, 
Nevermore from billow's roll. 

Wilt thou need thyself* to hide. 
Could the sightless, sunken eyes. 

Closed beneath the soft gray hair, 
Could the mute and stiff"ened lips 

Move again in pleading prayer. 
Still, aye still, the words would be, — 

"Let me hide myself in Thee." 

Anonymous, 



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THE SPIRIT-LAND. 

Father ! thy wonders do not singly stand, 

Nor far removed where feet have seldom strayed 

Around us ever lies the enchanted land, 

In marvels rich to thine own sons disfjlayed. 

In finding thee are all things round us found ; 

In losing thee are all things lost beside ; 

Ears have we, but in vain strange voices sound : 

And to our eyes the vision is denied. 

We wander in the country far remote, 

Mid tombs and ruined piles in death to dwell ; 

Or on the records of past greatness dote, 

And for a buried soul the living sell ; 

While on our path bewildered falls the night 

That ne'er returns us to the fields of light. 

JONES VERY. 



HEAVEN. 

Beyond these chilling winds and gloomy skies, 

Beyond death's cloudy portal, 
There is a land where beauty never dies, 

Where love becomes immortal ; 

A land whose life is never dimmed by shade. 

Whose fields are ever vernal ; 
Where nothing beautiful can ever fade, 

But blooms for aye eternal. 

We may not know how sweet its balmy air, 

How bright and fair its flowers ; 
We may not hear the songs that echo there, 

Through those enchanted bowers. 

The city's shining towers we may not see 

With our dim earthly vision, 
For Death, the silent warder, keeps the key 

That opes the gates elysian. 

But sometimes, when adown the western sky 

A fiery sunset lingers, 
Its golden gates swing inward noiselessly, 

Unlocked by unseen fingers. 

And while they stand a moment half ajar. 

Gleams from the inner glory 
Stream brightly through the azure vault afar, 

And half reveal the story. 

land unknown ! land of love divine ! 

Father, all-wise, eternal ! 
0, guide these wandering, wayworn feet of mine 

Into those pastures vernal ! 

NANCY AMELIA WOODBURY PRIEST. 



"ONLY WAITING." 

[A very aged man in an almshouse was asked what he was doing 
now. He repUed, " Only waiting."] 

Only waiting till the shadows 

Are a little longer grown. 
Only waiting till the glimmer 

Of the day's last beam is flown ; 
Till the night of earth is faded 

From the heart, once full of day ; 
Till the stars of heaven are breaking 

Through the twilight soft and gray. 

Only waiting till the reapers 

Have the last sheaf gathered home, 
For the summer time is faded, 

And the autumn winds have come. 
Quickly, reapers ! gather quickly 

The last ripe hours of my heart, 
For the bloom of life is withered, 

And I hasten to depart. 

Only waiting till the angels 

Open wide the mystic gate, 
At whose feet I long have lingered, 

Weary, poor, and desolate. 
Even now I hear the footsteps, 

And their voices far away ; 
If they call me, I am waiting, 

Only waiting to obey. 

Only waiting till the shadows 

Are a little longer grown, 
Only waiting till the glimmer 

Of the day's last beam is flown. 
Then from out the gathered darkness, 

Holy, deathless stars shall rise, 
By whose light my soul shall gladly 

Tread its pathway to the skies. 

FRANCIS LAUGHTON MACE. 



THE SOUL. 

Come, ' Brother, turn with me from pining 
thought 
And all the inward ills that sin has wrought ; 
Come, send abroad a love for all who live, 
And feel the deep content in turn they give. 
Kind wishes and good deeds, — they make not 

poor ; 
They '11 home again, full laden, to thy door ; 
The streams of love flow back where they begin. 
For springs of oiitward joys lie deep within. 

Even let them flow, and make the places glad 
Where dwell thy fellow-men. Shouldst thou be 
sad, 



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And earth seem bare, and hours, once happy, 

press 
Upon thy thoughts, and make thy loneliness 
More lonely for the past, thou then shalt hear 
The music of those waters running near ; 
And thy faint spirit drink the cooling stream. 
And thine eye gladden with the playing beam 
That now upon the water dances, now 
Leaps up and dances in the hanging bough. 

Is it not lovely ? Tell me, where doth dwell 
The power that wrought so beautiful a spell ? 
In thine own bosom. Brother ? Then as thine 
Guard with a reverent fear this power divine. 

And if, indeed, 't is not the outward state, 
But temper of the soul by which we rate 
Sadness or joy, even let thy bosom move 
With noble thoughts and wake thee into love ; 
And let each feeling in thy breast be given 
An honest aim, which, sanctified by Heaven, 
And springing into act, new life imparts, 
Till beats thy frame as with a thousand hearts. 

Sin clouds the mind's clear vision ; 
Around the self-starved soul has spread a dearth. 
The earth is full of life ; the living Hand 
Touched it with life ; and all its forms expand 
With principles of being made to suit 
Man's varied powers and raise him from the 

brute. 
And shall the earth of higher ends be full, — 
Earth which thou tread'st, — and thy poor mind 

be dull ? 
Thou talk of life, with half thy soul asleep ? 
Thou " living dead man," let thy spirit leap 
Forth to the day, and let the fresh air blow 
Through thy soul's shut-up mansion. Wouldst 

thou know 
Something of what is life, shake off this death ; 
Have thy soul feel the universal breath 
With which all nature 's quick, and learn to be 
Sharer in all that thou dost touch or see ; 
Break from thy body's grasp, thy spirit's trance ; 
Give thy soul air, thy faculties expanse ; 
Love, joy, even sorrow, — jdeld thyself to all ! 
They make thy freedom, groveller, not thy thrall. 
Knock off the shackles which thy spirit bind 
To dust and sense, and set at large the'mind ! 
Then move in sympathy with God's great whole. 
And be like man at first, a living soul. 

Richard Henry Dana. 



SIT DOWN, SAD SOUL. 

Sit down, sad soul, and count 
The moments flying ; 

Come, tell the sweet amount 
That 's lost by sighing ! 



How many smiles ? — a score ? 
Then laugh, and count no more 
For day is dying !, 

Lie down, sad soul, and sleep, 

And no more measure 
The flight of time, nor weep 

The loss of leisure ; 
But here, by this lone stream, 
Lie down with us, and dream 
Of starry treasure ! 

We dream : do thou the same ; 

We love, — forever ; 
We laugh, yet few we shame, — 

The gentle never. 
Stay, then, till sorrow dies ; 
Then — hope and happy skies 
Are thine forever ! 



Bryan Waller Procter. 
{Barry Corjiwall.) 



TELL ME, YE WINGED WINDS. 

Tell me, ye winged winds. 

That round my pathway roar, 
Do ye not know some spot 

Where mortals weep no more ? 
Some lone and pleasant dell, 

Some valley in the west, 
Where, free from toil and pain, 

The weary soul may rest ? 
The loud wind dwindled to a whisper low, 
And sighed for pity as it answered, — "No." 

Tell me, thou mighty deep, 

Whose billows round me play, 
Know'st thou some favored spot. 

Some island far away, 
Where weary man may find 

The bliss for which he sighs, — 
Where sorrow never lives. 
And friendship never dies ? 
The loud waves, rolling in perpetual flow. 
Stopped for a while, and sighed to answer, — 
"No." 

And thou, serenest moon, 

That, with such lovely face, 
Dost look upon the earth. 

Asleep in night's embrace ; 
Tell me, in all thy round 

Hast thou not seen some spot 
Where miserable man 

May find a happier lot ? 
Behind a cloud the moon withdrew in woe. 
And a voice, sweet but sad, resxwnded, — "No." 



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Tell me, my secret soul, 

0, tell me, Ho^e and Faith, 
Is there no resting-place 

From sorrow, sin, and death ? 
Is there no happy spot 

Where mortals may be blest, 
Where grief may find a balm. 
And weariness a rest ? 
Faith, Hope, and Love, best boons to mortals 

given, 
Waved .their bright wings, and whispered, — 
"Yes, in heaven !" 

CHARLES MACKAY. 



NOTHING BUT LEAVES. 

Nothing but leaves ; the spirit grieves 

Over a wasted life ; 
Sin committed while conscience sle^Dt, 
Promises made, but never kept, 

Hatred, battle, and strife ; 
Nothing but leaves/ 

Nothing but leaves ; no garnered sheaves 

Of life's fair, ripened grain ; 
Words, idle woi'ds, for earnest deeds ; 
We sow our seeds, — lo ! tares and weeds : 

We reap, with toil and pain, 
Nothing hut leaves ! 

Nothing but leaves ; memory weaves 

No veil to screen the past : 
As we retrace our weary way, 
Counting each lost and misspent day. 

We find, sadly, at last. 
Nothing but leaves I 

And shall we meet the Master so, 

Bearing our withered leaves ? 
The Saviour looks for perfect fruit, 
We stand before him, humbled, mute ; 
Waiting the words he breathes, — 
' ' Nothing hut leaves ? " 

LUCY E. akerman. 



U 



THE UNIVERSAL PRAYER. 

Father of all ! in every age. 

In every clime adored, 
By saint, by savage, and by sage, 

Jehovah, Jove, or Lord ! 

Thou great First Cause, least understood. 

Who all my sense confined 
To know but this, that thou art good, 

And that myself am blind ; 



Yet gave me, in this dark estate, 

To see the good from ill ; 
And, binding nature fast in fate. 

Left free the human will : 

What conscience dictates to be done. 

Or warns me not to do. 
This, teach me more than hell to shun, 

That, more than heaven pursue. 

What blessings thy free bounty gives 

Let me not cast away ; 
For God is paid when man receives. 

To enjoy is to obey. 

Yet not to earth's contracted span 

Thy goodness let me bound. 
Or think thee Lord alone of man, 

When thousand worlds are round : 

Let not this weak, unknowing hand 

Presume thy bolts to throw. 
And deal damnation round the land 

On each I judge thy foe. 

If I am right, thy grace impart 

Still in the right to stay ; 
If I am wrong, 0, teach n}y heart 

To find that better way ! 

Save me alike from foolish pride 

And impious discontent 
At aught thy wisdom has denied, 

Or aught thy goodness lent. 

Teach me to feel another's woe, 

To hide the fault I see ; 
That mercy I to others show. 

That mercy show to me. 

Mean though I am, not wholly so. 
Since quickened by thy breath ; 

0, lead me wheresoe'er I go. 
Through this day's life or death ! 

This day be bread and peace my lot ; 

All else beneath the sun. 
Thou know'st if best bestowed or not, 

And let thy will be done. 

To thee, whose temple is all space, 
Whose altar, earth, sea, skies. 

One chorus let all Being raise. 
All Nature's incense rise ! 

ALEXANDER POPE. 



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POExAIS OF RELIGION. 



571 



a 



WEESTLING JACOB. 

FIRST PART. 

CoMK, thou Traveller unknown, 
Whom still I hold, but caunot see ; 

My company before is gone, 
And I am left alone with thee ; 

"With thee all night I mean to stay. 

And wrestle till the break of day. 

I need not tell thee who I am ; 

My sin and misery declare ; 
Thyself hast called me by my name ; 

Look on thy hands, and read it there ; 
But who, I ask thee, who art thou ? 
Tell me thy name, and tell me now. 

In vain thou strugglest to get free ; 

I never will unloose my hold : 
Art thou the Man that died for me ? 

The secret of thy love unfold ;~ 
Wrestling, I will not let thee go 
Till I thy name, thy nature know. 

Wilt thou not yet to me reveal 

Thy new, unutterable name ? 
Tell me, I still beseech thee, tell ; 

To know it now resolved I am ; 
Wrestling, I will not let thee go 
Till I thy name, thy nature know. 

What though my shrinking flesh complain 
And murmur to contend so long ? 

I rise superior to my pain ; 

When I am weak, then am I strong ! 

And when my all of strength shall fail, 

I shall with the God-man prevail, 

SECOND PART. 

Yield to me now, for I am weak, 

But confident in self-despair ; 
Speak to my heart, in blessings speak ; 

Be conquered by my instant prayer ; 
Speak, or thou never hence shalt move, 
And tell me if thy name be Love. 

'T is Love ! 't is Love ! Thou diedst for me ; 

I hear thy whisper in my heart ; 
The morning breaks, the shadows ilee ; 

Pure, universal Love thou art ; 
To me, to all, thy bowels move ; 
Thy nature and thy name is Love. 

My prayer hath power with God ; the grace 

Unspeakable I now receive ; 
Through faith I see thee face to face ; 

I see thee/ace to face and live ! 



In vain I have not wept and strove ; 
Thy nature and thy name is Love. 

I know thee. Saviour, who thou art, 
Jesus, the feeble sinner's friend ; 

Nor wilt thou with tlie niglit depart, 
But stay and love me to the end ; 

Thy mercies never shall remove ; 

Thy nature and thy name is Love. 

The Sun of Eighteousness on me 

Hath risen, with healing in his wings ; 

Withered my nature's strength ; from thee 
My soul its life and succor brings ; 

My help is all laid up above ; 

Thy nature and thy name is Love. 

Contented now upon my thigh 
I halt till life's short journey end ; 

All helplessness, all weakness, I 
On thee alone for strength depend ; 

Nor have I power from thee to move ; 

Thy nature and thy name is Love. 

Lame as I am, I take tlie prey ; 

Hell, earth, and sin with ease o'ercome ; 
I leap for joy, pursue my way. 

And, as a bounding hart, fly home ; 
Through all eternity to prove 
Thy nature and thy name is Love. 

Charles Wesley. 



A MIGHTY FOETEESS IS OUE GOD, 

" Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott." 

A MIGHTY fortress is our God, 

A bulwark never failing ; 
Our helper he amid the flood 

Of mortal ills prevailing. 
For still our ancient foe 
Doth seek to work us woe ; 
His craft and power are great, 
And, armed with equal hate, 

On earth is not his equal. 



Did we in our own strength confide, 
Our striving would be losing ; 

Were not the right man on our side, 
The man of God's own choosing. 

Dost ask who that may be ? 

Christ Jesus, it is he, 

Lord Sabaoth his name. 

From age to age the same. 
And he must win the battle. 

From the German of Martin Luther. Translation 
of Frederic Henry Hedge. . 



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IT KINDLES ALL MY SOUL. 

"Urit me Patris decor." 

It kindles all my soul, 
My country's loveliness ! Those starry choirs 

That watch around the pole, 
And the moon's tender light, and heavenly fires 

Through golden halls that roll. 
chorus of the night ! planets, sworn 

The music of the spheres 
To follow ! Lovely watchers, that think scorn 

To rest till day appears ! 
Me, for celestial homes of glory born, 

Why here, 0, why so long, 
Do ye behold an exile from on high ? 

Here, ye shining throng, 
With lilies spread the mound where I shall lie : 

Here let me drop my chain. 
And dust to dust returning, cast away 

The trammels that remain ; 
The rest of me shall spring to endless day ! 

From the Latin of CaSIMIR OF POLAND. 



JEWISH HYMN IN BABYLON. 

God of the thunder ! from whose cloudy seat 

The fiery winds of Desolation flow ; 
Father of vengeance, that with purple feet 

Like a full wine-press tread'st the world below ; 
The embattled armies wait thy sign to slay, 
Nor springs the beast of havoc on his prey, 
Nor withering Famine walks his blasted way. 
Till thou hast marked the guilty land for woe. 

God of the rainbow ! at whose gracious sign 

The billows of the proud their rage suppress ; 
Father of mercies ! at one word of thine 

An Eden blooms in the waste wilderness, 
And fountains sparkle in the arid sands. 
And timbrels ring in maidens' glancing hands. 
And marble cities crown the laughing lands. 
And pillared temples rise thy name to bless. 

O'er Judah's land thy thunders broke, Lord ! 

The chariots rattled o'er her sunken gate. 
Her sons were wasted by the Assyrian's sword, 

Even her foes wept to see her fallen state ; 
And heaps her ivory palaces became. 
Her princes wore the captive's garb of shame, 
Her temples sank amid the smouldering flame, 

For thou didst ride the tempest cloud of fate. 

O'er Judah's land thy rainbow. Lord, shall beam. 
And the sad City lift her crownless head, 

And songs shall wake and dancing footsteps 
gleam 
In streets where broods the silence of the dead. 



The sun shall shine on Salem's gilded towers. 

On Carmel's side our maidens cull the flowers 

To deck at blushing eve their bridal bowers. 

And angel feet the glittering Sion tread. 

Thy vengeance gave us to the stranger's hand, 
And Abraham's children were led forth for 
slaves. 
With fettered steps we left our pleasant land, 

Envying our fathers in their peaceful graves. 
The strangers' bread with bitter teai-s we steep, 
And when our weary eyes should sink to sleep, 
In the mute midnight we steal forth to weep, 
Where the pale willows shade Euphrates' 
waves. 

The born in sorrow shall bring forth in joy ; 

Thy mercy. Lord, shall lead thy children home ; 
He that went forth a tender prattling boy 

Yet, ere he die, to Salem's streets shall come ; 
And Canaan's vines for us their fruit shall bear. 
And Hermon's bees their honeyed stores prepare. 
And we shall kneel again in thankful prayer. 

Where o'er the cherub-seated God full blazed 
the irradiate dome. 

HENRY HART MILMAN. 



EEBECCA'S HYMN. 

FROM " IVANHOE." 

When Israel, of the Lord beloved. 

Out from the land of bondage came, 
Her fathers' God before her moved. 

An awful guide in smoke and flame. 
By day, along the astonished lands. 

The cloudy pillar glided slow : 
By night, Arabia's crimsoned sands 

Eeturned the fiery column's glow. 

There rose the choral hymn of praise, 

And trump and timbrel answered keen, 
And Zion's daughters poured their lays. 

With priest's and warrior's voice between. 
No portents now our foes amaze. 

Forsaken Israel wanders lone : 
Our fathers would not know thy ways. 

And thou hast left them to their own. 

But present still, though now unseen ! 

When brightly shines the prosperous day. 
Be thoughts of thee a cloudy screen 

To temper the deceitful ray. 
And 0, when stoops on Judah's path 

In shade and storm the frequent night, 
Be thou, long-suff"ering, slow to wrath, 

A burning and a shining light ! 



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Our harps we left by Babel's streams, 

The tyrant's jest, the Gentile's scorn ; 
No censer round our altar beams, 

And mute are timbrel, harp, and horn. 
But thou hast said, "The blood of goat, 

The flesh of rams, I will not prize ; 
A contrite heart, a humble thought, 

Are mine accepted sacrifice." 

SIR Walter Scott. 



THE DYING SAVIOUR. 

SACRED Head, now wounded, 

With grief and shame weighed down ; 
Now scornfully surrounded 

With thorns, thy only crown ; 
sacred Head, what glory. 

What bliss, till now was thine ! 
Yet, though despised and gory, 

I joy to call thee mine. 

noblest brow and dearest, 

In other days the world 
All feared when thou appearedst ; 

What shame on thee is hurled ! 
How ai't thou pale with anguish. 

With sore abuse and scorn ! 
How does that visage languish 

Which once was bright as morn ! 

What language shall I borrow, ' 

To thank thee, dearest Friend, 
For this thy dying sorrow. 

Thy pity without end ! 
0, make me thine forever. 

And should I fainting be, 
Lord, let me never, never, 

Outlive my love to thee. 

If I, a wretch, should leave thee, 

Jesus, leave not me ! 
In faith may I receive thee. 

When death shall set me free. 
When strength and comfort languish, 

And I must hence depart, 
Release me then from anguish. 

By thine own wounded heart. 

Be near when I am dying, 

0, show thy cross to me ! 
And for my succor flying. 

Come, Lord, to set me free. 
These eyes new faith receiving. 

From Jesus shall not move ; i 
For he who dies believing 

Dies safely — through thy love. 

Paul Gerhardt. 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 

FROM "THE FAERIE QUEENE," BOOK 11. CANTO 8. 

And is there care in heaven ? And is there love 
In heavenly spirits to these creatures base. 
That may compassion of their evils move ? 
There is : — else much more wretched were the 

case 
Of men than beasts : but the exceeding gi-ace 
Of Highest God ! that loves his creatures so. 
And all his workes with mercy doth embrace. 
That blessed angels he sends to and fro. 

To serve to wicked man, to serve his wicked foe ! 

How oft do they their silver bowers leave. 
To come to succour us that succour want ! 
How oft do they with golden pinions cleave 
The flitting skyes, like flying pursuivant. 
Against fowle feendes to ayd us militant ! 
They for us fight, they watch, and dewly ward, 
And their bright squadrons round about us 

plant ; 
And all for love, and nothing for reward ; 

0, why should heavenly God to men have such 
regard . edmund Spenser. 



NEARER, MY GOD, TO THEE. 

Nearer, my God, to thee, 

Nearer to thee ! 
E'en though it be a cross 

That raiseth me ; 
Still all my song shall be, — 
Nearer, my God, to thee, 

Nearer to thee ! 

Though, like the wanderer, 

The sun gone down. 
Darkness be over me, 

My rest a stone ; 
Yet in my dreams I 'd be 
Nearer, my God, to thee. 

Nearer to thee ! 

There let the way appear 

Steps unto heaven ; 
All that thou sendest me 

In mercy given ; 
Angels to beckon me 
Nearer, my God, to thee, 

Nearer to thee ! 

Then with my M^aking thoughts, 
Bright with thy praise, 

Out of my stony griefs 
Bethel I '11 raise ; 

So by my woes to be 

Nearer, my God, to thee, 
Nearer to thee ! 



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Or if on joyful wing 

Cleaving the sky, 
Sun, moon, and stars forgot, 

Upward I fly ; 
Still all my song shall be, — 
Nearer, my God, to thee, 

Nearer to thee. 

SARAH FLOWER ADAMS. 



0, HOW THE THOUGHT OF GOD 
ATTRACTS ! 

0, HOW the thought of God attracts 
And draws the heart from earth. 

And sickens it of passing shows 
And dissipating mirth ! 

God only is the creature's home ; 

Though long and rough the road. 
Yet nothing less can satisfy 

The love that longs for God. 

0, utter but the name of God 
Down in your heart of hearts. 

And see how from the world at once 
All tempting light departs. 

A trusting heart, a yearning eye. 

Can win their way above ; 
If mountains can be moved by faith. 

Is there less power in love ? 

How little of that road, my soul. 

How little hast thou gone ! 
Take heart, and let the thought of God 

Allure thee farther on. 

Dole not thy duties out to God, 

But let thy hand be free ; 
Look long at Jesus ; his sweet blood. 

How was it dealt to thee ? 

The perfect way is hard to flesh ; 

It is not hard to love ; 
If thou wert sick for want of God, 

How swiftly wouldst thou move ! 

Frederick William Faber. 



THE CHANGED CROSS. 

It was a time of sadness, and my heart, 
Although it knew and loved the better part, 
Felt wearied with the conflict and the strife. 
And all the needful discipline of life. 

And while I thought on these, as given to me, 
My trial-tests of faith and love to be. 
It seemed as if I never could be sure 
That faithful to the end I should endure. 



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And thus, no longer trusting to his might 
Who says, " We walk by faith and not by sight," 
Doubting, and almost yielding to despair. 
The thought arose, "My cross I cannot bear. 

" Far heavier its weight must surely be 
Than those of others which I daily see ; 
Oh ! if I might another burden choose, 
Methinks I should not fear Tcjy crown to lose." 

A solemn silence reigned on all around. 
E'en Nature's voices uttered not a sound ; 
The evening shadows seemed of peace to tell. 
And sleep upon my weary spirit fell. 

A moment's pause, — and then a heavenly light 
Beamed full upon my wondering, raptured sight ; 
Angels on silvery wings seemed everywhere, 
And angels' music thrilled the balmy air. 

Then One, more fair than all the rest to see, 
One to whom all the others bowed the knee. 
Came gently to me, as I trembling lay. 
And, " Follow me," he said ; " I am the Way." 

Then, speaking thus, he led me far above. 
And there, beneath a canopy of love, 
Crosses of divers shape and size were seen. 
Larger and smaller than my own had been. 

And one there was, most beaiiteous to behold, — 

A little one, with jewels set in gold. 

"Ah! this," methought, "I can with comfort 

wear. 
For it will be an easy one to bear." 

And so the little cross I quickly took, 
But all at once my frame beneath it shook ; 
The sparkling jewels, fair were they to see, 
But far too heavy was their iveight for me. 

"This may not be," I cried, and looked again. 
To see if there was any here could ease my pain ; 
But, one by one, I passed them slowly by. 
Till on a lovely one I cast my eye. 

Fair flowers around its sculptured form entwined. 
And grace and beauty seemed in it combined. 
Wondering, I gazed, — and still I wondered more, 
To think so many should have passed it o'er. 

But oh ! that form so beautiful to see 
Soon made its hidden sorrows known to me ; 
Thorns lay beneath those flowers and colors fair ; 
Sorrowing, I said, "This cross I may not bear." 

And so it was with each and all around, — 
Not one to suit my need could there be found ; 
Weeping, I laid each heavy burden down. 
As my Guide gently said, "No cross, — no crown." 



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At length to him I raised my saddened heart ; 
He knew its sorrows, bade its doubts depart ; 
" Be not afraid," he said, " but trust in me ; 
My perfect love shall now be shown to thee." 

And then, with lightened eyes and willing feet, 
Again I turned, my earthly cross to meet ; 
With forward footsteps, turning not aside, 
For fear some hidden evil might betide ; 

And there — in the prepared, appointed way, 
Listening to hear, and ready to obey — ■ 
A cross I q^uickly found of plainest form, 
With only words of love inscribed thereon. 

With thankfulness I raised it from the rest, 
And joyfully acknowledged it the best, — 
The only one, of all the many there. 
That I could feel was good for me to bear. 

And, while I thus my chosen one confessed, 
I saw a heavenly brightness on it rest ; 
And as I bent, my burden to sustain, 
I recognized ony oion old cross again. 

But oh ! how different did it seem to be. 
Now I had learned its preciousness to see ! 
No longer could I unbelieving say, 
"Perhaps another is a better way." 

Ah, no ! henceforth my one desire shall be. 
That he who knows me best should choose for 

me ; 
And so, whate'er his love sees good to send, 
I '11 trust it 's best, — -because he knows the end. 
Hon. Mrs. Charles Hobart. 



FROM THE RECESSES OF A LOWLY 
SPIRIT. 

Fkom the recesses of a lowly spirit, 
Our humble prayer ascends ; Father ! hear it. 
Upsoaring on the wings of awe and meekness. 
Forgive its weakness ! 

We see thy hand, ■ — it leads us, it siipports its ; 
We hear thy voice, — it counsels and it courts ns ; 
And then we turn away ; and still thy kindness 
Forgives our blindness. 

0, how long-suffering, Lord ! but thou delightest 
To win with love the wandering : thou invitest, 
By smiles of mercy, not by frowns or terrors, 
Man from his errors. 

Father and Saviour ! plant within each bosom 
The seeds of holiness, and bid them blossom 
In fragrance and in beauty bright and vernal. 
And sp)ring eternal. 

JOHN BOWRING. 



THY WILL BE DONE. 

We see not, know not ; all our way 
Is night — with Thee alone is day : 
From out the torrent's troubled drift, 
Above the storm our prayers we lift, 
Thy will be done ! 

The flesh may fail, the heart may faint. 
But who are we to make complaint. 
Or dare to plead, in times like these. 
The weakness of our love of ease ? 
Thy will be done ! 

We take Avith solemn thankfulness 
Our burden up, nor ask it less. 
And count it joy that even we 
May suffer, serve, or wait for Thee, 
Whose will be done ! 

Though dim as yet in tint and line. 
We trace Thy picture's wise design. 
And thank Thee that our age supplies 
Its dark relief of sacrifice. 
Thy will be done ! 

And if, in our unworthiness, 
Thy sacrificial wine we press ; 
If from Thy ordeal's heated bars 
Our feet are seamed with crimson scars, 
Thy will be done ! 

If, for the age to come, this hour 
Of trial hath vicarious power, 
And, blest by Thee, our present pain 
Be Liberty's eternal gain, . 
Thy will be done ! 

Strike, Thou the Master, we Thy keys. 
The anthem of the destinies ! 
The minor of Thy loftier strain. 
Our hearts shall breathe the old refrain, 
Thy will be done ! 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 



NEARER HOME. 

One sweetly solemn thought 
Comes to me o'er and o'er ; 

I 'm nearer my home to-day 
Than I ever have been before ; 

Nearer my Father's house, 

Where the many mansions be ; 

Nearer the great white throne. 
Nearer the crystal sea ; 



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Nearer the 1)01111(1 of life, 

Where we lay our burdens down ; 
Nearer leaving the cross, 

Nearer gaining the crown ! 

But the waves of that silent sea 

Roll dark before my sight 
That brightly the other side 

Break on a shore of light. 

0, if my mortal feet 

Have almost gained the brink ; 
If it be I am nearer home 

Even to-day than I think, — 

Father, perfect my trust ! 

Let my spirit feel, in death, 
That her feet are firmly set 

On the Rock of a living faitli ! 

PHCEBE GARY. 
« 

ODE. 

FROM "THE SPECTATOR." 

The spacious firmament on high, 

With all the blue ethereal sky, 

And spangled heavens, a shining frame, 

Their great Original proclaim ; 

The unwearied sun, from day to day, 

Does his Creator's power display. 

And publishes to every land 

The work of an Almighty hand. 

Soon as the evening shades prevail. 
The moon takes up the wondrous tale, 
And nightly to the listening earth 
Repeats the story of her birth ; 
While all the stars that round her burn. 
And all the planets in their turn, 
Confirm the tidings as they roll, 
And spread the truth from pole to pole. 

What though, in solemn silence, all 
Move round the dark terrestrial ball ? 
What though no real voice or sound 
Amid their radiant orbs be found ? 
In Reason's ear they all rejoice. 
And litter forth a glorious voice, 
Forever singing, as they shine, 
" The hand that made us is divine ! " 

Joseph Addison. 



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LORD ! WHEN THOSE GLORIOUS LIGHTS 
I SEE. 

HYMN AND PRAYER FOR THE USE OF BELIEVERS. 

Lord ! when these glorious lights I see 
AVith which thou hast adorned the skies. 

Observing how they moved be. 

And how their splendor fills mine eyes. 



Methinks it is too lai'ge a grace. 
But that thy love ordained it so, — 

That creatures in so high a place 
Should servants be to man below. 

The meanest lamp now shining there 

In size and lustre doth exceed 
The noblest of thy creatures here. 

And of our friendship hath no need. 
Yet these upon mankind attend 

For secret aid or public light ; 
And from the world's extremest end 

Repair unto us every night. 

0, had that stamp been undefaced 

Which first on us thy hand had set. 
How highly should we have been graced, 

Since we are so much honored yet ! 
Good God, for what but for the sake 

Of thy beloved and only Son, 
Who did on him our nature take. 

Were these exceeding favors done ? 

As we by him have honored been. 

Let us to him due honors give ; 
Let his uprightness hide our sin, 

And let us worth from him receive. 
Yea, so let us by grace improve 

What thou by nature doth bestow, 
That to thy dwelling-place above 

We may be raised from below. 

GEORGE WnHER. 



HYMN 

BEFORE SUNRISE, IN THE VALE OF CHAMOUNI. 

Hast thou a charm to stay the morning star 
In his steep course ? So long he seems to pause 
On thy bald, awful head, sovran Blanc ! 
The Arve and Arveiron at thy base 
Rave ceaselessly ; but thou, most awful Form, 
Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines 
How silently ! Around thee and above, 
Deep is the air and dark, substantial, black, — 
An ebon mass. Methinks thou piercest it, 
As with a wedge ! But when I look again. 
It is thine own calm home, thy crystal shrine, 
Thy habitation from eternity ! 

dread and silent Mount ! I gazed upon thee, 
Till thou, still present to the bodily sense, 
Didst vanish from my thought. Entranced in 

prayer 

1 worshipx^ed the Invisible alone. 

Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody. 
So sweet we know not we are listening to it, 
Thou, the mean while, wast blending with my 
thought, — 



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Yea, with my life and life's own secret joy, — 
Till the dilating soul, enrapt, transfused, 
Into the mighty vision passing, there. 
As in her natural form, swelled vast to Heaven ! 

Awake, my soul ! not only passive praise 
Thou owest ! not alone these swelling tears. 
Mute thanks, and secret ecstasy ! Awake, 
Voice of sweet song ! Awake, my heart, awake ! 
Green vales and icy cliffs, all join my hymn. 

Thou first and chief, sole sovereign of the vale ! 
0, struggling with the darkness all the night, 
And visited all night by troops of stars, 
Or when they climb the sky, or when they sink. 
Companion of the morning-star at dawn, 
Thyself Earth's rosj'' star, and of the dawn 
Co-herald, — ■ wake, 0, wake, and utter praise ! 
AVho sank thy sunless pillars deep in earth ? 
Who filled thy countenance with rosy light ? 
Who made thee parent of perpetual streams ? 

And you, ye five wild torrents fiercely glad ! 
Who called you forth from night and utter death, 
From dark and icy caverns called you forth, 
Down those precipitous, black, jagged rocks, 
Forever shattered and the same forever ? 
Who gave you your invulnerable life, 
Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your 

joy. 

Unceasing thunder and eternal foam ? 

And who commanded (and the silence came). 

Here let the billows stifl'en, and have rest ? 

Ye ice-falls ! ye that from the mountain's brow 
Adown enormous ravines slope amain , — 
Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice. 
And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge ! 
Motionless torrents ! silent cataracts ! 
Who made you glorious as the gates of Heaven 
Beneath the keen full moon ? Who bade the sun 
Clothe you with rainbows ? Who, with living 

flowers 
Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at your feet ? 
God ! — let the torrents, like a shout of nations, 
Answer ! and let the ice-plains echo, God ! 
God ! sing, ye meadow-streams, with gladsome 

voice ! 
Ye pine-groves, with your soft and soul-like 

sounds ! 
And they too have a voice, yon piles of snow, 
And in their perilous fall shall thunder, God ! 

Ye living flowers that skirt the eternal frost ! 
Ye wild goats sporting round the eagle's nest ! 
Ye eagles, playmates of the mountain-storm ! 
Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the clouds ! 
Ye signs and wonders of the elements ! 
Utter forth God, and fill the hills with praise ! 



Thou, too, hoar Mount ! with thy sky-pointing 

peaks, 
Oft from whose feet the avalanche, unheard. 
Shoots downward, glittering through the pure 

serene, 
Into the depth of clouds that veil thy breast, — 
Thou too again, stupendous Mountain ! thou 
That, as I raise my head, awhile bowed low 
In adoration, upward from thy base 
Slow travelling with dim eyes suffused with tears. 
Solemnly seemest, like a vapory cloud, 
To rise before me, — Else, 0, ever rise ! 
Rise, like a cloud of incense, from the Earth ! 
Thou kingly Spirit throned among the hills, 
Thou dread ambassador from Earth to Heaven, 
Great Hierarch ! tell thou the silent sky, 
And tell the stars, and tell yon rising sun. 
Earth, with her thousand voices, praises God. 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 



AMAZING, BEAUTEOUS CHANGE! 

Amazing, beauteous change ! 
A world created new ! 
My thoughts with transport range, 
The lovely scene to view ; 

In all I trace. 

Saviour divine. 

The work is thine, — 

Be thine the praise ! 

See crystal fountains play 
Amidst the burning sands ; 
The river's winding way 
Shines through the thirsty lands ; 

New grass is seen. 

And o'er the meads 

Its carpet spreads 

Of living green. 

Where pointed brambles grew, 
Intwined with horrid thorn. 
Gay flowers, forever new, 
The painted fields adorn, — 

The blushing rose 

And lily there. 

In union fair. 

Their sweets disclose. 

Where the bleak mountain stood 
All bare and disarrayed. 
See the wide-branching wood 
Diffuse its grateful shade ; 

Tall cedars nod. 

And oaks and pines, 

And elms and vines 

Confess thee God. 



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The tyrants of the plain 
Their savage cliase give o'er, — 
No more they rend the slain, 
And thirst for blood no more ; 

But infant hands 

Fierce tigers stroke, 

And lions yoke 

In flowery bands. 

0, when, Almightj'' Lord ! 
Shall these glad scenes arise. 
To verify thy word. 
And bless our wandering eyes ? 

That earth may raise. 

With all its tongues, 

United songs 

Of ardent praise. 

Philip Doddridge. 



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THE SABBATH. 

How still the morning of the hallowed day ! 

Mute is the voice of rural labor, hushed 

The ploughboy's whistle and the milkmaid's 

song. 
The scythe lies glittering in the dewy wreath 
Of tedded grass, mingled with fading flowers, 
That yestermorn bloomed waving in the breeze ; 
Sounds the most faint attract the ear, — the 

hum 
Of early bee, the trickling of the dew. 
The distant bleating, midway up the hill. 
Calmness sits throned on yon unmoving cloud. 
To him who wanders o'er the upland leas 
The blackbird's note comes mellower from the 

dale ; 
And sweeter from the sky the gladsome lark 
Warbles his heaven-tuned song ; the lulling 

brook 
Murmurs more gentl}^ down the deep-worn glen ; 
While from yon lowly roof, whose circling smoke 
O'ermounts the mist, is heard at intervals 
The voice of psalms, the simple song of praise. 
With dovelike wings Peace o'er yon village 

broods ; 
The dizzying mill-wheel rests ; the anvil's din 
Hath ceased ; all, all around is quietness. 
Less fearful on this day, the limping hare 
Stops, and looks back, and stops, and looks on 

man. 
Her deadliest foe. The toil-worn horse, set free, 
Unheedful of the pasture, roams at large ; 
And as his stiff", unwieldy bulk he rolls, 
His iron-armed hoofs gleam in the morning ray. 

James grahame. 



THE MEETING. 

The elder folk shook hands at last, 

Down seat by seat the signal passed. 

To simple ways like ours unused. 

Half solemnized and half amused. 

With long-drawn breath and shrug, my guest 

His sense of glad relief expressed. 

Outside, the hills lay warm in sun ; 

The cattle in the meadow-run 

Stood half-leg deep ; a single bird 

The green repose above us stirred. 

" What part or lot have you," he said, 

"In these dull rites of drowsy-head ? 

Is silence woi-ship ? Seek it where 

It soothes with dreams the summer air ; 

Not in this close and rude-benched hall, 

But where soft lights and shadows fall. 

And all the slow, sleep-walking hours 

Glide soundless over grass and flowers ! 

From time and place and form apart. 

Its holy ground the human heart. 

Nor ritual-bound nor templeward 

Walks the free spirit of the Lord ! 

Our common Master did not jien 

His followers up from other men ; 

His service liberty indeed, 

He built no church, he framed no creed ; 

But while the saintly Pharisee 

ilade broader his phylactery. 

As from the synagogue was seen 

The dusty-sandaled Nazarene 

Through ripening cornfields lead the way 

Upon the awful Sabbath day. 

His sermons were the healthful talk 

That shorter made the mountain -walk. 

His wayside texts were flowers and birds, 

Where mingled with his gracious words - 

The rustle of the tamarisk-tree 

And ripple-wash of Galilee." 

"Thy words are well, friend," I said ; 

" Unmeasured and unlimited. 

With noiseless slide of stone to stone, 

The mystic Church of God has grown. 

Invisible and silent stands 

The temple never made with hands. 

Unheard the voices still and small 

Of its unseen confessional. 

He needs no special place of prayer 

Whose hearing ear is everywhere ; 

He brings not back the childish days 

That ringed the earth with stones of praise. 

Roofed Karnak's hall of gods, and laid 

The plinths of Philaj's colonnade. 

Still less he owns the selfish good 

And sickly growth of solitude, — 



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379 



The worthless grace that, out of sight, 
Flowers in the desert anchorite ; 
Dissevered from the suffering whole, 
Love hath no power to save a soul. 
Not out of Self, the origin 
And native air and soil of sin, 
The living waters spring and flow, 
The trees with leaves of healing grow. 

" Dream not, friend, because I seek 

This quiet shelter twice a Aveek, 

I better deem its pine-laid floor 

Tlian breezy hill or sea-sung shore ; 

But nature is not solitude ; 

She crowds us with her thronging wood ; 

Her many hands reach out to us, 

Her man}' tongues are garrulous ; 

Perpetual riddles of sui'prise 

She otters to our ears and eyes ; 

She will not leave our senses still. 

But drags them captive at her will ; 

And, making earth too great for heaven, 

She hides the Giver in the given. 

" And so I find it well to come 

For deeper rest to this still room. 

For here the habit of tlie soul 

Feels less the outer world's control ; 

The strength of mutual purpose pleads 

More earnestly our common needs ; 

And from the silence multiplied 

By these still forms on either side, 

The world that time and sense have known 

Falls off and leaves us God alone. 

" Yet rarely through the charmed repose 
Unmixed the stream of motive flows, 
A flavor of its many springs, 
The tints of earth and sky it brings ; 
In the still waters needs must be 
Some shade of human sympathy ; 
And here, in its accustomed place, 
I look on memory's dearest face ; 
The blind by-sitter guesseth not 
What shadow haunts that vacant spot ; 
No eyes save mine alone can see 
The love wherewith it welcomes me ! 
And still, with those alone my kin. 
In doubt and weakness, want and sin, 
I bow my head, my heart I bare 
As when that face was living there, 
And strive (too oft, alas ! in vain) 
The peace of simple trust to gain. 
Fold fancy's restless wings, and lay 
The idols of my heart away, 

" Welcome the silence all unbroken. 
Nor less the words of fitness spoken, — 



Such golden words as hers for whom 

Our autumn flowers have just made room ; 

Whose hopeful utterance through and through 

The freshness of the morning blew ; 

Who loved not less the earth that light 

Fell on it from the heavens in sight. 

But saw in all fair forms more fair 

The Eternal beauty mirrored there. 

Whose eighty years but added grace 

And saintlier meaning to her face, — 

The look of one who bore away 

Glad tidings from the hills of day, 

While all our hearts went forth to meet 

The coming of her beautiful feet ! 

Or haply hers whose pilgrim tread 

Is in the paths where Jesus led ; 

Who dreams her childhood's sabbath dream 

By Jordan's willow-shaded stream, 

And, of the hymns of hope and faith, 

Sung by the monks of Nazareth, 

Hears pious echoes, in the call 

To prayer, from Moslem minarets fall. 

Repeating where His works were wrought 

The lesson that her Master taught. 

Of whom an elder Sibyl gave, 

The prophesies of Cumse's cave ! 



" I ask no organ's soulless breath 

To drone the themes of life and death. 

No altar candle-lit by day, 

No ornate wordsman's rhetoric-play, 

No cool philosophy to teach 

Its bland audacities of speech 

To double-tasked idolaters. 

Themselves their gods and worshippers, 

No pulpit hammered by the fist 

Of loud-asserting dogmatist. 

Who borrows for the hand of love 

The smoking thunderbolts of Jove. 

I know how well the fathers taught, 

What work the later schoolmen wrought ; 

I reverence old-time faith and men, 

But God is near us now as then ; 

His force of love is still unspent. 

His hate of sin as imminent ; 

And still the measure of our needs 

Outgrows the cramping bounds of creeds ; 

The manna gathered yesterday 

Already savors of decay ; 

Doubts to the world's child-heart unknown 

Question us now from star and stone ; 

Too little or too much we know. 

And sight is swift and faith is slow ; 

The power is lost to self-deceive 

With shallow forms of make-believe. 

We walk at high noon, and the bells 

Call to a thousand oracles. 



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POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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But tlie sound deafens, and the liglit 
Is stronger than our dazzled sight ; 
The letters of the sacred Book 
Glimmer and swim beneath our look ; 
Still straggles in the Age's breast 
With deepening agony of quest 
The old entreaty : ' Art thou He, 
Or look we for the Christ to be ? ' 

" God should be most where man is least ; 

So, where is neither church nor priest, 

And never rag of form or creed 

To clothe the nakedness of need, — 

Where farmer-folk in silence meet, — 

I turn my bell-unsummoned feet ; 

I lay the critic's glass aside, 

I tread upon my lettered pride. 

And, lowest-seated, testify 

To the oneness of humanity ; 

Confess the universal want. 

And share whatever Heaven may grant. 

He findeth not who seeks his own, 

The soul is lost that 's saved alone. 

Not on one favored forehead fell 

Of old the fire-tongued miracle. 

But flamed o'er all the thronging host 

The baptism of the Holy Ghost ; 

Heart answers heart : in one desire 

The blending lines of prayer aspire ; 

' Where, in my name, meet two or three,' 

Our Lord hath said, ' I there will be ! ' 

" So sometimes comes to soul and sense 
The feeling which is evidence 
That very near about us lies 
The realm of spiritual mysteries. 
The sphere of the supernal powers 
Impinges on this world of ours. 
The low and dark horizon lifts, 
To light the scenic terror shifts ; 
The breath of a diviner air 
Blows down the answer of a prayer : — ■ 
That all our sorrow, pain, and doubt 
A great compassion clasps about. 
And law and goodness, love and force. 
Are wedded fast beyond divorce. 
Then duty leaves to love its task, 
The beggar Self forgets to ask ; 
With smile of trust and folded hands, 
The passive soul in waiting stands 
To feel, as flowers the sun and dew, 
The One true Life its own renew. 

' ' So, to the calmly gathered thought 
The innermost of truth is taught, 
The mystery dimly understood. 
That love of God is love of good, 
And, chiefly, its divinest trace 
In Him of Nazareth's holy face ; 



That to be saved is only this, — 

Salvation from our sellishness, 

From more than elemental fire. 

The soul's unsanctified desire. 

From sin itself, and not the pain 

That warns us of its chafing chain ; 

That worship's deeper meaning lies 

In mercy, and not sacrifice. 

Not proud humilities of sense 

And posturing of 2:)enitence, 

But love's unforced obedience ; 

That Book and Church and Day are given 

For man, not God, ■ — for earth, not heaven, - 

The blessed means to holiest ends. 

Not masters, but benignant friends ; 

That the dear Christ dwells not afar, 

The king of some remoter star. 

But flamed o'er all the thronging host 

The baptism of the Holy Ghost ; 

Heart answers heart : in one desire 

The blending lines of prayer aspire ; 

' Where, in my name, meet two or three,' 

Our Lord hath said, ' I there w'ill be ! ' " 

John Greenleaf Whittier. 



A PRAYER FOR LIFE. 

Father, let me not die young ! 
Earth's beauty asks a heart and tongue 
To give true love and praises to her worth ; 

Her sins and judgment-sufferings call 
For fearless martyrs to redeem thy Earth 
From her disastrous fall. 
For though her summer hills and vales might 

seem 
The fair creation of a poet's dream, — 

Ay, of the Highest Poet, 
Whose wordless rhythms are chanted by the 
gyres 
Of constellate star-choirs. 
That with deep melody flow and overflow it, — 
The sweet Earth, — very sweet, despite 
The rank grave-smell forever drifting in 
Among the odors from her censers white 
Of wave-swung lilies and of wind-swung 
roses, — 
The Earth sad-sweet is deeply attaint with 
sin ! 
The pure air, which encloses 
Her and her starry kin. 
Still shudders with the unspent palpitating 
Of a great Curse, that to its utmost shore 
Thrills with a deadly shiver 
Which has not ceased to quiver 
Down all the ages, nathless the strong beating 

Of Angel-wings, and the defiant roar 
Of Earth's Titanic thunders. 



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POEMS OF KELIGION. 



581 



a 



Fair and sad, 
In sin and beauty, our beloved Earth 
Has need of all her sons to make her glad ; 
Has need of martyrs to refire the hearth 
Of her quenched altars, — • of heroic men 
With Freedom's sword, or Truth's supernal pen. 
To shape the worn-out mould of nobleness again. 
And she has need of Poets who can string 
Their harps with steel to catch the light- 
ning's fire. 
And pour her thunders from the clanging 

wire. 
To cheer the hero, mingling with his cheer. 
Arouse the laggard in the battle's rear. 
Daunt the stern wicked, and from discord wring 
Prevailing harmony, while the humblest soul 
Who keeps the tune the warder angels sing 
In golden choirs above. 
And only wears, for crown and aureole. 

The glow-worm light of lowliest human love. 
Shall fill with low, sweet undertones the 

chasms 
Of silence, 'twixt the booming thunder-spasms. 
And Earth has need of Prophets fiery-lipped 
And deep-souled, to announce the glorious 
dooms 
Writ on the silent heavens in starry script, 
And flashing fitfully from her shuddering 
tombs, — 
Commissioned Angels of the new-born Faith, 

To teach the immortality of Good, 
The soul's God-likeness, Sin's coeval death. 
And man's indissoluble Brotherhood. 

Yet never an age, when God has need of him. 
Shall want its Man, predestined by that need, 
To pour his life in fiery word or deed, — 
The strong Archangel of the Elohim ! 

Earth's hollow want is prophet of his coming: 
In the low murnmr of her famished cry, 
And heavy sobs breathed up despairingly, 

Ye hear the near invisible humming 
Of his wide wings that fan the lurid sky 
Into cool ripples of new life and hope. 
While far in its dissolving ether ope 
Deeps beyond deeps, of sapphire calm, to cheer 
With Sabbath gleams the troubled Now and Here. 

Father ! thy will be done ! 
Holy and righteous One ! 
Though the reluctant years 
May never crown my throbbing brows with 
white, 
Nor round my shoulders turn the golden light 
Of my thick locks to wisdom's royal ermine : 
Yet by the solitary tears. 
Deeper than joy or sorrow, — by the thrill. 
Higher than hope or terror, whose quick germin, 



In those hot tears to sudden vigor sprung. 
Sheds, even now, the fruits of gi-aver age, — 
By the long wrestle in which inward ill 
Fell like a trampled viper to the ground, — 
By all that lifts me o'er my outward peers 
To that supernal stage 
Where soul dissolves the bonds by Natuie 
bound, — 
Fall when I may, by pale disease unstrung, 
Or by the hand of fratricidal rage, 

I cannot now die young ! 

George S. Burleigh. 



WHEN. 



If I were told that I must die to-morrow. 

That the next sun 
Which sinks should bear me past all fear and 
sorrow 
For any one. 
All the fight fought, all the short journey 
through. 
What should I do ? 

I do not think that I should shrink or falter, 

But just go on. 
Doing my work, nor change nor seek to alter 

Aught that is gone ; 
But rise and move and love and smile and pray 

For one more day. 

And, lying down at night for a last sleeping. 

Say in that ear 
Which hearkens ever : " Lord, within thy keeping 

How should I fear ? 
And when to-morrow brings thee nearer still, 

Do thou thy will." 

I might not sleep for awe ; but peaceful, tender. 

My soul would lie 
All the night long ; and when the morning 
splendor 

Flushed o'er the sky, 
I think that I could smile — could calmly sa3% 

"It is his day." 

But if a wondrous hand from the blue yonaer 

Held out a scroll, 
On which my life was writ, and I with wonder 

Beheld unroll 
To a long century's end its mystic clue, 

What should I do ? 

What could I do, blessed Guide and Master, 

Other than this ; 
Still to go on as now, not slower, faster, 

Nor fear to miss 
The road, although so very long it be. 

While led by thee ? 



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POEMS OF EELIGION. 



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Step after step, feeling thee close beside me, 

Although unseen, 
Through thorns, through flowers, whether the 
tempest hide thee, 

Or heavens serene, 
Assured thy faithfulness cannot betray. 

Thy love decay. 

I may not know ; my God, no hand revealeth 

Thy counsels wise ; 
Along the path a deepening shadow stealeth. 

No voice replies 
To all my questioning thought, the time to tell ; 

And it is well. 

Let me keep on, abiding and unfearing 

Thy will always. 
Through a long century's ripening fruition 

Or a short day's ; 
Thou canst not come too soon ; and I can wait 

If thou come late. 

Sarah WOOLSEY {Susan Coolidge). 



THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT. 



A BALLAD. 



^ 



There 's a legend that 's told of a gypsy who 
dwelt 
In the lands where the pyramids be ; 
And her robe was embroidered with stars, and 
her belt 
With devices right wondrous to see ; 
And she lived in the days when our Lord was a 
child 
On his mother's immaculate breast ; 
When he fled from his foes, — when to Egypt 
exiled, 
He went down with St. Joseph the blest. 

This Egyptian held converse with magic, methink s, 

And the future was given to her gaze ; 
For an obelisk marked her abode, and a sphinx 

On her threshold kept vigil always. 
She was pensive and ever alone, nor was seen 

In the haunts of the dissolute crowd ; 
But communed with the ghosts of the Pharaohs, 
I ween. 

Or with visitors wrapped in a shroud. 

And there came an old man from the desert one 
day. 
With a maid on a mule by that road ; 
And a child on her bosom reclined, and the way 

Led them straight to the gypsy's abode ; 
And they seemed to have travelled a wearisome 
path. 
From thence many, many a league, — 



From a tyrant's pursuit, from an enemy's wrath. 
Spent with toil and o'ercome with fatigue. 

And the gypsy came forth from her dwelling, and 
prayed 

That the pilgrims would rest them awhile ; 
And she offered her couch to that delicate maid, 

Who had come many, many a mile. 
And she fondled the babe with aifeetion's caress, 

And she begged the old man Avould repose ; 
"Here the stranger," she- said, " ever finds free 
access. 

And the wanderer balm for his woes." 

Then her guests from the glare of the noonday 
she led 
To a seat in her grotto so cool ; 
Where she spread them a banquet of fruits, and 
a shed, 
With a manger, was found for the mule ; 
With the wine of the palm-tree, with dates newdy 
culled. 
All the toil of the day she beguiled ; 
And with song in a language mysterious she lulled 
On her bosom the wayfaring child. 

AVhen the gypsy anon in her Ethiop hand 

Took the infant's diminutive palm, 
0, 'twas fearful to see how the features she scanned 

Of the babe in his slumbers so calm ! 
Well she noted each mark and each furrow that 
crossed 

O'er the tracings of destiny's line : 
"Whence came ye?" she cried, in astonish- 
ment lost, 

"For this Child is of lineage Divine !" 

" From the village of Nazareth," Joseph replied, 

"Where we dwelt in the land of the Jew, 
We have fled from a tyrant whose garment is 
dyed 

In the gore of the children he slew^ : 
We were told to remain till an angel's command 

Should appoint us the hour to return ; 
But till then we inhabit the foreigners' land. 

And in Egypt we make our sojourn." 

" Then ye tarry with me," cried the gypsy in joy, 

" And ye make of my dwelling your home ; 
Many years have I prayed that the Israelite boy 

(Blessed hope of the Gentiles !) would come." 
And she kissed both the feet of the infant and 
knelt. 

And adored him at once ; then a smile 
Lit the face of his mother, who cheerfully dwelt 

With her host on the banks of the Nile. 

Francis MAHONY {Father Prout). 



^ 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



383 



BUKIAL OF MOSES. 

" And he buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, over against 
Beth-peor ; but no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day." — 
DEUT. xxxiv. 6. 

By Nebo's lonely mountain, 

On this side Jordan's wave, 

In a vale in the land of Moab, 

There lies a lonely grave ; 

But no man built that sepulchre. 

And no man saw it e'er ; 

For the angels of God upturned the sod. 

And laid the dead man there. 

That was the grandest fiineral 

That ever passed on earth ; 

Yet no man heard the trampling, 

Or saw the train go forth : 

Noiselessly as the daylight 

Comes when the night is done. 

And the crimson streak on ocean's cheek 

Grows into the great sun ; 

Noiselessly as the spring-time 

Her crown of verdure weaves. 

And all the trees on all the hills 

Unfold their thousand leaves : 

So without sound of music 

Or voice of them that wept, 

Silently down from the mountain's crown 

The great procession swept. 

Perchance the bald old eagle 

On gray Beth-peor's height 

Out of his rocky eyry 

Looked on the wondrous sight ; 

Perchance the lion stalking 

Still shuns that hallowed spot ; 

For beast and bird have seen and heard 

That which man knoweth not. 

But, when the warrior dieth, 

His comrades of the war. 

With arms reversed and muffled drums, 

Follow the funeral car : 

They show the banners taken ; 

They tell his battles won ; 

And after him lead his masterless steed, 

While peals the minute-gun. 

Amid the noblest of the land 

Men lay the sage to rest. 

And give the bard an honored place, 

With costly marbles drest. 

In the great minster transept 

Where lights like glories fall. 

And the sweet choir sings, and the organ rings 

Along the emblazoned hall. 



This was the bravest warrior 

That ever buckled sword ; 

This the most gifted poet 

That ever breathed a word ; 

And never earth's philosopher 

Traced with his golden pen 

On the deathless page truths half so sage 

As he wrote down for men. 

And had he not high honor ? — 
The hillside for a pall ! 
To lie in state while angels wait. 
With stars for tapers tall ! 
.J And the dark rock-pines, like tossing plumes. 
Over his bier to wave, 
And God's own hand, in that lonely land, 
To lay him in his grave ! — • 

In that strange grave without a name, 

Whence his uncoffined clay 

Shall break again — wondrous thought ! — 

Before the judgment-day. 

And stand, with glory wrapped around. 

On the hills he never trod. 

And speak of the strife that won our life 

AVith the incarnate Son of God. 

lonely tomb in Moab's land ! 

dark Beth-peor's hill ! 

Speak to these curious hearts of ours. 

And teach them to be still : 

God hath his mysteries of grace, 

Ways that we cannot tell. 

He hides them deep, like the secret sleep 

Of him he loved so well. 

CECIL FRANCES ALEXANDER. 



THE GREENWOOD SHRIFT. 

GEORGE in. AND A DYING WOMAN IN WINDSOR FOREST. 

OtJTSTRETCHED beneath the leafy shade 
Of Windsor forest's deepest glade, 

A dying woman lay ; 
Three little children round her stood. 
And there went up from the greenwood 

A woful wail that day. 

" mother ! " was the mingled cry, 
" mother, mother ! do not die, 

And leave us all alone." 
" My blessed babes ! " she tried to say, 
But the faint accents died away 

In a low sobbing moan. 

And then, life struggled hard with death. 
And fast and strong she drew her breath, 
And up she raised her head ; 



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POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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And, peering through the deep wood maze 
With a long, sharp, unearthly gaze, 
" Will she not come ? " she said. 

Just then, the parting boughs between, 
A little maid's light form was seen. 

All breathless with her speed ; 
And, following close, a man came on 
(A portly man to look upon), 

Who led a panting steed. 

" Mother ! " the little maiden cried. 
Or e'er she reached the woman's side, 

And kissed her clay-cold cheek, — 
" I have not idled in the town. 
But long went wandering up and down, 

The minister to seek. 

" They told me here, they told me there, — 
I think they mocked me everywhere ; 

And when I found his home, 
And begged him on my bended knee 
To bring his book and come with me, 

Mother ! he would not come. 

" I told him how you dying lay, 
And could not go in peace away 

Without the minister ; 
I begged him, for dear Christ his sake, 
But 0, my heart was fit to break, — 

Mother ! he would not stir. 

"So, though my tears were blinding me, 
I ran back, fast as fast could be. 

To come again to you ; 
And here — close by- — this squire I met. 
Who asked (so mild) what made me fret ; 

And when I told him true, — 

"'I will go with you, child,' he said, 
' God sends me to this dying bed,' — 

Mother, he 's here, hard by." 
While thus the little maiden spoke. 
The man, his back against an oak. 

Looked on with glistening eye. 

The bridle on his neck hung free, 

With quivering flank and trembling knee. 

Pressed close his bonny bay ; 
A statelier man, a statelier steed. 
Never on greensward paced, I rede, 

Than those stood there that day. 

So, while the little maiden spoke, 
The man, his back against an oak, 

Looked on with glistening eye 
And folded arms, and in his look 
Something that, like a sermon-book. 

Preached, — "All is vanity." 



But when the dying woman's face 
Turned toward him with a wishful gaze. 

He stepped to where she lay ; 
And, kneeling down, bent over her, 
Saying, ' ' I am a minister, 

My sister ! let us pray." 

And well, withouten book or stole, 
(God's words were printed on his soul !) 

Into the dying ear 
He breathed, as 't were an angel's strain, 
The things that unto life pertain. 

And death's dark shadows clear. 

He spoke of sinners' lost estate. 
In Christ renewed, regenerate, — ■ 

Of God's most blest decree. 
That not a single soul should die 
Who turns repentant, with the cry 

" Be merciful to me." 

He spoke of trouble, pain, and toil, 
Endured but for a little while 

In patience, faith, and love, — 
Sure, in God's own good time, to be 
Exchanged for an eternity 

Of happiness above. 

Then, as the spirit ebbed away, 

He raised his hands and eyes to pray 

That peaceful it might pass ; 
And then — the orphans' sobs alone 
Were heard, and they knelt, every one. 

Close round on the green grass. 

Such was the sight their wandering eyes 
Beheld, in heart-struck, mute sur[)rise, 

Who reined their coursers back. 
Just as they found the long astray. 
Who, in the heat of chase that day. 

Had wandered from their track. 

But each man reined his pawing steed. 
And lighted down, as if agreed. 

In silence at his side ; 
And there, uncovered all, they stood, — 
It was a wholesome sight and good 

That day for mortal pride. 

For of the noblest of the land 

Was that deep-hushed, bareheaded band ; 

And, central in the ring, 
By that dead pauper on the ground, 
Her ragged orphans clinging round. 

Knelt their anointed king. 

ROBERT and CAROLINE SOUTHEY. 



a 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



38 



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THE COTTER'S SATURDAY NIGHT. 

INSCRIBED TO R. AIKEN, ESQ. 

" Let not ambition mock tlieir useful toil. 
Their homely joys and destiny obscure ; 

Nor grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile, 

The short but simple annals of the poor." — GRAY. 

My loved, my lionored, mucli-respected friend, 

No mercenary bard his homage pays : 
With honest pride I scorn each seltish end ; 
My dearest meed, a friend's esteem and 
praise. 
To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays, 

The lowly train in life's sequestered scene ; 

The native feelings strong, the guileless ways ; 

What Aiken in a cottage would have been ; 

Ah ! though his worth unknown, far happier 

there, I ween. 

November chill blaws loud wi' angry sugh ; 
The shortening winter-day is near a close ; 
The miry beasts retreating frae the pleugh, 
The blackening trains o' craws to their 
repose ; 
The toilworn cotter frae his labor goes, — 

This night his weekly moil is at an end, — 

Collects his spades, his mattocks, and his hoes. 

Hoping the morn in ease and rest to spend, 

And weary, o'er the moor, his course does hame- 

ward bend. 

At length his lonely cot appears in view, 

Beneath the shelter of an aged tree ; 
Th' expectant wee things, toddlin', stacher 
through 
To meet their dad, wi'flichterin' noise an' glee. 
His wee bit ingle, blinking bonnily. 

His clean hearthstane, his thriftie wifie's 
smile, 
The lisping infant prattling on his knee. 
Does a' his weary carking cares beguile. 
And makes him quite forget his labor and his toil. 

Bely ve * the elder bairns come drapping in, 

At service out amang the farmers roun ; 
Some ca' the pleugh, some herd, some tentie t 
rin 

A cannie errand to a neibor town ; 
Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown, 

In youthfu' bloom, love sparkling in her e'e. 
Comes hame, perhaps, to shew a bra' new gown. 

Or deposit her sair-won penny-fee. 
To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be. 

Wi' joy unfeigned brothers and sisters meet. 
An' each for other's weelfare kindly spiers : 

The social hours, swift-winged, unnoticed fleet ; 
Each tells the uncos that he sees or hears ; 

• By and by. t Csut.'cjs. 



The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years ; 

Anticipation forward points the view : 
The mother, wi' her needle an' her shears. 

Gars auld claes look amaist as weel 's the new ; 
The father mixes a' wi' admonition due. 

Their master's an' their mistress's command, 
The younkers a' are warned to obey ; 

And mind their labors wi' an eydent * hand. 
And ne'er, though out o' sight, to jauk or 

play ; 

" An' 0, be sure to fear the Lord alway ! 

An' mind your duty, duly, morn an' night ! 
Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray. 
Implore his counsel and assisting might ; 
They never sought in vain that sought the Lord 
aright ! " 

But, hark ! a rap comes gently to the door. 

Jenny, wha kens the meaning o' the same. 
Tells how a neibor lad cam o'er the moor, 

To do some errands and convoy her hame. 
The wily mother sees the conscious flame 

Sparkle in Jenny's e'e, and flush her cheek ; 
Wi' heart-struck anxious care inquires his 
name. 
While Jenny hafilins t is afraid to speak ; 
Weel pleased the mother hears it's nae wild, 
worthless rake. 

Wi' kindly welcome, Jenny brings him ben ; 

A strajjpin' youth ; he taks the mother's e'e ; 
Blithe Jenny sees the visit 's no ill ta'en ; 

The father cracks of horses, pleughs, and kye. 
The youngster's artless heart o'erflows wi' joy, 
But blate and lathefu', scarce can weel be- 
have ; 
The mother, wi' a woman's wiles, can spy 
What makes the youth sae bashfu' an' sae 
grave ; 
Weel pleased to think her bairn 's respected like 
the lave. 

happy love ! where love like this is found ! 
heartfelt raptures ! bliss beyond compare ! 

1 've paced much this weary mortal round, 

And sage experience bids me this declare : — 
If Heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare. 

One cordial in this melancholy vale, 
'T is when a youthful, loving, modest pair 
In other's arms breathe out the tender tale, 
Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the 
evening gale. 

Is there, in human form, that bears a heart, 
A wretch, a villain, lost to love and truth. 

That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art, 
Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth ? 



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fl- 



386 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



■a 



Curse on his perj ured arts ! dissembling smooth ! 

Are honor, virtue, conscience, all exiled ? 
Is there no pity, no relenting ruth, 

Points to the parents fondling o'er their 
child, 
Then paints the ruined maid, and their distrac- 
tion wild ? 

But now the supper crowns their simple board. 
The halesome parritch, chief o' Scotia's food ; 
The soupe their only hawkie * does aiford, 

That 'yont the hallant snugly chows hercood ; 
The dame brings forth, in complimental mood, 
To grace the lad, her weel-hained kebbuck :J: 
fell, 
An' aft he 's prest, an' aft he ca's it guid ; 
The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell. 
How 't was a towmond § auld, sin' lint was i' the 
bell. 

The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face, 

They, round the ingle, form a circle wide ; 
The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace, 

The big ha'-Bible, ance his father's pride ; 
His bonnet reverently is laid aside. 

His lyart haffets || wearing thin an' bare : 
Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide. 

He wales a portion with judicious care ; 
And " Let us worship God ! " he says with sol- 
emn air. 

They chant their artless notes in simple guise ; 

They tune their hearts, by far the noblest 

aim : 

Perhaps "Dundee's" wild-warbling measures 

rise, 

Or plaintive "Martyrs," worth}"^ of the name; 

Or noble "Elgin " beets the heavenward flame. 

The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays : 
Compared with these, Italian trills are tame ; 
The tickled ears no heartfelt raptures raise ; 
Nae unison hae they with our Creator's praise. 

The priest-like father reads the sacred page, — 

How Abram was the friend of God on high ; 
Or Moses bade eternal warfare wage 

With Amalek's ungracious progeny ; 
Or how the royal bard did groaning lie 

Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging ire ; 
Or Job's pathetic plaint, and wailing cry ; 

Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire ; 
Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre. 

Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme, — 
How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed ; 

How He, who bore in heaven the second name. 
Had not on earth whereon to lay his head : 



^ 



* Cow. 

§ Twelvemonth. 



+ Partition. 
11 Gray locks. 



How his first followers and servants sped ; 

The precepts sage they wrote to many a land ; 
How he, who lone in Patmos banished. 
Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand. 
And heard great Bab'lon's doom pronounced by 
Heaven's command. 

Then, kneeling down, to heaven's eternal King, 

The saint, the father, and the husband prays : 
Hope " springs exulting on triumphant wing," 

Tliat thus they all shall meet in future days ; 
There ever bask in uncreated rays. 

No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear. 
Together hymning their Creator's praise. 

In such society, yet still more dear ; 
"While circling Time moves round in an eternal 
sphere. 

Compared with this, how poor Eeligion's pride, 

In all the pomp of method and of art, 
When men display to congregations wide, 

Devotion's every grace, except the heart ! 
The Power, incensed, the pageant will desert. 

The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole ; 
But, haply, in some cottage far apart. 

May hear, well pleased, the language of the 
soul ; 
And in his Book of Life the inmates poor enroll. 

Then homeward all take off their several way ; 

The youngling cottagers retire to rest : 
The parent-pair their secret homage pay. 

And proffer up to Heaven the warm request, 
That He who stills the raven's clamorous nest, 

And decks the liljr fair in flowery pride. 
Would, in the way his wisdom sees the best, 

For them and for their little ones provide ; 
But, chiefly, in their hearts with grace divine 
preside. 

From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur 
springs, 
That makes her loved at home, revered 
abroad ; 
Princes and lords are but the breath of kings, 
" An honest man 's the noblest work of 
God ! " 
And certes, in fair Virtue's heavenly road. 

The cottage leaves the palace far behind : 
What is a lordling's pomp ? — a cumbrous load, 
Disguising oft the wretch of humankind. 
Studied in arts of hell, in wickedness refined ! 

Scotia ! my dear, my native soil ! 

For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is 
sent. 
Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil 

Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet 
content ! 



S^ 



And, 0, may Heaven their simple lives prevent 

From luxury's contagion, weak and vile ! 
Then, howe'er crowns and coronets be rent, 
A virtuous populace may rise the while. 
And stand a wall of lire around their much-loved 
isle. 

Thou ! who poured the patriotic tide, 

That streamed through Wallace's undaunted 
heart ; 
AVho dared to nobly stem tyrannic pride. 

Or nobly die, the second glorious part, 
(The patriot's God peculiarly thou art. 

His friend, inspirer, guardian, and reward !) 
0, never, never Scotia's realm desert ; 

But still the patriot and the patriot bard 
In bright succession raise, her ornament and guard ! 

ROBERT BURNS. 



[& 



THE RELIGION OF HUDIBRAS. 

FROM " HUDIBRAS," PART I. 

He was of that stubborn crew 
Of errant saints, whom all men grant 
To be the true church militant ; 
Such as do build their faith upon 
The holy text of pike and gun ; 
Decide all controversies by 
Infallible artillery. 
And prove their doctrine orthodox 
By apostolic blows and knocks ; 
Call fire, and sword, and desolation 
A godly, thorough Reformation, 
Which always must be carried on 
And still be doing, never done ; 
As if religion were intended 
For nothing else but to be mended. 
A sect whose chief devotion lies 
In odd perverse antipathies ; 
In falling out with that or this. 
And linding somewhat still amiss ; 
More peevish, cross, and splenetic. 
Than dog distract, or monkey sick ; 
That with more care keep holiday 
The wrong than others the right way ; 
Compound for sins they are inclined to. 
By damning those they have no mind to ; 
Still so perverse and opposite, 
As if they worshipped God for spite ; 
The self-same thing they will abhor 

One way, and long another for. 

Samuel Butler. 
« 

THE FAITHFUL ANGEL. 

FROM "PARADISE LOST," BOOK V. 

The seraph Abdiel, faithful found 
Among the faithless, faithfirl only he ; 
Among innumerable false, unmoved, 
Unshaken, unseduced, unterrified. 



His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal ; 

Nor number, nor example with him wrought 

To swerve from truth, or change his constant 
mind. 

Though single. From amidst them forth he 
passed, 

Long way through hostile scorn, which he sus- 
tained 

Superior, nor of violence feared aught ; 

And with retorted scorn his back he turned 

On those proud towers to swift destruction 
doomed. 



THE OTHER WORLD. 

It lies around us like a cloud, — 

A world we do not see ; 
Yet the sweet closing of an eye 

May bring us there to be. 

Its gentle breezes fan our cheek ; 

Amid our worldly cares 
Its gentle voices whisper love, 

And mingle with our prayers. 

Sweet hearts around us throb and beat, 
Sweet helping hands are stirred. 

And palpitates the veil between 
With breathings almost heard. 

The silence — awful, sweet, and calm — 
They have no power to break ; 

For mortal words are not for them 
To utter or partake. 

So thin, so soft, so sweet they glide, 
So near to press they seem, — 

They seem to lull us to our rest, 
And melt into our dream. 

And in the hush of rest they bring 

'T is easy now to see 
How lovely and how sweet a pass 

The hour of death may be. 

To close the eye, and close the ear. 

Rapt in a trance of bliss, 
And gently dream in loving arms 

To swoon to that — from this. 

Scarce knowing if we wake or sleep. 
Scarce asking where we are. 

To feel all evil sink away, 
All sorrow and all care. 

Sweet souls around us ! watch us still, 

Press nearer to our side. 
Into our thoughts, into our prayers, 

With gentle helpings glide. 



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388 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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Let death 'between us be as naught, 
A dried and vanished stream ; 

Your joy be tlie reality, 

Our suffering life the dream. 

Harriet Beecher Stowe. 



THE LOVE OF GOD. 

All things that are on earth shall wholly pass 

away, 
Except the love of God, which shall live and last 

for aye. 
The forms of men shall be as they had never been ; 
The blasted groves shall lose their fresh and ten- 
der green ; 
The birds of the thicket shall end their pleasant 

song, 
And the nightingale shall cease to chant the even- 
ing long. 
The kine of the pasture shall feel the dart that 

kills, 
And all the fair white iiocks shall perish from 

the hills. 
The goat and antlered stag, the wolf and the fox. 
The wild boar of the wood, and the chamois of 

the rocks. 
And the strong and fearless bear, in the trodden 

dust shall lie ; 
And the dolphin of the sea, and the mighty 

whale, shall die. 
And realms shall be dissolved, and empires be 

no more. 
And they shall bow to death, who ruled from 

shore to shore ; 
And the great globe itself, so the holy writings 

tell. 
With the rolling firmament, where the starry 

armies dwell. 
Shall melt with fervent heat, — they shall all 

pass away. 
Except the love of God, which shall live and last 

for aye. 

From the Provencal of BERNARD Rascas. Trans- 
lation of William Cullen Bryant. 



^ 



THE MASTER'S TOUCH. 

In the still air the music lies unheard ; 

In the rough marble beauty hides unseen : 
To make the music and the beauty, needs 

The master's touch, the sculptor's chisel keen. 

Great Master, touch us with thy skilful hand ; 

Let not the music that is in us die ! 
Great Sculptor, hew and polish us ; nor let, 

Hidden and lost, thy form within us lie ! 



Spare not the stroke ! do with us as thou wilt ! 

Let there be naught unfinished, broken, marred ; 
Complete thy purpose, that we may become 

Thy perfect image, thou our God and Lord ! 

HORATIUS BONAR. 



DIFFERENT MINDS. 

Some murmur when their sky is clear 

And wholly bright to view, 
If one small speck of dark appear 

In their great heaven of blue ; 
And some with thankful love are filled 

If but one streak of light. 
One ray of God's good mercy, gild 

The darkness of their night. 

In palaces are hearts that ask. 

In discontent and pride, 
"Why life is such a dreary task. 

And all good things denied ; 
And hearts in poorest huts admire 

How Love has in their aid 
(Love that not ever seems to tire) 

Such rich provision made. 

Richard Chenevix Trench. 



CAN A. 



Dear Friend ! whose presence in the house. 

Whose gracious word benign. 
Could once, at Cana's wedding feast. 

Change water into wine ; 

Come, visit us ! and when dull work 

Grows weary, line on line. 
Revive our souls, and let us see 

Life's water turned to wine. 

Gay mirth shall deepen into joy. 
Earth's hopes grow half divine, 

When Jesus visits us, to make 
Life's water glow as wine. 

The social talk, the evening fire, 

The homely household shrine, 
Grow bright with angel visits, when 

The Lord pours outthe wine. 

For when self-seeking turns to love, 

Not knowing mine nor thine. 
The miracle again is wrought. 

And water turned to wine. 

James Freeman Clarke. 



U^ 



\Sr 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



rn 



THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE 
LIFE. 

THOU great Friend to all the sons of men, 
Who once appeared in humblest guise below, 

Sin to rebuke, to break the captive's chain. 
And call thy brethren forth from want and 
woe, — 

We look to thee ! thy truth is still the Light 
Which guides the nations, groping on their 
way. 

Stumbling and falling in disastrous night, 
Yet hoping ever for the perfect day. 

Yes ; thou art still the Life, thou art the Way 
The holiest know ; Light, Life, the Way of 
heaven ! 

And they who dearest hope and deepest pray, 

Toil by the Light, Life, Way, which thou hast 

given. 

Theodore Parker. 



f& 



FOREVER WITH THE LORD. 

Forever with the Lord ! 
Amen ! so let it be ! 
Life from the dead is in that word, 
And immortality. 

Here in the body pent. 
Absent from him I roam, 
Yet nightly pitch my moving tent 
A day's march nearer home. 

My Father's house on high. 
Home of ray soul ! how near, 
At times, to faith's foreseeing eye 
Thy golden gates appear ! 

Ah ! then my spirit faints 
To reach the land I love. 
The bright inheritance of saints, 
Jerusalem above ! 

Yet clouds will intervene. 
And all my prospect flies ; 
Like Noah's dove, I flit between 
Rough seas and stormy skies. 

Anon the clouds depart. 
The winds and waters cease ; 
While sweetly o'er my gladdened heart 
Expands the bow of peace ! 

Beneath its glowing arch. 
Along the hallowed ground, 
1 see cherubic armies march, 
A camp of fire around. 



I hear at morn and even. 
At noon and midnight hour. 
The choral harmonies of heaven 
Earth's Babel tongues o'erpower. 

Then, then I feel that he. 
Remembered or forgot, 
The Lord, is never far from me, 
Though I perceive him not. 

In darkness as in light. 
Hidden alike from view, 
I sleep, 1 wake, as in his sight 
Who looks all nature through. 

All that I am, have been. 
All that I yet may be, 
He sees at once, as he hath seen, 
And shall forever see. 

" Forever with the Lord : " 
Father, if 't is thy will. 
The promise of that faithful word 
Unto thy child fulfil ! 

So, when my latest breath 
Shall I'end the veil in twain, 
By death I shall escape from death, 
And life eternal gain. 



JAMES MONTGOMERY. 



THE SABBATH OF THE SOUL. 

Sleep, sleep to-day, tormenting cares, 

Of earth and folly born ; 
Ye shall not dim the light that streams 

From this celestial morn. 

To-morrow will be time enough 

To feel your harsh control ; 
Ye shall not violate, this day. 

The Sabbath of my soul. 

Sleep, sleep forever, guilty thoughts ; 

Let fires of vengeance die ; 
And, purged from sin, may I behold 

A God of purity ! 

ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD. 



EDWIN AND PAULINUS: 

THE CONVERSION OF NORTHUMBRIA. 

The black-haired gaunt Paulinus 

By ruddy Edwin stood : — 
" Bow down, king of Deira, 

Before the blessed Rood ! 
Cast out thy heathen idols. 

And worship Christ our Lord." 
— But Edwin looked and pondered, 

And answered not a word. 



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I&-: 



390 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



"""H] 



Again the gaunt Paulinus 

To ruddy Edwin spake : 
"God offers life immortal 

For Ms dear Son's own sake ! 
"Wilt thou not hear his message, 

Who bears the keys and sword ? " 
— But Edwin looked and pondered, 

And answered not a word. 

Eose then a sage old warrior 

Was fivescore winters old ; 
Whose beard from chin to girdle 

Like one long snow-wreath rolled : 
"At Yule-time in our chamber 

We sit in warmth and light. 
While cold and howling round us 

Lies the black land of Night. 

" Athwart the room a sparrow 

Darts from the open door : 
Within the happy hearth-light 

One red flash, — and no nioi'e ! 
We see it come from darkness, 

And into darkness go : — 
So is our life, King Edwin ! 

Alas, that it is so ! 

" But if this pale Paulinus 

Have somewhat more to tell ; 
Some news of Whence and Whither, 

And where the soul will dwell ; — 
If on that outer darkness 

The sun of hope may shine ; — 
He makes life worth the living ! 

I take his God for mine ! " 

So spake the wise old warrior ; 

And all about him cried, 
" Paulinus' God hath conquered ! 

And he shall be our guide : — • 
For he makes life worth living 

Who brings this message plain, 
When our brief days are over, 

That we shall live again." 



Anonymous. 



& 



THE LOVE OF GOD SUPREME. 

Thou hidden love of God, whose height, 
Whose depth unfathomed no man knows, 

I see from far thy beauteous light, 
Inly I sigh for thy repose. 

My heart is pained, nor can it be 

At rest till it finds rest in thee. 

Thy secret voice invites me still 
The sweetness of thy yoke to prove. 

And fain I would ; but though my will 
Be fixed, yet wide my passions rove. 



Yet hindrances strew all the way ; 
I aim at thee, yet from thee stray. 

'T is mercy all that thou hast brought 
My mind to seek her peace in thee. 

Yet while I seek but find thee not 
No peace my wand'ring soul shall see. 

Oh ! when shall all my wand'rings end, 

And all my steps to-thee-ward tend ? 

Is there a thing beneath the sun 

That strives with thee my heart to share ? 
Ah ! tear it thence and reign alone. 

The Lord of every motion there. 
Then shall my heart from earth be free, 
When it has found repose in thee. 

Oh ! hide this self from me, that I 
No more, but Christ in me, may live. 

My vile aff'ections crucify, 

Nor let one darling lust survive. 

In all things nothing may I see. 

Nothing desire or seek but thee. 

Love, thy sovereign aid impart. 
To save me from low-thoughted care ; 

Chase this self-will through all my heart, 
Through all its latent mazes there. ■ 

Make me thy duteous child, that I 

Ceaseless may Abba, Father, cry. 

Ah ! no ; ne'er will I backward turn : 
Thine wholly, thine alone I am. 

Thrice happy he who views with scorn 
Earth's toys, for thee his constant flame. 

Oh ! help, that I may never move 

From the blest footsteps of thy love. 

Each moment draw from earth away 
My heart, that lowly waits thy call. 

Speak to my inmost soul, and say, 
"I am thy Love, thy God, thy All." 

To feel thy power, to hear thy voice. 

To taste thy love is all my choice. 

JOHN Wesley. 



THE RIGHT MUST WIN. 

0, IT is hard to work for God, 

To rise and take his part 
Upon this battle-field of earth. 

And not sometimes lose heart ! 

He hides himself so wondrously, 
As though there were no God ; 

He is least seen when all the powers 
Of ill are most abroad. 



'i 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



^ 



Or he deserts us at the hour 

The fight is all but lost ; 
And seems to leave us to ourselves 

Just when we need him most. 

Ill masters good, good seems to change 

To ill with greatest ease ; 
And, worst of all, the good with good 

Is at cross-purposes. 

Ah ! God is other than we think ; 

His ways are far above. 
Far beyond reason's height, and reached 

Only by childlike love. 

Workman of God ! 0, lose not heart, 

But learn what God is like ; 
And in the darkest battle-field 

Thou shalt know where to strike. 

Thrice blest is he to whom is given 

The instinct that can tell 
That God is on the field when he 

Is most invisible. 

Blest, too, is he who can divine 

Where real right doth lie, 
And dares to take the side that seems 

Wrong to man's blindfold eye. 

For right is right, since God is God ; 

And right the day must win ; 
To doubt would be disloyalty, 

To falter would be sin ! 

FREDERICK William Faeer. 



A DYING HYMN. 

Earth, with its dark and dreadful ills, 

Recedes and fades away ; 
Lift up your heads, ye heavenly hills ; 

Ye gates of death, give way ! 

My soul is full of whispered song, — 

My blindness is my sight ; 
The shadows that I feared so long 

Are full of life and light. 

The while my pulses fainter beat, 

My faith doth so abound ; 
I feel grow firm beneath my feet 

The green, immortal ground. 

That faith to me a courage gives 

Low as the grave to go ; 
I know that my Redeemer lives, — 

That I shall live I know. 



The palace walls I almost see 

Where dwells my Lord and King ! 

grave, where is thy victory ? 
death, where is thy sting ? 

Alice Gary. 



HOPEFULLY WAITING. 

" Blessed are they who are homesick, for they shall come at last to 
their Father's house." — HeiNRICH STILLING. 

Not as you meant, learned man, and good ! 
Do I accept thy words of truth and rest ; 
God, knowing all, knows what for me is best. 
And gives me what I need, not what he could. 

Nor always as I would ! 
I shall go to the Father's house, and see 

Him and the Elder Brother face to face, — 
What day or hour I know not. Let me be 
Steadfast in work, and earnest in the race. 
Not as a homesick child who all day long 
Whines at its play, and seldom speaks in song. 

If for a time some loved one goes away, 
And leaves us our appointed work to do. 
Can we to him or to ourselves be true 
In mourning his departure day by day. 

And so our work delay ? 
Nay, if we love and honor, we shall make 

The absence brief by doing well our task, — 
Not for ourselves, but for tlie dear One's sake. 
And at his coming only of him ask 

Approval of the work, which most was done, 
Not for ourselves, but our Beloved One. 

Our Father's house, I know, is broad and grand ; 
In it how many, many mansions are ! 
And, far beyond the light of sun or star. 
Four little ones of mine through that fair land 

Are walking hand in hand ! 
Tliink you I love not, or that I forget 

These of my loins ? Still this M'oiid is fair. 
And I am singing while my eyes are wet 
With weeping in this balmy summer air : 
Yet I 'm not homesick, and the children Tiere 
Have need of me, and so my way is clear. 

I would be joyful as my days go by. 

Counting God's mercies to me. He who bore 
Life's heaviest cross is mine forevermore, 
And I who wait his coming, shall not I 

On his sure word rely ? 
And if sometimes the way be rough and steep. 

Be heavy for the grief he sends to me. 
Or at my waking I would only weep. 
Let me remember these are things to be, 
To work his blessed will until he come 
To take my hand, and lead me safely home. 
Anson D. F. Randolph. 



ta 



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392 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



-a 



WHY THUS LONGING? 

Why thus longing, thus forever sighing 
For the far off, unattained, and dim, 

While the beautiful, all round thee lying, 
Offers up its low perpetual hymn ? 

Wouldst thou listen to its gentle teaching, 
Ail thy restless yearnings it would still ; 

Leaf and flower and laden bee are preaching 
Thine own sphere, though humble, first to fill. 

Poor indeed thou must be, if around thee 
Thou no ray of light and joy canst throw, — 

If no silken cord of love hath bound thee 
To some little world through weal and woe ; 

If no dear eyes thy fond love can brighten, — 
No fond voices answer to thine own ; 

If no brother's sorrow thou canst lighten 
By daily sympathy and gentle tone. 

Not by deeds that win the crowd's applauses. 
Not by works that gain thee world-renown, 

Not by martyrdom or vaunted crosses, 

Canst thou win and wear the immortal crown. 

Daily struggling, though unloved and lonely, 
Every day a rich reward will give ; 

Thou wilt find, by hearty striving only, 
And truly loving, thou canst truly live. 

Dost thou revel in the rosy morning, 
AVhen all nature hails the Lord of light, 

And his smile, the mountain-tops adorning. 
Robes yon fragrant fields in radiance bright ? 

Other hands may grasp the field and forest. 
Proud proprietors in pomp may shine ; 

But Avith fervent love if -thou adorest. 
Thou art wealthier, — all the woild is thine. 

Yet if through earth's wide domains thou rovest. 
Sighing that they are not thine alone, 

Not those fair fields, but thyself thou lovest. 
And their beauty and thy wealth are gone. 

Nature weai's the color of the spirit ; 

Sweetly to her worshipper she sings ; 
All the glow, the grace she doth inherit, 

Round her trusting child she fondly flings. 

HARRIET WINSLOW SEWALL. 



B- 



YET WE TRUST THAT SOMEHOW 
GOOD. 

FROM "IN MEMORIAM." 

YET we trust that somehow good 
Will be the final goal of ill, 
To pangs of nature, sins of will. 

Defects of doubt, and taints of blood ; 



That nothing walks with aimless feet ; 
That not one life shall be destroyed, 
Or cast as rubbish to the void. 

When God hath made the pile complete ; 

That not a worm is cloven in vain ; 
That not a moth with vain desire 
Is shrivelled in a fruitless fire, 

Or but subserves another's gain. 

Behold, we know not anything ; 
I can but trust that good shall fall 
At last — far off — at last, to all. 

And every winter change to spring. 

So runs my dream : but what am I ? 
An infant crying in the night : 
An infant crying for the light : 

And with no language but a cry. 

Alfred Tennyson. 



THE LOVE OF GOD. 

Thou Grace Divine, encircling all, 

A soundless, shoreless sea ! 
Wherein at last our souls must fall, 

Love of God most free ! 

When over dizzy heights we go, 
One soft hand blinds our eyes. 

The other leads us, safe and slow, 
Love of God most wise ! 

And though we turn us from thy face. 

And wander wide and long. 
Thou hold'st us still in thine embrace, 

Love of God most strong ! 

The saddened heart, the restless soul, 
The toil-worn frame and mind. 

Alike confess thy sweet control, 
Love of God most kind ! 

But not alone thy care we claim. 

Our wayward steps to win ; 
We know thee by a dearer name, 

Love of God within ! 

And, filled and quickened by thy breath, 

Our souls are strong and free 
To rise o'er sin and fear and death, 

Love of God, to thee ! 

ELIZA SCUDDER. 



LOVE DIVINE, ALL LOVE EXCELLING. 

Love divine, all love excelling, 
Joy of heaven to earth come down, 

Fix in us thy humble dwelling, 
All thy faithful mercies crown ; 



. [J l 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



393 



-a 



Jesus, thou art all compassion ! 

Pure, unbounded love thou art ; 
Visit us with thy salvation, 

Enter every trembling heart. 

Breathe, 0, breathe thy loving spirit 

Into every troubled breast ; 
Let us all in thee inherit, 

Let us find the promised rest ; 
Take away the love of sinning. 

Alpha and Omega be ; 
End of faith, as its beginning, 

Set our hearts at liberty. 

Come, almighty to deliver, 

Let us all thy life receive ; 
Suddenly return, and never. 

Never more thy temples leave : 
Thee we would be always blessing. 

Serve thee as thy hosts above ; 
Pray and praise thee without ceasing, 

Gloiy in thy precious love. 

Finish then thy new creation ; 

Pure, unspotted may we be ; 
Let us see th)^ great salvation 

Perfectly restored by thee : 
Changed from glory into glory. 

Till in heaven we take our place ! 
Till we cast our crowns before thee, 

Lost in wonder, love, and praise. 

AUGUSTUS TOPLADY. 



I SAW THEE. 

"When thou wast under the figj-tree, I saw thee." 

I SAW thee wlien, as twilight fell, 
And evening lit her fairest star, 

Thy footsteps sought yon quiet dell, 
The world's confusion left afar. 

I saw thee when thou stood'st alone. 

Where drooping branches thick o'erhung. 

Thy still retreat to all unknown, 
Hid in deep shadows darkly flung. 

I saw thee when, as died each sound 
Of bleating flock or woodland bird. 

Kneeling, as if on holy ground. 

Thy voice the listening silence heard. 

I saw thy calm, uplifted eyes. 

And marked the heaving of thy breast, 
When rose to heaven thy heartfelt sighs 

For purer life, for perfect rest. 



I saw the light that o'er thy face 
Stole with a soft, suffusing glow, 

As if, within, celestial grace 

Breathed the same bliss that angels know. 

I saw — what thou didst not — above 
Thy lowly head an open heaven ; 

And tokens of thy Father's love 

With smiles to thy rapt spirit given. 

I saw thee from that sacred spot 

With firm and peaceful soul depart ; 

I, Jesus, saw thee, — doubt it not, — 
And read the secrets of thy heart ! 

Ray Pal.mer. 



STRONG SON OF GOD, IMMORTAL LOVE. 

FROM "IN MEMORIAM." 

Strong Son of God, immortal Love, 
AVhom. we, that have not seen thy face, 
By faith, and faith alone, embrace. 

Believing where we cannot prove ; 

Thine are these orbs of light and shade ; 

Thou madest Life in man and brute ; 

Thou madest Death ; and lo, thy foot 
Is on the skull which thou hast made. 

Thou wilt not leave us in the dust : 
Thou madest man, he knows not why ; 
He thinks he was not made to die ; 

And thou hast made him : thou art just. 

Thou seemest human and divine. 
The highest, holiest manhood, thoir : 
Our wills are ours, we know not how ; 

Our wills are ours, to make them thine. 

Our little systems have their day ; 
They have their day and cease to be : 
They are but broken lights of thee. 

And thou, Lord, art more than they. 

We have but faith : we cannot know ; 

For knowledge is of things we see ; 

And yet we trust it comes from thee, 
A beam in darkness : let it grow. 

Let knowledge grow from more to more. 
But more of reverence in us dwell ; 
That mind and soul, according well. 

May make one music as before. 

But vaster. We are fools and slight ; 

We mock thee when we do not fear ; 

But help thy foolish ones to bear ; 
Help thy vain worlds to bear thy light. 



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394 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



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Forgive what seemed my sin in me ; 
What seemed my worth since I began ; ■ 
For merit lives from man to man, 

And not from man, Lord, to thee. 

Forgive my grief for one removed, 
Thy creature, whom I found so fair. 
I trust he lives in thee, and there 

I find him worthier to be loved. 

Forgive these wild and wandering cries, 

Confusions of a wasted youth ; 

Forgive them where they fail in truth, 
And in thy wisdom make me wise. 

ALFRED TENNYSOX. 



m- 



THE SOUL'S CRY. 

" I ciy unto thee daily." — PS. Ixxxvi. 3. 

0, EVER from the deeps 

Within my soul, oft as I muse alone, 

Comes forth a voice that pleads in tender tone ; 

As when one long unblest 

Sighs ever after rest ; 

Or as the wind perpetual murmuring keeps. 

I hear it when the day 

Fades o'er the hills, or 'cross the shimmering sea ; 

In the soft twilight, as is wont to be, 

Without my wish or will. 

While all is hushed and still. 

Like a sad, plaintive cry heard far aiway. 

Not even the noisy crowd, 

That like some mighty torrent rushing down 

Sweeps clamoring on, this cry of want can drown : 

But ever in my heart 

Afresh the echoes start ; 

I hear them still amidst the tumult loud. 

Each waking mom anew 

The sense of many a need returns again ; 

I feel myself a child, helpless as when 

I watched my mother's eye. 

As the .slow hours went by, 

And from her glance my being took its hue. 

I cannot shape my way 

W^here nameless perils ever may betide. 

O'er slippery steeps whereon my feet may slide ; 

Some mighty hand I crave. 

To hold and help and save. 

And guide me ever when my steps would stray. 

There is but One, I know. 

That all my hourly, endless wants can meet ; 

Can shield from hami, recall my wandering feet ; 

My God, thy hand can feed 

And day by day can lead 

Where the sweet streams of peace and .safety flow. 

RAY PALMER. 



FEAGMEKTS. 

Deity. 

From thee, great God, we spring, to thee we tend, 
Path, motive, guide, original, and end. 

T/ie Rambler, No. 7. DR. S. JOHNSON. 

God sendeth and giveth, both mouth and the meat. 

Good Husbandry Lessons. T. TUSSER. 

'T is Providence alone secures 

In every change both mine and yours. 



One God, one law, one element. 
And one far-off divine event. 
To which the whole creation moves. 

hi Menioria}n, CojiclitsioJi. TenN'YSON. 

Give what thou canst, without thee we are poor ; 
And with thee rich, take what thou wilt away. 

The Task: Winter Mornuiff Walk. CO\S'PER. 

God, from a beautiful necessity, is Love. 

0/ Immortality . M. F. TUPPER. 

Yet I shall temper so 
Justice Avith mercy, as may illustrate most 
Them fully satisfied, and thee appease. 

Paradise Lost, Book x. MiLTON. 

Who sees with equal eye, as God of all, 
A hero perish, or a sparrow fall. 
Atoms or systems into ruin hurled. 
And now a bubble burst, and now a world. 

Essay on Man. Epistle I. POPE. 

And He that doth the ravens feed. 
Yea, providently caters for the sparrow, 
Be comfort to my age ! 

As Yon LJke It, Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE; 

My God, my Father, and my Friend, 
Do not forsake me at my end. 

Translation of Dies Ires. EARL OF ROSCOMMON. 

As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns. 
As the rapt serajih that adores and burns : 
To Him no high, no low, no great, no small ; 
He fills. He bounds, connects, and equals all ! 

Essay on Man, Epistle !. POPE. 

To God the Father, God the Son, 
And God the Spirit, three in one ; 
Be honor, praise, and glory given, 
By all on earth, and all in heaven. 



Glory to the FatJter and the Son, 



DR. I. WATTS. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



395 



:-a 



Atheism. 

Fortli from his dark and lonely hiding-place, 
(Portentous sight !) the owlet Atheism, 
Sailing on obscene wings athwart the noon. 
Drops his blue-fringed lids, and holds them close. 
And, hooting at the glorious Sun in Heaven, 
Cries out, " Where is it ? " 

Ftai-s ill Solitude. COLERIDGE. 

An atheist's laugh 's a poor exchange 
For Deity offended ! 

Epistle to a YoitJig Friend. BURNS. 



Prkaciiing and Missions. 

I preached as never sure to preach again. 
And as a dying man to dying men. 

Love breathing TItanks and Praise. R. BA.XTER. 

What in me is dark 
Illumine, what is low raise and support ; 
That to the height of this great argument 
I ma}^ assert eternal Providence, 
And justify the ways of God to men. 

Paradise Lost, Book i . Ml LTON . 

Time flies, death nrges, knells call, heaven in- 
vites, 
Hell threatens. 

A'ijrht Thottghts. Night ii. DR. E. YOUNG. 

If goodness lead him not, yet weariness 
May toss him to my breast. 

The Pulley. GEORGE HERBERT. 

Religion stands on tiptoe in our land, 
Ready to pass to the American strand. 

The Church Militant. GEORGE HERBERT. 

From Greenland's icy mountains, 

From India's coral strand. 
Where Afric's sunny fountains 

Roll down their golden sand. 



Llissionary IJyn 



Bishop Heber. 



Sin. 



I see the right, and I approve it too, 

Condemn the wrong, and yet the wrong pursue. 

Metamorphoses, vii. 20. Tr. of Tate &• Stonestreet. OviD. 

Where is the man who has not tried 
How mirth can into folly glide, 
And folly into sin ! 

The Bridal of Triermain, Cant. i. SCOTT. 

There is a method in man's wickedness, 
It grows up by degrees. 

A King and ho King, Act v. Sc. 4. 

BEAUMONT and Fletcher. 

Ay me, how many perils doe enfold 

The righteous man, to make him daily fall. 

Faerie Queene, Book \. SPENSER. 



Of man's first disobedience and the fruit 
Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste 
Brought death into the Morld and all our woe. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MiLTON. 

Though every prospect pleases. 
And only man is vile. 

Missionary Hymn. BISHOP HEBER. 

And he that does one fault at first. 
And lies to hide it, makes it two. 

Divine Songs. DR. I. WATTS. 

But, sad as angels for the good man's sin, 
Weep to record, and blush to give it in. 

Pleasures of Hope. T. Ca.MPBELL. 

About some act, 
That has no relish of salvation in 't. 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Long is the way 
And hard, that out of hell leads up to light. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON. 

Commit 
The oldest sins the newest kind of ways. 

Henry IV., Part II. Act iv. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

So farewell hope, and w4th hope farewell fear. 
Farewell remorse : all good to me is lost. 
Evil, be thou my good. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON. 

Vice is a monster of so frightful mien 
As to be hated, needs but to be seen. 

Essay on Man, Epistle II. PoPE. 



shame, where is thy blush ? 

Hajnlet, Act iii. Sc. 4. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Conscience. 
Servant of God, well done. 

Paradise Lost, Book vi. 

As ever in my great taskmaster's e3'-e. 

On his being arrived to tlie Age of Twenty-three. 

And sure the eternal Master found 
His single talent well employed. 



: Robert Lez'e/. 



DR. S. JOHNSON. 



Consideration, like an angel, came 

And whipped the offending Adam out of him. 

Hcmy v., ActX.Sc. i. SH.4KESPEARE. 

Leave her to Heaven, 
And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge, 
To i)rick and sting her. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Why should not conscience have vacation, 
As well as other courts o' th' nation ? 

Hiidibras. Part H. Cant. ii. DR. S. BUTLER, 



-i 



fl-: 



96 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



f& 



Remorse. 

"Now conscience wakes despair 
That slumbered, wakes the bitter memory 
Of what he was, what is, and what must be. 

Paradise Lost, Bock iv. MiLTON. 

When the scourge 
Inexorable, and the torturing hour 
Call us to penance. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MiLTON. 

The hell within him. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON. 



Fleeting Good. 

Some fleeting good, that mocks me with the view. 

Goldsmith. 



The Traveller, 



The good he scorned 
Stalked off reluctant, like an ill-used ghost, 
Not to return ; or, if it did, in visits 
Like those of angels, short and far between. 

TheC7-av€. Part II. R. BL.\IR. 



Hell. 



All hope abandon, ye who enter here. 

In/erno Cant. iii. DANTE. 

Which way shall I fly 
Infinite wrath, and infinite despair ? 
Which way I fly is hell ; myself am hell ; 
And, in the lowest deep, a lower deep. 
Still threatening to devour me, opens wide, 
To which the hell I suflfer seems a heaven. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON. 

When all the world dissolves, 
And every creature shall be purified, 
All places shall be hell that are not heaven. 

Faustus. C. MARLOWE. 



The Devil. 

The devil hath power 
To assume a pleasing shape. 



Hatnlet, Act ii. Sc. : 



SHAKESPEARE. 



And oftentimes, to win us to our harm, 
The instruments of darkness tell us truths ; 
Win us with honest trifles, to betray us 
In deepest consequence. 

Macbeth, Acti. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

But the trail of the serpent is over them all. 

Paradise and the Peri. MoORE. 



Respectability. 
Assume a virtue, if you have it not. 

Hamlet, Act m. Sc. i,, SHAKESPEARE. 



Hypocrisy. 

That practised falsehood under saintly shew, 
Deep malice to conceal, couched with revenge. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MILTON. 

With devotion's visage, 
And pious action, we do sugar o'er 
The devil himself. 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

I waive the quantum o' the sin, 

The hazard of concealing ; 
But, och ! it hardens a' within, 

And petrifies the feeling. 

Efistle to a Voitnj^ Friend. BURNS. 

Built God a church, and laughed his word to 
scorn. 

Reti>-e}>ient. COWPER. 

But then I sigh, and with a piece of scripture 
Tell them that God bids us do good for e-vil : 
And thus I clothe my naked villany 
With odd old ends stol'n forth of holy writ. 
And seem a saint when most I play the devil. 

Ki7ig Richard HI., Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

And the devil did grin, for his darling sin 
Is pride that apes humility. 



The Devil's Thoughts. 



COLERIDGE. 



ECCLESIASTICISM. 

Christians have burnt each other, quite per- 
suaded 

That all the Apostles would have done as they 
did. 

Don yuan. Cant. i. BYRON. 

Till Peter's keys some christened Jove adorn, 
And Pan to Moses lends his pagan horn. 

The DiiHCiad, Book iii. POPE. 

With crosses, relics, crucifixes, 
Beads, pictures, rosaries, and pixes ; 
The tools of working out salvation 
By mere mechanic operation. 

Hudibras, Part HI. Cant. i. DR. S. BUTLER. 

When pious frauds and holy shifts 
Are dispensations and gifts. 



Part I. Cant. 



DR. S. BUTLER. 



In hope to merit heaven by making' earth a hell. 

Childe Harold, Cant. i. BVRON. 

Spires M'hose "silent finger points to heaven." 

The Excursion, Book vi. WORDSWORTH. 

To rest, the cushion and soft dean invite, 
Who never mentions hell to ears polite. 

Moral Essays, Epistle IV. POPE. 



^ 



FRAGMENTS. 



-—Si 



597 



Tervei-ts the Prophets and purloins the Psahns. 

Kiiglish Bards and Scotch Reviewers. BYRON. 

The enormous faith of many made for one. 

Bssay on Man, Epistle III. POPE. 

Embryos and idiots, eremites and friars, 
White, black, and gray, with all their trumpery 

Paradise Lost, Book iii. MILTON. 



Theology. 

In Adam's fall 
We sinned all. 

My Book and Heart 
Must never part. 

Young Obadias, 
David, Josias, — 
All were pious. 

Peter denyed 

His Lord, and cryed. 

Young Timothy 
Learnt sin to fly. 

Xerxes did die, 
And so must L 

Zaccheus he 

Did climb the tree 

Our Lord to see. 

New England Pri}>ier. 

Hold thou the good : define it well : 
For fear divine Philosophy 
Should push beyond her mark, and be 

Procuress to the Lords of Hell. 

In Memoriam. TENXYSON. 

Star-eyed Science ! hast thou Avandered there, 
To waft lis home the message of despair ? 

Pleasures of Hope. T. CAMPBELL. 



The Bible. 

When love could teach a monarch to be wise, 
And Gospel-light first dawned from BuUen's eyes. 

Education and Gover>i7ne7tt. T. GRAY. 

Just knows, and knows uo more, her Bible true. 

Truth. ' COWPER. 

Within that awful volume lies 
The mystery of mysteries ! 

And better had they ne'er been born. 
Who read to doubt, or read to scorn. 

The Monastery. SCOTT. 



Belief and Doubt. 

One in whom persuasion and belief 
Had ripened into faith, and faith become 
A passionate intuition. 

The Excursion, Book vi. WORDSWORTH. 

Nor less I deem that there are Powers 
Which of themselves our minds impress ; 
That we can feed this mind of ours 
In a wise passiveness. 

Expostulation and Reply. WORDSWORTM. 

But there are wanderers o'er Eternity 
Whose bark drives on and on, and anchored 
ne'er shall be. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iii. BVRON. 

Whose faith has centre everywhere. 
Nor cares to fix itself to form. 



hi Meinoriain, 



Tennyson. 



But Faith, fanatic Faith, once wedded fast 
To some dear falsehood, hugs it to the last. 

Lalla Rookh : Veiled Proplut of Khorassan. MoORE. 

For forms of government let fools contest ; 
Whate'er is best administered is best : 
For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight ; 
His can't be wrong Avliose life is in the right. 

Essay on Man, Epistle III. POPE. 

Perplexed in faith, but pure in deeds, 

At last he beat his music out. 

There lives more faith in honest doubt. 
Believe me, than in half the creeds. 

In Memoriam. TENNYSON. 



Jesus Christ. 

Brightest and best of the sons of the morning ! 
Dawn on our darkness, and lend us thine aid. 

Epiphany. BISHOP HEBER. 

Some say, that ever 'gainst that season conies 
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, 
The bird of dawning singeth all night long : 
And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad ; 
The nights are wholesome ; then no planets 

strike, 
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm, 
So hallowed and so gracious is the time. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

In those holy iields, 
Over whose acres walked those blessed feet 
Which fourteen hundred years ago were nailed. 
For our advantage, on the bitter cross. 

Henry IV., Part I. Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



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&z 



POEMS OF RELIGION. 



^a 



He was the Word, that spake it ; 
He took the bread and brake it ; 
And what that Word did make it, 
I do believe and take it. 

Dvuiiie Poems : On the Sacratnenl. 



DR. J. DONNE. 



I&^ 



ViKTUE. 

Do well and right, and let the world sink. 

Country Parson. GEORGE HERBERT. 

For blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds. 
And though a late, a sure reward succeeds. 

The Mourning Bride, Act v. Sc. 12. W. CONGREVE. 

That virtue only makes our bliss below, 
And all our knowledge is, ourselves to know. 

£ssay on Man, Epistle IV. POPE. 

Pygmies are pygmies still, though perched on 

Alps ; 
And pyramids are pyramids in vales. 
Each man makes his own stature, builds himself : 
Virtue alone outbuilds the Pyramids ; 
Her monuments shall last when Egypt's fall. 

Nisht Thoughts. Night m. DR. E. YOUNG. 

Abashed the devil stood, 
And felt how awful goodness is, and saw 
Virtue in her shape how lovely. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON. 

Count that day lost whose low descending sun 
Views from thy hand no worthy action done. 

Art of Reading. [Bartlett, p. 606.] STANIFORD. 

Shine by the side of every path we tread 
AVith such a lustre, he that runs may read. 

Tirocinium. COWPER. 

Good, tlie more 
Ciiinmunicated, more abundant grows. 

Paradise Lost, Book v. MILTON. 

Wx^fttiih, perhaps, in some nice tenets might 
Be wrong ; his life, I' m sure, was in the right. 

On the Death o/Crashaw. A. CoWLEY. 

Know then this truth (enough for man to know), 
" Virtue alone is ha]ipiness below." 

Essay on Man, Epistle IV. POPE. 

There buds the promise of celestial worth. 

The Last Day, Book iii. DR. E. YOUNG. 

The best of what we do and are. 
Just God, forgive. 

Thoughts S%iggested on the Banks 0/ Nith. WORDSWORTH. 



Truth- 

The firste vertue, sone, if thou wilt lere, 
Is to restreine, and kepen wel thy tonge. 

Tlie MancipUs Talc. CHAUCER. 

0, while you live, tell truth, and shame the devil. 



Henry IV., Part I. Act iii. Sc. i. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



And simple truth miscalled simplicity. 
And captive good attending captain ill. 

Sonnet LA' VI. SHAKESPEARE. 

Truth is the highest thing that man may keep. 

The Fmnkeleincs Tale. CHAUCER. 

For truth has such a face and such a mien, 
As to be loved needs onl}'' to be seen. 

The Hind and Panther. DrvdeN. 



Charity. 

In Faith and Hope the world will disagree. 
But all mankind's concern is charity. 

Essay on Man, Epistle III. POPE. 

Whene'er I take my walks abroad. 

How many poor I see ! 
What shall I render to my God 

For all his gifts to me ? 

Dix'ine Songs. DR. I. WATTS. 

Who will not mercie unto others show. 
How can he mercy ever hope to have ? 

Faerie Queene, Book vi. SPENSER. 

'T is hers to pluck the amaranthine flower 
Of Faith, and round the suiferer's temples bind 
Wreaths that endure affliction's heaviest shower, 
And do not shrink from sorrow's keenest wind. 

Sonnet XXXV. WORDSWORTH. 

The primal duties shine aloft, like stars ; 
The charities that soothe, and heal, and bless. 
Are scattered at the feet of man, like flowers. 



The Excursion, Book ix. 



WORDSWORTH. 



And learn the luxury of doing good. 

The Traveller. GOLDSMITH. 



Prayer. 

Prayer is the soul's sincere desire. 
Uttered or unexpressed. 

The motion of a hidden fire 
That trembles in the breast. 



What is Prayer ? 



J. MONTGOSIERV. 



And Satan trembles when he sees 
The weakest saint upon his knees. 

Exhortation to Prayer. 



^ 



TRAGMENTS. 



599 



ra 



The imperfect offices of ju-ayer and praise. 

The Excursion. Jioa/c i. WcJliDSWORTH. 

Her eyes are homes of silent prayer. 

In Memoruuii. Tl-NNYSON. 

limed soul ! that, struggling to be fi'ee, 

Art more engaged ! Heli), angels! make assay : 

Bow, stubborn knees ; and, heart, with strings 

of steel, 
Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe. 

2{a»iU-t, Ait iii . Sc. i SHAKESPEARE. 



Heligious Meditation'. 

Remote from man, with God he passed the days. 
Prayer all his business, all liis pleasure j)raise. 

The Hci-mit. T. PARNELL. 

Or if Sion hill 
Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook, that flowed 
Fast b}'^ the oracle of God. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MiLTON. 



The CmusTiAK Life. 

I held it truth, with him who sings 
To one clear harp in divers tones. 
That men may rise on stepping-stones 

Of their dead selves to higher things. 

In Ulcmoria-.n. TENNYSON. 

Saint Augustine ! well hast thou said. 

That of our vices we can frame 
A ladder, if we will but tread 

Beneath our feet each deed of shame ! 

The Ladder of St. Aiti;iistine. LONGFELLOW, 

Could we forbear dispute, and practise love, 
We should agree as angels do above. 

Di-ziine I.oze, Cant. iii. E. WALLER. 

A Christian is the highest style of man. 

Nia^tt Thoughts, Night iv. DR. E. YOUNG. 



Heaven. 

If Gotl hatli made this world so fair, 
AVhere sin and death abound, 

How beautiful, beyond compare, 
Will paradise be found ! 



The Harth/uU of Gods Goodness. 



J. MONTGOMERY. 



We know what we are, but know not what we 
may be. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Lo, the poor Indian ! whose untutored mind 
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind ; 
His soul, proud Science never taught to stray 
Far as the solar walk or milky way. 

But thinks, admitted to that equal sky, 
His faithful dog shall bear him company. 

Essay 071 Man, Epistle I. POPE. 

This world is all a fleeting show, 

For man's illusion given ; 
The smiles of joj'', the tears of woe. 

Deceitful shine, deceitful flow, — 
There 's nothing true but Heaven ! 

Sacred Songs : The 'iuorld is all ajleeting shoiv. MOORE. 

Beyond this vale of tears 

There is a life above. 
Unmeasured by the flight of years ; 

And all that life is love. 

The Issues 0/ Life and Death. J. MONTGOMERY. 

For all we know 

Of what the blessed do above 

Is, that they sing and that they love. 



Il'hite I listen to thy lie, 



E. WALLER. 



Of all that is most beauteous imaged there 
In happier beauty ; more pellucid streams. 
An ampler ether, a diviner air, 
And fields invested with purpureal gleams. 

Laodamia. AVORDSWORTH. 

Other heights in other lives, God willing. 

One Word More. R. BROWNING. 



O-^ 



■^ 



-a 



POEMS OF NATUEE. 



SONNET. 

The World is too much with us ; late aud soon, 
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers ; 
Little we see in nature that is ours ; 
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon ! 
This sea that bares her bosom to the moon ; 
The winds that will be howling at all hours, 
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers ; 
Fpr this, for everything, we are out of tune ; 
It moves us not. — Great God ! I 'd rather be 
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn. 
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, 
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn ; 
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea. 
Or hear old Tiiton blow his wreathed horn. 

William Wordsworth. 



NATURE. 

The bubbling brook doth leap when I come by. 
Because my feet find measure with its call ; 
The birds know when the friend they love is nigh. 
For I am known to them, both great and small. 
The flower that on the lonely hillside grows 
Expects me there when spring its bloom has given ; 
And many a tree and bush my wanderings knows. 
And e'en the clouds and silent stars of heaven ; 
For he who with his Maker walks aright. 
Shall be their lord as Adam was before ; 
His ear shall catch each sound with new delight, 
Each object wear the dress that then it wore ; 
And he, as when erect in soul he stood. 
Hear from his Father's lips tliat all is good. 

Jones very. 



BE- 



COME TO THESE SCENES OF PEACE. 

Come to these scenes of peace, 
Where, to rivers murmuring. 
The sweet birds all the summer sing. 
Where cares and toil aud sadness cease ! 
Stranger, does thy heart deplore 
Friends whom thou wilt see no more ? 



Does thy wounded spirit prove 
Pangs of hopeless, severed love ? 
Thee the stream that gushes clear, 
Thee the birds that carol near 
Shall soothe, as silent thou dost lie 
And dream of their wild lullaby ; 
Come to bless these scenes of peace. 
Where cares and toil and sadness cease. 

William Lisle Bowles. 



TINTERN ABBEY. 

Five years have past ; live summers, with the 

length 
Of five long winters ! and again I hear 
These waters,*rollingfrom their mountain-springs 
With a soft inland murmur. — Once again 
Do I behold these steep and lofty clitt's. 
That on a wild, secluded scene impress 
Thoughts of more deep seclusion, and connect 
The landscape with the quiet of the sky. 
The day is come when I again repose 
Here, under this dark sycamore, and view 
These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts. 
Which at this season, with their unripe fruits. 
Are clad in one green hue, and lose themselves 
Mid groves and copses. Once again I see 
These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines 
Of sportive wood run wild : these pastoral farms, 
Green to the very door ; and wreaths of smoke 
Sent up, in silence, from among the trees ! 
With some uncertain notice, as might seem 
Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods. 
Or of some hermit's cave, where by his fire 
The hermit sits alone. 

These beauteous forms, 
Through a long absence, have not been to me' 
As is a landscape to a blind man's ej^e ; 
But oft, in lonely rooms, and mid the din 
Of towns and cities, I have owed to them, 
In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, 
Felt in the blood, and felt along the heait ; 
And passing even into my purer mind, 



Tlie River Wye. 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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With tranquil restoration ; — feelings too 

Of unremembered pleasure : such, perhaps, 

As have no slight or trivial induence 

On that best portion of a good man's life, 

His little, nameless, unremembered acts 

Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust, 

To them I may have owed another gift. 

Of aspect more sublime ; that blessed mood, 

In which the burden of the mystery, 

In which tlie heavy and the weary weight 

Of all this unintelligible world, 

Is lightened, — that serene and blessed mood. 

In which the affections gently lead us on, 

Until, the breath of this corporeal frame 

And even the motion of our human blood 

Almost suspended, we are laid asleep 

In body, and become a living soul : 

While with an eye made quiet by the power 

Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, 

We see into the life of things. 

If this 
. Be but a vain helief, yet, 0, how oft — 
In darkness and amid the many shapes 
Of joyless daylight ; when the fretful stir 
Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, 
Have hung upon the beatings of my heart — 
How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee, 

sylvan Wye ! thou wanderer through the woods, 
How often has my spirit turned to thee ! 

And now, with gleams of half-extinguished 

thought, 
With many recognitions dim and faint, 
And somewhat of a sad perplexity, 
Tlie picture of the mind revives again : 
While here I stand, not only with the sense 
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts 
That in this moment there is life and food 
For future years. And so I dare to hope, 
Thougli changed, no doubt, from what I was when 

first 

1 came among these hills : when like a roe 
I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides 
Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, 
AVherever nature led : more like a man 
Plying from something that he dreads, than one 
Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then 
(The coarser pleasures of my boyish days 

And their glad animal movements all gone by) 
To nie was all in all. — I cannot paint 
What then I was. The sounding cataract 
Haunted me like a passion : the tall rock, 
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood. 
Their colors and their forms, wei'e then to me 
An appetite ; a feeling and a love. 
That had no need of a remoter charm 
By thoughts supplied, nor any interest 
Unborrowed from the eye. — That time is past. 



And all its aching joys are now no more. 

And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this 

Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur ; other gifts 

Have followed ; for such loss, I would believe. 

Abundant recompense. For I have leai-ned 

To look on nature, not as in the hour 

Of thoughtless youth ; but hearing oftentimes 

The still, sad music of humanity. 

Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power 

To chasten and subdue. And I have felt 

A presence that disturbs me with the joy 

Of elevated thoughts ; a sense sublime 

Of something far more deeply interfused. 

Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, 

And the round ocean, and the living air, 

And the blue skj', and in the mind of man : 

A motion and a spirit, that impels 

All thinking things, all objects of all thought, 

And rolls through all things. Therefore am I 

still 
A lover of the meadows and the woods, 
And mountains ; and of all that we beliold 
From this green earth ; of all the mighty world 
Of eye, and ear, — both what they half create,* 
And what perceive ; well i:)leased to recognize 
In nature and the language of the sense. 
The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse. 
The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul 
Of all my moral being. 

Nor perchance, 
If I were not thus taught, should I the more 
Suffer my genial spirits to decay : 
For thou art with me here upon the banks 
Of this fair river ; thou my clearest friend. 
My dear, dear friend ; and in thy voice I catch 
The language of my former heart, and read 
My former pleasures in the shooting liglits 
Of thy wild eyes. 0, yet a little while 
May I behold in thee what I was once, 
My dear, dear sister ! and this prayer I make, 
Knowing that Nature never did betray 
The heart that loved her ; 't is her privilege. 
Through all the j'ears of this our life, to lead 
Fi'oni joy to joy : for she can so inform 
The mind that is within us, so impress 
With quietness and beauty, and so feed 
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues, 
Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men. 
Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all 
The dreary intercourse of daily life, 
Shall e'er prevail against us, or disturb 
Our cheerful faith, that all which we behold 
Is full of blessings. Therefore let tlie moon 
Shine on thee in thy solitary walk ; 
And let the misty motintain-winds be free 

* " This line has a close resemblance to an admirable line of 
Young's, the exact expression of which I do not recollect.'' — THE 
AUTHOR. 



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To Wow against thee : and, in after years, 

AVIien these wiki ecstasies shall be matured 

Into a sober pleasure ; when thy mind 

Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms, 

Thy memory be as a dwelling-place 

For all sweet sounds and harmonies ; 0, then, 

If solitude or fear or pain or grief 

Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts 

Of tender joy wilt thou remember me. 

And these my exhortations ! Nor, perchance, — 

If I should be where I no more can hear 

Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these 

gleams 
Of past existence, ■ — wilt thou then forget 
That on the banks of this delightful stream 
We stood together ; and that I, so long 
A worshipper of Nature, hither came 
Unwearied in that service : rather say 
With warmer love, — 0, with far deeper zeal 
Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then forget 
That after many wanderings, many years 
Of absence, these steep woods and lofty cliffs. 
And this green pastoral landscape, were to me 
More dear, both for themselves and for thy sake ! 

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. 



FOR A COPY OF THEOCEITUS. 

VILLANELLE. 
FROM " ESSAYS IN OLD FRENCH FORMS OF VERSE." 

O Singer of the field and fold, 
Theocritus ! Pan's pipe was thine, — 
Thine was the happier Age of Gold. 

For thee the scent of new-turned mould, 
The beehives and the murmuring pine, 
Singer of the field and fold ! 

Thou sang'st the simple feasts of old, — • 
The beechen bowl made glad with wine : 
Thine was the happier Age of G old. 

Thou bad'st the rustic loves be told, 
Thou bad'st the tuneful reeds combine, 
Singer of the field and fold ! 

And round thee, ever laughing, rolled 
The blithe and blue Sicilian brine : 
Thine was the happier Age of Gold. 

Alas for us ! Our songs are cold ; 
Our Northern suns too sadly shine : — 
Singer of the field and fold, 
Thine was the happier Age of Gold ! 

AUSTIN DOBSON. 



NATUKE'S CHAIN. 

FROM "THE ESSAY ON MAN." 

Look round our world ; behold the chain of love 
Combining all below and all above. 
See plastic nature working to this end. 
The single atoms each to other tend. 
Attract, attracted to, the next in place. 
Formed and impelled its neighbor to embrace. 
See matter next, with various life endued. 
Press to one centre still, the general good. 
See dying vegetables life sustain. 
See life dissolving vegetate again : 
All forms that perish other forms supply 
( By turns we catch the vital breath, and die) ; 
Like bubbles on the sea of matter borne, 
They rise, they break, and to that sea return. 
Nothing is foreign ; parts relate to whole ; 
One all-extending, all-preserving Soul 
Connects each being, greatest with the least ; 
Made beast in aid of man, and man of beast ; 
All served, all serving ; nothing stands alone ; 
The chain holds on, and where it ends, unknown. 

Has God, thou fool ! worked solely for thy good, 
Thy joy, thy pastime, thy attire, thy food ? 
Who for thy table feeds the wanton fawn. 
For him as kindly spreads the flowery lawn. 
Is it for thee the lark ascends and sings ? 
Joy tunes his voice, joy elevates his wings. 
Is it for thee the linnet pours his throat ? 
Loves of his own and raptures swell the note. 
The bounding steed you pompously bestride 
Shares with his lord the pleasure and the pride. 
Is thine alone the seed that strews the plain ? 
The birds of heaven shall vindicate their grain. 
Thine the full harvest of the golden year ? 
Part pays, and justly, the deserving steer : 
The hog that ploughs not, nor obeys thy call, 
Lives on the labors of this lord of all. 

Know, Nature's children all divide her care ; 
The fur that \A'arms a moiiarch warmed a bear. 
While man exclaims, "See all things for my use ! " 
" See man for mine ! " replies a pampered goose : 
And just as short of reason he must fall 
Who thinks all made for one, not one for all. 

Alexander Pope. 



EACH AND ALL. 

Little thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked 

clown, 
Of thee from the hill-top looking down ; 
The heifer that lows in the upland farm, 
Far-heard, lows not thine ear to charm ; 
The sexton, tolling his bell at noon, 
Deems not that great Najioleon 
Stops his horse, and lists with delight. 
Whilst his files sweep round yon Alpine height ; 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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Nor knowest thou what argument 

Thy life to th}' neighbor's creed has lent. 

AH are needed by each one ; 

Nothing is fair or good alone. 

I thought the sparrow's note from heaven, 

Singing at dawn on the alder bough ; 

I brought him home, in his nest, at even ; 

He sings the song, but it pleases not now, 

For 1 did not bring home the river and sky ; — 

He sang to my ear, — they sang to my eye. 

The delicate shells lay on the shore ; 

The bubbles of the latest wave 

Fresh pearls to their enamel gave ; 

And the bellowhig of the savage sea 

Greeted their safe escape to me. 

I wiped away the weeds and foam, 

I fetched my sea-born treasures home ; 

But the poor, unsightly, noisome things 

Had left their beauty on the shore. 

With the sun and the sand and the wild uproar. 

The lover watched his graceful maid, 

As mid the virgin train she strayed. 

Nor knew her beauty's best attire 

"Was woven still by the snow-white choir. 

At last she came to his hermitage. 

Like the bird from the woodlands to the cage ; — 

The gay enchantment was undone, 

A gentle wife, but fairy none. 

Then I said, "I covet truth ; 

Beauty is unripe childhood's cheat ; 

I leave it behind with the games of youth." — 

As I spoke, beneath my feet 

The ground-pine curled its pretty wreath, 

Eunning over the club-moss burrs ; 

I inhaled the violet's breath ; 

Around me stood the oaks and firs ; 

Pine-cones and acorns lay on the ground ; 

Over me soared the eternal sky. 

Full of light and of deity ; 

Again I saw, again I heard. 

The rolling river, the morning bird ; — 

Ikauty through my senses stole ; 

1 yielded myself to the perfect whole. 

RALPH Waldo Emersox. 



Within my limits, lone and still, 
The blackbird pipes in artless trill ; 
Fast by my couch, congenial guest, 
The wren has wove her mossy nest : 
Fronr busy scenes and l)righter skies, 
To lurk with innocence, she flies, 
Here hopes in safe repose to dwell. 
Nor aught suspects the sylvan cell. 

At mora I tiike my customed round. 
To mark how buds yon shrubby mound, 
And every opening primrose count. 
That trimly paints my blooming mount ; 
Or o'er the sculptures, quaint and rude, 
That grace my gloomy solitude, 
I teach in winding wreaths to stray 
Fantastic ivy's gadding spray. 

At eve, within yon studious nook, 

I ope my brass-embossed book, 

Portrayed with man}'' a holy deed 

Of martyrs, crowned with heavenly meed ; 

Then, as my taper waxes dim. 

Chant, ere I sleep, my measured hymn. 

And, at the close, the gleams behold 

Of parting wings, bedropt with gold. 

While such pure joys my bliss create, 
Who but would smile at guilty state ? 
Who but would wish his holy lot 
In calm oblivion's humble grot ? 
Who but would cast his pomp away. 
To take my staff, and amice gray ; 
And to the world's tumultuous stage 
Prefer the blameless hermitage ? 

THOMAS WARTON. 



!& 



EETIREMENT. 

JNSCKIPTION IN A HERMITAGE. 

Beneath this .stony roof reclined, 
1 soothe to peace my pensive mind ; 
And while, to shade my lowly cave. 
Embowering elms their umbrage wave. 
And while the maple dish is mine, — 
The beechen cup, unstained with wine, 
1 scorn the gay licentious crowd. 
Nor heed the toys that deck the proud. 



ON A BEAUTIFUL DAY. 

TJXSEEN Spirit ! now a calm divine 

Comes forth from thee, rejoicing earth and air ! 

Trees, hills, and houses, all distinctly shine. 
And thy great ocean slumbers everywhere. 

The mountain ridge against the purple sky 
Stands clear and strong, witli darkened rocks 
and dells. 

And cloudless brightness opens wide and high 
A home aerial, where thy presence dwells. 

The chime of bells remote, the murmuring sea, 
Tlie song of birds in whispering copse and wood, 

Tiie distant voice of children's thoughtless glee, 
And maiden's song, are all one voice of good. 



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Amid the leaves' green mass a sunny play 
Of flash and shadow stirs like inward life : 

The ship's white sail glides onward far away, 
Unhauiiteil by a dream of storm or strife. 

John Steklixg. 



B— 



INVOCATION TO LIGHT. 

FROM " PARADISE LOST," BOOK III. 

Hail, holy Light, offspring of Heaven first-born ! 
Or of the Eternal coeternal beam 
May I express thee unblamed ? since God is light, 
And never but in nnapproached light 
Dwelt from eteriuty, dwelt then in thee, 
Bright effluence of bright essence increate ! 
Or hear'st thou rather pure ethereal stream, 
Whose fountain who shall tell ? Before the sun, 
Before the heavens, thou wert, and at the voice 
Of God, as with a mantle, didst invest j 
The rising world of waters dark and deep, 
Won from the void and formless infinite. 
Thee I revisit now with bolder wing. 
Escaped the Stygian pool, though long detained 
In that obscure sojourn, while in my flight 
Through utter and through middle darkness 

borne, 
With other notes than to the Orphean lyre, 
I sung of Chaos and eternal Night, 
Taught by the heavenly Muse to venture down 
The dark descent, and up to re-ascend. 
Though hard and rare : thee I revisit safe. 
And feel thy sovereign vital lamp ; but thou 
Eevisitest not these eyes, that roll in vain 
To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn ; 
So thick a drop serene hath quenched their orbs. 
Or dim suffusion veiled. Yet not the more 
Cease I to wander where the Muses haunt 
Clear spring, or shady grove, or sunny hill, 
Smit with the love of sacred song ; but chief 
Thee, Sion, and the flowery brooks beneath, 
That wash thy hallowed feet, and warbling flow, 
Nightly I visit : nor sometimes forget 
Those other two equalled with me in fate. 
So were I equalled with them in renown. 
Blind Thamyris and blind Mseonides, 
And Tiresias and Phineus, prophets old : 
Then feed on thoughts that voluntary move 
Harmonious numbers ; as the wakeful bird 
Sings darkling, and in shadiest covert hid 
Tunes her nocturnal note. Thus with the year 
Seasons return, but not to me returns 
Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn, 
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose. 
Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine ; 
liut cloud, instead, and ever-during dark, 
Surrounds nje, from the cheerful ways of men 



Cut ofl", and for the book of knowledge fair 
Pi'esented with a universal blank 
Of nature's works, to me expunged and rased. 
And wisdom at one entrance <iuite shi^t out. 
So much the rather thou, celestial Light, 
Shine inward, and the mind through all her 

powers 
Irradiate ; there plant eyes, all mist from thence 
Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell 
Of tilings invisible to mortal sight. 

MiLTON'. 



FROM THE "HYMN TO LIGHT." 

Say, from what golden quivers of the sky 
Do all thy winged arrows fly ? 
Swiftness and Power by birth are thine : 
From thy great sire they came, thy sire, the 
Word Divine, 

Thou in the Moon's bright chariot, proud and 

gay. 

Dost thy bright wood of stars survey ; 
And all the year dost with thee bring 
Of thousand flowery lights thine own nocturnal 
spring. 

Thou, Scythian-like, dost round thy lands 
above 
The Sun's gilt tent forever move. 
And still, as tliou in pomp dost go, 
The shining pageants of the world attend thy 
show- 

Nor amidst all these triumplis dost thou scorn 
The liumble glow-worms to adorn, 
And with those living spangles gild 
(0 greatness without pride !) the bushes of the 
field. 

Night and her ugly subjects thou dost fright. 
And Sleep, the lazy owl of night ; 
Ashamed, and fearful to appear. 
They screen their horrid shapes with the black 
hemisphere. 

At thy appearance. Grief itself is said 

To shake his wings, and rouse his head : 
And cloudy Care has often took 
A gentle beamy smile, reflected from thy look. 

At thy appearance, fear itself grows bold ; 
Thy sunshine melts away his cold. 
Encouraged at the sight of thee 
To the cheek color comes, and firmness to the 
knee. 



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When, goddess, tliou lift'st up thy wakened 
head 
Out of the morning's jrarple bed, 
Thy quire of birds about thee play, 
And all the joyful world salutes the rising day. 

All the world's bravery, that delights our eyes. 
Is but thy several liveries ; 
Thou the rich dye on tlieni bestow'st, 
Thy nimble pencil paints this landscape as thou 
go'st. 

A crimson garment in the rose thou wear'st ; 
A crown of studded gold thou bear'st ; 
The virgin-lilies, in their white. 
Are clad but with the lawn of almost naked light. 

The violet, Spring's little infant, stands 
Girt in thy purple swaddling-bands ; 
On the fair tulip thou dost dote ; 
Thou cloth'st it in a gay and i^arty-colored coat. 

Through the soft ways of heaven, and air, and 
sea, 
Which open all their pores to thee. 
Like a clear river thou dost glide. 
And with thy living stream through the close 
channels slide. 

But the vast ocean of iinbounded day, 

In the empyrean heaven does stay. 

Thy rivers, lakes, and springs, below. 

From thence took first their rise, thither at last 

must flow. 

Abraham Cowley. 



u 



DAYBREAK. 

A WIND came up out of the sea, 

And said, "0 mists, make room for me !" 

It hailed the ships, and cried, " Sail on, 
Ye mariners, the night is gone ! " 

And hurried landward far away. 
Crying, " Awake ! it is the day ! " 

It said unto the forest, " Shout ! 
Hang all your leafy banners out ! " 

It touched the wood-bird's folded wing. 
And said, " bird, awake and sing ! " 

And o'er the farms, " chanticleer, 
Your clarion blow ; the day is near ! " 

It whispered to the fields of corn, 

' ' Bow down, and hail the coming morn ! " 



It shouted through the belfry-tower, 
" Awake, bell ! pi'oclaim the hour." 

It crossed the churchyard with a sigh, 
And said, " Not yet ! in quiet lie." 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 



MORNING SONG. 

Up ! quit thy bower ! late wears the hour. 
Long have the rooks cawed round the tower 
O'er flower and tree loud hums the bee. 
And the wild kid sports merrily. 
The sun is bright, the sky is clear ; 
Wake, lady, wake ! and hasten here. 

Up, maiden fair ! and bind thy hair. 

And rouse thee in the breezy air ! 

The lulling stream that soothed thy dream 

Is dancing in the sunny beam. 

Waste not these hours, so fresh, so gay : 

Leave thy soft couch and haste away ! 

Up ! Time will tell the morning bell 
Its service-sound has chimed well ; 
The aged crone keeps house alone. 
The reapers to the fields are gone. 
Lose not these hours, so cool, so gay : 
Lo ! while thou sleep'st they haste away ! 

Joanna Baillie. 



MORNING. 

In the barn the tenant cock, 

Close to partlet perched on high, 

Briskly crows (the shepherd's clock !) 
Jocund that the morning 's nigh. 

Swiftly from the mountain's brow, 
Shadows, nursed by night, I'etire : 

And tlie peeping sunbeam now. 
Paints with gold the village spire. 

Philomel forsakes the thorn, 

Plaintive where slie prates at night ; 
And the lark, to meet the morn. 

Soars beyond the shepherd's sight. 

From the low-roofed cottage ridge. 
See the chattering swallow spring ; 

Dai-ting through the one-arched bridge. 
Quick she dips her dappled wing. 

Now the pine-tree's waving top 
Gently greets the morning gale : 

Kidlings now begin to crop 
Daisies, on the dewy dale. 



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From the balmy sweets, uncloyed 
(Restless till her task be done), 

Now the busy bee 's employed 
Sipping dew before the suu. 

Trickling through the creviced rock, 
Where the limpid stream distils. 

Sweet refreshment waits the flock 
When 't is sun-drove from the hills, 

Colin 's for the promised corn 
( Ere the harvest hopes are rijie ) 

Anxious ; — whilst the huntsman's horn, 
Boldly sounding, drowns his pipe. 

Sweet, sweet, the warbling throng. 
On the white emblossomed spray ! 

Nature's universal song 
Echoes to the rising day. 

JOHN CUNNINGHAM. 



THE NORTHERN LIGHTS. 

To claim the Arctic came the sun 
With banners of the burning zone. 
Unrolled upon their airy spars. 
They froze beneath the light of stars ; 
And there they float, those streamers old, 
Those Northern Lights, forever cold ! 

Benjamin Franklin Taylor. 



DAWN". 



The night Was dark, though sometimes a faint 
star 
A little while a little space made bright. 
The night was long and like an iron bar 
Lay heavy on the land : till o'er the sea 
Slowly, within the East, there grew a light 
Which half was starlight, and half seemed to be 
The herald of a greater. The pale white 
Turned slowly to pale rose, and up the height 
Of heaven slowly climbed. The gray sea grew 
Rose-colored like the sky. A white gull Hew 
Straight toward the utmost boundary of the East, 
Where slowly the rose gathered and increased. 
It was as on the opening of a door 
By one that in his hand a lamp doth hold. 
Whose flame is hidden by the garment's fold, — 
The still air moves, the wide room is less dim. 

More bright the East became, the ocean turned 
Dark and more dark against the brightening 

sky, — 
Sharper against the sky the long sea line. 
The hollows of the breakers on the shore 
Were green like leaves whereon no sun doth shine. 
Though white the outer branches of the tree. 



From rose to red the level heaven burned ; 
Then sudden, as if a sword fell from on high, 
A blade of gold flashed on the horizon's rim. 

Richard Watson Gilder. 



PACK CLOUDS AWAY. 

Pack clouds away, and welcome day, 

AVith night we banish sorrow ; 
Sweet air, blow soft ; mount, lark, aloft, 

To give my love good morrow. 
Wings from the wind to please her mind, 

Notes from the lark I '11 borrow : 
Bird, prune thy wing ; nightingale, sing, 

To give my love good morrow. 

To give my love good morrow, 

Notes from them all I '11 borrow. 

Wake from thy nest, robin redbreast, 

Sing, birds, in every furrow ; 
And from each hill let music shrill 

Give my fair^ove good morrow. 
Blackbird and thrush in every bush, 

Stare, linnet, and cock-sparrow, 
You petty elves, amongst yourselves, 

Sing my fair love good morrow. 

To give my love good morrow. 

Sing, birds, in every furrow. 

Thomas Heywood. 



MORNING. 



FROM "THE MINSTREL." 



But who the melodies of morn can tell ? 
The wild brook babbling down the mountain- 
side ; 
The lowing herd ; the sheepfold's simple bell ; 
The pipe of early shepherd dim descried 
In the lone valley ; echoing far and wide 
The clamorous horn along the cliffs above ; 
The hollow murmur of the ocean-tide ; 
The hum of bees, the linnet's lay of love. 
And the full choir that wakes the universal grove. 

The cottage curs at earlj^ pilgrim bark ; 
Crowned with her pail the trijiping milkmaid 

sings ; 
The whistling ploughman stalks afield ; and, 

hark! 
Down the rough slope the ponderous wagon 

rings ; 
Through rustling corn the hare astonished 

springs ; 
Slow tolls the village-clock the drowsy hour ; 
The partridge bursts away on whirring wings ; 
Deep mourns the turtle in sequestered bower. 
And shrill lark carols clear from her aerial tower. 

James Beattie. 



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THE SABBATH MORNmG. 

With silent awe I hail the sacred morn, 
That slowly wakes while all the fields are still ! 
A soothing calm on every breeze is borne ; 
A graver murmur gurgles from the rill ; 
And echo answers softer from the hill ; 
And sweeter sings the linnet from the thorn : 
The skylark warbles in a tone less shrill. 
Hail, light serene ! hail, sacred Sabbath morn ! 
The rooks float silent by in airy drove ; 
The sun a placid yellow lustre throws ; 
The gales that lately sighed along the grove 
Have hushed their downy wings in dead repose ; 
The hovering rack of clouds forgets to move, — 
So smiled the day when the first morn arose ! 

John Leyden. 



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REVE DU MIDI. 

When o'er the mountain steeps 
The hazy noontide creeps, 
And the shrill cricket sleeps 
Under the grass ; 
When soft the shadows lie, 
And clouds sail o'er the sky, 
And the idle winds go by, 
With the heavy scent of blossoms as they pass, — 

Then, when the silent stream 
Lapses as in a dream. 
And the water-lilies gleam 
Up to the sun ; 

When the hot and burdened day 
Rests on its downward way, 
When the moth forgets to play. 
And the plodding ant may dream her work is 
done, — ■ 

Then, from the noise of war 
And the din of e:U'tli afar, 
Like some forgotten star 
Dropt from the sky, — ■ 
The sounds of love and fear, 
All voices sad and clear. 
Banished to silence drear, — 
The willing thrall of trances sweet I lie. 

Some melancholy gale 
Breathes its znysterions tale, 
Till the rose's lips grow pale 
With her sighs ; 
And o'er my thoughts are cast 
Tints of the vanished past. 
Glories that faded fast, 
Renewed to splendor in my dreaming eyes. 



As poised on vibrant wings, 
Where its sweet treasure swings, 
The honey-lover clings 
To the red flowers, — 
So, lost in vivid light. 
So, rapt from day and night, 
I linger in delight. 
Enraptured o'er the vision-freighted hours. 

ROSE Terry Cooke. 



A SUMMER NOON. 

Who has- not dreamed a world of bliss 
On a bright sunny noon like this, 
Couched by his native brook's green maze. 
With comrade of his boyish days, 
While all around them seemed to be 
Just as in joyous infancy ? 
Who has not loved, at such an hour, 
Upon that heath, in birchen bower, 
Lulled in the poet's dreamy mood, 
Its wild and Sunny solitude ? 
While o'er the waste of purple ling 
You mark a sultry glimmering ; 
Silence herself thei'e seems to sleep. 
Wrapped in a slumber long and deep, 
Where slowly stray those lonely sheep 
Through the tall foxglove's crimson bloom, 
And gleaming of the scattered broom. 
Love you not, then, to list and hear 
The crackling of the gorse-flowers near. 
Pouring an orange-scented tide 
Of fragrance o'er the desert wide ? 
To hear the buzzard's whimpering shrill, 
Hovering above you high and still ? 
The twittering of the bird that dwells 
Among the heath's delicious bells ? 
While round your bed, o'er fern and blade, 
Insects in green and gold arrayed, 
The sun's gay tribes have lightly strayed ; 
And sweeter sound their humming wings 
Than the proud minstrel's echoing strings. 

William Howitt. 



NOONTIDE. 

Beneath a shivering canopy reclined, 
Of aspen-leaves that wave without a wind, 
I love to lie, when lulling breezes stir 
Tlie spiry cones that tremble on the fir ; 
Or wander mid the dark-green fields of broom, 
When peers in scattered tufts the yellow bloom ; 
Or trace the path with tangling furze o'errun. 
When bursting seed-bells crackle in the sun. 
And pittering grasshoppers, confus'dly shrill, 
Pipe giddily along the glowing hill : 



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Sweet grasshopper, who lov'st at noon to lie 
Serenely in the green-ribbed clover's eye, 
To sun thy filmy wings and emerald vest, 
Unseen th}' form, and undisturbed thy rest. 
Oft have I listening mused the sultry day. 
And wondered what thy chirping song might say. 
When naught was heard along the blossomed lea, 
To join thy music, save the listless bee. 

John Leyden. 



THE MIDGES DANCE ABOON THE BURN. 

The midges dance aboon the burn ; 

The dews begin to fa' ; 
The pairtricks down the rushy holm 

Set up their e'ening ca'. 
Now loud and clear the blackbird's sang 

Rings through the briery shaw. 
While, flitting gay, the swallows play 

Around the castle wa'. 

Beneath the golden gloamin' sky 

The mavis mends her lay ; 
The redbreast pours his sweetest strains 

To charm the lingering day ; 
While weary yeldrins seem to wail 

Their little nestlings torn. 
The merry wren, frae den to den, 

Gaes jinking through the thorn. 

The roses fauld their silken leaves, 

The foxglove shuts its bell ; 
The honeysuckle and the birk 

Spread fragrance through the dell. 
Let others crowd the giddy court 

Of mirth and revelry. 
The simple joys that nature yields 

Are dearer far to me. 

Robert Tannahill. 



DAY IS DYING. 

FROM "THE SPANISH GYPSY." 

Day is dying ! Float, song, 
Down the westward river. 

Requiem chanting to the Day, — 
Day, the mighty Giver. 

Pierced by shafts of Time he bleeds. 

Melted rubies sending 
Through the river and the sky. 

Earth and heaven blending ; 

All the long-drawn earthy banks 
Up to cloud-land lifting : 

Slow between them drifts the swan, 
'Twixt two heavens drifting. 



Wings half o]jen, like a flower 

Inly deeper flushing, 
Neck and breast as virgin's pure, — 

Virgin proudly blushing. 

Day is dying ! Float, swan, 

Down the ruby river ; 
Follow, song, in requiem 

To the mighty Giver. 

Marian Evans Lewes Cross [George Eliot). 



THE EVENING WIND. 

Spirit that breathest through my lattice : thou 
That cool'st the twilight of the sultry day ! 

Gratefully flows thy freshness round my brow ; 
Thou hast been out upon the deep at play, 

Riding all day the wild blue waves till now, 
Roughening their crests, and scattering high 
their spray, 

And swelling the white sail. I welcome thee 

To the scorched land, thou wanderer of the sea ! 

Nor I alone, — a thousand bosoms round 
Inhale thee in the fulness of delight ; 

And languid forms rise up, and pulses bound 
Livelier, at coming of the wind of night ; 

And languishing to hear thy welcome sound, 
Liesthe vast inland, stretched beyond the sight. 

Go forth into the gathering shade ; go forth, — 

God's blessing breathed upon the fainting earth ! 

Go, rock the little wood-bird in his nest ; 

Curl the still waters, bright with stars ; and 
rouse 
The wide old wood from his majestic rest. 

Summoning, from the innumerable boughs, 
The strange deep harmonies that haunt his breast. 

Pleasant shall be thy way where meekly bows 
The shutting flower, and darkling waters pass. 
And where the o'ershadowing branches sweep 
the grass. 

Stoop o'er the place of graves, and softly sway 
The sighing herbage by the gleaming stone. 

That they who near the churchyard willows stray, 
And listen in the deej^ening gloom, alone, 

May think of gentle souls that passed away. 
Like thy pure breath, into the vast unknown. 

Sent forth from heaven among the sons of men. 

And gone into the boundless heaven again. 

The faint old man shall lean his silver head 
To feel thee ; thou shalt kiss the child asleep. 

And dry the moistened curls that overspread 
His temples, while his breathing grows more 
deep ; 



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And tliey who stand about the sick man's bed 

Shall joy to listen to thy distant sweep, 
And softly part his curtains to allow 
Thy visit, grateful to his burning brow. 

Go, — but the circle of eternal change, 
Which is the life of nature, shall restore. 

With sounds and scents from all thy mighty 
range, 
Thee to thy birthplace of the deep once more. 

Sweet odors in the sea ail', sweet and strange. 
Shall tell the homesick mariner of the shore ; 

And, listening to thy murmur, he shall deem 

He hears the rustling leaf and running stream. 
William CulleiN Bryant. 



THE EVENING STAR. 

Star that bringest home the bee. 
And sett'st the weary laborer free ! 
If any star shed peace, 't is thou, 

That send'st it from above. 
Appearing when heaven's breath and brow 

Are sweet as hers we love. 

Come to the luxuriant skies. 

Whilst the landscape's odors rise. 

Whilst far-off lowing herds are heard. 

And songs when toil is done. 

From cottages whose smoke unstirred 
Curls yellow in the sun. 

Star of love's soft interviews. 
Parted lovers on thee muse ; 
Their remembrancer in heaven 

Of thrilling vows thou art, 
Too delicious to be riven 

By absence from the heart. 

THOMAS Campbell. 



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CAPE-COTTAGE AT SUNSET. 

We stood upon the ragged rocks. 

When the long day was nearly done ; 

The waves had ceased their sullen shocks. 
And lapped our feet with murmuring tone. 

And o'er the bay in streaming locks 
Blew the red tresses of the sun. 

Along the west the golden bars 

Still to a deeper glory grew ; 
Above our heads the faint, few stars 

Looked out from the unfathomed blue ; 
And the fair city's clamorous jars 

Seemed melted in that eveninsr hue. 



sunset sky ! purple tide ! 

friends to friends that closer pressed ! 
Those glories have in darkness died. 
And ye have left my longing breast. 

1 could not keep you by my side. 
Nor fix that radiance in the west. 

William Belcher Glazier. 



SUNSET. 

' FROM "QUEEN MAE." 

If solitude hath ever led thy steps 
To the wild ocean's echoing shore, 
And thou hast lingered there 
Until the sun's broad orb 
Seemed resting on the burnished wave. 

Thou must have marked the lines 
Of purple gold that motionless 

Hung o'er the sinking sphere : 
Thou must have marked the billowy clouds, 
Edged with intolerable radiancy, 
Towering like rocks of jet 
Crowned with a diamond wreath. 
And yet there is a moment. 
When the sun's highest point 
Peeps like a star o'er ocean's western edge. 
When those far clouds of feathery gold. 
Shaded with deepest purple, gleam 
Like islands on a dark- blue sea ; 
Then has thy fancy soared above the earth. 
And furled its wearied wing 
Within tlie Fairy's fane. 
Yet not the golden islands 
Gleaming in yon flood of light, 

Nor the feathery curtains 
Stretching o'er the sun's bright couch, 
Nor the burnished ocean's waves 

Paving that gorgeous dome, 
So fair, so wonderful a sight 
As Mab's ethereal palace could afford. 
Yet likest evening's vault, that fairy Hall ! 
Heaven, low resting on the wave, it spread 
Its floors of flashing light, 
Its vast and azure dome. 
Its fertile golden islands 
Floating on a silver sea ; 
Whilst suns their mingling beamings darted 
Through clouds of circumambient darkness. 
And pearly battlements around 
Looked o'er the immense of heaven. 

Percy bysshe Shelley. 



NIGHTFALL: A PICTURE. 

Low burns the summer afternoon ; 

A mellow lustre lights the scene ; 
And from its smiling beauty soon 

The purpling shade will chase the sheen. 



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The old, quaint homestead's windows blaze ; 

The cedars long, black pictures show ; 
And broadly slopes one path of rays 

Within the barn, and makes it glow. 

The loft stares out — the cat intent, 
Like carving, on some gnawing rat — 

With sun-bathed hay and rafters bent, 

Nooked, cobwebbed homes of wasp and bat. 

The harness, bridle, saddle, dart 

Gleams from the lower, rough expanse ; 

At either side the stooping cart. 

Pitchfork and plough cast looks askance. 

White Dobbin through the stable-doors 
Shows his round shape ; faint color coats 

The manger, where the farmer pours. 
With rustling rush, the glancing oats. 

A sun-haze streaks the dusky shed ; 

Makes spears of seams and gems of chinks : 
In mottled gloss the straw is spread ; 

And the gray grindstone dully blinks. 

The sun salutes the lowest west 

With gorgeous tints around it drawn ; 

A beacon on the mountain's breast, 
A crescent, shred, a star — and gone. 

The landscape now prepares for night : 
A gauzy mist slow settles round ; 

Eve shows her hues in every sight. 

And blends her voice with every sound. 

The sheep stream rippling down the dell, 
Their smooth, sharp faces pointed straight ; 

The pacing kine, with tinkling bell, 
Come grazing through the pasture-gate. 

The ducks are grouped, and talk in fits : 
One yawns with stretch of leg and wing ; 

One rears and fans, then, settling, sits ; 
One at a moth makes awkward spring. 

The geese march gi-ave in Indian file, 
The ragged patriarch at the head ; 

Then, screaming, flutter off awhile, 
Fold up, and once more stately tread. 

Brave chanticleer shows haughtiest air ; 

Hurls his shrill vaunt with lofty bend ; 
Lifts foot, glares round, then follows where 

His scratching, picking partlets wend. 

Staid Towser scents the glittering ground ; 

Then, yawning, draws a crescent deep. 
Wheels his head-drooping frame around 

And sinks with fore-paws stretched for sleep. 



The oxen, loosened from the plough, 
Rest by the pear-tree's crooked trunk ; 

Tim, standing with yoke-burdened brow. 
Trim, in a mound beside him sunk. 

One of the kine upon the bank 

Heaves her face-lifting, wheezy roar ; 

One smooths, with lapping tongue, her flank ; 
With ponderous droop one finds the floor. 

Freed Dobbin through the soft, clear dark 
Glimmers across the pillared scene. 

With the grouped geese, — a pallid mark, — 
And scattered bushes black between. 

The fire-flies freckle every spot 

With fickle light that gleams and dies ; 

The bat, a wavering, soundless blot, 
The cat, a pair of prowling eyes. 

Still the sweet, fragrant dark o'erflows 
The deepening air and darkening ground ; 

By its rich scent I trace the rose. 
The viewless beetle by its sound. 

The cricket scrapes its rib-like bars ; 

The tree-toad purrs in whirring tone ; 
And now the heavens are set with stars. 

And night and quiet reign alone. 

Alfred B. Street. 



EVENING IN PARADISE. 

FROM " PARADISE LOST," BOOK IV. 

Now came still evening on, and twilight gray 
Had in her sober livery all things clad ; 
Silence accompanied ; for beast and bird. 
They to their grassy couch, these to their iiests, 
Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale ; 
She all night long her amorous descant sung. 
Silence was pleased : now glowed the firmament 
With living sapphires ; Hesperus, that led 
The starry host, rode brightest, till the moon. 
Rising in clouded majesty, at length 
Apparent queen, unveiled her peerless light. 
And o'er the dark her silver mantle threw. 



EVENING. 



FROM "DON JUAN.' 



Ave Maria ! o'er the earth and sea. 

That heavenliest hour of heaven is worthiest thee ! 

Ave Maria ! blessed be the hoirr, 

The time, the clime, the spot, where I so oft 
Have felt that moment in its fullest power 

Sink o'er the earth so beautiful and soft. 



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^Vliile swung the deep bell in the distant tower 

Or the faint dying day-hymn stole aloft, 
And not a breath crept through the rosy air, 
And yet the forest leaves seemed stirred with 
prayer. 

Ave Maria ! 't is the hour of prayer ! 

Ave Maria ! 't is the hour of love ! 
Ave Maria ! may our spirits dare 

Look up to thine and to thy Son's above ! 
Ave Maria ! that face so fair ! 

Those downcast eyes beneath the Almighty 
dove, — 
"What though 't is but a pictured image ? — 

strike, — • 
That painting is no idol, — 't is too like. 

Sweet hour of twilight ! in the solitude 
Of the pine forest, and the silent shore 

Which bounds Eavenna's immemorial wood, 
Kooted where once the Adrian wave flowed o'er 

To where the last Cajsarean fortress stood. 
Evergreen forest ; which Boccaccio's lore 

And Dryden's lay made haunted ground to me. 

How have I loved the twilight hour and thee ! 

The shrill cicalas, people of the pine, 

Making their summer lives one ceaseless song, 

Were the sole echoes, save my steed's and 
mine. 
And vesper bells that rose the boughs along ; 

The spectre huntsman of Onesti's line, 

His hell-dogs, and their chase, and the fair 
throng 

Which learned from this example not to fly 

From a true lover, — shadowed my mind's eye. 

Hesperus ! thou bringest all good things, — 
Home to the weary, to the hungry cheer. 

To the young bird the parent's brooding wings. 
The welcome stall to the o'erlabored steer ; 

Whate'er of peace about our hearthstone clings, 
Whate'er our household gods protect of dear. 

Are gathered round us by thy look of rest ; 

Thou bring' st the child, too, to the mother's 
breast. 

Soft hour ! which wakes the wish and melts the 
heart 
Of those who sail the seas, on the first day 
When they from their sweet friends are torn 
apart ; 
Or fills with love the pilgrim on his way, 
As the far bell of vesper makes him start. 
Seeming to weep the dying day's decay : 
Is this a fancy which our reason scorns ? 
Ah ! surely nothing dies but something mourns. 

Lord Byron. 



TO DELIA. 

Care-charmer Sleep, son of the sable Night, 
Brother to Death, in silent darkness born : 
Relieve my languish and restore the light ; 
With dark forgetting of my care, return. 
And let the day be time enough to mourn 
The shipwreck of my ill-adventured youth : 
Let waking eyes suflice to wail their scorn 
Without the torment of the night's untruth. 
Cease dreams, the images of day desires, 
To model forth the passions of the morrow ; 
Never let rising sun approve you liars. 
To add more grief to aggravate my sorrow. 
Still let me sleep, embracing clouds in vain, 
And never wake to feel the day's disdain. 

Samuel Daniel. 



THE CAMP AT NIGHT. 

FROM "THE ILIAD," BOOK VIII. 

The winds transferred into the friendly sky 

Their supper's savor ; to the which they sat de- 
lightfully. 

And spent all night in open field ; fires round 
about them shined. 

As when about the silver moon, when air is free 
from wind. 

And stars shine clear, to whose sweet beams, 
high prospects, and the brows 

Of all steep hills and pinnacles, thrust up them- 
selves for shows. 

And even the lowly valleys joy to glitter in their 
sight. 

When the unmeasured firmament bursts to dis- 
close her light, 

And all the signs in heaven are seen, that glad 
the shepherd's heart ; 

So many fires disclosed their beams, made by the 
Trojan part. 

Before the face of llion, and her blight turrets 
showed. 

A thousand courts of guard kept fires, and every 
guard allowed 

Fifty stout men, by whom their horse eat oats 
and hard white corn, 

And all did wishfully expect the silver-throned 
morn. 

From the Greek of HOMER. Translation 
of GEORGE CHAPMAN. 



TO NIGHT. 

Swiftly walk over the western wave. 

Spirit of Night ! 
Out of the misty eastern cave, 
Where, all the long and lone daylight, 
Thou wovest dreams of joy and fear 
Which make thee terrible and dear, — 

Swift be thy flight- ! 



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Wrap thy form in a mantle gray, 

Star-inwrought ; 
Blind with thine hair the eyes of Day, 
Kiss her until she be wearied out ; 
Then wander o'er city and sea and land, 
Touching all with thine opiate wand, — 

Come, long-sought ! 

"When I arose and saw the dawn, 

I sighed for thee ; 
When light rode high, and the dew was gone, 
And noon lay heavy on flower and tree, 
And the weary Day turned to her rest, 
Lingering like an unloved guest, 

I sighed for thee ! 

Thy brother Death came, and cried, 

" Wouldst thou me ? " 
Thy sweet child Sleep, the filmy-eyed. 

Murmured like a noontide bee, 
' ' Shall I nestle near thy side ? 
Wouldst thou me ? " — And I replied, 

"No, not thee ! " 

Death will come when thou art dead, 

Soon, too soon, — 
Sleep will come when thou art fled ; 
Of neither would I ask the boon 
I ask of thee, beloved Night, — 
Swift be thine approaching flight. 

Come soon, soon ! 

Percy Bysshe Shelley. 



NIGHT. 

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO IL 

'T IS night, when Meditation bids us feel 
We once have loved, though love is at an end : 
The heart, lone mourner of its baffled zeal. 
Though friendless now, will dream it had a 

friend. 
Who with the weight of years would wish to 

bend, 
When Youth itself survives young Love and 

joy ? 
Alas ! when mingling souls forget to blend. 
Death hath but little left him to destroy ! 
Ah ! happy years ! once more who would not be 

a boy ? 

Thus bending o'er the vessel's laving side, 
To gaze on Dian's wave-reflected sphere, 
The soul forgets her schemes of Hope and Pride, 
And flies unconscious o'er each backward year. 
None are so desolate but something dear. 
Dearer than self, possesses or possessed 
A thought, and claims the homage of a tear ; 
A flashing pang ! of which the weary breast 
Would still, albeit in vain, the heavy heart divest. 



To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell. 
To slowly trace the forest's shady scene. 
Where things that own not man's dominion 

dwell. 
And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been ; 
To climb the trackless mountain all unseen, 
With the wild flock that never needs a fold ; 
Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean, — 
This is not solitude ; 't is but to hold 
Converse with Nature's charms, and view her 
stores unrolled. 

But midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of 

men 
To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess, 
And roam along, the world's tired denizen. 
With none who bless us, none whom we can 

bless ; 
Minions of s])lendor shrinking from distress ! 
None that, with kindred consciousness endued. 
If Ave were not, would seem to smile the less 
Of all that flattered, followed, sought, and sued ; 
This is to be alone ; this, this is solitude ! 

Lord Byron. 



NIGHT. 



MYSTEPaous Night ! when our first parent knew 
Thee, from report divine, and heard thy name. 
Did he not tremble for this lovely frame, — 
This glorious canopy of light and blue ? 
Yet 'neath a curtain of translucent dew, 
Bathed in the rays of the great setting flame, 
Hesperus, with the host of heaven, came. 
And lo ! creation widened in man's view. 
Who could have thought such darkness lay con- 
cealed 
Within thy beams, Sun ! or who could find. 
Whilst fly and leaf and insect stood revealed. 
That to such countless orbs thou mad'st us blind ! 
Why do we then shun death wdth anxious strife ! 
If light can thus deceive, wherefore not life ? 

JOSEPH BLANCO WHITE. 



NIGHT. 

FROM "QUEEN MAB." 

How beautiful this night ! the balmiest sigh 
Which vernal zephyrs breathe in evening's ear 
Were discord to the speaking quietude 
That wraps this moveless scene. Heaven's ebon 

vault, 
Studded with stars unutterably bright, 
Through which the moon's unclouded grandeur 

rolls, 
Seems like a canopy which love has spread 
To curtain her sleeping world. Yon gentle hills. 
Robed in a garment of untrodden snow ; 



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Yon darksome rocks, whence icicles depend, 
So stainless that their white and glittering spires 
Tinge not the moon's pure heam ; yon castle steep, 
Whose banner hangeth o'er the time-worn tower 
So idly that rapt fancy deemeth it 
A metaphor of peace — all form a scene 
Where musing solitude might love to lift 
Her soul above this sphere of earthliness ; 
Where silence undisturbed might watch alone, 
So cold, so bright, so still. 

The orb of day 
In southern climes o'er ocean's waveless field 
Sinks sweetly smiling : not the faintest breath 
Steals o'er the unruffled deep ; the clouds of eve 
Reflect unmoved the lingering beam of day ; 
And vesper's image on the western main 
Is beautifully still. To-morrow comes : 
Cloud upon cloud, in dark and deepening mass. 
Rolls o'er the blackened waters ; the deep roar 
Of distant thunder mutters awfully ; 
Tempest unfolds its pinion o'er the gloom 
That shrouds the boiling surge ; the pitiless fiend, 
With all his winds and lightnings, tracks his prey ; 
The torn deep yawns, — the vessel finds a grave 
Beneath its jagged gulf. 

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. 



NIGHT. 



Night is the time for rest : 
How sweet, when labors close, 

To gather round an aching breast 
The curtain of repose. 

Stretch the tired limbs, and lay the head 

Upon our own delightful bed ! 

Night is the time for dreams : 

The gay romance of life, 
When truth that is, and truth that seems, 

Blend in fantastic strife ; 
Ah ! visions, less beguiling far 
Than waking dreams by daylight are ! 

Night is the time for toil : 

To plough the classic field. 
Intent to find the buried spoil 

Its wealthy furrows yield ; 
Till all is ours that sages taught. 
That poets sang or heroes wrought. 

Night is the time to weep : 

To wet with unseen tears 
Those graves of Memory, where sleey 

The joys of other years ; 
Hopes, that were Angels at their birth. 
But perished young, like things of earth. 



Night is the time to watch : 

O'er ocean's dark expanse. 
To hail the Pleiades, or catch 

The full moon's earliest glance. 
That brings into the homesick mind 
All we have loved and left behind. 

Night is the time for care : 

Brooding on hours misspent. 
To see the spectre of Despair 

Come to our lonely tent ; 
Like Brutus, midst his slumbering host. 
Startled by Caesar's stalwart ghost. 

Night is the time to muse : 

When, from the eye, the soul 
Takes flight ; and, with expanding views, 

Beyond the starry pole 
Descries athwart the abyss of night 
The dawn of uncreated light. 

Night is the time to pray : 

Our Savioiir oft withdrew 
To desert mountains far away ; 

So will his followers do, — 
Steal from the throng to haunts untrod, 
And hold communion there with God. 

Night is the time for Death ; 

When all around is peace. 
Calmly to yield the weary breath, 

From sin and suff'ering cease. 
Think of heaven's bliss, and give the sign 
To parting friends ; — such death be mine ! 
James momtgojviery. 



HYMN TO THE NIGHT. 

I HEARD the trailing garments of the Night 
Sweep through her marble halls ! 

I saw her sable skirts all fringed with light 
From the celestial walls ! 

I felt her presence, by its spell of might, 

Stoop o'er me from above ; 
The calm, majestic presence of the Night, 

As of the one I love. 

I heard the sounds of sorrow and delight, 

The manifold, soft chimes, 
That fill the haunted chambers of the Night, 

Like some old poet's rhymes. 

From the cool cisterns of the midnight air 

ily spirit drank repose ; 
The fountain of perpetual peace flows there, — 

From those deep cisterns flows. 



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holy Night ! from thee I learn to bear 

What man has borne before ! 
Thou layest thy finger on the lips of Care, 

And they complain no more. 

Peace ! Peace ! Orestes-like I breathe this prayer ! 

Descend with broad-winged flight, 
The welcome, the thrice-prayed for, the most fair, 

The best-beloved Night ! 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 



HYMN. 



FROM "THE SEASONS." 



These, as they change, Almighty Father, these 
Are but the varied God. The rolling year 
Is full of thee. Forth in the pleasing spring 
Thy beauty walks, thy tenderness and love. 
"Wide flush the fields ; the softening air is balm ; 
Echo the mountains round ; the forest smiles ; 
And every sense and every heart is joy. 
Then comes thy glory in the summer months, 
AVith light and heat refulgent. Then thy sun 
Shoots full perfection through the swelling year ; 
And oft thy voice in dreadful thunder speaks. 
And oft at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve, 
By brooks and groves in hollow-whispering gales. 
Thy bounty shines in autumn unconfined. 
And spreads a common feast for all that lives. 
In winter awful thou ! with clouds and storms 
Around thee thrown, tempest o'er tempest rolled. 
Majestic darkness ! on the whirlwind's wing 
Eiding sublime, thou bidd'st the world adore, 
And humblest nature with thy northern blast. 

Mysterious round ! what skill, what force divine, 
Deep felt, in these appear ! a simple train. 
Yet so delightful mixed, with such kind art, 
Such beauty and beneficence combined ; 
Shade, unperceived, so softening into shade ; 
And all so forming an harmonious whole, 
That, as they still succeed, they ravish still. 
But wandering oft, with brute unconscious gaze, 
Man marks not thee, marks not the mighty hand, 
That, ever bus)'', wheels the silent spheres ; 
Works in the secret deep ; shoots, steaming, 

thence 
The fair profusion that o'erspreads the spring ; 
Flings from the sun direct the flaming day ; 
Feeds every creature ; hurls the tempest forth ; 
And, as on earth this grateful change revolves. 
With transport touches all the springs of life. 

Nature, attend ! join every living soul, 
Beneath the spacious temple of the sky. 
In adoration join ; and, ardent, raise 
One general song ! To Him, ye vocal gales. 
Breathe soft, whose spirit in your freshness 
breathes : 



0, talk of him in solitary glooms ; 

Where, o'er the rock, the scarcely waving pine 

Fills the brown shade with a religious awe. 

And ye whose bolder note is heard afar. 

Who shake the astonished woiid, lift high to 

Heaven 
The impetuous song, and say from whom you 

rage. 
His praise, ye brooks, attune, ye trembling rills ; 
And let me catch it as I muse along. 
Ye headlong torrents, rapid, and profound ; 
Ye softer floods, that lead the humid maze 
Along the vale ; and thou, majestic main, 
A secret world of wonders in thyself, 
Sound his stupendous praise, — whose greater 

voice 
Or bids you roar, or bids yor^r roarings fall. 
Soft roll your incense, herbs, and fruits, and 

flowers. 
In mingled clouds to him, — whose sun exalts, 
Whose breath perfumes you, and whose pencil 

paints. 
Ye forests bend, ye harvests wave, to him ; 
Breathe your still song into the reaper's heart. 
As home he goes beneath the joyous moon. 
Ye that keep watch in heaven, as earth asleep 
Unconscious lies, eff'use your mildest beams, 
Ye constellations, while your angels strike, 
Amid the spangled sky, the silver lyre. 
Great source of day ! best image here below 
Of thy Creator, ever pouring wide, 
From world to world, the vital ocean round. 
On Nature write with every beam his praise. 
The thunder rolls : be hushed the prostrate 

world ; 
While cloud to cloud returns the solemn hymn. 
Bleat out afresh, ye hills ; ye mossy rocks, 
Retain the sound ; the broad responsive low, 
Ye valleys, raise ; for the great Shepherd reigns, 
And his unsuff'ering kingdom yet will come. 
Ye woodlands all, awake : a boundless song 
Burst from the groves ; and when the restless 

day. 
Expiring, lays the warbling world asleep, 
Sweetest of birds ! sweet Philomela, charm 
The listening shades, and teach the night his 

praise. 
Ye chief, for whom the whole creation smiles. 
At once the head, the heart, and tongue of all, 
Crown the great hymn ! in swarming cities vast, 
Assembled men to the deep organ join 
The long-resounding voice, oft breaking clear, 
At solemn pauses, through the swelling bass ; 
And, as each mingling flame increases each, 
In one united ardor rise to heaven. 
Or if you rather choose the rural shade, 
And find a fane in every sacred grove, 
There let the shepherd's flute, the virgin's lay. 



[& 



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418 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



•a 



The prompting seraph, and the poet's lyre, 
Still sing the God of seasons as they roll. 
For me, when I forget the darling theme. 
Whether the blossom blows, the summer ray 
Eussets the plain, inspiring autumn gleams, 
Or winter rises in the blackening east, — 
Be my tongue mute, my fancy paint no more. 
And, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat ! 

Should fate command me to the farthest verge 
Of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes. 
Rivers unknown to song, — where first the sun 
Gilds Indian mountains, or his setting beam 
Flames on the Atlantic isles, — 't is naught to 

me : 
Since God is ever present, ever felt, 
In the void waste as in the city full ; 
And where he vital breathes there must be joy. 
When even at last the solemn hour shall come, 
And wing my mystic flight to future worlds, 
I cheerful will obey ; there, with new powers, 
Will rising wonders sing : I cannot go 
Where Universal Love not smiles around. 
Sustaining all yon orbs, and all their suns ; 
From seeming evil still educing good, 
And better thence 'again, and better still, 
In infinite progression. But I lose 
Myself in him, in light ineffable ! 
Come, then, expressive Silence, muse his praise. 

JAMES THOMSON. 



MARCH. 



Slayer of winter, art thou here again ? 
welcome, thou that bring'st the summer nigh ! 
The bitter wind makes not tliy victory vain, 
Nor will we mock thee for thy faint blue sky. 
Welcome, March ! whose kindly days and dry 
Make April ready for the throstle's song. 
Thou first redresser of the winter's wrong ! 

Yea, welcome, March ! and though I die ere June, 
Yet for the hope of life I give thee praise. 
Striving to swell the burden of the tune 
That even now I hear tliy brown birds raise, 
Unmindful of the past or coming days ; 
Who sing, " joy ! a new year is begun ! 
What happiness to look upon the sun ! " 

0, what begetteth all this storm of bliss, 
But Death himself, who, crying solemnly. 
Even from the heart of sweet Forgetfulness, 
Bids us, "Rejoice ! lest pleasureless ye die. 
Within a little time must ye go hy. 
Stretch forth your open hands, and, while ye live. 
Take aU the gifts that Death and Life may give"." 

William morris. 



MORNING IN MAY.* 

FROM "THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS : THE KNIGHTES TALE.' 

The busy larke, messager of daye, 
Salueth in hire song the morwe graye ; 
And fyryPhebus ryseth up so brigiite. 
That al the orient laugheth of the lighte. 
And with his stremes dryeth in the greves t 
The silver dropes, hongyng on the leeves. 
And Arcite, that is in the court ryal 
With Theseus, his squyer principal. 
Is risen, and loketh on the merye day. 
And for to doon his observaunce to May, 
Remembryng on the poynt of his desir. 
He on his courser, stertyng as the fir, J 
Is riden, into the feeldes him to pleye, § 
Out of the court, were it a myle or tweye. 
And to the grove, of which that I yow tolde. 
By aventure his wey he gan to holde. 
To maken him a garland of the greves. 
Were it of woodebynde or hawethorn leves. 
And lowde he song ayens the sonne scheene : 
" May, with alle thy floures and thy greene, 
Welcome be thou, wel faire fressche May, 
I hope that I som grene gete may." 

Chaucer. 



SPRING. 



FROM " IN MEMORIAM.' 



Dip down upon the northern shore, 
sweet new-year, delaying long : 
Thou doest expectant Nature wrong ; 

Delaying long, delay no more. 

What stays thee from the clouded noons. 
Thy sweetness from its proper place ? 
Can trouble live with April days, 

Or sadness in the summer moons ? 

Bring orchis, bring the foxglove spire. 
The little speedwell's darling blue. 
Deep tulips dashed with fiery dew, 

Laburnums, dropping- wells of fire. 

thou, new-year, delaying long, 
Delayest the sorrow in my blood, 
That longs to burst a frozen bud. 

And flood a fresher throat with song. 

Now fades the last long streak of snow ; 
Now bourgeons every maze of quick 
About the flowering squares, and thick 

By ashen roots the violets blow. 

* Text of the Clarendon Series. 

t Groves. { Fire. § Play. 



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POEMS OF NATURE 



419 



-a 



Now rings the woodland loud and long, 
The distance takes a lovelier hue, 
And drowned in yonder living blue 

The lark becomes a sightless song. 

Now dance the lights on lawn and lea, 
The flocks are whiter down the vale, 
And milkier everj' milkj^ sail 

On winding stream or distant sea ; 

Where now the sea-mew pipes, or dives 
In yonder greening gleam, and fly 
The happy birds, that change their sky 

To build and brood, that live their lives 

From land to land ; and in my breast 
Spring wakens too ; and my regret 
Becomes an April violet. 

And buds and blosaoms like the rest. 

ALFRED TENNYSON. 



DIE DOWN, DISMAL DAY. 

Die down, dismal day, and let me live ; 
And come, blue deeps, magnificently strewn 
With colored clouds," — large, light, and fugi- 
tive, — 
By upper winds through pomjious motions blown. 
Now it is death in life, — a vapor dense 
Creeps round my window, till I cannot see 
The far snow-shining mountains, and the glens 
Shagging the mountain-tops. God ! make free 
This barren shackled earth, so deadly cold, — 
Breathe gently forth thy spring, till winter flies 
In rude amazement, fearful and yet bold. 
While she performs her customed charities ; 
I weigh the loaded hours till life is bare, — 
God, for one clear day, a snowdrop, and sweet 
air ! 

DAVID GRAY. 



And the thousand charms belonging 

To the summer's day. 
Ah ! my heart is sick with longing, 

Longing for the May. 

Ah ! my heart is sore with sighing, 
Sighing for the May, — 
Sighing for their sure returning. 
When the summer beams are burning, 
Hopes and flowers that, dead or dying, 

All the winter lay. 
Ah ! my heart is sore with sighing, 
Sighing for the May. 

Ah ! my heart is pained with throbbing, 
Throbbing for the May, — 
Throbbing for the seaside billow's, 
Or the water-wooing willows ; 

Where, in laughing and in sobbing, 

Glide_.the streams away. 
Ah ! my heart, my heart is throbbing, 
Throbbing for the May. 

Waiting sad, dejected, weary, 
Waiting for the May : 
Spring goes by with wasted warnings, — 
Moonlit evenings, sunbright mornings, • — ■ 
Summer comes, yet dark and dreary 

Life still ebbs away ; 

Man is ever weary, weary, 

Waiting for the May ! 

DENIS FLORENCE MACCARTHY. 



B- 



SUMMER LONGINGS. 

Ah ! my heart is weary waiting. 
Waiting for the May, — 
Waiting for the pleasant rambles 
Where the iragrant haw-thorn-brambles. 
With the Avoodbine alternating. 

Scent the dewy way. 
Ah ! my heart is weary waiting. 
Waiting for the May. 

Ah ! my heart is sick with longing, 
Longing for the May, — 
Longing to esca})e from study 
To the young face fair and ruddy, 



WHEN THE HOUNDS OF SPRING. 

AYiiEN the hounds of spring are on winter's 
traces, 

The mother of months in meadow or plain 
Fills the shadows and windy places 

With lisp of leaves and ripple of rain ; 
And the brown bright nightingale amorous 
Is half assuaged for Itylus, 
For the Thracian ships and the foreign faces ; 

The tonguoless vigil, and all the pain. 

Come \A-itli bov.'s bent and with emptying of 
quivers. 

Maiden most perfect, lady of light, 
With a noise of winds and many rivers. 

With a clamor of waters, and with might ; 
Bind on thy sandals, thou most fleet. 
Over the splendor and speed of thy feet ! 
For the fiiint east quickens, the wan west shivers, 

Round the feet of the day and the feet of the 
night. 



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420 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



Where shall we find her, how shall we sing to her, 
Fold our hands round her knees and cling ? 

that man's heart were as fire and could spring 
to her, 
Fire, or the strength of the streams that spring ! 

For the stars and the Avinds are unto her 

As raiment, as songs of the harp-plaj^er ; 

For the risen stars and the fallen cling to her, 
And the southwest-wind and the west-wmd 
sing. 

For winter's rains and ruins are over. 
And all the season of snows and sins ! 

The days dividing lover and lover. 

The light that loses, the night that wins ; 

And time remembered its grief forgotten, 

And frosts are slain and flowers begotten, 

And in green underwood and cover 
Blossom by blossom the spring begins. 

The full streams feed on flower of rushes, 
Ripe grasses trammel a travelling foot. 

The faint fresh flame of the young year flushes 
From leaf to flower and flower to fruit ; 

And fruit and leaf are as gold and fire. 

And the oat is heard above the lyre, 

And the hoofed heel of a satyr crushes 
The chestnut-husk at the chestnut-root. 

And Pan by noon and Bacchus by night. 

Fleeter of foot than the fleet-foot kid. 
Follows with dancing and fills with delight 

The Mtenad and the Bassarid ; 
And soft as lips that laugh anjd hide. 
The laughing leaves of the trees divide. 
And screen from seeing and leave in sight 
The god pursuing, the maiden hid. 

The ivy falls with the Bacchanal's hair 
Over her eyebrows shading her eyes ; 
The wild vine slipping down leaves bare 

Her bright breast shortening into sighs ; 
The wild vine slips with the weight of its leaves, 
But the berried ivy catches and cleaves 
To the limbs that glitter, the feet that scare 
The wolf that follows, the fawn that flies. 

ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE, 



THE WINTER BEING OVER. 

The Avinter being over. 

In order comes the siting, 

Which doth green herbs discover, 

And cause the birds to sing. 

The night also expired, 

Tlien comes the morning bright, 



Which is so much desired 
By all that love the light. 

This may learn 

Them that mourn 
To put their grief to flight : 
The spring succeedeth winter, 
And day must follow night. 

He therefore that sustaineth 
Affliction or distress 
Which every member paineth, 
And findeth no release, — 
Let such therefore despair not, 
But on firm hope depend, 
Whose griefs immortal are not. 
And therefore must have end. 

They that faint 

With complaint 
Therefore are to blame ; 
They add to their afflictions, 
And amplify the same. 

For if they could with patience 
Awhile possess the mind, 
By inward consolations 
They might refreshing find, 
To sweeten all their crosses. 
That little time they 'dure ; 
So might they gain by losses. 
And sharp would sweet procure. 

But if the mind 

Be inclined 
To unquietness. 
That only may be called 
The worst of all distress. 

He that is melancholy, 
Detesting all delight. 
His wits by sottish folly 
Are ruinated quite. 
Sad discontent and murmurs 
To him are incident ; 
Were he possessed of honors. 
He could not be content. 

Sparks of joy 

Fly away ; 
Floods of care arise ; 
And all delightful motion 
In the conception dies. 

But those that are contented 
HoAvever things do fall. 
Much anguish is prevented, 
And they soon freed from all. 
They finish all their labors 
With much felicity ; 
Their joy in trouble savors 
Of perfect piety. 



i 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



421 



a 



Cheerfulness 

Dotli express 
A settled pious mind, 
Which is not prone to grudging, 
From murmuring refined. 

ANNE COLLINS. 



SPRING. 

WRITTEN WHILE A PRISONER IN ENGLAND. 

The Time hath laid his mantle by 

Of wind and rain and icy chill, 
And dons a rich embroidery 

Of sunlight poured on lake and hill. 
No beast or bird in earth or sky, 

"Whose voice doth not with gladness thrill, 
For Time hath laid his mantle by 

Of wind and rain and icy chill. 

Eiver and fountain, brook and rill, 
Bespangled o'er with livery gay 
Of silver droplets, wind their way. 
All in their new apparel vie. 
For Time hath laid his mantle by. 

CHARLES OF ORLEANS. 



SPRING. 

Again the violet of our early days 

Drinks beauteous azure from the golden sun, 

And kindles into fragrance at his blaze ; 

The streams, rejoiced that winter's work is done. 

Talk of to-morrow's cowslips, as they run. 

Wild apple, thou art blushing into bloom ! 

Thy leaves are coming, snowy-blossomed thorn ! 

Wake, buried lily ! spirit, quit thy tomb ! 

And thou shade-loving hyacinth, be born ! 

Then, haste, sweet rose ! sweet woodbine, hymn 

the morn, 
Whose dewdrops shall illume with pearly light 
Each grassy blade that thick embattled stands 
From sea to sea, while daisies infinite 
Uplift in praise their little glowing hands. 
O'er every hill that under heaven expands. 

Ebenezer Elliott. 



a 



RETURN OF SPRING. 

God shield ye, heralds of the spring ! 
Ye faithful swallows, fleet of wing, 

Houps, cuckoos, nightingales. 
Turtles, and every wilder bird. 
That make your hundred chirpings heard 

Through the green woods and dales. 

God shield ye, Easter daisies all, 
Fair roses, buds, and blossoms small. 

And he whom erst the gore 
Of Ajax and Narciss did print. 
Ye wild thyme, anise, balm, and mint, 

I welcome ye once more ! 

God shield ye, bright embroidered train 
Of butterflies, that on the plain 

Of each sweet herblet sip ; 
And ye, new swarms of bees, that go 
Where the pink flowers and yellow grow 

To kiss them with your lip ! 

A hundred thousand times I call 
A hearty welcome on ye all ! 

This season how I love — 
This merry din on every shore - 
For winds and storms, whose sullen roar 

Forbade my steps to rove. 

From the French of PIERRE RONSARD. 



SPRING. 

Lo ! where the rosy-bosomed Hours, 

Fair Venus' train, appear. 
Disclose the long-expecting flowers 

And wake the purple year ! 
The Attic warbler pours her throat 
Responsive to the cuckoo's note, 
The untaught harmony of spring : 
While, whispering pleasure as they fly, 
Cool zephyrs through the clear blue sky 

Their gathered fragrance fling. 

Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch 

A broader, browner shade. 
Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech 

O'ercanopies the glade. 
Beside some water's rushy brink 
With me the Muse shall sit, and think 
(At ease reclined in rustic state) 
How vain the ardor of the crowd, 
How low, how little are the proud. 

How indigent the great ! 

Still is the toiling hand of care ; 

The panting lierds repose : 
Yet hark, how through the peopled air 

The busy murmur glows ! 
The insect youth are on the wing, 
Eager to taste the honeyed spring 
And float amid the liquid noon : 
Some lightly o'er the current skim, 
Some show their gayly gilded trim 

Quick-glancing to the sun. 

To Contemplation's sober eye 

Such is the race of man ; 
And they that creep, and they that fly. 

Shall end where they began. 



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422 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



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Alike tlie busy and the gay 
But flutter through life's little clay, 
In Fortune's varying colors drest : 
Brushed by the hand of rough mischance 
Or chilled by age, their airy dance 
They leave, in dust to rest. 

Methinks I hear in accents low 

The sportive kind reply : 
Poor moralist ! and what art thou ? 

A solitary fly ! 

Thy joys no glittering female meets, 

No hive hast thou of hoarded sweets. 

No painted plumage to display ; 

On hasty wings thy youth is flown ; 

Thy sun is set, thy spring is gone, — 

We frolic while 't is May. 

( Thomas Gray. 



SWEETLY BREATHING, VERNAL AIR. 

Sweetly breathing, vernal air, 
That with kind warmth doth repair 
Winter's ruins ; from whose breast 
All the gums and spice of the East 
Borrow their perfumes ; whose eye 
Gilds the morn, and clears the sky- 
Whose dishevelled tresses shed 
Pearls upon the violet bed ; 
On whose brow, with calm smiles drest 
The halcyon sits and builds her nest ; 
Beauty, youth, and endless spring 
Dwell upon thy rosy wing ! 

Thou, if stormy Boi'eas throws 
Down whole forests when he blows. 
With a pregnant, flowery birth. 
Canst refresh the teeming earth. 
If he nip the early bud, 
If he blast what 's fair or good, 
If he scatter our choice flowers, 
If he shake our halls or bowers. 
If his rude breath threaten us, 
Thou canst stroke great ^olus, 
And from him the grace obtain. 
To bind him in an iron chain . 

THOMAS CAREW. 



[& 



SPFJNG, THE SWEET SPRING. 

Spuing, the sweet spring, is the year's pleasant 

king; 
Then blooms each thing, then maids dance in a 

ring. 
Cold doth not sting, the pretty birds do sing, 
Cuckoo, jug -jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo ! 



The palm and may make country-houses gay. 
Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pipe all day. 
And we hear aye birds tune this merry lay, 
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo ! 

The fields breathe sweet, the daisies kiss our feet, 
Young lovers meet, old wives a sunning sit. 
In every street these tunes our ears do greet, 
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo ! 
Spring ! the sweet spring ! 

THOMAS NASH. 



SPRING. 

Behold the young, the rosy spring 
Gives to the breeze her scented wing. 
While virgin graces, warm with May, 
Fling roses o'er her dewy way. 
The murmuring billows of the deep 
Have languished into silent sleep ; 
And mark ! the flitting sea-birds lave 
Their plumes in the reflecting wave ; 
While cranes from hoary winter fly 
To flutter in a kinder sky. 
Now the genial star of day 
Dissolves the murky clouds away^ 
And cultured field and winding stream 
Are freshly glittering in his beam. 

Now the earth prolific swells 
With leafy buds and flowery bells ; 
Gemming shoots the olive twine ; 
Clusters bright festoon the vine ; 
All along the branches creeping, 
Through the velvet foliage peeping, 
Little infant fruits we see 
Nursing into luxury. 

From the Greek of AnACREON. Transla- 
tion of THOMAS MOORE. 



MAY MORNING. 

Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger. 
Comes dancing from tlie east, and leads with her 
The flowery May, who from her green lap throws 
The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose. 
Hail, bounteous May ! that doth inspire 
Mirth and youth and warm desire ; 
Woods and groves are of thy dressing, 
Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing. 
Thus we salute thee with our early song. 
And welcome thee, and wish thee long. 



SPRING IN CAROLINA. 

Spring, with that nameless pathos in the air 
Which dwells with all things fair, « 

Spiing, with her golden suns and silver rain, 
Is with us once again. 



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POEMS OP NATURE. 



42 



m 



Out in the lonely woods the jasmine burns 
Its fi-agrant lamps, and turns 
Into a royal court with green festoons 
The banks of dark lagoons. 

In the deep heart of every forest tree 
The blood is all aglee, 

And there 's a look about the leafless bowers 
As if they dreamed of flowers. 

Yet still on every side we trace the hand 
Of Winter in the land, 
Save where the maple reddens on the lawn, 
Flushed by the season's dawn ; 

Or where, like those strange semblances we find 
That age to childhood bind. 
The elm puts on, as if in Nature's scorn, 
The brown of autumn corn. 

As yet the turf is dark, although you know 
That, not a span below, 

A thousand germs are groping through the gloom, 
And soon will burst their tomb. 

In gardens you may note amid the dearth, 
The crocus breaking earth ; 
And near the snowdrop's tender white and green, 
The violet in its screen. 

But many gleams and shadows need must pass 
Along the budding grass. 
And weeks go by, before the enamored South 
Shall kiss the rose's mouth. 

Still there 's a sense of blossoms yet unborn 
In the sweet airs of morn ; 
One almost looks to see the very street 
Grow pui'ple at his feet. 

At times a fragrant breeze conies floating by, 
And brings, you know not why, 
A feeling as when eager croAvds await 
Before a palace gate 

Some wondrous pageant ; and you scarce would 

start. 
If from a beech's heart, 

A blue-eyed Dryad, stepping forth, should say, 
" Behold me ! I am May ! " 

HENRY TIMROD. 



MAY. 



I FEEL a newer life in every gale ; 

The winds that fan the flowers. 
And with their welcome breathings fill the sail, 
Tell of serener hours, — 
Of hours that glide unfelt away 
Beneath the sky of May. 



The spirit of the gentle south -wind calls 

Fi'om his blue throne of air. 
And where his whis^Jering voice in music falls. 
Beauty is budding there ; 
The bright ones of the valley break 
Their slumbers, and awake. 

The waving verdure rolls along the plain, 

And the wide forest weaves, 
To welcome back its playful mates again, 
A canopy of leaves ; 
And from its darkening shadow floats 
A gush of trembling notes. 

Fairer and brighter spreads the reign of May ; 

The tresses of the woods 
With the light dallying of the west-wind play ; 
And the full-brimming floods. 
As gladly to their goal they run, 
Hail the returning sun. 

James Gates percival. 



THEY COME! THE MERRY SUMMER 
MONTHS. 

They come ! the merry summer months of 

beauty, song, and flowers ; 
They come ! the gladsome months that bring 

thick leafiness to bowers. 
Up, up, my heart ! and walk abroad ; fling cark 

and care aside ; 
Seek silent hills, or rest thyself where peaceful 

waters glide ; 
Or, underneath the shadow vast of patriarchal 

tree. 
Scan through its leaves the cloudless sky in rapt 

tranquillity. 

The grass is soft, its velvet touch is grateful to 
the hand ; 

And, like the kiss of maiden love, the breeze is 
sweet and bland ; 

The daisy and the buttercup are nodding cour- 
teously ; 

It stirs their blood with kindest love, to bless 
and welcome thee ; 

And mark how with thine own thin locks — 
they now are silvery gray — 

That blissful breeze is wantoning, and whisper- 
ing, "Be gay !" 

There is no cloud that sails along the ocean of 

yon sky 
But hath its own winged mariners to give it 

melody ; 



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424 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



^~Ql:i 



Thou seest their glittering fans outspread, all 

gleaming like red gold ; 
And hark ! with shrill pipe musical, their merry 

course they hold. 
God bless them all, those little ones, who, far 

above this earth, 
Can make a scoff of its mean joys, and vent a 

nobler mirth. 

But soft ! mine ear upcaught a sound, — from 

yonder wood it came ! 
The spirit of the dim green glade did breathe his 

own glad name ; — 
Yes, it is he ! the hermit bird, that, apart from 

all his kind, 
Slow spells his beads monotonous to the soft 

western wind ; 
Cuckoo ! Cuckoo ! he sings again, — his notes 

are void of art ; 
But simplest strains do soonest sound the deep 

founts of the heart. 

Good Lord ! it is a gracious boon for thought- 
crazed wight like me, 

To smell again these summer flowers beneath 
this summer tree ! 

To suck once more in every breath their little 
souls awaj''. 

And feed my fancy with fond dreams of youth's 
bright summer day, 

When, rushing forth like untamed colt, the 
reckless, truant boy 

Wandered through greenwoods all day long, a 
mighty heart of joy ! 

I 'm sadder now, — I have had cause ; but 0, 

I 'm proud to think 
That each pure joy-fount, loved of yore, I yet 

delight to drink ; — 
Leaf, blossom, blade, hill, valley, stream, the 

calm, unclouded sky, 
Still mingle music with my dreams, as in the 

days gone by. 
When summer's loveliness and light fall round 

me dark and cold, 
I '11 bear indeed life's heaviest curse, — a heart 

that hath waxed old ! 

William Motherwell. 



JUNE. 

FROM "THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL." 

Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us ; 

The beggar is taxed for a corner to die in, 
The priest hath his fee who comes and shrives us. 

We bargain for the. graves we lie in ; 
At the Devil's booth are all things sold. 
Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold : 



&- 



For a cap and bells our lives we pay, 
Bubbles we earn with a whole soul's tasking : 
'! 'T is heaven alone that is given away, 
'T is only God may be had for the asking ; 
There is no price set on the lavish summer, 
And June may be had by the jworest comer. 

And what is so rare as a day in June ? 

Then, if ever, come perfect days ; 
Then Heaven tries the earth if it be in tune, 

And over it softly her warm ear lays : 
Whether we look, or whether we listen, 
We hear life murmur, or see it glisten ; 
Every clod feels a stir of might. 

An instinct within it that reaches and towers 
And, groping blindly above it for light, 

Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers ; 
The flush of life may well be seen 

Thrilling back over hills and valleys ; 
The cowslip startles in meadows green. 

The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice, 
And there 's never a leaf or a blade too mean 

To be some happy creature's palace ; 
The little bird sits at his door in the sun, 

Atilt like a blossom among the leaves, 
And lets his illumined being o'errun 

With the deluge of summer it receives ; 
His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings. 
And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and 

sings ; 
He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest, — 
In the nice ear of Nature, which song is the best ? 

Now is the high-tide of the year. 

And whatever of life hath ebbed away 
Comes flooding back, with a ripply cheer. 

Into every bare inlet and creek and bay ; 
Now the heart is so full that a drop overfills it, 
We are happy now because God wills it ; 
No matter how barren the past may have been, 
'T is enough for us now that the leaves are green ; 
We sit in the warm shade and feel right well 
How the sap creeps up and the blossoms swell ; 
We may shut our eyes, but we cannot help know- 
ing 
That skies ai-e clear and grass is growing ; 
The breeze comes whispering in our ear, 
That dandelions are blossoming near. 

That maize has sprouted, that streams are 
flowing. 
That the river is bluer than the sky. 
That the robin is plastering his house hard by ; 
And if the breeze kept the good news back. 
For other couriers we should not lack ; 

We could guess it all by yon heifer's lowing, — 
And hark ! how clear bold chanticleer, 
Warmed with the new wine of the year, 

Tells all in his lusty crowing ! 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



42 { 



^1 



Joy comes, grief goes, we know not how ; 
Everything is happy now. 

Everything is upward striving ; 
'T is as easy now for the heart to be true 
As for grass to be green or skies to be blue, — 

'T is the natural way of living : 
Who knows whither the clouds have iled ? 

In the unscarred heaven they leave no wake, 
And tlie eyes forget the tears they have shed, 

The heart forgets its sorrow and ache ; 
The soul partakes the season's youth, 

And the sulphurous rifts of passion and woe 
Lie deep 'neath a silence pure and smooth, 

Like burnt-out craters healed with snow. 

James Russell Lowell, 



JUNE. 



I GAZED upon the glorious sky, 

And the green mountains round, 
And thought that when I came to lie 

At rest within the ground, 
'T were pleasant that in flowery June, 
"When brooks send up a cheerful tune, 

And groves a cheerful sound, 
The sexton's hand, my grave to make, 
The rich, green mountain turf should break. 

A cell within the frozen mould, 

A coffin borne through sleet, 
And icy clods above it rolled. 

While fierce the tempests beat — 
Away ! I will not think of these — 
Blue be the sky and soft the breeze, 

Earth green beneath the feet. 
And be the damp mould gently pressed 
Into my narrow place of rest. 

There, through the long, long, summer hou. 

The golden light should lie. 
And thick young herbs and groups of flowers 

Stand in their beauty by. 
Tlie oriole should build and tell 
His love-tale close beside my cell ; 

The idle butterfly 
Should rest him there, and there be heard 
The liousewife bee and humming-bird. 

And what if cheerful shouts at noon 

Come, from the village sent. 
Or song of maids beneath the moon 

With fairy laughter blent ? 
And what if, in the evening light, 
Betrothed lovers walk in sight 

Of my low monument ? 
I would the lovely scene around 
Might know uo sadder sight nor sound. 



I know that I no more should see 

The season's glorious show, 
Nor would its brightness shine for me, 

Nor its wild music flow ; 
But if, around my place of sleep. 
The friends I love should come to weep, 

They might not haste to go. 
Soft airs, and song, and light and bloom 
Should keep them lingering by my tomb. 

These to their softened hearts should bear 
The thought of what has been. 

And speak of one who cannot share 
The gladness of the scene ; 

Whose part, in all the pomp that fills 

The circuit of the summer hills, 
Is that his grave is green ; " 

And deeply would their hearts rejoice 

To hear again his living voice. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



SONG OF THE SUMMER WINDS. 

Up the dale and down the bourne, 
O'er the meadow swift we fly ; 

Now Ave sing, and now we moirrn, 
Now we whistle, now we sigh. 

By the grassy-fringed river, 

Through the murmuring reeds we sweep 
Mid the lily-leaves we quiver. 

To their very hearts we creep. 

Now the maiden rose is blushing 

At the frolic things we say. 
While aside her cheek we 're rushing, 

Like some truant bees at play. 

Through the blooming graves we rustle. 
Kissing every bud we pass, — 

As we did it in the bustle. 
Scarcely knowing how it was. 

Down the glen, across the mountain, 
O'er the yellow heath we roam, 

Whirling round about the fountain, 
Till its little breakers foam. 

Bending down the weeping willows, 
While our vesper hymn we sigh ; 

Then unto our rosy pillows 
On our weary wings we hie. 

There of idlenesses dreaming. 
Scarce from waking we refrain. 

Moments long as ages deeming 
Till we 're at our play again. 

GEORGE DARLEY. 



& 



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426 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



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THE STORY OF A SUMMER DAY. 

PERFECT Light, which shaid away 

The darkness from the light, 
And set a ruler o'er the day, 

Another o'er the night ; 

Thy glory, when the day forth flies, 

More vively does appear, 
Than at midday unto our eyes 

The shining sun is clear. 

The shadow of the earth anon 

Removes and drawis by, 
While in the east, when it is gone, 

Appears a clearer sky. 

"Which soon pei'ceive the little larks, 

The lapwing and the snipe. 
And time their songs, like Nature's clerks, 

O'er meadow, muir, and stripe. 

Our hemisphere is polished clean, 
And lightened more and more ; 

"While everything is clearly seen. 
Which seemed dim before ; 

Except the glistering astres bright. 
Which all the night were clear, 

Offusked with a greater light 
No longer do appear. 

The golden globe incontinent 

Sets up his shining head. 
And o'er the earth and firmament 

Displays his beams abread. 

For joy the birds with boulden throats 

Against his visage sheen 
Take up their kindly music notes 

In woods and gardens green. 

The dew upon the tender crops, 
Like pearles white and round. 

Or like to melted silver drops. 
Refreshes all the ground. 

The misty reek, the clouds of rain 
From tops of mountains skails, 

Clear are the highest hills and plain. 
The vapors take the vales. 

The ample heaven, of fabric sure, 

In cleanness does surpass 
The crystal and the silver pure, 

Or clearest polished glass. 

The time so tranquil is and .still. 

That nowhere shall ye find. 
Save on a high and barren hill, 

The air of peeping wind. 



All trees and simples, great and small, 

That balmy leaf do bear, 
Than they were painted on a wall, 

No more they move or steir. 

Calm is the deep and purple sea, 
Yea, smoother than the sand ; 

The waves, that weltering wont to be. 
Are stable like the land. 

So silent is the cessile air. 

That every cry and call. 
The hills and dales and forest fair 

Again repeats them all. 

The flourishes and fragi'ant flowers, 
Through Phoebus' fostering heat. 

Refreshed with dew and silver showers. 
Cast up an odor sweet. 

The clogged, busy hi:mming-bee.g. 

That never think to drone, 
On floW'Crs and flourishes of trees. 

Collect their liquor brown. 

The sun, most like a .speedy post, 
With ardent course ascends ; 

The beauty of the heavenly host 
Up to our zenith tends. 

Not guided by a Phaethon, 

Not trained in a chair, 
But by the high and holy One, 

Who does alhvhere empire. 

The burning beams down from his face 

So fervently can beat. 
That man and beast now seek a place 

To save them from the heat. 

The herds beneath some leafy tree. 
Amidst the flowers they lie ; 

The stable ships upon the sea 
Tend up their sails to dry. 

With gilded eyes and open wings, 
The cock his courage shows ; 

With claps of joy his breast he dings, , 
And twenty times he crows. 

The dove with whistling wings so blue. 

The winds can fast collect, 
Her purple pens turn many a hue 

Against the sun direct. 

Now noon is Avent ; gone is midday. 

The heat does slake at last, 
The sun descends down west away, 

For three o'clock is past. 



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427 



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The rayons of the sun we see 

Diminish in their strength, 
The shade of every tower and tree 

Extended is in length. 

Great is the calm, for everywhere 

The wind is settling down, 
The reek throws right up in the air 

From every tower and town. 

The gloaming comes, tlie day is spent, 

The sun goes out of sight, 
And painted is the Occident 

With purple sanguine bright. 

The scarlet nor the golden thread, 

•Who would their beauty try. 
Are nothing like the color red 

And beauty of the sky. 

Our west horizon circular. 

From time the sun be set, 
Is all with rubies, as it were. 

Or roses red o'erfret. 

What pleasure were to walk and see, 

Endlong a river clear, 
The perfect form of every tree 

Within the deep appear. 

0, then it were a seemly thing, 

While all is still and calm. 
The praise of God to play and sing 

With cornet and with shalm ! 

All laborers draw home at even. 

And can to other say. 
Thanks to the gracious God of heaven, 

Which sent this summer day ! 

ALEXANDER HU.ME. 



BEFORE THE RAIK 

We knew it would rain, for all the morn, 

A spirit on slender ropes of mist 
Was lowering its golden buckets down 

Into the vapory amethyst 

Of marshes and swamps and dismal fens, — 
Scooping the dew that lay in the flowers, 

Dipping the jewels out of the sea. 

To sprinkle them over the land in showers. 

We knew it would rain, for the poplars showed 
The white of their leaves, the amber grain 

Shrunk in the wind, — and the lightning now 
Is tangled in tremulous skeins of rain. 

THOMAS DAILEY ALDRICH. 



SIGNS OF RAIN.* 

FORTY REASONS FOR NOT ACCEPTING AN INVITATION OF 
A FRIEND TO MAKE AN EXCURSION WITH HIM. 

1 The hollow winds begin to blow ; 

2 The clouds look black, the glass is low, 

3 The soot falls down, the spaniels sleep, 

4 And spiders from their cobwebs peep. 

5 Last night the sun went pale to bed, 

6 The moon in halos hid her liead ; 

7 The boding shepherd heaves a sigh, 

8 For see, a rainbow spans the sky ! 

9 The walls are damp, the ditches smell, 

10 Closed is the pink-eyed pimpernel. 

11 Hark how the chairs and tables crack ! 

12 Old Betty's nerves are on the rack ; 

13 Loud quacks the duck, the peacocks cry, 

14 The distant hills are seeming nigh. 

15 How restless are the snorting swine ! 

16 The busy flies disturb the kine, 

17 Low o'er the grass the swallow wings, 

18 The cricket, too, how sharp he sings ! 

19 Puss on the hearth, with velvet paws, 

20 Sits wiping o'er her whiskered jaAvs ; 

21 Through the clear streams the fishes rise, 

22 And nimbly catch the incautious flies. 

23 The glow-worms, -numerous and light, 

24 Illumed the dewy dell last night ; 

25 At dusk the squalid toad was seen, 

26 Hopping and crawling o'er the green ; 

27 The whirling dust the wind obeys, 

28 And in the rapid eddy plays ; 

29 The frog has changed his yellow vest, 

30 And in a russet coat is dressed. 

31 Though June, the air is cold and still, 

32 The mellow blackbird's voice is shrill ; 

33 My dog, so altered in his taste, 

34 Quits mutton-bones on grass to feast ; 

35 And see yon rooks, how odd their flight ! 

36 They imitate the gliding kite, 

37 And seem precipitate to fall, 

38 As if they felt the piercing ball. 

39 'T will surely rain ; I see with sorrow, 

40 Our jaunt must be put off" to-morrow. 

Dr. Edward Jenner. 



SUMMER MOODS. 

I LOVE at eventide to walk alone, 
Down narrow glens, o'erhung with dewy thorn. 
Where from the long gi'ass underneath, the snail, 
Jet black, creeps out, and sprouts his timid 

horn. 
I love to muse o'er meadows newly mown, 



* "Verified by Darwin," says C. C Bombaugh in his "Glean- 
ings from tlie Harvest Fields of Literature, " though his version of 
the lines varies somewhat from this. 



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428 



POEMS OF .NATURE. 



a 



Where withering grass perfumes the sultry air ; 
Where bees search round, with sad and weary 

drone, 
In vain, for flowers that bloomed but newly 

there ; 
While in the juicy corn the hidden quail 
Cries, " Wet my foot ; " and, hid as thoughts 

unborn. 
The faiiy-like and seldom-seen land-rail 
Utters "Oraik, craik," like voices underground, 
Eight glad to meet the evening's dewy veil, 
And see the light fade into gloom around. 

JOHN CLARE. 



INVOCATION TO RAIN IN SUMMER. 

GENTLE, gentle summer rain, 

Let not the silver lily pine. 
The drooping lily pine in vain 

To i'eel that dewy touch of thine, — 
To drink thy freshness once again, 
gentle, gentle summer rain ! 

In heat the landscape quivering lies ; 

The cattle pant beneath the tree ; 
Through parching air and purple skies 

The earth looks up, in vain, for thee ; 
For thee — for thee, it looks in vain, 
gentle, gentle summer rain. 

Come thou, and brim the meadow streams, 
And soften all the hills with mist, 

falling dew ! from burning dreams 
15y thee shall herb and tiower be kissed. 

And Earth shall bless thee yet again, 

gentle, gentle summer rain. 

William Cox Ben.nett. 



t 



RAIN IN SUMMER. 

How beautiful is the rain ! 

After the dust and heat, 

In the broad and fiery street, 

In the narrow lane, 

How beautiful is the rain ! 

How it clatters along the roofs, 

Like the tramp of hoofs ! 

How it guslies and struggles out 

From the throat of the overflowing spout 

Across the window-pane 

It pours and pours ; 

And swift and wide, 

AVith a muddy tide, 

Like a river down the gutter roars 

The rain, the welcome rain ! 



The sick man from his chamber looks 

At the twisted brooks ; 

He can feel the cool 

Breath of each little pool ; 

His fevered brain 

Grows calm again. 

And he breathes a blessing on the rain. 

From the neighboring school 

Come the boys, 

With more than their wonted noise 

And commotion ; 

And down the wet streets 

Sail their mimic fleets. 

Till the treacherous pool 

Ingulfs them in its whirling 

And turbulent ocean. 

In the country, on every side, 

Where far and wide. 

Like a leopard's tawny and spotted hide, 

Stretches the plain. 

To the dry grass and the drier grain 

How welcome is the rain ! 

In the furrowed land 

The toilsome and patient oxen stand ; 

Lifting the yoke-encumbered head, 

With their dilated nostrils spread, 

They silently inhale 

The clover-scented gale. 

And the vapors that arise 

From the well-watered and smoking soil. 

For this rest in the furrow after toil 

Their large and lustrous eyes 

Seem to thank the Lord, 

More than man's spoken Avord. 

Near at hand, 

From under the sheltering trees. 

The farmer sees 

His pastures, and his fields of grain, 

As they bend their tops 

To the numberless beating drops 

Of the incessant rain. 

He counts it as no sin 

That he sees therein 

Only his own thrift and gain. ' 

These, and far more than these, 

The Poet sees ! 

He can behold 

Aquarius old 

Walking the fenceless fields of air; 

And from each ample fold 

Of the clouds about him rolled 

Scattering everywhere 

The showery rain. 

As the farmer scatters his grain. 



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POEMS OP NATURE. 



429 



ra 



He can behold 

Things manifold 

That have not yet been wholly told, — 

Have not been wholly sung noi' said. 

For his thought, that never stops, 

Follows the water-drops 

Down to the graves of the dead, 

Down through chasms and gulfs profound, 

To the dreary fountain-head 

Of lakes and rivers underground ; 

And sees them, when the rain is done, 

On the bridge of colors seven 

Climbing up once more to heaven, 

Opposite the setting sun. 

Thus the Seer, 

With vision clear, 

Sees forms appear and disappear, 

In the perpetual round of strange, 

Mysterious change 

From birth to death, from death to birth, 

From earth to heaven, from heaven to earth ; 

Till glimpses more sublime 

Of things, unseen before. 

Unto his wondering eyes reveal 

The Universe, as an immeasurable wheel 

Turning forcvermore 

In the rapid and rushing river of Time. 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 



I& 



SUMMER STORM. 

Untremulous in the river clear. 
Toward the sky's image, hangs the imaged bridge ; 

So still the air that I can hear 
The slender clarion of tlie unseen midge ; 

Out of the stillness, with a gathering creep, 
Like rising wind in leaves, which now decreases, 
Now lulls, now swells, and all the while increases. 

The huddling trample of a drove of sheep 
Tilts the loose planks, and then as gradually ceases 
In dust on the other side ; life's emblem deep, 
A confused noise between two silences. 
Finding at last in dust precarious peace. 
On the wide marsh tlie purple-blossomed grasses 
Soak up tlie sunshine ; sleeps the brimming tide. 
Save when the wedge-shaped wake in silence 
passes 
Of some slow water-rat, whose sinuous glide 
Wavers the long green sedge's shade from side 
to side ; 
But up the west, like a rock-shivered surge. 
Climbs a great cloud edged with sun-whitened 
spray ; 
Huge whirls of foam boil toppling o'er its verge, 
And falling still it seems, and yet it climbs 
alway. 



Suddenly all the .sky is hid 

As with the shutting of a lid, 
One by one great drops are falling 

Doubtful and slow ; 
Down the- pane they are crookedly crawling, 

And the wind breathes low ; 
Slowly the circles widen on the river, 

Widen and mingle, one and all ; 
Here and there the slenderer flowers shiver, 

Struck by an icy rain-drop's fall. 

Now on the hills I hear the thunder mutter. 

The wind is gathering in the west ; 
The upturned leaves first whiten and flutter, 

Then droop to a fitful rest ; 
Up from the stream with sluggish flap 
Struggles the gull and floats away ; 
Nearer and nearer rolls the thunder-clap, — 
We shall not see the sun go down to-day : 
Now leaps tlie wind on the sleepy marsh, 

And tramples the grass with terrified feet, 
The startled river turns leaden and harsh. 
You can hear the CLuick heart of the tempest 
beat. 

Look ! look ! that livid flash ! 
And instantly follows the rattling thunder, 
As if some cloud-crag, split asunder, 

Fell, splintering with a ruinous crash. 
On the Earth, which crouches in silence under ; 

And now a solid gray wall of rain 
Shuts off the landscape, mile by mile ; 

For a breath's space I see the blue wood again. 
And, ere the next heart-beat, the wind-hurled pile. 
That seemed but now a league aloof, 
Bursts crackling o'er the sun-parched roof ; 
Against the windows the storm comes dashing, 
Tlu'ough tattered foliage the hail tears crashing. 
The blue lightning flashes, 
The rapid hail clashes, 
The white waves are tumbling. 

And, in one baffled roar. 
Like the toothless sea mumbling 

A rock-bristled shore. 
The thunder is rumbling 
And crashing and crumbling, — 
Will silence return nevermore ? 

Hush ! Still as death. 
The tempest holds his breath 
As from a sudden will ; 
The rain stops short, but from the eaves 
You see it drop, and hear it from the leaves, 
All is so bodingly .still ; 

Again, now, now, again 
Plashes the rain in heavy gouts. 
The crinkled lightning 
Seems ever brightening, 







(& 



430 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



a 



And loud and long 
Again the thunder shouts 

His battle-song, — 
One quivering flash, 
One wiideriiig crash, 
Followed by silence dead and dull, 
As if the cloud, let go, 
Leapt bodily below 
To whelm the earth in one mad overthrow. 
And then a total lull. 

Gone, gone, so soon ! 
No more my half-crazed fancy there 
Can shape a giant in the air, 
No more I see his streaming hair, 
The writhing portent of his form ; — 
The pale and quiet moon 
Makes her calm forehead bare. 
And the last fragments of the storm. 
Like shattered rigging from a fight at sea. 
Silent and few, are drifting over me. 

James Russell Lowell. 



AFTER THE RAIN. 

The rain has ceased, and in my room 
The sunshine pours an airy flood ; 
And on the church's dizzy vane 
The ancient Cross is bathed in blood. 

From out the dripping ivy-leaves. 
Antiquely carven, gray and high, 
A dormer, facing westward, looks 
Upon the village like an eye : 

And now it glimmers in the sun, 
A square of gold, a disk, a speck : 
And in the belfry sits a Dove 
With purple ripples on her neck. 

THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH. 



U^ 



A DROP OF DEW. 

See hoM' the orient dew. 
Shed from the bosom of the morn 
Lito the blowing roses, 
(Yet careless of its mansion new 
For the clear region where 't was born) 
Round in itself encloses, 
And in its little globe's extent 
Frames, as it can, its native element. 

How it the purple flower does slight. 

Scarce touching where it lies ; 
But gazing back upon the skies, 
Shines with a mournful light, 



Like its own tear, 
Because so long divided from the sphere ; 
Restless it rolls, and unsecure. 

Trembling, lest it grow impure, 
Till the warm sun pities its pain. 
And to the skies exhales it back again. 
So the soul, that drop, that ray 
Of the clear fountain of eternal day. 
Could it within the human flower be seen. 
Remembering still its former height, 
Shuns the sweet leaves and blossoms green, 
And, recollecting its own light. 
Does, in its pure and circling thoughts, express 
The greater heaven in a heaven less. 
In how coy a figure wound, 
Every way it turns away ; 
So the world 'excluding round. 
Yet receiving in the day. 
Dark beneath, but bright above ; 
Here disdaining, there in love. 
How loose and easy hence to go ! 
How girt and ready to ascend ! 
Moving but on a point below, 
It all about does upwards bend. 
Such did the manna's sacred dew distil, 
White and entire, although congealed and chill, — 
Congealed on earth, but does, dissolving, run 
Into the glories of the Almighty sun. 

Andrew Marvell. 



A SUMMER EVENING'S MEDITATION. 

•' One sun by day, by night ten thousand shine." — YOUNG. 

'T IS past, — the sultry tyrant of the South 
Has spent his short-lived rage ; more grateful 

hours 
Move silent on ; the skies no more repel 
The dazzled sight, but, with mild maiden beams 
Of tempered lustre, court the cherished eye 
To wander o'er their sphere ; where, hung aloft, 
Dian's bright crescent, like a silver bow. 
New strung in heaven, lifts its beamy horns 
Impatient for the night, and seems to push 
Her brother down the sky. Fair Venus shines 
Even in the eye of day ; with sweetest beam 
Propitious shines, and shakes a trembling flood 
Of softened radiance with her dewy locks. 
The shadows spread apace ; while meekened Eve, 
Her cheek yet warm with blushes, slow I'etires 
Through the Hesperian gardens of the AVest, 
And shuts the gates of Day. 'T is now the hour 
When Contemplation, from her sunless haunts, 
The cool damp grotto, or the lonely dej^th 
Of unpierced woods, where rapt in solid shade 
She mused away the gaudy hours of noon. 
And fed on thoughts unripened by the .sun. 
Moves forward and with radiant finger points 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



431 



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To yon blue concave swelled hy breath divine, 
Where, one by one, the living eyes of heaven 
Awake, quick kindling o'er the face of ether 
One boundless blaze ; ten thousand trembling 

fires. 
And dancing lustres, where the unsteady eye, 
Kestless and dazzled, wanders unconlined 
O'er all this field of glories ; spacious field. 
And worthy of the Master, — He whose hand 
With hieroglyphics elder than the Nile 
Inscribed the mystic tablet, hung on high 
To public gaze, and said. Adore, man ! 
The finger of thy God. From what pure wells 
Of milky light, what soft o'erflowing urn. 
Are all these lamps so filled? — these friendly 

lamps. 
Forever streaming o'er the azure deep 
To point our path, and light us to our home. 
How soft they slide along their lucid spheres, 
And, silent as the foot of Time, fulfil 
Their destined courses ! Nature's self is hushed. 
And but a scattered leaf, which rustles through 
The thick-wove foliage, not a sound is heard 
To break the midnight air ; though the raised 

ear, 
Intently listening, drinks in every breath. 
How deep the silence, yet how loud the praise ! 
But are they silent all ? or is there not 
A tongue in every star that talks with man, 
And wooes him to be wise ? nor wooes in vain : 
This dead of midnight is the noon of thought. 
And Wisdom mounts her zenith with the stars. 
At this still hour the self-collected soul 
Turns inward, and beholds a stranger there 
Of high descent, and more than mortal rank ; * 
An embryo God ; a spark of fire divine. 
Which must burn on for ages, when the sun 
(Fair transitory creature of a day !) 
Has closed his golden eye, and, wrapt in shades. 
Forgets his wonted journey through the East. 

Ye citadels of light, and seats of gods ! 
Perhaps my future home, from whence the soul, 
Eevolving periods past, may oft look tiack. 
With recollected tenderness, on all 
The various busy scenes she left below, 
Its deep-laid projects and its strange events, 
As on some fond and doting tale that soothed 
Her infant hours, — 0, be it lawful now 
To tread the hallowed circle of your courts. 
And with mute wonder and delighted awe 
Approach your burning confines ! Seized in 

thought, 
On Fancy's wild and roving wing I sail. 
From the green borders of the peopled earth. 
And the pale moon, her duteous, fair attendant ; 
From solitary Mars ; from the vast orb 
Of Jupiter, whose huge gigantic bulk 
Dances in ether like the lightest leaf, 



To the dim verge, the suburbs of the system, 
Where cheerless Saturn midst his watery moons 
Girt with a lucid zone, in gloomy pomp. 
Sits like an exiled monarch : fearless thenco 
I launch into the trackless deeps of space. 
Where, burning round, ten thousand suns appear. 
Of elder beam, which ask no leave to shine 
Of our terrestrial star, nor borrow light 
From the proud regent of our scanty day ; 
Sonsof the morning, first-born of creation. 
And only less than Him who marks their track 
And guides their fiery wheels. Here must I stop. 
Or is there aught beyond ? What hand unseen 
Impels me onward through the glowing orbs 
Of habitable nature, far remote, 
To the dread confines of eternal night, 
To solitudes of waste unpeopled space. 
The deserts of creation, wide and wild ; 
Where embryo systems and unkindled suns 
Sleep in the womb of chaos ? Fancy droops. 
And Thought, astonished, stops her bold career. 
But, thou mighty Mind ! whose powerful word 
Said, "Thus let all things be," and thus they 

were, 
Where shall I seek thy presence ? how unblamed 
Invoke thy dread perfection ? 
Have the broad eyelids of the morn beheld thee ! 
Or does the beamy shoulder of Orion 
Support thy throne ? 0, look with pity down 
On erring, guilty man ; not in thy names 
Of terror clad ; not with those thunders armed 
That conscious Sinai felt, when fear appalled 
The scattered tribes ; thou hast a gentler voice, 
That whispers comfort to the swelling heart. 
Abashed, yet longing to behold her ]\Iaker ! 
But now my soul, unused to stretch her powers 
In flight so daring, drops her weary wing. 
And seeks again the known accustomed spot, 
Drest up with sun and shade and lawns and 

streams, 
A mansion fair and spacious for its guests. 
And all replete with wonders. Let me here. 
Content and grateful, wait the appointed time, 
And ripen for the skies : the hour will come 
When all these splendors bursting on my sight 
Shall stand unveiled, and to my ravished sense 
Unlock the glories of the world unknown. 

Anna Letitia Bareauld. 



A SUMMER EVENING. 

How fine has the day been ! how bright was the 

sun ! 
How lovely and joyful the course that he run. 
Though he rose in a mist when his race he begun, 
And there followed some droppings of rain ! 



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432 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



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But now the fair traveller 's come to the west, 
His rays are all gold, and his beauties are best : 
He paints the sky gay as he sinks to his rest, 
And foretells a bright rising again. 

Just such is the Christian : his course he begins, 
Like the sun in a mist, when he mourns for his 

sins, 
And melts into tears ; then he breaks out and 

shines. 

And travels his heavenly way : 

But when he comes nearer to finish his race, 

Like a fi.ne setting sun, he looks richer in grace, 

And gives a sure hope, at the end of his days, 

Of rising in brighter array. 

ISAAC Watts. 



MY HEAET LEAPS UP. 

My heart leaps up when I behold 

A rainbow in the sky ; 
So was it when my life began, 
So is it now I am a man. 
So be it when I shall grow old, 

Or let me die ! 
The Child is father of the Man ; 
And I could wish my days to be 
Bound each to each by natural piety. 

William Wordsworth. 



MOONLIGHT IN SUMMER. 

Low on the i;tmost boundary of the sight, 
The rising vapors catch the silver light ; 
Thence fancy measures, as they parting fly. 
Which first will throw its shadow on the eye, 
Passing the source of light ; and thence away, 
Succeeded quick by brighter still than they. 
For yet above these wafted clouds are seen 
(In a remoter sky still more serene) 
Others, detached in ranges through the air, 
Spotless as snow, and countless as thev 're 

fair ; 
Scattered immensely wide from east to west, 
The beauteous semblance of a flock at rest. 
These, to the raptured mind, aloud proclaim 
Their mighty Shepherd's everlasting name ; 
And thus the loiterer's utmost stretch of soul 
Climbs the still clouds, or passes those that 

roll. 
And loosed imagination soaring goes 
High o'er his home and all his little woes. 



u- 



Robert Bloomfield. 



MOONLIGHT ON THE PRAIRIE. 

FROM " EVANGELINE." 

Beautiful was the night. Behind the black 

wall of the forest. 
Tipping its summit with silver, arose the moon. 

On the river 
Fell hea'e and there through the branches a tremu- 
lous gleam of the moonlight, 
Like the sweet thoughts of love on a darkened 

and devious spirit. 
Nearer and round about her, the manifold flowers 

of the garden 
Poured out their souls in odors, that were their 

prayers and confessions 
Unto the night, as it went its way, like a silent 

Carthusian. 
Fuller of fragrance than they, and as heavy with 

shadows and night-dews, 
Hung the heart of the maiden. The calm and 

the magical moonlight 
Seemed to inundate her soul with indefinable 

longings, 
As, through the garden gate, and beneath the 

shade of the oak-trees, 
Passed she along the path to the edge of the 

measureless prairie. 
Silent it lay, with a silvery haze upon it, and 

fire-flies 
Gleaming and floating away in mingled and in- 
finite numbers. 
Over her head the stars, the thoughts of God in 

the heavens. 
Shone on the eyes of man, who had ceased to 

marvel and worship, 
Save when a blazing comet was seen on the walls 

of that temple. 
As if a hand had appeared and written upon 

them, " Upharsin." 
And the soul of the maiden, between the stars 

and the fire-flies, 
Wandered alone, and she cried, "0 Gabriel! 

my beloved ! 
Art thou so near unto me, and yet I cannot 

behold thee ? 
Art thou so near unto me, and yet thy voice 

does not reach me ? 
Ah ! how often thy feet have trod this path to 

the prairie ! 
Ah ! how often thine eyes have looked on the 

woodlands around me ! 
Ah ! how often beneath this oak, returning from 

labor, 
Thou hast lain down to rest, and to dream of 

me in thy slumbers. 
When shall these eyes behold, these arms bo 

folded about thee ? " 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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Loud and sudden and near the note of a vvhip- 

poorwill sounded 
Like a llute in tlie woods ; and anon, tlirougli 

the neighboring thickets, 
Farther and farther away it floated and dropped 

into silence. 
" Patience ! " whispered the oaks from oracular 

caverns of darkness ; 
And, from the moonlit meadow, a sigh responded, 

"To-morrow ! " 

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 



f& 



SEPTEMBER. 

Sweet is the voice that calls 

From babbling waterfalls 
In meadows where the downy seeds are flying; 

And soft the bi'eezes blow, 

And eddying come and go 
In faded gardens where the rose is dying. 

Among the stubbled corn 

The blithe quail pipes at morn, 
The merry partridge drums in hidden places. 

And glittering insects gleam 

Above the reedy stream, 
Where busy spiders spin their hlmy laces. 

At eve, cool shadows fall 

Across the garden wall. 
And on the clustered grapes to purple turning ; 

And pearly vapors lie 

Along the eastern sky, 
Where the broad harvest-moon is redly burning. 

Ah, soon on field and hill 
The wind shall whistle chill. 

And patriarch swallows call their Hocks together. 
To fly from frost and snow. 
And seek for lands where blow 

The fairer blossoms of a balmier weather. 

The cricket chirps all day, 

" fairest summer, stay ! " 
The squirrel eyes askance the chestnuts browning; 

The wild fowd fly alar 

Above the foamy bar. 
And hasten southward ere the skies are frowning. 

Now comes a fi'agrant breeze 

Through the dark cedar-trees. 
And round about my temples fondly lingers, 

In gentle playfulness. 

Like to the soft caress 
Bestowed in happier days by loving fingers. 



Yet, though a sense of grief 

Comes with the falling leaf. 
And memory makes the summer doubly pleasant. 

In all my autumn dreams 

A future summer gleams. 
Passing the fairest glories of the present ! 

George Arnold. 



AUTUMN. 



The autumn is old ; 
The sear leaves are flying ; 
He hath gathered up gold. 
And now he is dying : 
Old age, begin sighing ! 

The vintage is ripe ; 
The harvest is heaping ; 
But some that have sowed 
Have no riches for reaping : — 
Poor wretch, fall a-weeping ! 

The year 's in the wane ; 
There is nothing adorning ; 
The night has no eve. 
And the day has no morning ; 
Cold winter gives warning. 

The rivers run chill ; 
The red sun is sinking ; 
And I am grown old. 
And life is fast shrinking ; 
Here 's enow for sad thinking ! 

Thomas Hood. 



THE LATTER RAIN. 

The latter rain, — it falls in anxious haste 
Upon the sun-dried fields and branches bare. 
Loosening with searching drops the ligid waste 
As if it would each root's lost strength repair ; 
But not a blade grows green as in the spring ; 
No swelling twig puts forth its thickening 

leaves ; 
The robins only mid the harvests sing, 
Pecking the grain that scatters from the sheaves ; 
The rain falls still, — the fruit all ripened 

drops, 
It pierces chestnut-burr and walnut-shell ; 
The furrowed fields disclose the yellow crops ; 
Each bursting pod of talents used can tell ; 
And all that once received the early rain 
Declare to man it was not sent in vain. 

Jones Very. 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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THE AUTUMN. 

The autumn time is with us ! Its approacli 
Was heralded, not many days ago, 
By hazy skies that veiled the brazen sun, 
And sea-like murmurs from the rustling corn, 
And low-voiced brooks that wandered drowsily 
By purpling clusters of the juicy grape, 
Swinging upon the vine. And now, 't is here, 
And what a change hath passed upon the face 
Of Nature, where thy waving forests spread. 
Then robed in deepest green ! All through the 

night 
The subtle frost hath plied its mystic art, 
And in the day the golden sun hath wrought 
True wonders ; and the wings of morn and even 
Have touched with magic breath the changing 

leaves. 
And now, as wanders the dilating eye 
Athwart the varied landscape circling far, 
What gorgcousness, what blazonry, what pomp 
Of colors, bursts upon the ravished sight ! 
Here, where the maple rears its yellow crest, 
A golden glory ; yonder, where the oak 
Stands monarch of the forest, and the ash 
Is girt with flame-like parasite, and broad 
The dog-wood spreads beneath a rolling field 
Of deepest crimson ; and afar, where looms 
The gnarled gum, a cloud of bloodiest red ! 

William D. Gallagher. 



INDIAN SUMMER. 

When leaves grow sear all things take sombre hue ; 
The wild winds waltz no more the woodside 

through. 
And all the faded grass is wet with dew. 

A gauzy nebula films the pensive sky, 

The golden bee supinely buzzes by, 

In silent fiocks the bluebirds southward fly. 

The forest's cheeks are crimsoned o'er with shame, 

The cynic frost enlaces every lane. 

The ground with scarlet blushes is aflame ! 

The one we love grows lustrous-eyed and sad, 
With sympathy too thoughtful to be glad, 
While all the colors round are running mad. 

The sunbeams kiss askant the sombre hill. 
The naked woodbine climbs the window-sill, 
The breaths that noon exhales are faint and chill. 

The ripened nuts drop downward day by day, 
Sounding the hollow tocsin of decay. 
And bandit squirrels smuggle them away. 



Vague sighs and scents pervade the atmosphere, 
Sounds of invisible stirrings hum the ear. 
The morning's lash reveals a frozen tear. 

The hermit mountains gird themselves with mail. 
Mocking the threshers with an echo flail, 
The while the afternoons grow crisp and pale. 

Inconstant Summer to the tropics flees. 

And, as her rose-sails catch the amorous breeze, 

Lo ! bare, brown Autumn trembles to her knees ! 

The stealthy nights encroach upon the days. 
The earth with sudden whiteness is ablaze, 
And all her paths are lost in crystal maze ! 

Tread lightly where the dainty violets blew. 
Where the spring winds their soft eyes open flew ; 
Safely they sleep the churlish winter through. 

Though all life's XDortals are indiced with woe. 
And frozen pearls are all the world can show. 
Feel ! Nature's breath is warm beneath the snow. 

Look up, dear mourners ! Still the blue expanse, 
Serenely tender, bends to catch thy glance ; 
Within thy tears sibyllic sunbeams dance ! 

With blooms full-sapped again will smile the 

land : 
The fall is but the folding of Ilis hand. 
Anon with fuller glories to expand. 

The dumb heart hid beneath the pulseless tree 
Will throb again ; and then the torpid bee 
Upon the ear will drone his drowsy glee. 

So shall the truant bluebirds backward fly. 
And all loved things that vanish or that die 
Return to us in some sweet By-and-By. 

AiNONYJIOUS. 



WINTER SONG. 

Summer joys are o'er ; 

Flowerets bloom no more, 
Wintry winds are sweeping ; 
Through the snow-drifts peeping, 

Cheerful evergreen 

Rarely now is seen. 

Now no plumed throng 
Charms the wood with song ; 

Ice-bound trees are glittering ; 

Merry snow-birds, twittering, 
Fondly strive to cheer 
Scenes so cold and drear. 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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435 



Winter, still I see 

Many charms in thee, — 
Love thy chilly gi-eeting, 
Snow-storms fiercely beating, 

And the dear delights 

Of the long, long nights. 

From the German of LUDWIG HOLTY. Trans 
latioa of CHARLES T. BKOOKS. 



NO! 



No sun - - no moon ! 

No morn - — no noon — 
No dawn — no dust — no pio^ier time of day — 

No sky — no earthly view — 

No distance looking blue — 
No road — no street — no " t' other side the 
way " — 

No end to any Row — 

No indications whei'e the Crescents go — 

No top to any steeple — 
No recognitions of familiar people — 

No courtesies for showing 'em — 

No knowing 'em ! 
No travelling at all — no locomotion, 
No inkling of the way — no notion — ■ 

" No go " — by land or ocean — 

No mail — no post — 

No news from any foreign coast — ■ 
No park — no ring — no afternoon gentility — 

No company — no nobility — 
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease, 
No comfortable feel in any member — 
No shade, no shine, no bntterllies, no bees, 
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds, 
November ! 

THOMAS HOOD. 



U^ 



WINTER MORNING. 

FROM "THE WINTER MORNING WALK:" 
" THE TASK," BOOK V. 

'T IS morning ; and the sun, with ruddy orb 
Ascending, fires the horizon ; while the clouds, 
That crowd away before the driving wind, 
More ardent as the disk emerges more, 
Resemble most some city in a blaze. 
Seen through the leafless wood. His slanting ray 
Slides inett'ectual down the snowy vale, 
And, tingeing all with his own rosy hue. 
From every herb and every spiry blade 
Stretches a length of shadow o'er the field. 
Mine, spindling into longitude immense. 
In spite of gravity, and sage remark 
That I myself am but a fleeting shade, 
Provokes me to a smile. With eye askance 



I view the muscular proportioned limb 
Transformed to a lean shank. The shapeless pair, 
As they designed to mock me, at my side 
Take step for step ; and, as I near approach 
The cottage, walk along the plastered wall. 
Preposterous sight ! the legs without the man. 
The verdure of the plain lies buried deep 
Beneath the dazzling deluge"; and the bents, 
And coarser grass, upspearing o'er the rest, 
Of late unsightly and unseen, now shine 
Conspicuous, and in bright apparel clad. 
And, fledged with icy feathers, nod superb. 
The cattle mourn in corners, where the fence 
Screens them, and seem half petrified to sleep 
In unrecumbent sadness. There they wait 
Their wonted fodder ; not, like hungering man. 
Fretful if unsupplied ; but silent, meek, 
And patient of the slow-paced swain's delay. 
He from the stack carves out the accustomed load. 
Deep plunging, and again deep plunging oft. 
His broad keen knife into the solid mass : 
Smootli as a wall the upright remnant stands. 
With such undeviating and even force 
He severs it away : no needless care 
Lest storms should overset the leaning pile 
Deciduous, or its own unbalanced weight. 
Forth goes the woodman, leaving unconcerned 
The cheerful haunts of men, — to wield the axe 
And drive the wedge in j'onder forest drear. 
From morn to eve his solitary task. 
Shaggy and lean and shrewd with pointed ears. 
And tail cropped short, half lurcher and half cur, 
His dog attends him. Close behind liis heel 
Now creeps ho slow ; and now, with many a frisk 
Wide-scampering, snatches up the drifted snow 
With ivory teeth, or ploughs it with his snout ; 
Then shakes his powdered coat, and barks for jo}*. 

Now from the roost, or from the neighboring pale. 
Where, diligent to catch the first faint gleam 
Of smiling day, they gossiped side by side. 
Come trooping at the housewife's well-known call 
The feathered tribes domestic. Half on wing. 
And half on foot, they brush the fleecy flood. 
Conscious and fearful of too deep a plunge. 
The sparrows peep, and quit the sheltering eaves 
To seize the fair occasion. Well they eye 
The scattered grain, and, thievishly resolved 
To escape the impending famine, often scared 
As oft return, a pert voracious kintL 
Clean riddance quickly made, one onl\' care 
Remains to each, the search of sunny nook. 
Or shed inqiervious to the blast. Resigned 
To sad necessity, the cock foregoes 
His wonted strut, and, wading at their head 
With well-considered steps, seems to resent 
His altered gait and stateliness retrenclicd. 
How find the myriads, that in summer cheer 



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436 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



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The hills and valleys with their ceaseless songs, 
Due sustenance, or where subsist they now ? 
Earth yields them naught ; the imprisoned worm 

is safe 
Beneath the frozen clod ; all seeds of herbs 
Lie covered close ; and berry-bearing thorns, 
That feed the thrush (whatever some suppose), 
Afford the smaller minstrels no supply. 
The long protracted rigor of the year 
Thins all their numerous flocks. In chinks and 

holes 
Ten thousand seek an unmolested end. 
As instinct promj)ts ; self-buried ere they die. 
William covvper. 



NEW ENGLAND IN WINTER. 

FROM "SNOW-BOUND." 

The sun that brief December day 

Kosc cheerless over hills of gray, 

And, darkly circled, gave at noon 

A sadder light than waning moon. 

Slow tracing down the thickening sky 

Its mute and ominous prophecy, 

A portent seeming less than threat, 

It sank from sight before it set. 

A chill no coat, however stout. 

Of homespun stuff could quite shut out, 

A hard, dull bitterness of cold. 

That checked, mid-vein, the circling race 

Of life-blood in the sharpened face, 

The coming of the snow-storm told. 

The wind blew east : we heard the roar 

Of Ocean on his wintry shoi'e. 

And felt the strong pulse throbbing there 

Beat with low rhythm our inland air. 

Meanwhile we did our nightly chores, — 
Brought in the wood from out of doors, 
Littered the stalls, and from the mows 
Eaked down the hcrd's-grass for the cows ; 
Heard the horse whinnying for his corn ; 
And, sharplj- clashing horn on horn, 
Impatient down the stanchion rows 
The cattle shake their walnut bows ; 
While, peering from his early perch 
Upon the scalfold's })ole of birch. 
The cock his crested helmet bent 
And down his querulous challenge sent. 

Un warmed by any sunset light 
The gray day darkened iuto night, 
A night made hoary with the swarm 
And whirl-dance of the blinding storm, 
As zigzag wavering to and fro 
Crossed and recrossed the winged snow : 



And ere the early bedtime came 
The white drift piled the window-frame. 
And through the glass the clothes-line posts 
Looked in like tall and sheeted ghosts. 

So all night long the storm roared on : 

The morning broke without a sun ; 

In tiny spherule traced with lines 

Of Nature's geometric signs, 

In starry flake, and pellicle, 

All day the hoary meteor fell ; 

And, when the second morning shone. 

We looked upon a world unknown, 

On nothing we could call our own. 

Around the glistening wonder bent 

The blue walls of the firmament. 

No cloud above, no earth below, — 

A universe of sky and snow ! 

The old familiar sights of ours 

Took marvellous shapes; strange domes and towers 

Rose up where sty or corn -crib stood. 

Or garden wall, or belt of wood ; 

A smooth white mound the brush-pile showed, 

A fenceless drift what once was road ; 

The bridle-post an old man sat 

With loose-flung coat and high cocked hat ; 

The well-curb had a Chinese roof ; 

And even the long sweep, high aloof, 

In its slant splendor, seemed to tell 

Of Pisa's leaning miracle. 

A prompt, decisive man, no breath 
Our father wasted : " Boys, a path ! " 
Well jileased, (for when did farmer boy 
Count such a summons less than joy ?) 
Our buskins on our feet we drew ; 
With mittened hands, and caps drawn low, 
To guard our necks and ears from snow, 
We cut the solid whiteness through. 
And, where the drift A\as deepest, made 
A tunnel walled and overlaid 
With dazzling crystal : we had read 
Of rare Aladdin's wondrous cave, 
And to our own his name M'e gave, 
Witli many a wish the luck were ours 
To test his lamp's supernal powers. 
We reached the barn with merry din, 
And roused the prisoned brutes within. 
The old horse thrust his long head out, 
And grave with wonder gazed about ; 
The cock his lusty greeting said, 
And forth his speckled harem led ; 
The oxen lashed their tails, and hooked, 
And mild re])roach of hunger looked ; 
The horned patriarch of the sheep. 
Like Egypt's Amun roused from sleep, 
Shook his sage head with gesture mute. 
And emphasized with stamp of foot. 



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All (lay the gusty north-wind bore 

The loosening drift its breath before ; 

Low circling round its southern zone, 

The sun through dazzling snow-mist shone. 

No church-bell lent its Christian tone 

To the savage ail', no social smoke 

Curled over woods of snow-hung oak. 

A solitude made more intense 

By dreary- voiced elements. 

The shrieking of the mindless wind. 

The moaning tree-boughs swaying blind, 

And on the glass the unmeaning beat 

Of ghostly finger-tips of sleet. 

Beyond the circle of our hearth 

No welcome sound of toil or mirth 

Unbound the spell, and testified 

Of human life and thought outside. 

We minded that the sharpest ear 

The buried brooklet could not hear, 

The music of whose liquid lip 

Had been to us companionship, 

And, in our lonely life, had grown 

To have an almost human tone. 

As niglit drew on, and, from the crest 
Of wooded knolls that ridged the west, 
The sun, a snow-blown traveller, sank 
From sight beneath the smothering bank. 
We ])ileil, with care, our nightly stack 
Of wood against the chimney-back, — 
The oaken log, green, huge, and thick, 
And on its top the stout back-stick ; 
The knotty forestick laid apart. 
And filled between with curious art 
The ragged brush ; then, hovering near. 
We watched the first red blaze appear. 
Heard the sharp crackle, caught the gleam 
On whitewashed wall and sagging beam, 
Until the old, rude -furnished room 
Burst, flower-like, into rosy bloom ; 
While radiant with a mimic flame 
Outside the sparkling drift became. 
And through the bare-boughed lilac-tree 
Our own warm hearth seemed blazing free. 
The crane and pendent trannnels showed ; 
The Turks' heads on the andirons glowed ; 
AVhile childish fancy, prompt to tell 
The meaning of the miracle, 
Whispered the old rhyme : " Under the tree, 
JFkcnfire outdoors hums merrily. 
There the witehes are vialcing tea." 

The moon above the eastern wood 
Shone at its full ; the hill-range stood 
Transfigured in the silver flood. 
Its blown snows flashing cold and keen, 
Dead white, save where some shai-p ravine 
Took shadow, or the sombre green 



Of hemlocks turned to pitchy black 
Against the whiteness at their back. 
For such a world and such a Jiight 
Most fitting that unwarming light. 
Which only seemed where'er it fell 
To make the coldness visible. 

Shut in from all the world without. 
We sat the clean-winged hearth about, 
Content to let the north-wind roar 
In baffled rage at pane and door, 
While the red logs before us beat 
The frost-line back with tropic heat ; 
And ever, when a louder blast 
Shook beam and rafter as it passed, 
The merrier up its roaring draught 
The great throat of the chimney laughed ; 
The house-dog on his paws outspread 
Laid to the lire his drowsy head. 
The cat's dark silhouette on the wall 
A couehant tiger's seemed to fall ; 
And, for the winter fireside meet. 
Between the andirons' straddling feet, 
The mug of cider simmered slow, 
The apples sputtered in a row. 
And, close at hand, the basket stood 
With nuts from brown October's wood. 

John Greenleaf Whittier. 



WINTER NOON. 

"""" FROM "THE WINTER. WALK AT NOON:" \ 
" THE TASK," BOOK VI. 

Thk night was winter in his roughest mood. 
The morning sharp and clear. But now at noon 
Upon the southern side of the slant hills, 
And where the woods fence off the northern 

blast, 
The season smiles, resigning all its rage. 
And has the warmth of May. The vault is blue 
AVithout a cloud, and white without a speck 
The dazzling splendor of the scene below. 

Again tlie harmony comes o'er tlie vale ; 
And tlirough the trees I view the embattled tower, 
Whence all the music. I again peiceive 
The soothing influence of the wafted strains. 
And settle in soft musings as I tread 
The walk, still verdant, under oaks and elms. 
Whose outspread branches overarch the glade. 

No noise is here, or none that hinders thought. 
The redbreast warbles still, but is content 
With slender notes, and more than half sup- 
pressed : 
Pleased with his solitude, and flitting light 
From spray to spray, where'er he rests he shakes 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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From many a twig the pendent drops of ice, 
That tinkle in the withered leaves below. 
Stillness, accompanied with sounds so soft, 
Charms more than silence. Meditation here 
May think down hours to moments. Here the 

heart 
May give a useful lesson to the head, 
And Learning wiser grow without his books. 

William Cowper. 



WINTER. 

The day had been a calm and sunny day. 

And tinged with amber was the sky at even ; 
The fleecy clouds at length had rolled away, 

And lay in furrows on the eastern heaven ; — 
The moon arose and shed a glimmering ray, 
And round her oib a misty circle lay. 

The hoar-frost glittered on the naked heath, 
The roar of distant winds was loud and deep, 

The dry leaves rustled in each passing breath, 
And the gay world was lost in quiet sleep. 

Such was the time when, on the landscape brown, 

Through a December air the snow came down. 

The morning came, the dreary morn, at last. 
And showed the whitened waste. The shiv- 
ering herd 
Lowed on the hoary meadow-ground, and fast 

Fell the light flakes upon the earth unstirred ; 
The forest firs with glittering snows o'erlaid 
Stood like hoar priests in robes of white arrayed. 
John Howard Bryant. 



e 



WINTER PICTURES. 

IFROM "THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL." 

Down swept the chill wind from the mountain 
peak. 

From the snow five thousand summers old ; 
On open wold and hill-top bleak 

It hail gathered all the cold, 
And whirled it like sleet on the wanderer's cheek ; 
It carried a shiver everywhere 
From the unleafed boughs and pastures bare ; 
The little brook heard it and built a roof 
'Neath which he could house him, winter-proof ; 
All night by the white stars' frosty gleams 
He groined his arches and matched his beams ; 
Slender and clear were his crystal spars 
As the lashes of light that trim the stars : 
He sculptured every summer delight 
In his halls and chambers out of sight ; 
Sometimes his tinkling waters slipt 
Down through a frost-leaved forest-crypt, 



Long, sparkling aisles of steel-stemmed trees 
Bending to counterfeit a breeze ; 
Sometimes the roof no fretwork knew 
But silvery mosses that downwai'd grew ; 
Sometimes it was carved in sharp relief 
With quaint arabesques of ice-fern leaf ; 
Sometimes it was simply smooth and clear 
For the gladness of heaven to shine through, and 

here 
He had caught the nodding bulrush-tops 
And hung them thickly with diamond drops. 
Which crystalled the beams of moon and sun. 
And made a star of every one : ■ 
No mortal builder's most rare device 
Could match this winter-palace of ice ; 
'T was as if every image that mirrored lay 
In his depths serene through the summer day. 
Each flitting shadow of earth and sky, 

Lest the happy model should be lost, 
Had been mimicked in fairy masonry 

By the elfin builders of the frost. 

Within the hall are song and laughter, 

The checks of Christmas grow I'ed and jolly. 
And sprouting is every corbel and rafter 

With the lightsome green of ivy and holly ; 
Through the deep gulf of the chinniey wide 
Wallows the Yule-log's roaring tide ; 
The broad flame-pennons droop and flap 

And belly and tug as a flag in the wind ; 
Like a locust shrills the imprisoned sap, 

Hunted to death in its galleries blind ; 
And swift little troops of silent sparks. 

Now pausing, now scattering away as in fear, 
Go threading the soot-forest's tangled darks 

Like herds of startled deer. 

But the wind without was eager and sharp, 
Of Sir Launfal's graj"- hair it makes a harj), 
And rattles and rings 
The icy strings, 
Singing, in dreary monotone, 
A Christmas carol of its own. 
Whose burden still, as he might guess, 
Was — "Shelterless, shelterless, shelterless!" 
The voice of the seneschal flared like a torch 
As he shouted the wanderer away from the porch, 
And he sat in the gateway and saw all night 
The great hall-fire, so cheery and bold. 
Through the window-slits of the castle old, 
Build out its piers of ruddy light 
Against the drift of the cold. 

There was never a leaf on bush or tree, 
The bare boughs rattled shudderingly ; 
The river was dumb and could not speak. 
For the weaver Winter its shroud had spun ; 



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A single crow on the tree-top bleak 

From his shining feathers shed off the cold sun ; 
Again it was morning, hut shriuik and cold, 
As if her veins were sapless and old, 
And she rose up decrepitly 
For a last dim look at earth and sea. 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 



WINTER SCENES. 

FROM "THE SEASONS : WINTER." 

The keener tempests rise ; and fuming dun 
From all the livid east, or piercing north, 
Thick clouds ascend ; in whose capacious womb 
A vapory deluge lies, to snow congealed. 
Heavy they roll their fleecy world along ; 
And the sky saddens with the gathered storm. 
Through the hushed air the whitening shower 

descends 
At first thin wavering ; till at last the flakes 
Fall broad and wide and fast, dimming the day 
With a continual flow. The cherished fields 
Put on their winter robe of purest white. 
'Tis brightness all; save where the new snow 

melts 
Along the mazy current. Low the woods 
Bow their hoar head ; and, ere the languid sun 
Faint from the west emits his evening ray, 
Earth's imiversal face, deep hid and chill, 
Is one wide dazzling waste, that buries wide 
The works of man. Drooping, the laborer-ox 
Stands covered o'er with snow, and then demands 
The fruit of all his toil. The fowls of heaven, 
Tamed by the cruel season, crowd around 
The winnowing store, and claim the little boon 
AVhich Providence assigns them. One alone. 
The redbreast, sacred to the household gods. 
Wisely regardful of the embroiling sky. 
In joyless fields and thorny thickets leaves 
His shivering mates, and pays to trusted man 
His annual visit. Half afraid, he first 
Against the window beats ; then, brisk, alights 
On the warm hearth ; then, hopping o'er the floor. 
Eyes all the smiling family askance, 
And pecks, and starts, and wonders where he is : 
Till, more familiar grown, the table-crumbs 
Attract his slender feet. The foodless wilds 
Pour forth their brown inhabitants. The hare. 
Though timorous of heart, and hard beset 
P>y death in various forms, dark snares, and dogs. 
And more unpitying man, the garden seeks. 
Urged on by fearless want. The bleating kind 
Eye the bleak . heaven, and next the glistening 

earth. 
With looks of dumb despair ; then, sad dispersed, 
Dig for the withered herb through heaps of snow. 

James Thomson. 



WHEN ICICLES HANG BY THE WALL. 

FROM "LOVE'S LABOR'S LOST," ACT V. SC. 2. 

When icicles hang by the wall. 

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail, 
And Tom bears logs into the hall. 

And milk comes frozen home in pail. 
When blood is nipped, and ways be foul, 
Then nightly sings the staring owl, 

To-who ; 
To-whit, to-who, a merry note, 
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. 

When all aloud the wind doth blow, 

And coughing drowns the parson's saw, 
And birds sit brooding in the snow, 

And Marian's nose looks red and raw, 
When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl. 
Then nightly sings the staring owl, 

To-who ; 
To-whit, to-who, a merry note, 
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



THE SNOW-STORM. 

Announced by all the trumpets of the sky. 
Arrives the snow ; and, driving o'er the fields, 
Seems nowhere to alight ; the whited air 
Hides hills and woods, the river, and the heaven. 
And veils the farm-house at the garden's end. 
The sled and traveller stopped, the courier's feet 
Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates 

sit 
Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed 
In a tumultuous privacy of storm. 

Come see the north-wind's masonry ! 
Out of an unseen quarry, evermore 
Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer 
Curves his white bastions with projected roof 
Round every windward stake or tree or door ; 
Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work 
So fanciful, so savage ; naught cares he 
For number or proportion. Mockingl}'', 
On coop or kennel he hangs Parian wreaths ; 
A swan-like form invests the hidden thorn ; 
Fills up the farmer's lane from wall to wall, 
Maugre the farmer's sighs ; and at the gate 
A tapering turret overtops the work. 
And when his hours are numbered, and the world 
Is all his own, retiring as he were not, 
Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art 
To mimic m slow structures, stone by stone, 
Built in an age, the mad wind's night-work. 
The frolic architecture of the snow. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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THE SNOW-SHOWER. 

Stand here by my side and turn, I pray, 

On the lake below thy gentle eyes ; 
The clouds hang over it, heavy and gray, 

And dark and silent the water lies ; 
And out of that frozen mist the snow 
In wavering flakes begins to flow ; 

Flake after flake 
They sink in the dark and silent lake. 

See how in a living swarm they come 

From the chambers beyond that misty veil ; 

Some hover awhile in air, and some 

Rush prone from the sky like summer hail. 

All, dropping swiftly or settling slow. 

Meet, and are still in the depths below ; 
Flake after flake 

Dissolved in the dark and silent lake. 

Here delicate snow-stars, out of the cloud, | 
Come floating downward in airy play. 

Like spangles dropped from the glistening crowd 
That whiten by night the Milky Way ; 

There broader and burlier masses fall ; 

The sullen water buries them all, — 

Flake after flake, — 

All drowned in the dark and silent lake. 

And some, as on tender wings they glide 

From their chilly birth-cloud, dim and gray. 

Are joined in their fall, and, side by side, 
Come clinging along their imsteady way ; 

As friend with friend, or husband with wife. 

Makes hand in hand the passage of life ; 
Each mated flake 

Soon sinks in the dark and silent lake, 

Lo ! while we are gazing, in swifter haste 

Stream down the snows, till the air is white, 
As, myriads by myriads madly chased, 

They fling ' themselves from their shadowy 
height. 
The fair, frail ci-eatures of middle sky. 
What speed they make, with their grave so nigh ; 

Flake after flake 
To lie in the dark and silent lake ! 

I see in thy gentle eyes a tear ; 

They turn to me in sorrowful thought ; 
Thou thinkest of friends, the good and dear. 

Who were for a time, and now are not ; 
Like these fair children of cloud and frost. 
That glisten a moment and then are lost, — 

Flake after flake, — 
All lost in the dark and silent lake. 



Yet look again, for the clouds divide ; 

A gleam of blue on the water lies ; 
And far away, on the mountain-side, 

A sunbeam falls from the opening skies. 
But the hurrying host that flew between 
The cloud and the water no more is seen.; 

Flake after flake 
At rest in the dark and silent lake. 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 



SNOW.— A WINTER SKETCH. 

The blessed morn has come again ; 

The early gray 
Taps at the slumberer's window-pane, 

And seems to say, 
Break, break from the enchanter's chain 

Away, away ! 

'T is winter, yet there is no sound 

Along the air 
Of winds along their battle-ground ; 

But gently there 
The snow is falling, — all around 

How fair, how fair ! 

RALPH HOYT. 



SNOW-FLAKES. 

Out of the bosom of the Air, 

Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken, 
Over the woodlands brown and bare. 
Over the harvest-fields forsaken. 
Silent and soft and slow 
Descends the snow. 

Even as our cloudy fancies take 

Suddenly shape in some divine expression. 
Even as the troubled heart doth make 
In the white countenance confession, 
The troubled sky reveals 
The grief it feels. 

This is the poem of the air. 

Slowly in silent sjdlables recorded ; 
This is the secret of despair, 

Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded, 
Now whispered and revealed 
To wood and field. 

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 



A SNOW-STORM. 

SCENE IN A VERMONT WINTER. 

'T IS a fearful night in the winter time, 

As cold as it ever can be ; 
The loar of the blast is heard like the chinio 

Of the waves on an angry sea. 



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441 



n 



The moon is full ; but her silver light 
The storm dashes out with its wings to-night ; 
And over the sky from south to north 
Not a star is seen, as the wind comes forth 
In the strength of a mighty glee. 

All day had the snow come down, — all day 

As it never came down before ; 
And over the hills, at sunset, lay 

Some two or three feet, or more ; 
The fence was lost, and the wall of stone ; 
The windows blocked and the well-curbs gone ; 
The haystack had grown to a mountain lift, 
And the wood-pile looked like a monster drift, 

x\s it lay by the farmer's door. 

The night sets in on a world of snow, 
While the air grows sharp and chill. 

And the warning roar of a fearful blow- 
Is heard on the distant hill ; 

And the norther, see ! on the mountain peak 

In his breath how the old trees writhe and shriek! 

He shouts on the plain, ho-ho ! ho-lio ! 

He drives from his nostrils the blinding snow, 
And growls with a savage Avill. 

Such a night as this to be found abroad. 

In the drifts and the freezing air, 
Sits a shivering dog, in the field, by the road, 

With the snow in his shaggy hair. 
He shuts his eyes to the wind and growls ; 
He lifts his head, and moans and howls ; 
Then crouching low, from the cutting sleet, 
His nose is pressed on his quivering feet, — 

Pray, what does the dog do there ? 

A farmer came from the village plain, — 

But he lost the travelled way ; 
And for hours he trod with might and main 

A path for his horse and sleigh ; 
But colder still the cold winds blew. 
And deeper still the deep drifts grew. 
And his mare, a beautiful Morgan brown. 
At last in her struggles floundered down, 

Where a log in a hollow lay. 

In vain, with a neigh and a frenzied snort. 

She plunged in the drifting snow. 
While her master urged, till his breath grew short, 

With a word and a gentle blow ; 
But the snow was deep, and the tugs were tight ; 
His hands were numb and had lost their might ; 
So he wallowed back to his half-filled sleigh, 
And strove to shelter himself till day, 

With his coat and the buffalo. 

He has given the last faint jerk of the rein. 

To rouse up his dying steed ; 
And the poor dog howls to the blast in vain, 

For help in his master's need. 



For a while he strives with a wistful cry 
To catch a glance from his drowsy eye. 
And wags his tail if the rude winds flap 
The skirt of the buffalo over his laji, 
And whines when he takes no heed. 

The wind goes down and the storm is o'er, — 

'T is the hour of midnight, past ; 
The old trees writhe and bend no more 

In the whirl of the rushing blast. 
The silent moon with her peaceful light 
Looks down on the hills with snow all white, 
And the giant shadow of Camel's Hvunp, 
The blasted pine and the ghostly stump, 

Afar on the plain are cast. 

But cold and dead by the hidden log 
• Are they who came from the town, — 
The man in his sleigh, and his faithful dog. 

And his beautiful Morgan brown, — 
In the Avide snow-desert, far and grand. 
With bis cap on his head and the reins in his 

hand, — 
The dog with his nose on his master's feet, 
And the mare half seen through the crusted sleet. 

Where she lay when she floundered down. 

Charles Gamage Eastman. 



WINTEE! WILT THOU NEVER GO? 

WINTER ! wilt thou never, never go ? 
summer ! but I weary for thy coming, 
Longing once more to hear the Luggie flow, 
And frugal bees, laboriously humming. 
Now the east-wind diseases the infirm, 
And must crouch in corners from rough weather ; 
Sometimes a winter sunset is a charm, — 
When the fired clouds, compacted, blaze together, 
And the large sun dips red behind the hills. 
I, from my window, can behold this pleasure ; 
And the eternal moon, what time she fills 
Her orb with argent, treading a soft measure. 
With Cjueenly motions of a bridal mood. 
Through the white spaces of infinitude. 

David Gray. 



VIEW FROM THE EUGANEAN HILLS,* 
NORTH ITALY. 

Many a green isle needs must be 
In the deeji wide sea of misery, 
Or the mariner, worn and wan. 
Never thus could voyage on 
Day and night, and night and daj^, 
Drifting on his dreary way, 

* Tlie lonely mountains which surround what was once t!io re- 
treat, and is now the sepulchre, of Petrarch. 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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Witli the solid darkness black 
Closing round his vessel's track ; 
Whilst above, the sunless sky, 
Big with clouds, hangs heavily. 
And behind, the tempest fleet 
Hurries on with lightning feet, 
Kiving sail and cord and plank 
Till the ship has almost drank 
Death from the o'erbrimming deep ; 
And sinks down, down, like that sleep 
When the dreamer seems to be 
Weltering through eternity ; 
And the dim low line before 
Of a dark and distant shore 
Still recedes, as, ever still 
Longing with divided will. 
But no power to seek or shun. 
He is ever drifted on 
O'er the unreposing wave 
To the haven of the grave. 

Ay, many flowering islands lie 

In the waters of wide agony : 

To such a one this morn was led 

My bark, by soft winds piloted. 

— Mid the mountains Euganean 

I stood listening to the pssan 

With which the legioned rooks did hail 

The sun's uprise majestical : 

Gathering round with wings all hoar. 

Through the dewy mist they soar 

Like gray shades, till the eastern heaven 

Bursts, and then, as clouds of even. 

Flecked with lire and azure, lie 

In the unfathomable skj', 

So their plumes of purple grain, 

Starred with drops of golden rain, 

Gleam above the sunlight woods. 

As in silent multitudes 

On the morning's fitful gale. 

Through the broken mist they sail ; 

And the vapors cloven and gleaming 

Follow, down the dark steep streaming, 

Till all is bright and clear and still 

Eound the solitary hill. 

Beneath is spread like a green sea 
The waveless plain of Lombardy, 
Bounded by the vaporous air, 
Islanded by cities fair ; 
Underneath day's azure eyes. 
Ocean's nursling, Venice, lies, — 
A peopled labyrinth of walls, 
Amphitrite's destined halls. 
Which her hoary sire now paves 
With his blue and beaming waves. 
Lo ! the sun upsprings behind, 
Broad, red, radiant, half reclined 



On the level quivering line 
Of the waters crystalline ; 
And before that chasm of light. 
As within a furnace bright. 
Column, tower, and dome, and spire 
Shine like obelisks of fire. 
Pointing Avith inconstant motion 
From the altar of dark ocean 
To the sapphire-tinted skies ; 
As the flames of sacrifice 
From the marble shrines did rise, 
As to pierce the dome of gold 
Where Apollo spoke of old. 

Sun-girt city ! thou hast been 

Ocean's child, and then his queen ; 

Now is come a darker day. 

And thou soon must be his prey, 

If the power that raised thee here 

Hallow so thy watery bier. 

A less drear ruin then than now, 

With thy conquest-branded brow 

Stooping to the slave of slaves 

From thy throne among the waves, 

W^ilt thou be when the sea-mew 

Flies, as once before it flew. 

O'er thine isles depopulate. 

And all is in its ancient state. 

Save where many a palace-gate 

With green sea-flowers overgrown 

Like a rock of ocean's own, 

Topples o'er the abandoned sea 

As the tides change sullenly. 

The fisher on his watery w^ay 

Wandering at the close of day 

Will spread his sail and seize his oar 

Till he pass the gloomy shore, 

Lest thy dead should, from their sleep 

Bursting o'er the starlight deep. 

Lead a rapid mask of death 

O'er the waters of his path. 

Noon descends around me now : 
'T is the noon of autumn's glow, 
When a soft and purple mist. 
Like a vaporous amethyst. 
Or an air-dissolved star. 
Mingling light and fragrance, far 
From the curved horizon's bound 
To the point of heaven's profound, 
Fills the overflowing sky ; 
And the plains that silent lie 
Underneath ; the leaves unsodden 
Where the infant frost has trodden 
With his morning- winged feet. 
Whose bright pi'int is gleaming yet ; 
And the red and golden vines. 
Piercing with their trellised lines 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



443 



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The rough, dark-skirted wilderness ; 

The dun and bladed grass no less, 

Pointing from this hoary tower 

In the windless air ; the flower 

Glimmering at my feet ; the line 

Of the olive-sandalled Apennine 

In the south dimly islanded ; 

And the Alps, whose snows are spread 

High between the clouds and sun ; 

And of living things each one ; 

And my spirit, which so long 

Darkened this swift stream of song, — 

Interpenetrated lie 

By the glory of the sky ; 

Be it love, light, harmony. 

Odor, or the soul of all 

Which from heaven like dew doth fall, 

Or the mind which feeds this verse 

Peopling the lone universe. 

Noon descends, and after noon 

Autumn's evening meets me soon, 

Leading the infantine moon 

And that one star, which to her 

Almost seems to minister 

Half the crimson light she brings 

From the sunset's radiant springs : 

And the soft dreams of the morn 

(Which like winged winds had borne 

To that silent isle, which lies 

Mid remembered agonies, 

The frail bark of this lone being) 

Pass, to other sufferers fleeing, 

And its ancient pilot. Pain, 

Sits beside the helm again. 

Other flowering isles must be 
In the sea of life and agony ; 
Other spirits float and flee 
O'er that gulf ; even now, perhaps. 
On some rock the wild wave wraps. 
With folding winds they waiting sit 
For my bark, to pilot it 
To some calm and blooming cove. 
Where for me, and those I love. 
May a windless bower be built. 
Far from passion, pain, and guilt, 
In a dell mid lawny hills. 
Which the wild sea-murmur fills. 
And soft sunshine, and the sound 
Of old forests echoing round. 
And the light and smell divine 
Of all flowers that breathe and shine, 
■ — We may live so happy there, 
That the spirits of the air, 
Envying us, may even entice 
To our healing paradise 



The polluting multitude ; 

But their rage would be subdued 

By that clime divine and calm, 

And the winds whose wings rain balm 

On the uplifted soul, and leaves 

Under which the bright sea heaves ; 

While each breathless interval 

In their whisperings musical 

The inspired soul supplies 

With its own dee]) melodies ; 

And the love which heals all strife, 

Circling, like the breath of life. 

All things in that sweet abode 

With its own mild brotherhood. 

They, not it, would change ; and soon 

Every sprite beneath the moon 

Would repent its envy vain. 

And the earth grow young again ! 

Percy Bysshe Shelley. 



GRONGAR HILL. 

[The Vale of the Towy embraces, in its winding' course of fifteen 
miles, some of the loveliest scenery of South Wales. If it be less 
cultivated than the Vale of Usk, its woodland views are more ro- 
mantic and frequent. The neighborhood is historic and poetic 
ground. From Grongar Hill the eye discovers traces of a Roman 
camp ; Golden Grove, the home of Jeremy Taylor, is on the oppo- 
site side of the river ; Merlin's chair recalls Spenser ; and a farm- 
house near the foot of Llangumnor Hill brings back the memory 
of its once genial occupant, Richard Steele. Spenser places the 
cave of Merlin among the dark woods of Dinevawr.J 

Silent nymph, with curious eye, 

Who, the purple even, dost lie 

On the mountain's lonely van. 

Beyond the noise of busy man, ^ 

Painting fair the form of things. 

While the yellow linnet sings. 

Or the tuneful nightingale 

Charms the forest with her tale, — 

Come, with all thy various hues. 

Come, and aid thy sister Muse. 

Now, while Phoebus, riding high. 

Gives lustre to the land and sky, 

Grongar Hill invites my song, — 

Draw the landscape bright and strong ; 

Grongar, in whose mossy cells 

Sweetly musing Quiet dwells ; 

Grongar, in whose silent shade, 

For the modest Muses made. 

So oft 1 have, the evening still, 

At the fountain of a rill, 

Sat upon a flowery bed. 

With my hand beneath my head. 

While strayed my eyes o'er Towy's flood, 

Over mead and over wood, 

From house to house, from hill to hill. 

Till Contemplation had her fill. 

About his checkered sides I wind. 
And leave his brooks and meads behind. 



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And gi'oves and grottoes where I lay, 
And vistas shooting beams of day. 
AVide and wider spreads the vale, 
As circles on a smooth canal. 
The mountains round, unhappy fate ! 
Sooner or later, of all height, 
Withdraw their summits from the skies, 
And lessen as the others rise. 
Still the prospect wider spreads, 
Adds a thousand woods and meads ; 
Still it widens, widens still. 
And sinks the newly risen hill. 

Now I gain the mountain's brow ; 
What a landscape lies below ! 
No clouds, no vapors intervene ; 
But the gay, the open scene 
Does the face of Nature show 
In all the hues of heaven's bow ! 
And, swelling to embrace the light, 
Spreads around beneath the sight. 

Old castles on the cliffs arise. 
Proudly towering in the skies ; 
Bushing fi-om the woods, the spires 
Seem from hence ascending fires ; 
Half his beams Apollo sheds 
On the yellow mountain-heads, 
Gilds the fleeces of the flocks. 
And glitters on the broken rocks. 

Below me trees unnumbered rise, 
Beautiful in various dyes : 
The gloomy pine, the poplar blue, 
The yellow beech, the sable yew, 
The slender fir that taper grows. 
The sturdy oak with broad-spread boughs ; 
And beyond, the pr^rple grove, 
Haunt of Phyllis, queen of love ! 
Gaudy as the opening dawn, 
Lies a long and level lawn. 
On which a dark hill, steep and high, 
Holds and charms the wandering eye ; 
Deep are his feet in Towy's flood ; 
His sides are clothed with waving wood ; 
And ancient towers crown his brow, 
That cast an awful look below ; 
Whose ragged walls the ivy creeps, 
And with her arms from falling keeps ; 
So both a safety from the wind 
In mutual dependence find. 
'T is now the raven's bleak abode ; 
'T is now the apartment of the toad ; 
And there the fox securely feeds ; 
And there the poisonous adder breeds, 
Concealed in ruins, moss, and weeds ; 
While, ever and anon, there fall 
Huge heaps of hoary, mouldered wall. 
Yet Time has seen, — that lifts the low 
And level lays the lofty brow, — 
Has seen this broken pile complete, 



Big with the vanity of state. 

But transient is the smile of Fate ;' 

A little rule, a little sway, 

A sunbeam in a winter's day. 

Is all the proud and mighty have 

Between the cradle and the grave. 

And see the rivers, how they run 
Through woods and meads, in shade and sun, 
Sometimes swift, sometimes slow, — 
Wave succeeding wave, they go 
A various journey to the deep. 
Like human life to endless sleep ! 
Thus is Nature's vesture wrought 
To instruct our wandering thought ; 
Thus she dresses green and gay 
To disperse our cares away. 

Ever charming, ever new. 
When will the landscape tire the view ! 
The fountain's fall, the river's flow ; 
The woody valleys, warm and low ; 
The windy summit, wild and high. 
Roughly rushing on the sky ; 
The pleasant seat, the ruined tower. 
The naked rock, the shady bower ; 
The town and village, dome and farm, — 
Each gives each a double charm. 
As pearls upon an Ethiop's arm. 

See on the mountain's southern side. 
Where the prospect opens wide. 
Where the evening gilds the tide. 
How close and small the hedges lie ! 
What streaks of meadow cross the eye ! 
A step, methinks, may pass the stream. 
So little distant dangers seem ; 
So we mistake the Future's face. 
Eyed through Hope's deluding glass ; 
As yon summits, soft and fair, 
Clad in colors of the air, 
Which, to those who journey near, 
Barren, brown, and rough appear ; 
Still we tread the same coarse way, — 
The present 's still a cloudy day. 

0, may I with myself agree, 
And never covet what I see ; 
Content me with a humble shade. 
My passions tamed, my wishes laid ; 
For while our wishes wildly roll, 
We banish quiet from the soul. 
'T is thus the busy beat the air. 
And misers gather wealth and care. 

Now, even now, my joys run high, 
As on the mountain-turf I lie ; 
While the wanton Zephyr sings. 
And in the vale perfumes his wings ; 
While the waters murmur deep ; 
While the shepherd charms his sheep ; 
While the birds unbounded fly. 
And with music fill the sky, — 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



44, 



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Now, even now, my joys run high. 

Be full, ye courts ; be great who will ; 
Search for Peace with all your skill ; 
Open wide the lofty door. 
Seek her on the marble floor : 
In vain you search ; she is not there ! 
In vain you search the domes of Care ! 
Grass and flowers Quiet treads. 
On the meads and mountain-heads, 
Ateng with Pleasure, — close allied, 
Ever by each other's side, — 
And often, by the murmuring rill, 
Hears the thrush, while all is still 
Within the groves of Grongar Hill. 

John Dyer. 



BUILDING A HOME. 

FROM "THE ART OF PRESERVING HEALTH." 

Meantime, the moist malignity to shun 
Of bxirdened skies, mark where the dry cham- 
paign 
Swells into cheerful hills : where marjoram 
And thyme, the love of bees, perfume the air ; 
And where the cynorrhodon with the rose 
For fragrance vies ; for in the thirsty soil 
Most fragrant breathe the aromatic tribes. 
There bid thy roofs high on the basking steep 
Ascend, there light thy hospitable fires. 
And let them see the winter morn arise. 
The summer evening blushing in the west : 
While with umbrageous oaks the ridge behind 
O'erhung, defends you from the blustering North, 
And bleak affliction of the peevish East. 
0, when the growling winds contend, and all 
The sounding forest fluctuates in the storm, 
To sink in warm repose, and hear the din 
Howl o'er the steady battlements, delights 
Above the luxury of vulgar sleep. 
The murmuring rivulet, and the hoarser strain 
Of waters rushing o'er the slippery rocks, 
Will nightly lull you to ambrosial rest. 
To please the fancy is no trifling good, 
M''here health is studied ; for whatever moves 
The mind with calm delight promotes the just 
And natural movements of the harmonious frame. 
Besides, the sportive brook forever shakes 
The trembling air, that floats from hill to hill. 
From vale to mountain, with incessant change 
Of purest element, I'efreshing still 
Your airy seat, and uninfected gods. 
Chiefly for this I praise the man who builds 
High on the breezy ridge, whose lofty sides 
The ethereal deep with endless billows chafes. 
His purer mansion nor contagious years 
Shall reach, nor deadly putrid airs annoy. 

John Armstrong. 



DOVER CLIFF. 

FROM " KING LEAR," ACT IV. SC. 6. 

Come on, sir ; here 's the place : stand still ! 

How fearful 
And dizzy 't is, to cast one's eyes so low ! 
The crows and choughs that wing the midway air 
Show scarce so gross as beetles : half-way down 
Hangs one that gathers samphire, — dreadful 

trade ! 
Methinks he seems no bigger than his head : 
The fishermen, that walk npon the beach. 
Appear like mice ; and yon tall anchoring bark. 
Diminished to her cock ; her cock, a buoy 
Almost too small for sight : the murmuring surge. 
That on the unnumbered idle pebbles chafes. 
Cannot be heard so high. — I '11 look no more ; 
Lest my brain turn, and the deficient sight 
Topple down headlong. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



ALPINE HEIGHTS. 

On Alpine heights the love of God is shed ; 
He paints the morning red. 
The flowerets white and blue. 
And feeds them with his dew. 

On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells. 

On Alpine heights, o'er many a fragrant heath, 
The loveliest breezes breathe ; 
So free and pure the air, 
His breath seems floating there. 

On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells. 

On Alpine heights, beneath his mild blue eye, 

Still vales and meadows lie ; 

The soaring glacier's ice 

Gleams like a paradise. 
On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells. 

Down Alpine heights the silvery streamlets flow ! 
There the bold chamois go ; 
On giddy crags they stand. 
And di'ink from his own hand. 

On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells. 

On Alpine heights, in troops all white as snow, 
The sheep and wild goats go ; 

here, in the solitude. 
He fills their hearts with food. 

On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells. 

On Alpine heights the herdsman tends his herd ; 

His Shepherd is the Loi'd ; 

For he who feeds the sheep 

Will sure his off'spring keep. 
On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells. 

From the German of KRUMMACHF.R, Transla- 
tion of CHARLES T. Brooks. 



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446 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



a 



THE DESCENT. 

My mule refreshed, his bells 
Jingled once more, the signal to depart, 
And we set out in the gray light of dawn, 
Descending rapidly, — by waterfalls 
East frozen, and among huge blocks of ice 
That in their long career had stopt midway ; 
At length, unchecked, unbidden, he stood still. 
And all his bells were muffled. Then my 

guide, 
Lowering his voice, addressed me : — " Through 

tills chasm 
On, and say nothing, — for a word, a breath. 
Stirring the air, may loosen and bring down 
A winter's snow, — enough to overwhelm 
The horse and foot that, night and day, defiled 
Along this path to conquer at Marengo." 

Samuel Rogers. 



u 



SONG OF THE BROOK. 

FROM "THE brook:: AN IDYL." 

I COME from haunts of coot and hern 

I make a sudden sally 
And sparkle out among the fern, 

To bicker down a valley. 

By thirty hills I hurry down, 
Or slip between the ridges, 

By twenty thorps, a little town, 
And half a hundred bridges. 

Till last by Philip's farm I flow 
To join the brimming river. 

For men may come and men may go. 
But I go on forever. 

I chatter over stony ways, 
In little sharps and trebles, 

I bubble into eddying bays, 
I babble on the pebbles. 

With many a curve my banks I fret 
By many a field and fallow, 

And many a fairy foreland set 
"With willow-weed and mallow. 

I chatter, chatter, as I flow 
To join the brimming river ; 

For men may come and men may go, 
But I go on forever. 

I wind about, and in and out, 
With here a blossom sailing. 

And here and there a lusty trout. 
And here and there a grayling. 



And here and there a foamy flake 

Upon me, as I travel 
With many a silvery waterbreak 

Above the golden gravel, 

And draw them all along, and flow 

To join the brimming river ; 
For men may come and men may go, 

But I go on forever. 

I steal by lawns and grassy plots : 

I slide by hazel covers ; 
I move the sweet forget-me-nots 

That grow for happy lovers. 

I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance. 
Among my skimming swallows ; 

I make the netted sunbeam dance 
Against my sandy shallows ; 

I murmur under moon and stars 

In brambly wildernesses ; 
I linger by my shingly bars ; 

I loiter round my cresses ; 

And out again I curve and flow 

To join the brimming river ; 
For men may come and men may go. 

But I go on forever. 

Alfred Tennyson. 



THE RHINE. 

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO HI. 

The castled crag of Drachenfels 

Frowns o'er the wide and Avinding Rhine, 
Whose breast of waters broadly SAvells 

Between the banks which bear the vine. 
And hills all rich with blossomed trees, 

And fields which promise corn and wine, 
And scattered cities crowning these. 

Whose far white walls along them shine. 
Have strewed a scene, M'hich I should see 
With double joy, wert thou with me. 

And peasant-girls, with deeji-blue eyes. 

And hands which offer early flowers. 
Walk smiling o'er this paradise ; 

Above, the frequent feudal towers 
Through green leaves lift their walls of gray. 

And many a rock which steeplj'' lowers. 
And noble arch in proud decay. 

Look o'er this vale of vintage-bowers ; 
But one thing want these banks of Rhine, — 
Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine ! 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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I send the lilies given to me, 

Though long before thy hand they touch 
I know that they must withered be, — 

But yet reject them not as such ; 
For I have cherished them as dear. 

Because they yet may meet thine eye. 
And guide thy soul to mine even here. 

When thou behold'st them drooping nigh, 
And know'st them gathered by the Ehine, 
And offered from my heart to thine ! 

The river nobly foams and flows, 

The charm of this enchanted ground, 
And all its thousand turns disclose 

Some fresher beauty varying round : 
The haughtiest breast its wish might bound 

Through life to dwell delighted here ; 
Nor could on earth a spot be found 

To nature and to me so dear, 
Could thy dear eyes in following mine 
Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine ! 

BYRON. 



ON THE RHINE. 



'T 



WAS morn, and beautiful the mountain's 
brow — 
Hung with the clusters of the bending vine — 
Shone in the early light, when on the Rhine 
We sailed and heard the waters round the prow 
In murmurs parting ; varying as we go. 
Rocks after rocks come forward and retire, 
As some gray convent wall or sunlit spire 
Starts up along the banks, unfolding slow. 
Here castles, like the prisons of despair. 
Frown as we pass ; — there, on the vineyard's 

side. 
The bursting sunshine pours its streaming tide ; 
M''hile Grief, forgetful amid scenes so fair. 
Counts not the hours of a long summer's day. 
Nor heeds how fast the prospect winds away. 
William Lisle Bowles. 



B- 



THE VALLEY BROOK. 

Fresh from the fountains of the wood 

A rivulet of the valley came. 
And glided on for many a rood. 

Flushed with the morning's ruddy flame. 

The air was fresh and soft and sweet ; 

The slopes in spring's new verdure lay, 
And wet with dew-drops at my feet 

Bloomed the young violets of May. 



No sound of busy life was heard 
Amid those pastures lone and still, 

Save the faint chirp of early bird, 
Or bleat of flocks along the hill. 

I traced that rivulet's winding way ; 

New scenes of beauty opened round, 
Where meads of brighter verdure lay. 

And lovelier blossoms tinged the ground. 

"Ah, happy valley stream !" I said, 
' ' Calm glides thy wave amid the flowers. 

Whose fragrance round thy path is shed 
Through all the joyous summer hours. 

" 0, could my years, like thine, be jtassed 
In some remote and silent glen, 

Where I could dwell and sleep at last. 
Far from the bustling haunts of men ! 

But what new echoes greet my ear ? 

The village school-boy's merry call ; 
And mid the village hum I hear 

The murmur of the waterfall. 

I looked ; the widening veil betrayed 
A pool that shone like burnished steel. 

Where that bright valley stream was stayed 
To turn the miller's ponderous wheel. 

Ah ! why should I, I thought with shame, 

Sigh for a life of solitude. 
When even this stream without a name 

Is laboring for the common good. 

No longer let me shun my part 

Amid the busy scenes of life. 
But Avith a warm and generous heart 

Press onward in the glorious strife. 

JOHiM HOWARD BRYANT. 



AFTON WATER. 

Floav gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes ; 
Flow gently, I '11 sing thee a song in thy praise ; 
My Mary 's asleep by thy murmuring stream. 
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream. 

Thou stocik-dove whose echo resounds through 
the glen. 

Ye wild whistling blackbirds in yon thorny den. 

Thou green-crested lapwing, thy screaming for- 
bear ; 

I charge you disturb not my slumbering fair. 

How lofty, sweet Afton, thy neighboring hills, 
Far marked with the courses of clear-winding rills ! 
There daily I wander as noon rises high. 
My flocks and my Mary's sweet cot in my eye. 



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448 



POEMS or NATURE. 



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How pleasant tliy banks and green valleys below, j 
Where wild in the woodlands the primroses blow ! 
There oft as mild evening weeps over the lea, 
The sweet-scented birk shades my Mary and me. 

Thy crystal stream, Afton, how lovely it glides, 
And winds by the cot where my Mary resides ; 
How wanton thy waters her snowy feet lave. 
As, gathering sweet flowerets, she stems thy clear 
wave ! 

Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes ; 
Flow gently, sweet river, the theme of my lays ; 
My Mary 's asleep by thy mnrmnring stream. 
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream. 

Robert Burns. 



THE SHADED WATER. 

When that my mood is sad, and in the noise 
And bustle of the crowd I feel rebuke, 

I turn my footsteps from its hollow joys 
And sit me down beside this little brook ; 

The waters have a music to mine ear 
It glads me much to hear. 

It is a quiet glen, as you may see. 

Shut in from all intrusion by the trees, 

That spread their giant branches, broad and free. 
The silent growth of many centuries ; 

And make a hallowed time for hapless moods, 
A sabbath of the woods. 

Few know its quiet shelter, — none, like me. 
Do seek it out with such a fond desire, 

Poring in idlesse mood on flower and tree. 

And listening as the voiceless leaves respire, — 

When the far-travelling breeze, done wandering. 
Rests here his weary wing. 

And all the day, with fancies ever new, 

And sweet companions from their boundless 
store. 
Of merry elves bespangled all with dew. 

Fantastic creatures of the old-time lore. 
Watching their wild but unobtrusive play, 
I fling the hours away. 

A gracious couch — the root of an old oak 
Whose branches yield it moss and canopy — 

Is mine, and, so it be from woodman's stroke 
Secure, shall never be resigned by me ; 

It hangs above the stream that idly flies, 
Heedless of any ej'es. 

There, with eye sometimes shut, but upward bent. 

Sweetly I muse through many a (^uiet hour, 
While every sense on earnest mission sent. 



Returns, thought-laden, back witli bloom and 
flower ; 
Pursuing, though rebuked by those who moil, 
A profitable toil. 

And still the waters, trickling at my feet, 
Wind on their way with gentlest melodj'', 

Yielding sweet music, which the leaves repeat, 
Above them, to the gay breeze gliding by, — 

Yet not so rudely as to send one sound 
Through the thick copse around. 

Sometimes a brighter cloud than all the rest 
Hangs o'er the archway opening through the 
trees. 
Breaking the spell that, like a slumber, pressed 

On my worn spirit its sweet luxuries, — ■ 
And with awakened vision upward bent, 
I watch the firmament. 

How like its sure and undisturbed retreat - — 
Life's sanctuary at last, secure fi'om storm ■ — 

To the pure waters trickling at my feet 

The bending trees that overshade my form ! 

So far as sweetest things of earth may seem 
Ijike those of which we dream. 

Such, to my mind, is the philosophy 

Theyoungbird teaches, who, with sudden flight, 

Sails far into the blue that spreads on high, 
Until I lose him from my straining sight, — 

With a most lofty discontent to fly 
Upward, from eartli to sky. 

WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS. 



SONG OF THE RIVER. 

Clear and cool, clear and cool, 

By laughing shallow and dreaming pool ; 

Cool and clear, cool and clear. 

By shining shingle and foaming weir ; 

Under the crag where the ouzel sings. 

And the ivied wall where the church-bell rings, 

Undefiled for the undefiled ; 

Play by me, bathe in me, mother and child ! 

Dank and foul, dank and foul, 

By the smoky town in its murky cowl ; 

Foul and dank, foul and dank. 

By wharf, and sewer, and slimy bank ; 

Darker and darker the further I go, 

Baser and baser tlie richer I grow ; 

Who dare sport with the sin-defiled ? 

Shrink from me, turn from me, mother and child ! 

Strong and free, strong aiul free. 
The flood-gates are open, away to the sea : 
Free and strong, free and strong. 
Cleansing my streams as I hurry along 



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POEMS OF Nx\.TURE. 



449 



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To the golden sands and the leaping bar, 

And the taintless tide that awaits me afar, 

As I lose myself in the infinite main. 

Like a sonl that has sinned and is pardoned again, 

Undefiled for the undefiled ; 

Play by nie, bathe in me, mother and child ! 

Charles Kingsley. 



TO SENECA LAKE. 

On thy fair bosom, silver lake. 

The wild swan spreads his snowy sail. 

And round his breast the ripples break. 
As down he bears before the gale. 

On thy fair bosom, \\'aveless stream. 

The dipping paddle echoes far. 
And Hashes in the moonlight gleam. 

And bright reflects the polar star. 

The waves along thy pebbly shore. 

As blows the north-wind, heave their foam. 

And curl around the dashing oar. 
As late the boatman hies him home. 

How sweet, at set of sun, to view 
Thy golden mirror spreading wide, 

And see the mist of mantling blue 

Float round the distant mountain's side. 

At midnight hour, as shines the moon, 

A sheet of silver spreads below. 
And swift she cuts, at highest noon, 

Light clouds, like wreaths of purest snow. 

On thy fair bosom, silver lake, 

0, I could ever sweep the oar. 
When early birds at morning wake, 

And evening tells us toil is o'er ! 

James Gates Percival. 



THE BUGLE. 



FROM "THE PRINCESS." 



e 



The splendor falls on castle walls 

And snowy summits old in story : 
The long light shakes across the lakes. 
And the wild cataract leaps in glory. 
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying, 
Blow, bugle ; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying. 

hark ! hear ! how thin and clear, 
And thinner, clearer, fai'ther going ! 
sweet and far, from cliff and scar. 
The horns of Elfland faintl}' blowing ! 
Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying : 
Blow, bugle ; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying. 



love, they die in yon rich sky, 

They faint on hill or held or river ; 
Our echoes roll from soul to soul. 
And grow forever and forever. 
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying, 
And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying. 
Alfred ten.myson'. 



THE FALL OF NIAGARA. 

The thoughts are strange that crowd into my 

brain, 
While I look upward to thee. It would seem 
As if God poured thee from his hollow hand. 
And hung his bow upon thine awful front. 
And spoke in that loud voice which seemed to him 
Who dwelt in Patmos for his Saviour's sake 
The sound of many waters ; and had bade 
Thy flood to chronicle the ages back, 
And notch his centuries in the eternal rocks. 

Deep calleth unto deep. And what are we, 
That hear the question of that voice sublime ? 
0, what are all the notes that ever rung 
From war's vain trumpet, by thy thundering 

side ? 
Yea, what is all the riot man can make 
In his short life, to thy unceasing roar ? 
And yet, bold babbler, what art thou to Him 
Who drowned a world, and heaped the waters far 
Above its loftiest mountains ? — a light wave, 
That breaks, and whispers of its Maker's might. 
John Gardiner Calkins Brainard. 



THE CATARACT OF LODORE. 

DESCRIBED IN RHYMES FOR THE NURSERY. 

" How does the water 
Come down at Lodore ! " 
My little boy asked nie 
Thus, once on a time ; 
And moreover he tasked me 
To tell him in rhyme. 
Anon' at the word. 
There first came one daughter. 
And then came another, 
To second and third 
The request of their brother, 
And to hear how the water 
Comes down at Lodore, 
With its rush and its roar. 

As many a time 
They had seen it before. 
So I told them in I'liyme, 
For of ihymes I had store ; 



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450 



POEMS or NATURE. 



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And 't was in my vocation 
For their recreation 

That so I should sing ; 
Because I was Laureate 

To them and tlie King. 

From its sources which well 
In the tarn on the fell ; 
From its fountains 
In the mountains, 
Its rills and its gills ; 
Through moss and through brake, 
It runs and it creeps 
For a while, till it sleeps 

In its own little lake. 

And thence at departing, 

Awakening and starting, 

It runs through the reeds. 

And away it proceeds. 

Through meadow and glade, 

In sun and in shade, 
And through the wood-shelter, 
Among crags in its flurry. 
Helter-skelter, 
Hurry- skurry. 
Here it comes sparkling, 
And there it lies darkling ; 
Now smoking and frothing 
Its tumult and wrath in, 
Till, in this rapid race 
On which it is bent. 
It reaches the place 
Of its steep descent. 

The cataract strong 
Then plunges along, 
Striking and raging 
As if a war waging 
Its caverns and rocks among ; 
Rising and leaping, 
Sinking and creeping. 
Swelling and sweeping. 
Showering and springing, 
Flying and flinging. 
Writhing and ringing, 
Eddying and whisking, 
Spouting and frisking, 
Turning and twisting. 
Around and around 
"With endless rebound : 
Smiting and fighting, 
A sight to delight in ; 
Confounding, astounding. 
Dizzying and deafening the ear with its sound. 

Collecting, projecting, 
Receding and speeding, 
And shocking and rocking, 
And darting and parting, 



And threading and spreading, 
And whizzing and hissing, 
And dripping and skipping, 
And hitting and splitting. 
And shining and twining, 
And rattling and battling, 
And shaking and quaking. 
And pouring and roaring. 
And waving and raving. 
And tossing and crossing, 
And flowing and going, 
And running and stunning, 
And foaming and roaming. 
And dinning and spinning, 
And dropping and hopping. 
And working and jerking, 
And guggling and struggling. 
And heaving and cleaving, 
And moaning and groaning ; 

And glittering and frittering. 
And gathering and feathering. 
And whitening and brightening, 
And quivering and shivering. 
And hurrying and skurrying. 
And thundering and floundering ; 

Dividing and gliding and sliding. 

And falling and brawling and sprawling, 

And driving and riving and striving, 

And sprinkling and twinkling and wrinkling, 

And sounding and bounding and rounding. 

And bubbling and troubling and doubling, 

And grumbling and rumbling and tumbling, 

And clattering and battering and shattering ; 

Retreating and beating and meeting and sheeting, 
Delaying and straying and playing and spraying, 
Advancing and prancing and glancing and dan- 
cing, 
Recoiling, turmoiling and toiling and boiling, 
And gleaming and streaming and steaming and 

beaming, 
And rushing and flushing and brushing and 

gushing, 
And flapping and rapping and clapping and 

slapping, 
And curling and whirling and purling and twirl- 
ing, 
And thumping and plumping and bumping and 

jumping, 
And dashing and flashing and splashing and 

clashing ; 
And so never ending, but always descending, 
Sounds and motions for ever and ever are blend- 
ing 
All at once and all o'er, with a might}'' uproar, — 
And this way the water comes down at Lodore. 
Robert Southey. 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



451 



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WHAT THE WINDS BRING. 

Which is the wind that brings the cokl ? 

Tlie north- wind, Freddy, and all the snow; 
And the sheep will scamper into the fold 

When the north begins to blow. 

Which is the wind that brings the heat ? 

The south-wind, Kat}' ; and corn will grow, 
And peaches redden for you to eat. 

When the south begins to blow. 

Which is the wind that brings the rain ? 

The east-wind, Arty ; and farmers know 
That cows come shivering up the lane 

When the east begins to blow. 

Which is the wind that brings the flowers ? 

The west-wind, Bessy ; and soft and low 
The birdies sing in the summer hours 

When the west begins to blow. 

Edmund Clarence Stedhan. 



©■ 



THE DANCING OF THE AIR. 

And now behold your tender nurse, the air. 
And common neighbor that aye runs around, 

How many pictures and impressions fair 
Within her empty regions are there found. 
Which to your senses dancing do propound ! 

For what are breath, speech, echoes, music, winds, 

But dancings of the air in sundry kinds ? 

For when you breathe, the air in order moves, 
Now in, now oiit, in time'and measure true ; 

And when you speak, so well she dancing loves. 
That doubling oft, and oft redoubling new. 
With thousand forms she doth herself endue : 

For all the words that from your lips repair, 

Are naught but tricks and turnings of the air. 

Hence is her prattling daughter. Echo, born, 
That dances to all voices she can hear : 

There is no sound so harsh that she doth scorn. 
Nor any time wherein she will forbear 
The airy pavement with her feet to wear : 

And yet her hearing sense is nothing quick, 

For after time she endeth every trick. 

And thou, sweet Music, dancing's only life, 

The ear's sole happiness, the air's best speech. 
Loadstone of fellowship, charming-rod of strife. 
The soft mind's paradise, the sick mind's leech. 
With thine own tongue thou trees and stones 
canst teach, . 
That, when the air doth dance her finest measure. 
Then art thou born, the gods' and men's sweet 
pleasure. 



Lastly, where keep the winds their revelry. 
Their violent turnings, and wild whirling hays, 

But in the air's translucent gallery, 

Wheve she herself is turned a hundred ways. 
While with these maskers wantonly she plays ? 

Yet in this misrule, they such rule embrace. 

As two at once encumber not the place. 

SIR JOHN DAVIES. 



THE ORIENT. 

FROM "THE BRIDE OF ABYDOS." 

Know ye the land where the cypress and myrtle 
Are emblems of deeds that are done in their 

clime ; 
Where the rage of the vulture, the love of the 

turtle. 
Now melt into sorrow, now madden to crime ? 
Know ye the land of the cedar and vine, 
Where the flowers ever blossom, the beams ever 

shine ; 
Where the light wings of Zephyr, oppressed with 

perfume, 
Wax faint o'er the gardens of Giil in her bloom ? 
Where the citron and olive are fairest of fruit. 
And the voice of the nightingale never is mute ; 
Where the tints of the earth, and the hues of 

the sky, 
In color though varied, in beautjr may vie, 
And the purple of ocean is deepest in dye ; 
Where the virgins are soft as the roses they twine. 
And all, save the spirit of man, is divine ? 
'T is the clime of the East ; 't is the land of the 

Sun, — 
Can he smile on such deeds as his children have 

done ? 

0, wild as the accents of lover's farewell 

Are the hearts which they bear and the tales 

which they tell ! 

Lord Byron. 



SYRIA. 

from "paradise AND THE PERI." 

No"w, upon Syria's land of roses 
Softly the light of eve reposes. 
And, like a glory, the broad sun 
Hangs over sainted Lebanon, 
Whose head in wintry grandeur towers, 

And whitens with eternal sleet. 
While summer, in a vale of flowers. 

Is sleeping rosy at his feet. 

To one who looked from upper air 
O'er all the enchanted regions there. 
How beauteous must have been the glow. 
The life, how sparkling from below ! 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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Fair gardens, shining streams, with I'anks 

Of golden melons on their banks. 

More golden where the sunlight falls ; 

Gay lizards, glittering on the walls 

Of ruined shiines, busy and bright 

As they were all alive with light ; 

And, yet more splendid, numerous flocks 

Of pigeons, settling on the rocks, 

With their rich restless wings, that gleam 

Variously in the crimson beam 

Of the warm west, — as if inlaid 

With brilliants from the mine, or made 

Of tearless rainbows, such as span 

The unclouded skies of Peristan ! 

And then, the mingling sounds that come, 

Of shepherd's ancient reed, with hum 

Of the wild bees of Palestine, 

Banqueting through the flowery vales ; — 
And, Jordan, those sweet banks of thine. 

And woods, so full of nightingales ! 

THOMAS MOORE. 



THE VALE OF CASHMERE. 

FROM " THE LIGHT OF THE HAREM." 

Who has not heard of the Vale of Cashmere, 
With its roses the brightest that earth ever 
gave. 
Its temples, and grottoes, and fountains as clear 
As the love-lighted eyes that hang over their 
wave ? 

0, to see it at sunset, — when warm o'er the lake 

Its splendor at parting a summer eve throws, 

Like a bride, full of blushes, when lingering to 

take 
A last look of her mirror at night ere she 

goes ! — 
When the shrines through the foliage are gleam- 
ing half shown. 
And each hallows the hour by some rites of its 

own. 
Here the music of prayer from a minaret swells. 
Here the Magian his urn full of perfume is 

SM'inging, 
And here, at the altar, a zone of sweet bells 
Round the waist of some fair Indian dancer is 

ringing. 
Or to see it by moonlight, — when mellowly 

shines j 

The light o'er its palaces, gardens, and shrines ; 
When the waterfalls gleam like a quick fall of i 

stars, I 

And the nightingale's hymn from the Isle of j 

Chenars j 

Is broken by laughs and light echoes of feet j 

From the cool shining walks where the young 

people meet. I 



Or at morn, when the magic of daylight awakes 
A new wonder each minute as slowly it breaks. 
Hills, cupolas, fountains, called forth every one 
Out of darkness, as they were just born of the 

sun ; 
When the spirit of fragrance is up with the day, 
From his harem of night-flowers stealing away ; 
And the wind, full of wantonness, wooes like a 

lover 
The young asjjen-trees till they tremble all over ; 
When the east is as warm as the light of first 

hopes, 
And day, with its banner of radiance unfurled. 
Shines in through the mountainous portal that 

opes, 
Sublime, from that valley of bliss to the world ! 
Thomas Moore. 



A FOREST HYMN. 



Ere 



The groves were God's first tenijiles. 
man learned 
To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave. 
And spread the roof above thejn, — ere he framed 
The lofty vault, to gather and roll back 
The sound of anthems ; in the darkling wood, 
Amidst the cool and silence, he knelt down. 
And ofl"ered to the Mightiest solemn thanks 
And supplication. For his simple heart 
Might not resist the sacred influences 
Which, from the stilly twilight of the place, 
And from the gray old trunks that high in heaven 
Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound 
Of the invisible breath that swayed at once 
All their green tops, stole over him, and bowed 
His spirit with the thought of boundless power 
And inaccessible majesty. Ah, whj^ 
Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect 
God's ancient sanctuaries, and adore 
Only among the crowd, and undei- roofs 
That our frail hands have raised ? Let me, at 

least. 
Here, in the shadow of this aged wood. 
Offer one hymn, — thrice happy if it find 
Acceptance in his ear. 

Father, thy hand 
Hath reared these venerable columns, thou 
Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look 

down 
Upon the naked earth, and forthwith rose 
All these fair ranks of trees. They in thy sun 
Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy 

breeze. 
And shot towards heaven. The century-living 

crow, 
Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



453 



U 



Among their branches, till at last they stood, 
As now they stand, massy and tall and dark, 
Fit shrine ibr humble worshipper to hold 
Communion with his Maker. These dim vaults, 
These winding aisles, of human pomp or pride 
Eeport not. No fantastic carvings show 
The boast of our vain race to change the form 
Of thy fair works. But thou art here, — thou 

fill'st 
The solitude. Thou art in the soft winds 
That run along the summit of these trees 
In music ; thou art in the cooler breath 
That from the inmost darkness of the place 
Comes, scarcely felt ; the barky trunks, the 

ground. 
The fresh moist ground, are all instinct witli thee. 
Here is continual worship ; — nature, here. 
In the tranquillity that thou dost love, 
Enjoys thy presence. Noiselessly around, 
From perch to perch, the solitary bird 
Passes ; and yon clear spring, that, midst its 

herbs, 
Wells softly forth and wandering steeps the roots 
Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale 
Of all the good it does. Thou hast not left 
Thyself without a witness, in these shades. 
Of thy perfections. Grandeur, strength, and grace 
Are here to speak of thee. This mighty oak, — 
]jy whose immovable stem I stand and seem 
Almost annihilated, — not a prince. 
In all that proud old world beyond the deep. 
E'er wore his crown as loftily as he 
"Wears the green coronal of leaves with which 
Thy hand has graced him. Nestled at his root 
Is beauty, such as blooms not in the glare 
Of the broad sun. That delicate forest flower 
With scented breath, and look so like a smile. 
Seems, as it issues from the shapeless mould. 
An emanation of the indwelling Life, 
A visible token of the vipholding Love, 
That are the soul of this wide universe. 

My heart is awed within me when I think 
Of the great miracle that still goes on. 
In silence, round me, — the perpetual work 
Of thy creation, finished, j'et renewed 
Foi'ever. Written on thy works I read 
The lesson of thy own eternit3^ 
Lo ! all grow old and die ; but see again. 
How on the faltering footsteps of decay 
Youth presses, — ever gay and beautiful youth 
In all its beautiful forms. Tliese lofty trees 
Wave not less proudly that their ancestors 
Moulder beneath them. 0, there is not lost 
One of Earth's charms ! upon her bosom yet. 
After the flight of untold centuries, 
The freshness of her far beginning lies, 
And yet shall lie. Life 7nocks the idle hate 



Of his arch-enemy Death, — yea, seats himself 
Upon the tyrant's throne, the sepulchre, 
And of the triumphs of his ghastly foe 
Makes his own nourishment. For he came forth 
From thine own bosom, and shall have no end. 

There have been holy men who hid themselves 
Deep in the woody wilderness, and gave 
Their lives to thought and prayer, till they out- 
lived 
The generation born with them, nor seemed 
Less aged than the hoary trees and rocks 
Around them ; — and there have been holy men 
Who deemed it were not well to pass life thus. 
But let me often to these solitudes 
Retire, and in thy presence reassure 
My feeble virtue. Here its enemies. 
The passions, at thy plainer footsteps shrink 
And tremble, and are still. God ! when thou 
Dost scare the world with tempests, set on fire 
The heavens with falling thunderbolts, or fill. 
With all the waters of the firmament, 
The swift dark whirlwind that uproots the woods 
And drowns the villages ; when, at thy call. 
Uprises the great deep, and throws himself 
Upon the continent, and overwhelms 
Its cities, — who forgets not, at the sight 
Of these tremendous tokens of thy power. 
His pride, and lays his strifes and follies by ? 
0, from these sterner aspects of thj^ face 
Spare me and mine, nor let us need the wTath 
Of the mad unchained elements to teach 
Who rules them. Be it ours to meditate. 
In these calm shades, thy milder majesty, 
And to the beautiful order of thy works 
Learn to conform the order of our lives. 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 



THE PRIMEVAL FOREST. 

FROM THE INTRODUCTION TO " EVANGELI.NE." 

This is the forest primeval. The murmuring 

pines and the hemlocks. 
Bearded with moss, and in garments green, in- 
distinct in the twilight, 
Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and 

prophetic, 
Stand like harpers hoar, mth beards that rest 

on their bosoms. 
Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced 

neighboring ocean 
Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the 

wail of the forest. 
This is the forest primeval ; but where are the 

hearts that beneath it 
Leaped like the roe, when he hears in the Avood- 

land the voice of the huntsman ? 

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLilW. 



P 



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454 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



""^ 



THE GREENWOOD. 

0, WHEN 't is summer weather, 
And the yellow bee, with fairy sound, 
The waters clear is humming round. 
And the cuckoo sings unseen, 
And the leaves are waving green, — 

0, then 't is sweet, 

In some retreat, 
To hear the murmuring dove, 
With those whom on earth alone we love, 
And to wind through the greenwood together. 

But when 't is winter weather, 

And crosses grieve, 

And friends deceive, 

And rain and sleet 

The lattice beat, — 

0, then 't is sweet 

To sit and sing 
Of the friends with whom, in the days of spring, 
We roamed through the greenwood together. 

William Lisle Bowles. 



THE BRAVE OLD OAK. 

A SONG to the oak, the brave old oak. 

Who hath ruled in the greenwood long ; 
Here 's health and renown to his broad green crown, 

And his fifty arms so strong. 
There 's fear in his frown when the sun goes down. 

And the fire in the west fades out ; 
And he showeth his might on a wild midnight. 

When the storms through his branches shout. 

Then here's to the oak, the brave old oak. 
Who stands in his pride alone ; 

And still flourish he, a hale green tree, 
When a hundred years are gone ! 

In the days of old, when the spring with cold 

Had brightened his branches gray. 
Through the grass at his feet crept maidens sweet, 

To gather the dew of May. 
And on that day to the rebeck gay 

They frolicked with lovesome swains ; 
They are gone, they are dead, in the churchyard 
laid. 

But the tree it still remains. 
Then here 's, etc. 

He saw the rare times when the Christmas chimes 

Were a merry sound to hear. 
When the squire's wide hall and the cottage small 

Were filled with good English cheer. 



Now gold hath the sway we all obey. 

And a ruthless king is he ; 
But he never shall send our ancient friend 

To be tossed on the stormy sea. 
Then here 's, etc. 

HENRY FOTHERGILL CHORLEY. 



. THE ARAB -TO THE PALM. 

Next to thee, fair gazelle, 

Beddowee girl, beloved so well ; 

Next to the fearless Nedjidee, 

Whose fleetness shall bear me again to thee ; 

Next to ye both, I love'the palm. 

With his leaves of beauty, his fruit of balm ; 

Next to ye both, I love the tree 
Whose fluttering shadow wraps us three 
With love and silence and mystery ! 

Our tribe is many, our poets vie 
With any under the Arab sky ; 
Yet none can sing of the palm but I. 

Tlie marble minarets that begem 

Cairo's citadel-diadem 

Are not so light as his slender stem. 

He lifts his leaves in the sunbeam's glance. 
As the Almehs lift their arms in dance, — 

A slumberous motion, a passionate sign. 
That works in the cells of the blood like wine. 

Full of passion and sorrow is he. 
Dreaming where the beloved may be ; 

And Avhen the warm south-winds arise. 
He breathes his longing in fervid sighs. 

Quickening odors, kisses of balm. 

That drop in the lap of his chosen palm. 

The sun maj'' flame, and the sands may stir, 
But the breath of his passion reaches her. 

tree of love, by that love of thine, 
Teach me how I shall soften mine ! 

Give me the secret of the sun. 
Whereby the wooed is ever won ! 

If I were a king, stately tree, 

A likeness, glorious as might be, 

In the court of my palace I 'd build for thee ; 

With a shaft of silver, burnished bright. 
And leaves of beryl and malachite ; 



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455 



With, spikes of golden bloom ablaze, 
And fruits of topaz and chrysoprase ; 

And there the poets, in thy praise, 

Should night and morning frame new lays, — 

New measures, sung to tunes divine ; 
But none, palm, should equal mine ! 

BAYARD TAYLOR. 



^ 



THE PALM-TREE. 

Is it the palm, the cocoa-palm, 

On the Indian Sea, by the isles of balm ? 

Or is it a ship in the breezeless calni ? 

A ship whose keel is of palm beneath, 
Whose ribs of palm have a palm-bark sheath, 
And a rudder of palm it steereth with. 

Branches of palm are its spars and rails. 

Fibres of palm are its woven sails. 

And the rope is of palm that idly trails ! 

What does the good ship bear so well ? 
The cocoa-nut with its stony shell, 
And the milky sap of its inner cell. 

What are its jars, so smooth and fine. 

But hollowed nuts, filled with oil and wine, 

And the cabbage that ripens under the Line ? 

Who smokes his nargileh, cool and calm ? 

The master, whose cunning and skill could charm 

Cargo and ship from the bounteous palm. 

In the cabin he sits on a palm-mat soft. 
From a beaker of palm his drink is quaffed, 
And a palm thatch shields from the sun aloft ! 

His dress is woven of palmy strands, 

And he holds a palm-leaf scroll in his hands. 

Traced with the Prophet's wise commands ! 

The turban folded about his head 

Was daintily wrought of the palm-leaf braid. 

And the fan that cools him of palm was made. 

Of threads of palm was the carpet spun 
Whereon he kneels when the day is done, 
And the foreheads of Islam are bowed as one ! 

To him the palm is a gift divine. 
Wherein all uses of man combine, — 
House and raiment and food and wine ! 

And, in the hour of his great release. 
His need of the palm shall only cease 
With the shroud whei-ein he lieth in peace. 



"Allah il Allah ! " he sings his psalm 
On the Indian Sea, by the isles of balm ; 
" Thanks to Allah, who gives the palm ! " 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 



THE HOLLY-TREE. 

READER ! hast thou ever stood to see 

The holly-tree ; 
The eye that contemplates it well perceives 

Its glossy leaves 
Ordered by an intelligence so wise 
As might confound the atheist's sophistries. 

Below, a circling fence, its leaves are seen 

Wrinkled and keen ; 
No grazing cattle, through their prickly round. 

Can reach to wound ; 
But as they grow where nothing is to fear, 
Smooth and unarmed the pointless leaves appear. 

1 love to view these things with curious eyes. 

And moralize ; 
And in this wisdom of the holly-tree 

Can emblems see 
Wherewith, perchance, to make a pleasant rhyme. 
One which may profit in the after-time. 

Thus, though abroad, perchance, I might appear 

Harsh and austere ; 
To those who on my leisure would intrude, 

Reserved and rude ; 
Gentle at home amid my friends I 'd be, 
Like the high leaves upon the holly-tree. 

And should my youth — as youth is apt, I know — 

Some harshness show. 
All vain asperities I, day by day, 

Would wear away. 
Till the smooth temper of my age should be 
Like the high leaves upon the holly-tree. 

And as, when all the summer trees are seen 

So bright and green. 
The holly-leaves their fadeless hues display 

Less bright than they ; 
But when the bare and wintry woods we see. 
What then so cheerful as the holly-tree ? 



So, serious should my youth appear among 

The thoughtless throng ; 
So would I seem, amid the young and gay, 

More grave than they ; 
That in my age as cheerful I might be 
As the green winter of the holly-tree. 

Robert Southey. 



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456 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



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THE SPICE-TREE. 

The spice-tree lives in the garden green ; 

Beside it the fountain flows ; 
And a fair bird sits the boughs between, 

And sings his melodious woes. 

'So greener garden e'er was known 

Within the bounds of an earthly king ; 

No lovelier skies have ever shone 

Than those that illumine its constant spring. 

That coil-bound stem has branches three ; 

On each a thousand blossoms grow ; 
And, old as aught of time can be. 

The root stands fast in the rocks below. 

In the spicy shade ne'er seems to tire 
The fount that builds a silvery dome ; 

And flakes of purple and ruby fire 
Gush out, and sparkle amid the foam. 

The fair white bird of flaming crest. 
And azure wings bedropt with gold, 

Ne'er has he known a pause of rest, 

But sings the lament that he framed of old : 

" princess bright ! how long the night 
Since thou art sunk in the waters clear ! 

How sadly they flow from the depth below, — 
How long must I sing and thou wilt not hear ? 

"The waters play, and the flowers are gay, 

And the skies are sunny above ; 
I would that all could fade and fall. 

And I, too, cease to mourn my love. 

" 0, many a year, so wakeful and drear, 
I have sorrowed and watched, beloved, for thee ! 

But there comes no breath from the chambers of 
death, 
"While the lifeless fount gushes under the tree." 

The skies grow dark, and they glare with red ; 

The tree shakes off" its spicy bloom ; 
The waves of the fount in a black pool spread ; 

And in thunder sounds the garden's doom. 

Down springs the bird with a long shrill cry. 

Into the sable and angry flood ; 
And the face of the pool, as he falls from high, 

Curdles in circling stains of blood. 

But sudden again upswells the fount ; 

Higher and higher the waters flow, — 
In a glittering diamond arch they mount. 

And round it the colors of morning glow. 



Finer and finer the watery mound 
Softens and melts to a thin-spun veil. 

And tones of music circle ai'ound, 

And bear to the stars the fountain's tale. 

And swift the eddying rainbow screen 
Falls in dew on the grassy floor ; 

Under the spice-tree the garden's queen 
Sits by her lover, who wails no more. 

John Sterling. 



THE GRAPE-VINE SWING. 

Lithe and long as the serpent train, 

Springing and clinging from tree to tree, 
NoAV darting upward, now down again. 

With a twist and a twirl that are strange to see ; 
Never took serpent a deadlier hold. 

Never the cougar a wilder spring, 
Strangling the oak with the boa's fold, 

Spanning the beach with tlie condor's wing. 

Yet no foe that we fear to seek, — 

The boy leaps wild to thy rude embrace ; 
Thy bulging arms bear as soft a cheek 

As ever on lover's breast found place ; 
On thy waving train is a playful hold 

Thou shalt never to lighter grasp persuade ; 
While a maiden sits in thy drooping fold. 

And swings and sings in the noonday shade ! 

giant strange of our Southern woods ! 

I dream of thee still in the well-known spot, 
Though our vessel strains o'er the ocean floods. 
And the northern forest beholds thee not ; 

1 think of thee still Avith a sweet regret, 

As the cordage yields to my playful grasp, — 
Dost thou spring and cling in our woodlands yet ? 
Does the maiden still swing in thy giant clasp ? 
William Gilmore Simms. 



B- 



TO BLOSSOMS. 

Fair pledges of a fruitful tree. 
Why do ye fall so fast ? 
Your date is not so past 

But you may stay yet here awhile 
To blush and gently smile. 
And go at last. 

What ! were ye born to be 
An hour or half's delight, 
And so to bid good-night ? 

'T is pity Nature brought ye forth. 
Merely to show your worth, 
And lose you quite. 



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But you are lovely leaves, where wo 
May read how soon things have 
Their end, though ne'er so brave ; 
And after they have shown their pride 
Like you awhile, they glide 
Into the grave. 

Robert Herrick. 



ALMOND BLOSSOM. 

Blossom of the almond-trees, 

April's gift to April's bees, 

Birthday ornament of spring, 

Flora's fairest daughterling ; — 

Coming when no flowerets dare 

Trust the cruel outer air. 

When the royal king-cup bold 

Dares not don his coat of gold, 

And the sturdy blackthorn spray 

Keeps his silver for the May ; — ■ 

Coming when no flowerets would, 

Save thy lowly sisterhood, 

Early violets, blue and white, 

Dying for their love of light. 

Almond blossom, sent to teach us 

That the spring days soon will reach us, 

Lest, with longing over-tried. 

We die as the violets died, — 

Blossom, clouding all the tree 

With thy crimson broidery, 

Long before a leaf of green 

On the bravest bough is seen, — 

Ah ! when winter winds are swinging 

All thy red bells into ringing, 

With a bee in every bell, 

Almond bloom, we greet thee well ! 

Edwin Arnold. 



THE PLANTING OF THE APPLE-TREE. 

Come, let us plant the apple-tree. 
Cleave the tough gr-eensward with the spade ; 
Wide let its hollow bed be made ; 
There gently lay the roots, and there 
Sift the dark mould with kindly care, 

And press it o'er them tenderly, 
As round the sleeping infant's feet 
We softly fold the ci'adle-.sheet ; 

So plant we the apple-tree. 

What plant we in this apple-tree ? 
Buds, which the breath of summer days 
Shall lengthen into leafy spi-ays ; 
Boughs where the thrush with crimson breast 
Shall haunt, and sing, and hide her nest ; 



We plant, ujion the sunny lea, 
A shadow for the noontide hour, 
A shelter from the summer shower. 

When we plant the apple-tree. 

What plant we in this apple-tree ? 
Sweets for a hundred flowery springs 
To load the May-wind's restless wings, 
When, from the orchard row, he pours 
Its fragrance through our open doors ; 

A world of blossoms for the bee. 
Flowers for the sick 'girl's silent room. 
For the glad infant sprigs of bloom, 

We plant with the apple-tree. 

What plant we in this apple-tree ! 
Fruits that shall swell in sunny June, 
And redden in the August noon, 
And drop, when gentle airs come by. 
That fan the blue September sky, 

While children come, with ci'ies of glee, 
And seek them where the fragrant grass 
Betrays their bed to those who pass, 

At the foot of the apple-tree. 

And when, above this apple-tree. 
The winter stars are quivering bright. 
And winds go howling through the night, 
Girls, whose 3''oung eyes o'erflow with mirth, 
Shall peel its fruit by cottage hearth. 

And guests in prouder homes shall see, 
Heaped with the grape of Cintra's vine 

And golden orange of the Line, 

The fruit of the apple-tree. 

The fruitage of this apple-tree 
Winds and our flag of stripe and star 
Shall bear to coasts that lie afar, 
Where men shall wonder at the view, 
And ask in what fair groves they gi'ew ; 

And sojourners beyond the sea 
Shall think of cliildhood's careless day 
And long, long hours of summer play, 

In the shade of the apple-tree. 

Each year shall give this apple-ti-ee 
A broader flush of roseate bloom, 
A deeper maze of verdurous gloom, 
And loosen, when the frost-clouds lower, 
The crisp br.own leaves in thicker shower. 

The years shall come and pass, but we 
Shall hear no longer, where we lie. 
The summer's songs, the autumn's sigh. 

In the boughs of the apple-tree. 

And time shall waste this apple-tree. 
0, when its aged branches throw 
Thin shadows on the ground below. 
Shall fraud and force and iron will 
Oppress the weak and helpless still ? 



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What shall the tasks of mercy be, 
Amid the toils, the strifes, the tears 
Of those who live when length of years 

Is wasting this apple-tree ? 

" Who planted this old apple-tree ? " 
The children of that distant day 
Thus to some aged man shall say ; 
And, gazing on its mossy stem, 
The gray-haired man shall answer them : 

" A poet of the laird was he. 
Born in the rude hut good old times ; 
'T is said he made some quaint old rhymes 

On planting the apple-tree." 

William Cullen Bryant. 



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THE MAIZE. 

" That precious seed into the furrow cast 
Earliest in spring-time crowns the harvest last." 

PHCEBE CARY. 

A SONG for the plant of my own native West, 

Where natui'e and freedom reside, 
By plenty still crowned, and by peace ever blest, 

To the corn"! the green corn of her pride ! 
In climes of the East has the olive' been sung. 

And the grape been the theme of their lays ; 
But for thee shall a harp of the backwoods be 
strung. 

Thou bright, ever beautiful maize ! 

Afar in the forest the rude cabins rise, 

And send up their pillars of smoke. 
And the tops of their columns are lost in the 
skies. 

O'er the heads of the cloud-kissing oak ; 
Near the skirt of the grove, where the sturdy 
arm swings 

The axe till the old giant sways, 
And echo repeats every blow as it rings, 

Shoots the green and the glorious maize ! 

There buds of the buckeye in spring are the first, 

And the willow's gold hair then appears. 
And snowy the cups of the dogwood that burst 

By the red bud, with pink-tinted tears. 
And striped the bolls which the poppy holds up 

For the dew, and the sun's yellow rays. 
And brown is the pawpaw's shade-blossoming 
cup. 

In the wood, near the sun-loving maize ! 

When througlr the dark soil the bright steel of ! 

the plough ■ 

Turns the mould from its unbroken bed ; 

The ploughman is cheered by the finch on the ; 

bough, I 

And tlie blackbird doth follow his tread. i 



And idle, afar on the landscape descried, 
The deep-lowing kine slowly graze. 

And nibbling the grass on the sunny hillside 
Are the sheep, hedged away from the maize. 

With spring-time and culture, in martial array 

It waves its green broadswords on high, 
And fights with the gale, in a fluttering fray, 

And the sunbeams, which fall from the sky ; 
It strikes its green blades at the zephyrs at 
noon. 

And at night at the swift- flying fays. 
Who ride through the darkness the beams of the 
moon. 

Through the spears and the flags of the maize ! 

When the summer is fierce still its banners are 
green, 
Each warrior's long beard groweth red, 
His emerald-bright sword is sharp-pointed and 
keen, 
And golden his tassel-plumed head. 
As a host of armed knights set a monarch at 
naught, 
That defy the day-god to his gaze, 
And, revived every morn from the battle that 's 
fought. 
Fresh stand the green ranks of the maize ! 

But brown conies the autumn, and sear grows 
the corn. 

And the woods like a rainbow are dressed, 
And but for the cock and the noontide horn 

Old Time would be tempted to rest. 
The humming bee fans off" a shower of gold 

From the mullein's long rod as it sways, 
And dry grow the leaves which protecting infold 

The ears of the well-ripened maize ! 

At length Indian Summer, the lovely, doth come. 

With its blue frosty nights, and days still, 
When distantly clear sounds the waterfall's hum, 

And the sun smokes ablaze on the hill ! 
A dim veil hangs over the landscape and flood. 

And the hills are all mellowed in haze. 
While Fall, creeping on like a monk 'neath his 
hood, 

Plucks the thick-rustling wealth of the maize. 

And the heavy wains creak to the barns large 
and gray. 

Where the treasure securely we hold. 
Housed safe from the tempest, dr3'--sheltered away. 

Our blessing more precious than gold ! 
And long for this manna that springs from the sod 

Shall we gratefully give him the praise, 
The source of all bounty, our Father and God, 

Who sent us from heaven the maize ! 

William W. Fosdick. 



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THE PUMPKIN. 

0, GREENLY and fair in the lands of the sun, 

The vines of the gourd and the rich melon run, 

And the rock and the tree and the cottage en- 
fold, 

With broad leaves all greenness and blossoms 
all gold, 

Like that which o'er Nineveh's prophet once 
grew, 

While he waited to know that his warning was 
true, 

And longed for the storm-cloud, and listened in 
vain 

For the rush of the whirlwind and red fire-rain. 

On the banks of the Xenil, the dark Spanish 

maiden 
Comes up with the fruit of the tangled vine 

laden ; 
And the Creole of Cuba laughs out to behold 
Thi'ough orange-leaves shining the broad spheres 

of gold ; 
Yet with dearer delight from his home in the 

North, 
On the fields of his harvest the Yankee looks forth, 
AVhere crook-necks are coiling and yellow fruit 

shines. 
And the sun of September melts down on his vines. 

Ah ! on Thanksgiving Day, when from East and 

from West, 
From North and from South come the pilgrim 

and guest. 
When the gray -haired New-Englander sees round 

his board 
The old broken links of affection restored, 
When the care-wearied man seeks his mother 

once more. 
And the worn matron smiles where the girl smiled 

before, 
What moistens the lip and what brightens the 

eye? 
What calls back the past, like the rich pumpkin- 
pie ? 

0, fruit loved of boyhood ! the old days recalling ; 
When wood-grapes were purpling and brown nuts 

were falling ! 
When wild, ugly faces we carved in its skin, 
Glaring out through the dark with a candle 

within ! 
When we laughed round the corn-heap, with 

hearts all in tune, 
Our chair a broad pumpkin, our lantern the moon, 
Telling tales of the fairy who travelled like steam 
In a pumpkin-shell coach, with two rats for her 

team ! 



Then thanks for thy present ! — none sweeter or 

better 
E'er smoked from an oven or circled a platter ! 
Fairer hands never wrought at a pastry more fine, 
Brighter eyes never watched o'er its baking, than 

thine ! 
And the prayer, which my mouth is too full to 

express. 
Swells my heart that thy shadow may never be 

less. 
That the days of thy lot may be lengthened below, 
And the fame of thy worth like a pumpkin-vine 

grow. 
And thy life be as sweet, and its last sunset sky 
Golden-tinted and fair as thy own pumpkin-pie ! 
John Greenleaf whittier. 



. HYMN TO THE FLOWERS. 

Day-stars ! that ope your frownless eyes to 
twinkle 
From rainbow galaxies of earth's creation, 
And dew-drops on her lonely altars sprinkle 
As a libation. 

Ye matin worshippers ! who bending lowly 
Before the uprisen sun, God's lidless eye. 
Throw from your chalices a sweet and holy 
Incense on high. 

Ye bright mosaics ! that with storied beauty 

The floor of Nature's temple tessellate, 
What numerous emblems of instructive duty 
Your forms create ! 

'Neath cloistered boughs, each flioral bell that 
swinge th 
And tolls its perfume on the passing air. 
Makes Sabbath in the fields, and ever ringeth 
A call to pi-ayer. 

Not to the domes where crumbling arch and col- 
iTmn 
Attest the feebleness of mortal hand, 
But to that fane, most catholic and solemn. 
Which God hath planned ; 

To that cathedral, boundless as our wonder. 
Whose quenchless lamps the sun and moon 
supply ; 
Its choir the winds and waves, its organ thunder, 
Its dome the sky. 

There, as in solitude and shade I wander 

Through the green aisles, or stretched upon 
the sod. 
Awed by the silence, revei-ently ponder 
The waj's of God, 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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Your voiceless lips, flowers ! are living preach- 
ers, 
Each cup a pulpit, every leaf a book. 
Supplying to my fancy numerous teachers 
From loneliest nook. 

Floral apostles ! that in dewy splendor 

"Weep without woe, and blush without a 
crime," 
0, may I deeply learn, and ne'er surrender 
Your lore sublime ! 

' ' Thou wert not, Solomon, in all thy glory, 

Arrayed," the lilies cry, " in robes like ours ! 
How vain your grandeur ! ah, how transitory 
Are human flowers !" 

In the sweet-scented pictures, heavenly artist. 
With which thou paintest Nature's wide-spread 
hall. 
What a delightful lesson thou impartest 
Of love to all ! 

Not useless are ye, flowers ! though made for 
pleasure ; 
Blooming o'er field and wave, by day and 
night, 
From every source your sanction bids me treasure 
Harmless delight. 

Ephemeral sages ! what instructors hoary 

For such a world of thought could furnish 
scope ? 
Each fading calyx a memento mori, 
Yet fount of hope. 

Posthumous glories ! angel-like collection ! 

Upraised from seed or bulb interred in earth. 
Ye are to me a type of resiirrection 
And second birth. 

Were I in churchless solitudes remaining, 

Far from all voice of teachers and divines. 
My soul would find, in flowers of God's ordaining, 
Priests, sermons, shrines ! 

HORACE Smith. 



i4 



FLOWERS. 

I WILL not have the mad Clytie, 

Whose head is turned by the sun 
The tulip is a courtly quean. 

Whom, therefore, I will shun : 
The cowslip is a country wench, 

The violet is a nun ; — 
But I will woo the dainty rose. 

The queen of every one. 



The pea is but a wanton witch. 

In too much haste to wed, 
And clasps her rings on every hand ; 

The wolfsbane I should dread ; 
Nor will I dreary rosemarye. 

That always mourns the dead ; 
But I will woo the dainty rose, 

With her cheeks of tender red. 

The lily is all in white, like a saint, 

And so is no mate for me ; 
And the daisy's cheek is tipped with a blush, 

She is of such low degree ; 
Jasmine is sweet, and has many loves, 

And the broom 's betrothed to the bee ; — 

But I will plight with the dainty rose, 

For fairest of all is she. 

Thomas Hood. 



BETROTHED ANEW. 

The sunlight fills the trembling air, 
And balmy days their guerdons bring ; 

The Earth again is young and fair. 
And amorous with musky Spring. 

The golden nurslings of the May 

In splendor strew the spangled green, 

And hues of tender beauty play. 
Entangled where the wallows lean. 

Mark how the rippled currents flow ; 

What lustres on the meadows lie ! 
And hark ! the songsters come and go, 

And trill between the earth and sky. 

Who told us that the years had fled. 
Or borne afar our blissful youth ? 

Such joys are all about us spread ; 
We know the whisper was not truth. 

The birds that break from grass and grove 
Sing every carol that tlu'v sung 

When fii'st our veins were rich with love, 
And May her mantle round us flung. 

fresh-lit dawn ! immortal life ! 

Earth's betrothal, sweet and true. 
With whose delights our souls are rife, 

And aye their vernal vows renew ! 

Then, darling, walk with me this morn ; 

Let your brown tresses drink its sheen ; 
These violets, within them worn. 

Of floral fays shall make you queen. 

What though there comes a time of pain 
When autumn winds forebode decay ? 

The days of love are born again ; 
That faliled time is far away ! 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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And never seemed the land so fair 
As now, nor birds such notes to sing, 

Since first within your shining hair 
I wove the blossoms of the spring. 

Ed.mund Clarence Stedman. 



THE EARLY PRIMROSE. 

Mild offspring of a dark and sullen sire ? 
Whose modest form, so delicately line, 

Was nursed in whirling storms 

And cradled in the winds. 

Thee, when young Spring first questioned Win- 
ter's sway, 
And dared the sturdy blusterer to the fight. 

Thee on this bank he threw 

To mark his victory. 

In this low vale the promise of the year. 
Serene, thou openest to the nipping gale, 

Unnoticed and alone, 

Thy tender elegance. 

So Virtue blooms, brought forth amid the stonus 
Of chill adversitj'' ; in some lone walk 

Of life she rears her head. 

Obscure and unobserved ; 

While every bleaching breeze that on her blows 
Chastens her spotless purity of breast. 

And hardens her to bear 

Serene the ills of life. 

HENRY KIRKE WHITE 



THE RHODORA. 

LINES ON BEING ASKED, WHENCE IS THE FLOWERi 

In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes, 
I found the fresh rliodora in the woods. 
Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook. 
To please the desert and the sluggish brook : 
The purple petals fallen in the pool 

Made the black waters with their beauty gay, — 
Here might the red-bird come his plumes to cool. 

And court the flower that cheapens his array. 
Rhodora ! if the sages ask thee why 
This charm is wasted on the marsh and sky, 
Dear, tell them, that if eyes were made for seeing, 
Then beauty is its own excuse for being. 

Why thou wert there, rival of the rose ! 
I never thought to ask ; I never knew. 

But in my simple ignorance suppose 
The self-same Power that brought me there brought 
you. 



VIOLETS. 

Welcome, maids of honor ! 

You doe bring 

In the Spiing, 
And wait upon her. 

She has virgins many, 

Fresh and faire ; 

Yet you are 
More sweet than any. 

Y' are the maiden Posies, 

And, sograc't, 

To be plac't 
'Fore damask roses. 

Yet though thus respected. 

By and by 

Ye doe lie, 
Poore girles ! neglected. 

ROBERT HERRICK. 



C&^ 



Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



THE VIOLET. 

FAINT, delicious, spring-time violet ! 

Thine odor, like a key, 
Turns noiselessly in memory's wards to let 

A thought of sorrow free. 

The breath of distant fields upon my brow 
Blows through that open door 

The sound of wind-borne bells, more sweet and low, 
And sadder than of yore. 

It comes afar, from that beloved place. 

And that beloved hour. 
When life hung ripening in love's golden grace, 

Like grapes above a bovver. 

A spring goes singing through its reedy grass ; 

The lark sings o'er my head. 
Drowned in the sky ^ 0, pass, ye visions, pass ! 

I would that I were dead ! — 

Why hast thou opened that forbidden door. 

From which I ever flee ? 
vanished joy ! love, that art no more, 

Let my vexed spirit be ! 

violet ! thy odor through my brain 

Hath searched, and stung to grief 

This sunny day, as if a curse did stain 
Thy velvet leaf. 



William Wetiiore Story. 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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THE DAISY. 

FROM THE "LEGEND OF GOOD WOMEN." 

Of all the floures in the mede, 
Thau love I most these tloures white and rede, 
Soch that men callen daisies in our town; 
To hem I have so great affection, 
As I said erst, whan comen is the May, 
That in my bedde there daweth me no day 
That I nam * up and walking in the mede, 
To seene this flour ayenst the Sunne sprede, 
Whan it up riseth early by the morrow. 
That blissful sight softeneth all my sorrow, 
So glad am I-, whan that I have the presence 
Of it, to done it all reverence. 
And ever I love it, and ever ylike newe. 
And ever shall, till that mine herte die 
All swere I not, of this I will not lie. 

My busie gost, that thursteth alway newe, 
To seen this flour so yong, so fresh of hew, 
Constrained me, with so greedy desire, 
Tiiat in my herte I fele yet the fire, 
That made me rise ere it were day, 
And this was now the first niorow of May, 
With dreadful t herte, and glad devotion 
For tp been at the resurrection 
Of this floure, whan that it should unclose 
Againe the Sunne, that rose as redde as rose. 
And doune on knees anon right I me sette. 
And as I could, this fresh floure I grette, 
Kneeling alway, till it unclosed was, 
Upon the small, soft, swete gras. 
That was with floures swete embrouded all, 
Of such swetenesse, and such odour overall 
That for to speke of gomme, herbe, or tree, 
Comparison may not ymaked be, 
For it surmounteth plainly all odoures, 
And of rich beaute of floures. 
And Zephirus, and Flora gentelly, 
Yave to these floures soft and tenderly, 
Hir swote J breth, and made hem for to sprede, 
As god and goddesse of the flourie mede. 
In which me thoughte I might day by daj'', 
Dwellen alway, the joly month of May, 
Withouten slepe, withouten meat or drinke ; 
Adoune full softly I gan to sinke, 
And leaning on my elbow and my side, 
The long day I shope me for to abide, 
For nothing els, and I shall nat lie, 
But for to looke upon the daisie, 
That well by reason men it call may 
The daisie, or els the eye of the day. 
The empress and floure of floures all, 
I pray to God that faire mote she fall. 
And all that loven floures for her sake. 



^ 



TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY, 

ON TURNING ONE DOWN WITH THE PLOUGH, IN APRIL, 178! 

Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flower. 
Thou 's met me in an evil hour. 
For I maun crush amang the stoure 

Thy slender stem ; 
To spare thee now is past my power. 

Thou bonny gem. 

Alas ! it 's no thy neebor sweet, 
The bonnie lark, companion meet, 
Bending thee 'mang the dewy weet, 

Wi' spreckled breast. 
When upward springing, blithe to greet 

The purpling east. 

Cauld blew the bitter-biting north 
Upon thy early, humble birth ; 
Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth 

Amid the storm. 
Scarce reared above the parent earth 

Thy tender form. 

The flaunting flowers our gardens yield 
High sheltering woods and wa's maun shield 
But thou beneath the random bield 

0' clod or stane, 
Adorns the histie stibble-field. 

Unseen, alane. 

There, in thy scanty mantle clad. 
Thy snawie bosom sunward spread. 
Thou lifts thy unassuming head 

In humble guise ; 
But now the share uptears thy bed, 

And low thou lies ! 

Such is the fate of artless maid. 
Sweet floweret of the rural shade ! 
Bj' love's simplicity betrayed, 

And guileless trust. 
Till she, like thee, all soiled, is laid 

Low i' the dust. 

Such is the fate of simple bard, 

On life's rough ocean luckless starred ! 

Unskilful he to note the card 

Of prudent lore. 
Till billows rage, and gales blow hard. 

And whelm him o'er ! 

Such fate to suffering worth is given. 
Who long with wants and woes has striven, 
By human pride or cunning driven 

To misery's brink, 
Till, wrenched of every stay but Heaven, 

He, ruined, sink ! 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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Even thou who mourn'st the daisy's fate, 
That fate is thine, — no distant date : 
Stern Ruin's ploughshare drives, elate, 

Full on thy bloom, 
Till crushed beneath the furrow's weight 

Shall be thy doom ! 

Robert burns. 



THE DAISY. 

Star of the mead ! sweet daughter of the day, 
Whose opening flower invites the morning ray, 
Fi'om the moist cheek and bosom's chilly fold 
To kiss the tears of eve, the dew-drops cold ! 
Sweet daisy, flower of love ! when birds are 

paired, 
'T is sweet to see thee, with thy bosom bared. 
Smiling in virgin innocence serene. 
Thy pearly crown above thy vest of green. 
The lark with sparkling eye and rustling wing 
llejoins his widowed mate in early spring, 
And, as he prunes his plumes of russet hue, 
Swears on thy maiden blossom to be true. 
Oft have I watched thy closing buds at eve. 
Which for the parting sunbeams seem.ed to 

grieve ; 
And when gay morning gilt the dew-bright 

plain. 
Seen them unclasp their folded leaves again ; 
Nor he who sung "The daisy is so sweet ! " 
More dearly loved thy pearly form to greet. 
When on his scarf the knight the daisy bound, 
And dames to tourneys shone with daisies 

crowned, 
And fays forsook the purer fields above. 
To hail the daisy, flower of faithful love. 

John Leyden. 



THE DAISY. 

There is a flower, a little flower 
With silver crest and golden eye. 

That welcomes every changing hour. 
And weathers every sky. 

The prouder beauties of the field 
In gay but quick succession shine ; 

Race after race their honors yield, 
They flourish and decline. 

But this small flower, to Nature dear, 
While moons and stars their courses run, 

In wreathes the circle of the year. 
Companion of the sun. 

It smiles upon the lap of May, 

To sultry August spreads its charm, 

Lights pale October on his way, 
And twines December's arm. 



The pui-ple heath and golden broom 
On moory mountains catch the gale ; 

O'er lawns the lily sheds perfume. 
The violet in the vale. 

But this bold floweret climbs the hill, 
Hides in the forest, haunts tlie glen, 

Plays on the margin of the rill. 
Peeps round the fox's den. 

Within the garden's cultured i-ound 
It shares tlie sweet carnation's bed ; 

And blooms on consecrated ground 
In honor of the dead. 

The lambkin crops its crimson gem ; 

The wild bee murmurs on its breast ; 
The blue-fl}^ bends its pensile stem 

Light o'er the skjdark's nest. 

'T is Flora's page, — in every place, 
In every season, fresh and fair ; 

It opens with perennial grace, 
And blossoms everywhere. 

On waste and woodland, rock and plain, 
Its humble buds unheeded rise ; 

The rose has but a summer reign ; 
The daisy never dies! 

James Montgomery. 



DAFFODILS. 

I WANDERED loucly as a cloud 

That floats on high o'er vales and hills, 

When all at once I saw a crowd, — 
A host of golden dafibdils 

Beside the lake, beneath the trees. 

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. 

Continuous as the stars that shine 
And twinkle on the Milky Way, 

They stretched in never-ending line 
Along the margin of a bay : 

Ten thousand saw I, at a glance. 

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. 

The waves beside them danced, but they 
Outdid the spai'kling waves in glee ; 

A poet could not but be gay 
In such a jocund company ; 

I gazed — and gazed — but little thought 

What wealth the show to me had brought. 



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464 



POK.MS OF NATURE. 



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For oft, when on my couch I lie, 
In vacant or in pensive mood. 

They flash upon that inward eye 
Which is the bliss of solitude ; 

And then my heart with pleasure fills, 

And dances with the daffodils. 

William Wordsworth. 



DAFFODILS. 

Faire daffadills, we weep to see 

You haste awaj' so soone ; 
As yet the early-rising sun 

Has not attained his noone. 
Stay, stay. 

Until the hastening day 
Has run 

But to the even-song ; 
And, having prayed together, we 

Will goe with you along. 

We have short time to stay as yon, 

We have as short a spring ; 
As quick a growth, to meet decay, 

As you or anything. 
We die, 

As your hours doe, and drie 
Away, 

Like to the summer's raine. 
Or as the pearles of morning's dew, 

Ne'er to be found againe. 

I<.OBERT HERRICK. 



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THE ROSE. 

FROM '• HASSAN BEN KHALED." 

Then took the generous host 
A basket filled with roses. Every guest 
Cried, " Give me roses ! " and he thus addressed 
His words to all : " He who exalts them most 
lu song, he only shall the roses wear." 
Then sang a guest: " The rose's cheeks are fair; 
It crowns the purple bowl, and no one knows 
If the rose colors it, or it the rose." 
And sang another : " Crimson is its hue. 
And on its breast the morning's crystal dew 
Is changed to rubies." Then a third replied : 
" It blushes in the sun's enamored sight. 
As a young virgin on hei- wedding night. 
When from her face the bridegroom lifts the veil." 
When all had sung their songs, I, Hassan, tried. 
"The rose," I sang, "is either red or pale, 
Like maidens whom the flame of i)assioii burns. 
And love or jealous}' controls, by turns. 
Its buds are lips preparing for a kiss ; 
Its open flowers arc like the blush of bliss 



On lovers' cheeks ; the thorns its armor are, 

And in its centre shines a golden star. 

As on a favorite's cheek a sequin glows ; — 

And thus the garden's favorite is the rose." 

The master from his open basket shook 

The roses on my head. 

Bayard Taylor. 



THE ROSE. 

The rose had been washed, just washed in a 
shower. 

Which Mary to Anna conveyed, 
The plentiful moisture encumbered the flower, 

And weighed down its beautiful head. 

The cup was all filled, and the leaves were all wet, 

And it seemed, to a fanciful view. 
To weep for the buds it had left with regret, 

On the flourishing bush where it grew. 

I hastily seized it, unfit as it was 

For a nosegay, so dripping and drowned, 

And swinging it rudely, too rudely, alas ! 
I snapped it, it fell to the gi'ouud. 

And such, I exclaimed, is the pitiless part 

Some act by the delicate mind, 
Regardless of wringing and breaking a heart 
Already to sorrow resigned. 

This elegant rose, had I shaken it less. 

Might have bloomed with its owner awhile ; 

And the tear that is wiped with a little address, 
May be followed perhaps by a smile. 

Willia.m Cowper. 



THE MOSS ROSE. 

The angel of the flowers, one day, 
Beneath a rose-tree sleeping lay, — 
That spirit to whose charge 't is given 
To bathe young buds in dews of heaven. 
Awaking from his light repose. 
The angel whispered to the rose : 
" fondest object of my care, 
Still fairest found, where all are fair ; 
For the sweet shade thou giv'st to me 
Ask what thou wilt, 'tis granted thee." 
"Then," said the rose, with deepened glow, 
"On me another grace bestow." 
The spirit imused, in silent thought, 
What grace was there that flower had not ? 
'T was but a moment, — o'er the rose 
A veil of moss the angel throws. 
And, robed in nature's simplest weed. 
Could there a flower that rose exceed ? 

From the German of KRUMlIACHnK, 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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'TIS THE LAST KOSE OF SUMMER. 

FROM " IRISH MELODIES." 

'T IS the last rose of summer, 

Left blooiiiing alone ; 
All her lovely companions 

Are faded and gone ; 
No tiower of lier kindred, 

No rosebud, is nigh 
To reflect back her blushes. 

Or give sigh for sigh ! 

I '11 not leave thee, thou lone one ! 

To pine on the stem ; 
Since the lovely are sleeping, 

Go, sleep thou with them ; 
Thus kindly I scatter 

Thy leaves o'er the bed 
Where thy mates of the garden 

Lie scentless and dead. 

So soon may / follow, 

When friendships decay. 
And from love's shining circle 

The gems drop away ! 
When true hearts lie withered. 

And fond ones are flown, 
0, who would inhabit 

This bleak world alone ? 

Thomas Moore. 



^ 



TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN. 

Thou blossom, bright with autumn dew. 
And colored with the heaven's own blue. 
That openest when the quiet light 
Succeeds the keen and frosty night ; 

Thou comest not when violets lean 
O'er wandering brooks and springs unseen. 
Or columbines, in purple dressed. 
Nod o'er the ground-bird's hidden nest. 

Thou waitest late, and com'st alone, 
When woods are bare and birds are flown. 
And frosts and shortening days portend 
The aged Year is near his end. 

Then doth thy sweet and quiet eye 
Look through its fringes to the sky, 
Blue — blue — as if that sky let fall 
A flower from its cerulean wall. 

I would that thus, when I shall see 
The hour of death draw near to me, 
Hope, blossoming within my heart. 
May look to heaven as I depart. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



THE VOICE OF THE GRASS. 

Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ; 

By the dusty roadside. 

On the sunny hillside, 

Close by the noisy brook. 

In every shady nook, 
I come creeping, creeping everywhere. 

Here I come creeping, smiling everywhere ; 

All round the open door, 

Where sit the aged poor ; 

Here where the children play. 

In the bright and merry May, 
I come creeping, creeping everywhere. 

Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ; 

In the noisy city street 

My pleasant face you '11 meet, 

Cheering the sick at heart 

Toiling his busy part, — 
Silently creeping, creeping everywhere. 

Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ; 
You cannot see me coming. 
Nor hear my low sweet humming ; 
For in the starry night. 
And the glad morning light, 

I come quietly creeping everywhere. 

Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ; 
ilore welcome than the flow^ers 
In summer's pleasant hours ; 
The gentle cow is glad. 
And the merry bird not sad. 

To see me creeping, creeping everywhere. 

Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ; 
When you 're numbered with the dead 
In your still and narrow bed. 
In the happy spring 1 '11 come 
And deck your silent home, — 

Creeping, silently creeping everywhere. 

Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ; 

My humble song of praise 

Most joyfully I raise 

To Him at whose command 

I beautify the land, 
Creeping, silently creeping everywhere. 

SARAH ROBERTS. 



THE IVY GREEN. 

0, A DAINTY plant is the ivy green, 

That creepeth o'er ruins old ! 
Of right choice food are his meals, I ween. 

In his cell so lone and cold. 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



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The walls must he crumbled, the stones decayed, 

To pleasure his dainty whim ; 
And the mouldering dust that years have made, 
Is a merry meal for him. 

Creej)ing where no lite is seen, 
A rare old plant is the Ivy green. 

Fast he stealeth on, though he wears no wings, 

And a staunch old heart has he ! 
How closely he twineth, how tight he clings 

To his friend, the huge oak-tree ! 
And slj'ly he traileth along the ground, 

And his leaves he gently waves, 
And he joyously twines and hugs around 

The rich mould of dead men's graves. 
Creeping where grim death has been, 
A rare old plant is the Ivy green. 

Whole ages have fled, and their works decayed, 

And nations have scattered been ; 
But the stout old ivy shall never fade 

From its hale and hearty green. 
The brave old plant in its lonely days 

Shall fatten upon the past ; 
For the stateliest building man can raise 

Is the ivy's food at last. 

Creeping on where Time has been, 
A rare old plant is the Ivj' green. 

CHARLES DICKENS. 



t& 



THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS. 

The melancholy days are come, the saddest of 
the year. 

Of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows 
brown and sear. 

Heaped in the hollows of the grove, the autumn 
leaves lie dead ; 

They rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rab- 
bit's tread. 

The robin and the wren are flown, and from the 
shrubs the jay, 

And from the wood-top calls the crow through 
all the gloomy day. 

Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers, 

that lately sprang and stood 
In brighter light and softer airs, a beauteous 

sisterhood ? 
Alas ! they all are in their graves ; the gentle 

race of flowers 
Are lying in their low^ly beds with the fair and 

good of ours. 
The rain is falling where they lie ; but the cold 

November rain 
Calls not from out the gloomy earth the lovely 

ones again. 



The wind-flower and the violet, they perished 
long ago, 

And the brier-rose and the orchis died amid the 
summer glow ; 

But on the hill the golden-rod, and the aster in 
the wood. 

And the yellow sunflower by the brook in au- 
tumn beauty stood. 

Till fell the frost from the clear cold heaven, as 
falls the plague on men, 

And the brightness of their smile was gone from 
upland, glade, and glen. 

And now, Avhen comes the calm mild day, as 

still such days will come, 
To call the squirrel and the bee from out their 

winter home ; 
When the sound of dropping nuts is heard, 

though all the trees are still, 
And twinkle in the smoky light the waters of 

the rill ; 
The south-wind searches for the flowers whose 

fragrance late he bore, 
And sighs to find them in the wood and by the 

stream no more. 

And then I think of one who in her youthful 

beauty died. 
The fair meek blossom that grew up and faded 

by my side. 
In the cold moist earth we laid her, when the 

forests cast the leaf, 
And v.'e wept that one so lovely should have a 

life so brief ; 
Yet not unmeet it was that one, like that young 

friend of ours. 
So gentle and so beautiful, should perish with 

tlie flowers. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



THE USE OF FLOWERS. 

God might have bade the earth bring forth 

Enough for great and small, 
The oak-tree and the cedar-tree, 

Without a flower at all. 
We might have had enougli, enough 

For every want of ours, 
For luxur)', medicine, and toil, 

And j'^et have had no flowers. 

Tlien wherefore, wherefore were they made, 

All dyed with I'ambow light. 
All fashioned with supi'emest grace, 

Upspringing day and night : — 
Springing in vallej'^s green and low, 

And on the mountains high, 
And in the silent wilderness 

Where no man passes by / 



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a 



Our outward life requires them not, — 

Then wherefore had they birth ? — 
To minister delight to man, 

To beautify the earth ; 
To comfort man, — to whisper hope, 

Whene'er his faith is dim, 
For who so careth for the flowers 

Will care much more for him ! 

MARY HOWITT. 



THE LION'S RIDE. 

The lion is the desert's king ; through his do- 
main so wide 

Eight swiftly and right royally this night he 
means to ride. 

By the sedgy brink, where the wild herds drink, 
close couches the grim chief ; 

The trembling sycamore above whispers with 
every leaf. 

At evening, on the Table Mount, when ye can 

see no more 
The changeful play of signals gay ; when the 

gloom is speckled o'er 
With kraal fires ; when the Caffre wends home 

through the lone karroo ; 
V/hen the boshbok in the thicket sleeps, and by 

the stream the gnu ; 

Then bend your gaze across the waste, — what 

see ye ? The giraffe, 
Majestic, stalks towards the lagoon, the turbid 

lymph to quaff ; 
With outstretched neck and tongue adust, he 

kneels him down to cool 
His hot thirst with a welcome draught from the 

foul and brackish pool. 

A rustling sound, a roar, a bound, — the lion sits 

astride 
Upon his giant courser's back. Did ever king so 

ride? 
Had ever king a steed so rare, caparisons of state 
To match the dappled skin whereon that rider 

sits elate ? 

In the muscles of the neck his teeth are plunged 

with I'a venous greed ; 
His tawny mane is tossing round the withers of 

the steed. 
Up leaping with a hollow yell oi anguish and 

surprise, 
Away, away, in wild dismay, the cameleopard 

flies. 



His feet have wings ; see how he springs across 
the moonlit plain ! 

As from their sockets they would burst, liis 
glaring eyeballs strain ; 

In thick black streams of purling blood, full fast 
his life is fleeting ; 

The stillness of the desert hears his heart's tu- 
multuous beating. 

Like the cloud that, through the wilderness, the 

path of Israel traced, — 
Like an airy phantom, dull and wan, a spirit of 

the waste, — 
From the sandy sea uprising, as the water-spout 

from ocean, 
A whirling cloud of dust keeps pace with the 

courser's fiery motion. 

Croaking companion of their flight, the vulture 

whirs on high ; 
Below, the terror of the fold, the panther fierce 

and sly, 
And hyenas foul, round graves that prowl, join 

in the horrid race ; 
By the footprints wet with gore and sweat, their 

monarch's course they trace. 

They see him on his living throne, and quake 

with fear, the while 
With claws of steel he tears piecemeal his cushion's 

painted pile. 
On ! on ! no pause, no rest, giraffe, while life and 

strength remain ! 
The steed by such a rider backed may madly 

plunge in vain. 

Reeling upon the desert's verge, he falls, and 

breathes his last ; 
The courser, stained with dust and foam, is the 

rider's fell repast. 
O'er Madagascar, eastward far, a faint flush is 

descried : — 
Thus nightly, o'er his broad domain, the king of 

beasts doth ride. 

From the German of Ferdinand Freiligrath. 



THE BLOOD HORSE. 

Gamarra is a dainty steed, 
Strong, black, and of a noble breed, 
Full of fire, and full of bone, 
With all his line of fathers known ; 
Fine his nose, his nostrils thin. 
But blown abroad by the pride within 



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POEJIS OF NATURE. 



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His mane is like a river flowing, 
And his eyes like embers glowing 
In the darkness of the night, 
And his pace as swift as light. 

Look, — how round his straining throat 

Grace and shifting beauty float ; 

Sinewy strength is in his reins, 

And the red blood gallops through his veins 

Richer, redder, never ran 

Through the boasting heart of man. 

He can trace his lineage higher 

Than the Bourbon dare aspire, — 

Douglas, Guzman, or the Guelph, 

Or O'Brien's blood itself I 

He, who hath no peer, was born 

Here, upon a red March morn. 

But his famous fathers dead 

Were Arabs all, and Arab-bred, 

And the last of that great line 

Trod like one of a race divine ! 

And yet, — he was but friend to one 

AVho fed him at the set of sun 

Bj' some lone fountain fringed with green ; 

With him, a roving Bedouin, 

He lived (none else would he obey 

Through all the hot Arabian day), 

And died untamed upon the sands 

Where Balkh amidst the desert stands. 

Bryan W. Procter (Barry Cornwall). 



c& 



THE TIGER. 

Tiger ! Tiger ! burning bright. 
In the forests of the night ; 
What immortal hand or eye 
Could frame thy fearful symmetry ? 

In what distant deeps or skies 
Burned the fire of thine eyes ? 
On what wings dare he aspire ? 
What the hand dare seize the fire ? 

And what shoulder, and what art. 
Could twist the sinews of thine heart ? 
And when thy heart began to beat. 
What dread hand ? and what dread feet ? 

What the hammer, what the chain ? 
In what furnace w-as thy brain ? 
What the anvil ? what dread grasp 
Dare its deadly terrors clasp ? 

When the stars threw down their spears, 
And watered heaven with tlnnr tears, 
Did he smile his work to see ? 
Did He, who made the Lamb, make thee 



Tiger ! Tiger ! burning bright, 
In the forests of the night. 
What immortal hand or eye 
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry 1 

WILLIAM BLAHE. 



TO A MOUSE; 

ON TURNING HER UP IN HER NEST WITH THE PLOUGH, 
NOVEMBER, 1785. 

Wee, sleekit, cowerin', timorous beastie, 
0, what a panic 's in thy breastie ! 
Thou needna start awa sae hasty, 

Wi' bickering brattle ! 
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee, 

Wi' murdering pattle ! 

I 'm truly sorry man's dominion 
Has broken nature's social union, 
An' justifies that ill opinion 

Which makes thee startle 
At me, thy poor earth-born companion. 

An' fellow-mortal ! 

I doubtna, wh3des, but thou may thieve ; 
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live ! 
A daimen-icker * in a tlirave + 

'S a sma' rei^uest ; 
I '11 get a blessin' wi' the lave. 

And never miss 't ! 

Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin ! 
Its silly wa's the win's are strewin' ! 
An' naething now to big a new ane 

0" foggage green ! 
An' bleak December's winds ensuin', 

Baith snell and keen ! 

Thou saw the fields laid bare an' waste. 
An' weaiy winter comin' fast. 
An' cozie here, beneath the blast. 

Thou thought to dwell, 
Till, crash! the cruel coulter past 

Out through thy cell. 

That wee bit heap o' leaves an' stibble 
Has cost thee mony a weary nibble ! 
Now thou 's turned out, for a' thy trouble. 

But house or hald. 
To thole the winter's sleety dribble, 

An' cranreuch % cauld ! 

But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane. 
In proving foresight may be vain : 
The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men 

Gang, aft a-gley, 
An' lea'e us naught but grief and pain, 

For promised joy. 



An ear of corn. 
Hoar-frobt. 



t Twenty-four slieaves. 



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469 



;<) I — I 



Still thoii art blest, compared wi' me ! 
The present only touchetli thee : 
But, och! I backward cast my e'e 

On prospects drear ; 
An' forward, though 1 canna see, 

I guess an' fear. 

Robert Burxs. 



LAMBS AT PLAY. 

Say, ye that know, ye who have felt and seen 
Spring's morning smiles, and soul-enlivening 

green, — 
Say, did you give the thrilling transport way. 
Did your eye brighten, when young lambs at play 
Leaped o'er your path with animated pride, 
Or gazed in merry clusters by your side ? 
Ye who can smile — to wisdom no disgrace — 
At the arch meaning of a kitten's face ; 
If spotless innocence and infant mirth 
Excites to praise, or gives reflection birth ; 
In shades like these pursue your favorite joy. 
Midst nature's revels, sports that never cloy. 
A few begin a short but vigorous race, 
And indolence, abashed, soon flies the place : 
Thus challenged forth, see thither, one by one. 
From every side assembling playmates run ; 
A thousand wily antics mark their staj', 
A starting crowd, impatient of delay ; 
Like the fond dove from fearful prison freed, 
Each seems to say, " Come, let us try our speed ; " 
Away they scour, impetuous, ardent, strong. 
The green turf trembling as they bound along 
Adown the slope, then up the hillock climb. 
Where every mole-hill is a bed of thyme, 
Then, panting, stoj); yet scarcely can refrain, — 
A bird, a leaf, will set them off" again : 
Or, if a gale with strength unusual blow, 
Scattering the wild-brier roses into snow, 
Their little limbs increasing eff"orts tr}^ ; 
Like the torn flower, the fair assemblage fly. 
Ah, fallen rose ! sad emblem of their doom ; 
Frail as thyself, they perish while they bloom ! 

ROBERT BLOOMFIELD. 



rg^ 



FOLDING THE FLOCKS. 

Shepherds all, and maidens fair, 
Fold your flocks up ; for the air 
'Gins to thicken, and the sun 
Already his great course hath run . 
See the dew-drops, how they kiss 
Every little flower that is ; 
Hanging on their velvet heads, 
Like a string of crj'^stal beads. 
See the heavy clouds low falling 
And bright Hesperus down calling 



The dead night from underground ; 

At whose rising, mists unsound, 

Damps and vapors, fly apace, 

And hover o'er the smiling face 

Of these pastures ; where they come. 

Striking dead both bud and bloom. 

Therefore from such danger lock 

Every one his loved flock ; 

And let your dogs lie loose without, 

Lest the wolf come as a scout 

From the mountain, and ere day, 

Bear a lamb or kid away ; 

Or the crafty, thievish fox. 

Break upon your simple flocks. 

To secure yourself from these, 

Be not too secure in ease ; 

So shall you good shepherds prove, 

And deserve your master's love. 

Now, good night ! may sweetest slumbers 

And soft silence fall in numbers 

On your eyelids. So farewell : 

Thus I end my evening knell. 

Beaumont and Fletcher. 



THE SONGSTERS. 

FROM " THE SEASONS : SPRING." 

Up springs the lark, 

Shrill-voiced and loud, the messenger of morn. 

Ere yet the shadows fly, he mounted sings 

Amid the dawning clouds, and from their haunts 

Calls up the tuneful nations. Every copse 

Deep-tangled, tree irregular, and bush 

Bending with dewy moisture, o'er the heads 

Of the coy quiristers that lodge within, 

Are prodigal of harmony. The thrush 

And woodlark, o'er the kind-contending throng 

Superior heard, run through the sweetest length 

Of notes ; when listening Philomela deigns 

To let them joy, and purposes, in thought 

Elate, to make her night excel their day. 

The blackbird whistles from the thorny brake ; 

The mellow bullfinch answers from the grove ; 

Nor are the linnets, o'er the flowering furze 

Poured out profusely, silent : joined to these, 

Innumerous songsters, in the freshening shade 

Of new-sprung leaves, their modulations mix 

Mellifluous. The jay, the rook, the daw, 

And each harsh pipe, discordant heard alone, 

Aid the full concei't ; while the stockdove breathes 

A melanchol}'' murmur through the whole. 

'Tis love creates their melody, and all 

This waste of music is the voice of love ; 

That even to birds and beasts the tender arts 

Of jfleasing teaches. 

James Thomson. 



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470 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



a 



DOMESTIC BIRDS. 

FROM, "THE SEASONS: SPRING." 

The careful hen 
Calls all her chirping family around, 
Fed and defended by the fearless cock, 
Whose breast with ardor flames, as on he walks, 
Graceful, and crows defiance. In the pond 
The finely checkered duck before her train 
Rows garrulous. The stately-sailing swan 
Gives out her snowy plumage to the gale ; 
And, arching proud his neck, with oary feet 
Bears forward fierce, and guards his osier-isle. 
Protective of his young. The turkey nigh, 
Loud-threatening, reddens ; while the peacock 

spreads 
His every-colored glory to the sun, 
And swims in radiant majesty along. 
O'er the whole homely scene, the cooing dove 
Flies thick in amorous chase, and wanton rolls 
The glancing eye, and turns the changeful neck. 

James Thomson. 



BIRDS. 



B- 



FROM "THE PELICAN ISLAND." 

— Birds, the free tenants of land, air, and ocean. 
Their forms all symmetry, their motions grace ; 
In plumage, delicate and beautiful, 
Thick without burden, close as fishes' scales, 
Or loose as full-blown poppies to the breeze ; 
With wings that might have had a soul within 

them, 
They bore their owners by such sweet enchant- 
ment, 
• — Birds, small and great, of endless shapes and 

colors. 
Here flew and perched, there swam and dived at 

pleasure ; 
Watchful and agile, uttering voices wild 
And harsh, yet in accordance with the waves 
Upon the beach, the winds in caverns moaning, 
Or winds and waves abroad upon the water. 
Some sought their food among the finny shoals. 
Swift darting from the clouds, emerging soon 
With slender captives glittering in their beaks ; 
These in recesses of steep crags constructed 
Their eyries inaccessible, and trained 
Their hardy broods to forage in all weathers : 
Others, more gorgeously apparelled, dwelt 
Among the woods, on nature's dainties feeding. 
Herbs, seeds, and roots ; or, ever on the wing. 
Pursuing insects through the boundless air : 
In hollow trees or thickets these concealed 
Their exquisitely woven nests ; whei'e lay 
Their callow offspring, quiet as the down 



On their own breasts, till from her search the 

dam 
With laden bill returned, and shared the meal 
Among her clamorous suppliants, all agape ; 
Then, cowering o'er them with expanded wings. 
She felt how sweet it is to be a mother. 
Of these, a few, with melody untaught, 
Turned all the air to music within hearing, 
Themselves unseen ; while bolder quiristers 
On loftiest branches strained their clarion-pipes, 
And made the forest echo to their screams 
Discordant, — yet there was no discord there, 
But tempered harmony ; all tones combining. 
In the rich confluence of ten thousand tongues, 
To tell of joy and to inspire it. Who 
Could hear such concert, and not join in chorus ? 

JAMES MONTGOMERY. 



THE MOCKING-BIRD. 

FROM " OUT OF THE CRADLE ENDLESSLY ROCKING." 

Once, Paumanok, 

When the snows had melted, and the Fifth- 
month grass was growing, 

Up this sea-shore, in some briers, 

Two guests from Alabama, — two together, 

And their nest, and four light-green eggs, spotted 
with brown, 

And every day the he-bird, to and fro, near at 
hand, 

And every day the she-bird, crouched on her 
nest, silent, with bright eyes. 

And ever}' day I, a curious boy, never too close, 
never disturbing them. 

Cautiously peeving, absorbing, translating. 

" Shine ! shine ! shine ! 
Pour down your warmth, great Sun ! 
While we bask — we two together. 

" Two together ! 
Winds blow south, or winds blow north, 
Day come white, or niglit come black. 
Home, or rivers and mountains from home, 
Singing all time, minding no time, 
If we two but kee]3 together." 

Till, of a sudden. 
Maybe killed, unknown to her mate. 
One forenoon the she-bird crouched not on the 

nest, 
Nor returned that afternoon, nor the next. 
Nor ever appeared again. 

And thenceforward, all summer, in the sound 
of tlie sea. 
And at night, under the full of the moon, in 
calmer weather. 



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POEMS OP NATUEE. 



471 



a 



u 



Over the hoarse surging of the sea, 

Or flitting from brier to brier by day, 

I saw, 1 heard at intervals, the remaining one, 

the he-bird. 
The solitary guest from Alabama. 

" Blow ! blow ! blow ! 
Blow up, sea-winds, along Paumanok's shore ! 
I wait and I wait, till you blow my mate to me." 

Yes, when the stars glistened. 
All night long, on the prong of a moss-scalloped 

stake, 
Down, almost amid the slapping waves. 
Sat the lone singer, wonderful, causing tears. 

He called on his mate ; 
He poured forth the meanings which I, of all 
men, know. 

" Soothe ! soothe ! soothe ! 
Close on its wave soothes the wave behind, 
And again another behind, embracing and lap- 
ping, every one close. 
But my love soothes not me, not me. 

" Low hangs the moon — it rose late. 
0, it is lagging — 0, I think it is heavy with 
love, with love. 

" 0, madly the sea pushes, pushes upon the 
land. 
With love — with love. 

" night ! do I not see my love fluttering out 
there among the breakers ? 
What is that little black thing I see there in the 
white ? 

"Loud! loud! loud! 
Loud I call to you, my love ! 
High and clear I shoot my voice over the waves ; 
Surely you must know who is here, is here • 
You must know who I am, my love ! 

" Low-hanging moon I 
What is that dusky spot in your brown yellow ? 
0, it is the shape, the shape of my mate ! 
moon, do not keep her from me any longer. 

" Land I land ! land ! 
AVhichever way I turn, 0, 1 think you could give 
me my mate back again, if you only would; 
For I am almost sure I see her dimly whichever 
way I look. 

"0 rising stars ! 
Perhaps the one I want so much will rise, will 
rise with some of you. 



" throat ! trembling throat I 
Sound clearer through the atmosphere ! 
Pierce the woods, the earth ; 
Somewhere listening to catch you, must be the 
one I want. 

"Shake out, carols ! 
Solitary here — the night's carols ! 
Carols of lonesome love ! Death's carols ! 
Carols under that lagging, yellow, waning moon ! 
0, under that moon, where she droops almost 

down into the sea ! 
reckless, despairing carols ! 

" But soft ! sink low ; 

Soft ! let me just murmur ; 

And do you wait a moment, you husky-noised 
sea ; 

For somewhere I believe I heard my mate re- 
sponding to me, 

So faint — I must be still, be still to listen ; 

But not altogether still, for then she might not 
come immediately to me. 

" Plither, my love I 
Here I am ! Here ! 
With this just-sustained note I announce myself 

to you ; 
This gentle call is for you, my love, for you. 

" Do not be decoj^ed elsewhere ! 
That is the whistle of the wind — it is not my 

voice ; 
That is the fluttering, the fluttering of the spray ; 
Those are the shadows of leaves. 

"0 darkness ! in vain ! 
0, I am very sick and sorrowful." 

Walt Whitman. 



TO THE CUCKOO. 

Hail, beauteous stranger of the grove ! 

Thou messenger of spring ! 
Now Heaven repairs thy rural seat, 

And woods thy welcome sing. 

Soon as the daisy decks the'green, 

Thy certain voice we hear. 
Hast thou a star to guide thy path, 

Or mark the rolling year ? 

Delightful visitant ! with thee 

I hail the time of flowers, 
And hear the sound of music sweet 

From birds among the bowers. 



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472 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



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The scliool-boy, wandering through the wood 

To pull the primrose gay, 
Stai'ts, thy most curious voice to hear, 

And imitates thy lay. 

What time the pea puts on the bloom, 

Thou fliest thy vocal vale, 
An annual guest in other lands, 

Another spring to hail. 

Sweet bird ! thy bower is ever green, 

Thy sky is ever clear ; 
Thou hast no sorrow in thy song. 

No winter in thy year ! 

0, could I fly, I 'd fly with thee ! 
We 'd make, with joyful wing. 
Our annual visit o'er the globe, 

Attendants on the spring. 

John Logan. 



TO THE CUCKOO. 

BLITHE new-comer ! I have heard, 

I hear thee and rejoice. 
cuckoo ! shall I call thee bird, 

Or but a wandering voice ? 

While I am lying on the grass 

Thy twofold shout I hear ; 
From hill to hill it seems to pass. 

At once far off and near. 

Though babbling only to the vale 
Of sunshine and of flowers. 

Thou bringest unto me a tale 
Of visionary hours. 

Thrice welcome, darling of the spring ! 

Even yet thou art to me 
No bird, but an invisible thing, 

A voice, a mystery ; 

The same whom in my school-boy days 

I listened to ; that cry 
Which made me look a thousand ways, 

In bush and tree and sky. 

To seek thee did I often rove 

Through woods and on the gi'een ; 

And thou wert still a hope, a love ; 
Still longed for, never seen. 

And I can listen to thee yet ; 

Can lie upon the plain 
And listen, till I do beget 

That golden time again. 



blessed bird ! the earth we pace 

Again appears to be 
An unsubstantial, fairy place ; 

That is fit home for thee ! 

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. 



^ 



THE BELFRY PIGEON. 

On the cross-beam under the Old South bell 
The nest of a pigeon is builded well. 
In summer and winter that bird is there, 
Out and in with the morning air ; 
I love to see him track the street, 
With his wary eye and active feet ; 
And I often watch him as he springs, 
Circling the steeple with easy wings. 
Till across the dial his shade has passed. 
And the belfry edge is gained at last ; 
'T is a bird I love, with its brooding note. 
And the trembling throb in its mottled throat ; 
There 's a human look in its swelling breast, 
And the gentle curve of its lowly crest ; 
And 1 often stop with the fear I feel, - — 
He runs so close to the rapid wheel. 

Whatever is rung on that noisy bell, — ' 
Chime of the hour, or funeral knell, — 
The dove in the belfry must hear it well. 
When the tongue swings out to the midniglit 

moon. 
When the sexton cheerly rings for noon. 
When the clock strikes clear at morning light, 
When the child is waked with "nine at night," 
When the chimes play soft in the Sabbath air. 
Filling the spirit with tones of prayer, — 
Whatever tale in the bell is heard. 
He broods on his folded feet unstirred, 
Or, rising half in his rounded nest, 
He takes the time to smooth his breast, 
Then drops again, with filmed eyes. 
And sleeps as the last vibration dies. 

Sweet bird ! I would that 1 could be 
A hermit in the crowd like thee ! 
With wings to fly to wood and glen, 
Thy lot, like mine, is cast with men ; 
And daily, with unwilling feet, 
I tread, like thee, the crowded street. 
But, unlike me, when day is o'er. 
Thou canst dismiss the world, and soar ; 
Or, at a half-felt wish for rest. 
Canst smooth the feathers on thy breast, 
And drop, forgetful, to thy nest. 

I would that in such wings of gold 
I could my weary heart upfold ; 
I would I could look down unmoved 
(Unloving as I am unloved). 
And while the world throngs on beneath. 
Smooth down my cares and calmly breathe ; 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



47. 



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And never sad with others' sadness , 
And never glad with others' gUidness, 
Listen, unstirred, to knell or chime, 
And, lapped in ipiiet, bide my time. 

Nathaniel Parker Willis. 



THE SKYLARK. 

Bird of the wilderness. 

Blithesome and cumberless, 
Sweet be thy matin o'er moorland and lea ! 

Emblem of happiness. 

Blest is thy dwelling-place, — 
0, to abide in the desert with thee ! 

Wild is thy lay and loi\d 

Far in the downy cloud, 
Love gives it energy, love gave it birth. 

Where, on thj'" dewy wing, 

M^'here art thou journeying ? 
Thy lay is in heaven, thy love is on earth. 

O'er fell and fountain sheen. 

O'er moor and mountain green, 
O'er the red streamer that heralds the day, 

Over the cloudlet dim. 

Over the rainbow's rim. 
Musical cherub, soar, singing, away ! 

Then, when the gloaming comes, 

Low in the heather blooms 
Sweet will thj'' welcome and bed of love be ! 

Emblem of happiness, 

Blest is thy dwelling-place, — 
0, to abide in the desert with thee ! 

James Hogg. 



ffl-. 



TO THE SKYLARK. 

Hail to thee, blithe spirit ! 

Bird thou never wert, 
That from heaven, or near it, 
Pourest thy full heart 
In profuse strains of unpremeditated art. 

Higher still and higher 

From the earth thou springest, 
Like a cloud of fire ; 

The blue deep thou wingest. 
And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever 
singest. 

In the golden lightning 

Of the setting sun. 
O'er which clouds are brightening, 
Thou dost float and run ; 
Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun. 



The pale purple even 

Melts around thy flight ; 
Like a star of heaven, 
In the broad daylight 
Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight. 

Keen as are the arrows 

Of that silver sphere, 
Whose intense lamp narrows 

In the white dawn clear. 
Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there. 

All the earth and air 

With thy voice is loud, 
As, when night is bare. 
From one lonely cloud 
The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is 
overflowed. 

What thou art we know not ; 

What is most like thee ? 
From rainbow clouds there flow not 

Drops so bright to see. 
As from thy presence showers a rain of melody. 

Like a poet hidden 

In the liglrt of thought, 
Singing hymns unbidden. 
Till the world is wrought 
To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not ; 

Like a high-born maiden 

In a palace tower, 
Soothing her love-laden 
Soul in secret hour 
With music sweet as love, which overflows her 
bower ; 

Like a glow-worm golden, 

In a dell of dew. 
Scattering unbeholden 
Its aerial hue 
Among the flowers and grass which screen it 
from the view ; 

Like a rose embowered 

In its own green leaves. 
By warm winds deflowered, 
Till the scent it gives 
Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy- 
winged thieves. 

Sound of vernal showers 

On the twinkling grass, 
Rain-awakened flowers. 
All that ever was 
Joyous and fresh and clear thy music doth sur- 
pass. 



3 



[& 



474 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



a 



Teach us, sprite or bird, 

Wliat sweet thouglits are tliine ; 

I have never heard 
Praise of love or wine 
That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine. 

Chorus hymeneal. 

Or triumphant chant. 
Matched with thine, would be all 
But an empty vaunt, — 
A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden 
want. 

What objects are the fountains 

Of thy happy strain ? 
What fields, or waves, or mountains ? 
What shapes of sky or plain ? 
What love of thine own kind ? What ignorance 
of pain ? 

With thy clear, keen joyance 

Languor cannot be : 
Shadow of annoyance 

Never come near thee : 
Thou lovest ; but ne'er knew love's sad satiety. 

Waking or asleep, 

Thou of death must deem 
Things more true and deep 
Than we mortals dream, 
Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal 
stream ? 

We look before and after. 

And pine for what is not ; 
Our sincerest laughter 

With some pain is fraught ; 
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest 
thought. 

Yet if we could scorn 

Hate and pride and fear,. 
If we were things born 
Not to shed a tear, 
I know not how thy joy we ever should come near. 

Better than all measures 

Of delightful sound. 
Better than all treasures 
That in books are found, 
Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the 
ground ! 

Teach me half the gladness 
That thy brain must know, 

Such harmonious madness 
From my lips would flow, 
The Avorld should listen then, as I am listening 



6-^ 



Percy Bysshe Shelley. 



HARK, HARK! THE LARK. 

FROM " CYMBELINE," ACT II. SC. 3. 

Hark, hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings. 

And Phoebus 'gins arise. 
His steeds to water at those springs 

On chaliced flowers that lies ; 
And winking Mary-buds begin 

To ope their golden eyes ; 
With everything that pretty bin. 

My lady sweet, arise ; 
Arise, arise I 

SHAKESPEARE. 



TO THE SKYLARK. 

Ethereal minstrel ! pilgrim of the sky ! 

Dost thou despise the earth where cares abound ? 
Or, while the wings aspire, are heart and eye 

Both with thy nest upon the dewy ground ? 
Thy nest, which thou canst drop into at will, 
Those quivering wings composed, that music still ! 

To the last point of vision, and beyond, 

Mount, daring warbler ! — that love-prompted 
strain, 

'Twixt thee and thine a never-failing bond, 
Thrills not the less the bosom of the plain ; 

Yet mightst thou seem, proud privilege ! to sing 

All independent of the leafy spring. 

Leave to the nightingale her shady wood ; 

A privacy of glorious light is thine. 
Whence thou dost pour upon the world a flood 

Of harmony, with instinct more divine ; 
Type of the wise, who soar, but never roam, — 
True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home ! 
William Wordsworth. 



ANSWER TO A CHILD'S QUESTION. 

Do you ask what the birds say ? The sparrow, 
the dove. 

The linnet, and thrush say ' ' I love, and I 
love !" 

In the winter they 're silent, the wind is so 
strong ; 

What it says I don't know, but it sings a loud 
song. 

But green leaves, and blossoms, and sunny 
warm weather, 

And singing and loving — all come back to- 
gether. 

But the lark is so brimful of gladness and love. 

The green fields below him, the blue sky above. 

That he sings, and he sings, and forever sings he, 

" I love my Love, and my Love loves me." 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 



^^ 



fl^ 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



47 



rfl] 



THE ENGLISH ROBIN. 

See yon robin on the spray ; 

Look ye how his tiny form 
Swells, as when his merry lay 

Gushes forth amid the storm. 

Thongh the snow is falling fast, 

Specking o'er his coat with white, — 

Though loud roars the clrilly blast, 
And the evening 's lost in night, — 

Yet from out the darkness dreary 
Cometh still that cheerful note ; 

Praiseful aye, and never weary. 
Is that little warbling throat. 

Thank him for his lesson's sake, 
Thank God's gentle minstrel there, 

Who, when storms make others quake, 
Sings of days that brighter were. 

Harrison Weir. 



[& 



THE BOBOLINK. 

Bobolink ! that in the meadow, 
Or beneath the orchard's shadow, 
Keepest up a constant rattle 
Joyous as my children's prattle, 
"Welcome to the north again ! 
Welcome to mine ear thy strain. 
Welcome to mine eye the sight 
Of thy buff, thy black and white ! 
Brighter plumes may greet the sun 
By the banks of Amazon ; 
Sweeter tones may weave the spell 
Of enchanting Philomel ; 
But the tropic bird would fail. 
And the Englisli nightingale. 
If we should compare their worth 
With thine endless, gushing mirth. 

When the ides of May are past, 
June and summer nearing fast. 
While from depths of blue above 
Comes the mighty breath of love. 
Calling out each bud and flower 
With resistless, secret power, — 
Waking hope and fond desire. 
Kindling the erotic fire, — 
Filling youths' and maidens' dreams 
With mysterious, pleasing themes ; 
Then, amid the sunlight clear, 
Floating in the fragrant air. 
Thou dost fill each heart with pleasure 
By thy glad ecstatic measure. 



A single note, so sweet and low, 
Like a full heart's overflow, 
Forms the prelude ; but the strain 
Gives us no such tone again ; 
For the wild and saucy song 
Leaps and skips the notes among. 
With such quick and sportive Jilay, 
Ne'er was madder, merrier lay. 

Gayest songster of the spring ! 
Thy melodies before me bring 
Visions of some dream-built land. 
Where, by constant zephyrs fanned, 
I might walk the livelong day. 
Embosomed in perpetual May. 
Nor care nor fear thy bosom knows ; 
For thee a tempest never blows ; 
But when our northern summer 's o'er. 
By Delaware's or Schuylkill's shore 
The wild rice lifts its airj'' head. 
And royal feasts for thee are spread. 
And when the winter threatens there. 
Thy tireless wings yet own no fear, 
But bear thee to more southern coasts. 
Far beyond the reach of frosts. 

Bobolink ! still may thy gladness 
Take from me all taints of sadness ; 
Fill my soul with trust unshaken 
In that Being who has taken 
Care for every living thing, 

summer, winter, fall, and spring. 

THOMAS Hill. 



THE O'LINCOLN FAMILY. 

A FLOCK of merry singing-birds were sporting in ' 
the grove : 

Some were warbling cheerily, and some were 
making love : 

There were Bobolincon, Wadolincon, Winter- 
seeble, Conquedle, — 

A livelier set was never led by tabor, pipe, or 
fiddle, — 

Crying, "Phew, shew, Wadolincon, see, see, 
Bobolincon, 

Down among the tickletops, hiding in the but- 
tercups ! 

I know the saucy chap, I see his shining cap 

Bobbing in the clover there, — see, see, see ! " 

JJ]) flies Bobolincon, perching on an apple-tree. 
Startled bj;- his rival's song, quickened by his 

raillery ; 
Soon he spies the rogue afloat, cui-vetting in the 

air. 
And merrily he turns about, and Avarns him to 

beware ! 



iS 



476 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



-n 



" 'T is you that would a- wooing go, down among 

the rushes ! 
But wait a week, till flowers are cheery, — wait 

a week, and, ere j^ou marry, 
Be sure of a house wherein to tarry ! 
Wadolink, Whiskodink, Tom Denny, wait, wait, 

wait ! " 

Every one 's a funny fellow ; every one 's a little 

mellow ; 
Follow, follow, follow, follow, o'er the hill and 

in the hollow ! 
Merrily, merrily, there they hie ; now they rise 

and now they fly ; 
They cross and turn, and in and out, and down 

in the middle, and w^heel about, — 
With a ' ' Phew, shew, Wadolincon ! listen to 

me, Bobolincon ! — 
Happy 's the Avooing that 's speedily doing, that 's 

speedily doing, 
That 's merry and over with the bloom of the 

clover ! 

Bobolincon, Wadolincon, Winterseeble, follow, 

follow me ! 

Wilson Flagg. 



B- 



THE TELLTALE. 

Once, on a golden afternoon. 

With radiant faces and hearts in tune. 

Two fond lovers in dreaming mood 

Threaded a rural solitude. 
Wholly happy, they only knew 
That the earth was bright and the sky was blue. 

That light and beauty and joy and song 

Charmed the way as they passed along : 
The air was fragrant with woodland scents ; 
The squirrel frisked on the roadside fence ; 

And hovering near them, "Chee, chee, 
chink ? " 

Queried the curious bobolink. 
Pausing and peering with sidelong head, 
As saucily questioning all they said ; 

While the ox-eye danced on its slender 
stem, 

And all glad nature rejoiced with them. 
Over the odorous fields were strown 
Wilting windrows of grass new-mown, 

And I'osy billows of clover bloom 

Surged in the sunshine and breathed per- 
fume. 
Swinging low on a slender limb, 
The sparrow warbled his wedding hymn, 

And, balancing on a blackberry-brier, 

The bobolink sung with his heart on fire, — 
"Chink ? If you wish to kiss her, do ! 
Do it, do it ! You coward, you ! 

Kiss her ! Kiss, kiss her ! Who will see ? 

Only we three ! we three ! we three ! " 



Under garlands of drooping vines. 
Through dim vistas of sweet-breathed pines, 
Past wide meadow-fields, lately mowed. 
Wandered the indolent country road. 
The lovers followed it, listening still. 
And, loitering slowly, as lovers will. 

Entered a low-roofed bridge that lay. 
Dusky and cool, in their pleasant way. 
Under its arch a smooth, brown stream 
Silently glided, with glint and gleam. 
Shaded by graceful elms that spread 
Their verdurous canopy overhead, — 
The stream so narrow, the boughs so wide, 
They met and mingled across the tide. 
Alder.s loved it, and seemed to keep 
Patient watch as it lay asleep. 
Mirroring clearly the trees and sky 
2ind the flitting form of the dragon-fly. 

Save where the swift-winged swallow played 
In and out in the sun and shade, 
And darting and circling in merry chase. 
Dipped, and dimpled its clear dark face. 

Fluttering lightly from brink to brink 

Followed the garrulous bobolink, 

Rallying loudly, with mirthful din. 
The pair who lingered unseen within. 

And when from the friendly bridge at last 

Into the road beyond they passed. 

Again beside them the tempter went. 
Keeping the thread of his argument : — ■ 

" Kiss her I'kiss her ! chink-a-chee-chee ! 

I 'II not mention it ! Don't mind me ! 
I '11 be sentinel — I can see 
All around from this tall birch-tree ! " 

But ah ! they noted — nor deemed it strange — 

In his rollicking chorus a trifling change : 
" Do it ! do it ! " with might and main 
Warbled the telltale — " Do it again ! " 

Anonymous. 



ROBERT OF LINCOLN. 

Mereily swinging on brier and weed. 
Near to the nest of his little dame. 
Over the mountain-side or mead, 

Robert of Lincoln is telling his name : 
Bob-o'-Iink, bob-o'-link, 
Spink, spank, spink ; 
Snug and safe is that nest of ours. 
Hidden among the summer flowers. 

Chee, chee, chee. 

Robert of Lincoln is gayly dressed. 

Wearing a bright black wedding coat ; 
White are his shoulders and white his crest. 
Hear him call in his merry note : 
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, 
Spink, spank, spink ; 



^ 



fi- 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



477 



ra 



u 



Look, what a nice new coat is mine, 
Sure there was never a bird so fine. 

Cliee, cliee, chee. 

Robert of Lincoln's Quaker wife, 

Pretty and quiet, with plain brown wings. 
Passing at home a patient life, 

Broods in the grass while her husband sings : 
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, 
Spink, spank, spink ; 
Brood, kind creature ; you need not fear 
Thieves and robbers while I am here. 
Chee, chee, chee. 

Modest and shy as a nun is she. 

One weak chirp is her only note, 
Braggart and prince of braggarts is he, 
Pouring boasts from his little throat : 
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, 
Spink, spank, spink ; 
Never was I afraid of man ; 
Catch me, cowardly knaves, if you can. 
Chee, chee, chee. 

Six white eggs on a bed of hay, 

Flecked with purple, a pretty sight ! 
There as the mother sits all day, 

Eobert is singing with all his might : 
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, 
Spink, spank, spink ; 
Nice good wife, that never goes out. 
Keeping house while I frolic about. 

Chee, chee, chee. 

Soon as the little ones chip the shell 
Six wide mouths are open for food ; 
Robert of Lincoln bestirs him well. 
Gathering seed for the hungry brood. 
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, 
Spink, spank, spink ; 
This new life is likely to be 
Hard for a gay young fellow like me. 
Chee, chee, chee, 

Robert of Lincoln at length is made 

Sober with work, and silent with care ; 
Off is his holiday garment laid. 
Half forgotten that merry air, 
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, 
Spink, spank, spink ; 
Nobody knows but my mate and I 
Where our nest and our nestlings lie. 
Chee, chee, chee. 

Summer wanes ; the children are grown ; 

Fun and frolic no more he knows ; 
Robert of Lincoln's a humdrum crone ; 

Off he flies, and we sing as he goes : 



Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, 
Spink, spank, spink ; 
When you can pipe that merry old sti'ain, 
Robert of Lincoln, come back again. 
Chee, chee, chee. 
William Cullen Bryant. 



THE HEATH-COCK. 

Good morrow to thy sable beak 
And glossy plumage dark and sleek, 
Thy crimson moon and azure eye. 
Cock of the heath, so wildly shy : 
I see thee slyly cowering through 
That wiry web of silvery dew, 
That twinkles in the morning air. 
Like casemeixts of my lady fair. 

A maid there is in yonder tower. 
Who, peeping from her early bower. 
Half shows, like thee, her simple wile, 
Her braided hair and morning smile. 
The rarest things, with wayward will. 
Beneath the covert hide them still ; 
The rarest things to break of day 
Look shortly forth, and shrink away. 

A fleeting moment of delight 
I sunned me in her cheering sight ; 
As short, I ween, the time will be 
That I shall parley hold with -thee. 
Through Snowdon's mist red beams the day. 
The climbing herd-boy chants his la}'-, 
The gnat-flies dance their sunny ring, — 
Thou art already on the wing. 

Joanna Baillie. 



PERSEVERANCE. 

A SWALLOW in the spring 
Came to our granary, and 'neath the eaves 
Essayed to make a nest, and there did bring 

Wet earth and straw and leaves. 

Day after day she toiled 
With patient art, but ere her work was crowned. 
Some sad mishap the tiny fabric spoiled. 

And dashed it to the ground. 

She found the ruin wrought, 
But, not cast down, forth from the place she flew, 
And with her mate fresh earth and grasses brought 

And built her nest anew. 

But scarcely had she placed 
The last soft feather on its ample floor. 
When wicked hand, or chance, again laid waste 

And wrought the ruin o'er. 



^ 



fi- 



478 



POEMS OP NATURE. 



-a 



But still her heart she kept, 
And toiled again, — and last night, hearing calls, 
I looked, — and lo ! three little swallows slept 

Within the earth-made walls. 

What truth is here, man ! 
Hath hope been smitten in its early dawn ? 
Have clouds o'ercast thy purpose, trust, or plan ? 

Have faith, and struggle on ! 

R. s. s. Andros. 



B-^ 



THE WINGED WORSHIPPERS. 

[Addressed to two swallows that flew into the Chauncy Place 
Church during' divine service.] 

Gay, guiltless pair. 
What seek ye from the fields of heaven ? 

Ye have no need of prayer ; 
Ye have no sins to be forgiven. 

Why perch ye here. 
Where mortals to their Maker bend ? 

Can your pure spirits fear 
The God ye never could offend ? 

Ye never knew 
The crimes for which we come to weep. 

Penance is not for you. 
Blessed wanderei's of the upper deep. 

To j'^ou 't is given 
To wake sweet Nature's untaught lays ; 

Beneath the arch of heaven 
To chirp away a life of praise. 

Then spread each wing 
Par, far above, o'er lakes and lands. 

And join the choirs that sing 
In yon blue dome not reared with hands. 

Or, if ye stay, 
To note the consecrated hour, 

Teach me the airy way. 
And let me try your envied power. 

Above the crowd 
On upward wings could I but fly, 

I 'd bathe in yon bright cloud. 
And seek the stars that gem the sky. 

'T were heaven indeed 
Through fields of trackless light to soar. 

On Nature's charms to feed. 
And Nature's own great God adore. 

Charles Sprague. 



THE SWALLOW. 

The gorse is yellow on the heath, 

The banks with speedwell flowers are gay, 
The oaks are budding ; and beneath, 
Tlie hawthorn soon will bear the wreath. 
The silver wreath of May. 

The welcome guest of settled spring. 
The swallow too is come at last ; 

Just at sunset, when thrushes sing, 

I saw her dash with rapid wing. 
And hailed her as she x^assed. 

Come, summer visitant, attach 

To my reed-roof thy nest of clay. 
And let my ear thy music catch, 
Low twittering underneath the thatch, 
At the gray dawn of day. 

As fables tell, an Indian sage. 

The Hindustani woods among. 
Could in his desert hermitage. 
As if 't were marked in written page. 

Translate the wild bird's song. 

I wish I did his power possess. 

That I might learn, fleet bird, from thee. 
What our vain systems only guess. 
And know from what wild wilderness 

Thou camest o'er the sea. 

CHAKLOTIE SlIITH. 



THE DEPARTURE OF THE SWALLOW. 

Ajs^d is the swallow gone ? 

Who beheld it ? 

Which way sailed it ? 
Farewell bade it none ? 

No mortal saw it go ; — 

But who dotli hear 

Its summer cheer 
As it flitteth to and fro ? 



So the freed spirit flies ! 

From its surrounding clay 

It steals away 
Like the swallow from the skies. 

Whither ? wherefore doth it go ? 

'Tis all unknown ; 

We feel alone 
That a void is left below. 

William Howitt. 



-ff 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



479 



,^ 



TO A NIGHTINGALE. 

Sweet bird ! that sing'st away the early hours 
Of winters past or coming, void of care ; 
"Well pleased with delights which present are, 
Fair seasons, budding sprays, sweet-smelling 

flowers : 
To rocks, to springs, to rills, from leafy bowers 
Thou thy Creator's goodness dost declare, 
And what dear gifts on thee he did not spare, 
A stain to human sense in sin that lowers. 
What soul can be so sick which by thy songs 
(Attired in sweetness) sweetly is not driven 
Quite to forget earth's turmoils, spites, and wrongs. 
And lift a reverent eye and thought to heaven ? 
Sweet, artless songster ! thou my mind dost raise 
To airs of spheres, — yes, and to angels' lays. 
William Drummond. 



THE NIGHTINGALE. 

The rose looks out in the valley, 

And thither will I go ! 
To the rosy vale, where the nightingale 

Sings his song of Avoe. 

The virgin is on the river-side, 

Culling the lemons pale : 
Thither, — yes ! thither mil I go, 

To the rosy vale, where the nightingale 
Sings his song of woe. 

The fairest fruit her hand hath culled, 

'T is for her lover all ; 
Thither, — yes ! thither will I go. 

To the rosy vale, where the nightingale 
Sings his song of woe. 

In her hat of straw, for her gentle swain. 
She has placed the lemons pale : 

Thither, — yes ! thither will I go. 

To the rosy vale, where the nightingale 
Sings his song of woe. 

From the Portugfuese of GiL VICENTE. 
Translation of JOHN BOWRING. 



THE NIGHTINGALE. 

PiiiZE thou the nightingale, 
Who soothes thee with his tale, 
And wakes the woods around ; 
A singing feather he, — a winged and wandering 
sound ; 

Whose tender carolling 
Sets all ears listening 
Unto that living lyre. 
Whence flow the airy notes his ecstasies insj)ire : 



Whose shrill, capricious song 
Breathes like a flute along. 
With many a careless tone, — 
Music of thousand tongues, formed by one tongue 
alone. 

charming creature rare ! 
Can aught with thee compare ? 
Thou art all song, — thy breast 
Thrills for one month o' the year, — is tranquil 
all the rest. 

Thee wondrous we may call, — 
Most wondrous this of all. 
That such a tiny throat 
Should wake so loud a sound, and pour so loud 
a note. 
From the Dutch of Maria Tesselschade Visscher. 
Translation of John Bowring. 



PHILOMELA. 

Hark ! ah, the nightingale ! 
The tawny-throated ! 

Hark ! from that moonlit cedar what a burst ! 
What triumph ! hark, — what pain ! 
wanderer from a Grecian shore. 
Still, — after many years, in distant lands, — 
Still nourishing in thy bewildered brain 
That wild, unquenched, deep-sunken, Old-World 
pain, — 

Say, will it never heal ? 
And can this fragrant laAvn, 
With its cool trees, and night. 
And the sweet, tranquil Thames, 
And moonshine, and the dew. 
To thy racked heart and brain 

Afford no balm ? 

Dost thou to-night behold. 
Here, through the moonlight on this English 

grass, 
The unfriendly palace in the Thracian wild ? 

Uost thou again peruse. 
With hot cheeks and seared eyes. 
The too clear web, and thy dumb sister's shame ? 

Dost thou once more essay 
Thy flight ; and feel come over thee, 
Poor fugitive ! the feathery change 
Once more ; and once more make resound. 
With love and hate, triumph and agony, 
Lone Daulis, and the high Cephisian vale ? 
Listen, Eugenia, — 
How thick the bursts come crowding through 

the leaves ! 
Again — thou hearest ! 
Eternal passion ! 
Eternal pain ! 



Matthew Arnold. 



-*-S 



480 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



■a 



TO THE , NIGHTINGALE. 

As it fell upon a day, 

In the merry month of May, 

Sitting in a pleasant shade 

"Which a grove of myrtles made, 

Beasts did leap, and birds did sing, 

Trees did grow, and plants did SY)ring ; 

Everything did banish moan, 

Save the nightingale alone. 

She, poor bird, as all forlorn. 

Leaned her breast np-till a thorn ; 

And there sung the doleful'st ditty 

That to hear it was great pity. 

Fie, fie, fie ! now would she cry ; 

Teru, teru, by and by ; 

That, to hear her so complain. 

Scarce I could from tears refrain ; 

For her griefs, so lively shown. 

Made me think upon mine own. 

Ah ! (thought I) thou mourn'st in vain ; 

None takes pity on thy pain ; 

Senseless trees, they cannot hear thee ; 

Euthless bears, they will not cheer thee ; 

King Pandion, he is dead ; 

All thy friends are lapped in lead : 

All thy fellow-birds do sing. 

Careless of thy sorrowing ! 

Whilst as fickle Fortune smiled, 

Thou and I were both beguiled, 

Every one that flatters thee 

Is no friend in misery. 

Words are easy, like the wind ; 

Faithful friends are hard to find. 

Every man will be thy friend 

Whilst thou hast wherewith to spend ; 

But, if stores of crowns be scant, 

No man will supply thy want. 

If that one be prodigal, 

Bountiful they will him call ; 

And, with such-like flattering, 

" Pity but he were a king." 

If he be addict to vice, 

Quickly him they will entice ; 

But if Fortune once do froAvn, 

Then farewell his great renown : 

They that fawned on him before, 

Use his company no more. 

He that is thy friend indeed, 

He will help thee in thy need ; 

If thou sorrow, he will weep. 

If thou wake, he cannot sleep. 

Thus, of every grief in heai't, 

He with thee doth bear a part. 

These are certain signs to know 

Faithful friend from flattering foe. 

Richard Barnfielu. 



THE PELICAN. 

FROM "THE PELICAN ISLAND." 

At early dawn I marked them in the sky. 
Catching the morning colors on their plumes ; — 
Not in voluptuous pastime revelling there, 
Among the rosy clouds, while orient heaven 
Flamed like the opening gates of Paradise, 
Whence issued forth the angel of the sun. 
And gladdened nature with returning day : 
— Eager for food, their searching eyes they fixed 
On ocean's unrolled volume, from a height 
That brought immensity within their scope ; 
Yet" with such power of vision looked they down. 
As though they watched the shell-fish slowly 

gliding 
O'er sunken rocks, or climbing trees of coral. 
On indefatigable wing upheld, 
Breath, pulse, existence, seemed suspended in 

them : 
They were as pictures painted on the sky ; 
Till suddenly, aslant, away they shot, 
Like meteors changed from stars to gleams of 

lightning, 
And struck upon the deep, where, in wild play. 
Their quarry floundered, unsuspecting harm ; 
With terrible voracity, they plunged 
Their heads among the affrighted shoals, and beat 
A tempest on the surges with their wings. 
Till flashing clouds of foam and spray concealed 

them. 
Nimbly they seized and secreted their prey. 
Alive and wriggling in the elastic net, 
AVhich Nature hung beneath their grasping beaks, 
Till, swollen with captures, the unwieldy burden 
Clogged their slow flight, as heavily to land 
These mighty hunters of the deep returned. 
There on the cragged cliff's they perched at ease. 
Gorging their hapless victims one by one ; 
Then, full and weary, side by side they slept, 
Till evening roused them to the chase again. 

Love found that lonely couple on their isle, 
And soon surrounded them with blithe compan- 
ions. 
The noble birds, with skill spontaneous, framed 
A nest of reeds among the giant-grass, 
That Avaved in lights and shadows o'er the soil. 
There, in sweet thraldom, yet unweening why. 
The patient dam, who ne'er till now had known 
Parental instinct, brooded o'er her eggs. 
Long ere she found the curious secret out, 
That life was hatching in their brittle shells. 
Then, from a wild rapacious bird of prey. 
Tamed by the kindly process, she became 
That gentlest of all living things, — a mother ; 
Gentlest while yearning o'er her naked young, 
Fiercest when stirred by anger to defend them. 



^ 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



481 



ra 



Her mate himself tlie softening power confessed, 
Forgot his sloth, restrained his ajipetite, 
And ranged the sky and fished the stream for her. 
Or, when o'ervvearied Natnre forced her off 
To shake her torpid feathers in the breeze, 
And bathe her bosom in the cooling flood. 
He took her place, and felt through every nerve, 
While the plump nestlings throbbed against his 

heart. 
The tenderness that makes the vidture mild ; 
Yea, half unwillingly his post resigned, 
"When, homesick Avitli the absence of an hour. 
She hurried back, and drove him from her seat 
With pecking bill and cry of fond distress, 
Answered by him with murmurs of delight, 
Whose gutturals harsh to her were love's own 

music. 
Then, settling down, like foam iipon the wave, 
White, flickering, effervescent, soon subsiding. 
Her nrflled pinions smoothly she composed ; 
And, while beneath the comfort of her wings. 
Her crowded progeny quite filled the nest, 
The halcyon sleeps not soimder, when the wind 
Is breathless, and the sea without a curl, 
— Nor dreams the halcyon of serener days, 
Or nights more beautiful with silent stars, 
Than in that hour, the motlier pelican. 
When the warm tiimults of affection sunk 
Into calm sleep, and dreams of what they were, — 
Di'eams more delicious than reality. 
He sentinel beside her stood, and watched 
With jealous eye the raven in the clouds. 
And the rank sea-mews wheeling round the cliffls. 
Woe to the reptile then that ventured nigh ! 
The snap of his tremendous bill was like 
Death's scythe, down-cutting everything it 

struck. 
The heedless lizard, in his gambols, peeped 
Upon the guai'ded nest, from out the flowers, 
But paid the instant forfeit of his life ; 
Nor could the serpent's subtlety elude 
Capture, when gliding by, nor in defence 
]\Iight his malignant fangs and venom save him. 

Erelong the thriving brood outgrew their 
cradle, 
Ran through the grass, and dabbled in the pools ; 
No sooner deniz.ens of earth than made 
Free both of air and water ; day by day, 
New lessons, exercises, and amusements 
Employed the old to teach, the young to learn. 
Now floating on the blue lagoon behold them ; 
The sire and dam in swan-like beauty steering. 
Their cygnets following through the foamy wake, 
Picking the leaves of plants, pursuing insects, 
Or catching at the bubbles as they broke : 
Till on some minor fry, in reedy shallows, 
With flapping pinions and unsparing beaks, 



The well-taught scholars plied their double art, 
To fish in troubled waters, and secure 
The petty captives in their maiden i:)ouches ; 
Then hurried with their banquet to the shore. 
With feet, wings, breast, half swimming and 

half flying. 
But when their pens grew strong to fight the 

storm, 
And buff"et with the breakers on the reef, 
The j)arents put them to severer proof : 
On beetling rocks the little ones were marshalled ; 
There, by endearments, stripes, example, urged 
To try the void convexity of heaven, 
And plough the ocean's horizontal field. 
Timorous at first they fluttered round the verge. 
Balanced and furled their hesitating wings, 
Then put them forth again with steadier aim ; 
Now, gaining courage as they felt the wind 
Dilate their feathers, fill their airy frames 
With buoyancy that bore them from their feet. 
They yielded all their burden to the breeze, 
And sailed and soared where'er tlieir guardians led; 
Ascending, hovering, wheeling, or alighting. 
They searched the deep in quest of nobler game 
Tlian yet their inexperience had encountered ; 
With these they battled in that element, 
Where Avings or fins were equally at home, 
Till, conquerors in many a desperate strife. 
They dragged their spoils to land, and gorged at 

leisure. 

James MoNTGOiMERY. 



TO A WATERFOWL. 

Whither, midst falling dew, 
While glow the heavens with the last steps of 

day. 
Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue 

Thy solitary way ? 

Vainly the fowler's eye 
Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong, 
As, dai-kly painted on the crimson sky. 

Thy figure floats along. 

Seek'st thou the plashy brink 
Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide. 
Or where the rocking billows rise and sink 

On the chafed ocean-side ? 

There is a Power whose care 
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast, — 
The desert and illimitable air, — 

Lone wandering, but not lost. 

All day thy wings have fanned. 
At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere. 
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land. 

Though the dark night is near. 



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t& 



482 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



fi 



And soon that toil shall end ; 
Soon shalt thou find a sunimer home, and rest, 
And scream among thy fellows ; reeds shall bend, 

Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest. 

Thou 'rt gone, the abyss of heaven 
Hath swallowed up thy form ; yet, on my heart 
Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given. 

And shall not soon depart : 

He who, from zone to zone. 
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain 

flight, 
In the long way that I must tread alone, 
Will lead my steps aright. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



TO A BIRD 

THAT HAUNTED THE WATERS OF LAAKEN IN THE WINTER. 

MELANCHOLY bird, a winter's daj- 

Thou standest by the margin of the pool. 
And, taught by God, dost thy whole beiirg 
school 

To patience, which all evil can allay. 

God has appointed thee the fish thy prey. 
And given thyself a lesson to the fool 
Unthrifty, to submit to moral rule. 

And his unthinking course by thee to weigh. 
There need not schools nor the professor's chair. 

Though these be good, true wisdom to impart : 
He who has not enough for these to spare, 

Of time or gold, may yet amend his heart. 
And teach his soul by brooks and rivers fair, — 

Nature is always wis in every part. 

Edward Hovel, Lord Thurlow. 



U 



THE SANDPIPER. 

Across the narrow beach we flit, 

One little sandpiper and I ; 
And fast I gather, bit by bit, 

The scattered driftwood bleached and dry. 
The wild waves reach their hands for it. 

The wild wind raves, the tide runs high. 
As up and down the beach we flit, — 

One little sandpiper and I. 

Above our heads the sullen clouds 

Scud black and .swift across the sky : 
Like silent ghosts in niist}'^ shrouds 

Stand out the white light-houses high. 
Almost as far as eye can reach 

I see the close-reefed vessels fly, 
As fast we flit along the beach, — 

One little sandpijier and I. 



I watch him as he skims along. 

Uttering his sweet and mournful cry ; 
He starts not at my fitful song. 

Or flash of fluttering drapery ; 
He has no thought of any wrong, 

He scans me with a fearless eye. 
Stanch friends are we, well tried and strong. 

The little sandpiper and I. 

Comrade, Avhere wilt thou be to-night 

When the loosed storm breaks furiously ? 
My driftwood-fire will burn so bright ! 

To what warm shelter canst thou fly ? 
I do not fear for thee, though wroth 

The tempest rushes through the sky : 
For are we not God's children both, 

Thou, little sandpiper, and I ? 

celia thaxter. 



THE LITTLE BEACH BIRD. 

Thou little bird, thou dweller by the sea, 
Why takest thou its melancholy voice ? 
Why with that boding cry 
O'er the waves dost thou fly ? 
0, rather, bird, with me 

Through the fair land rejoice ! 

Thy flitting form comes ghostlj'' dim and pale, 
As driven by a beating storm at sea ; 
Thy cr}' is weak and scared, 
As if thj' mates had shared 
The doom of us. Thy wail ■ — 
What does it bring to me ? 

Thou call'st along the sand, andhaunt'stthe surge, 
Restless and sad ; as if, in strange accord 
With motion and Avith roar 
Of waves that drive to shore. 
One spirit did ye urge — 
The Mystery— the Word. 

Of thousands thou both sepulchre and pall, 
Old ocean, art ! A requiem o'er the dead. 
From out thy gloomy cells, 
A tale of mourning tells, — 
Tells of man's woe and fall, 
His sinless glory fled. 

Then turn thee, little bird, and take thy flight 
Where the complaining sea shall sadness bring 
Thy spirit nevermore. 
Come, quit with me the shore. 
For gladness and the light, 
Where birds of summer sing. 

Richard Henry da\a 



[S~" 



POEMS OF NATUHE. 



1^ 



THE STORMY PETREL. 

A THOUSAND miles from land are we, 

Tossing about on the stormy sea, — 

From billow to bounding billow cast, 

Like fleecy snow on the stormy blast. 

Tlie sails are scattered abroad like weeds ; 

The strong masts shake like quivering reeds ; 

The mighty cables and iron chains, 

The hull, which all earthly strength disdains, — 

They strain and they crack ; and hearts like stone 

Their natural, hard, proud strength disown. 

Up and down ! — up and down ! 

From the base of the wave to the billow's crown, 

And amidst the flashing and feathery foam 

The stormy petrel finds a home, — 

A home, if such a place may be 

For her who lives on the wide, wide sea, 

On the craggy ice, in the frozen air. 

And only seeketh her rocky lair 

To wai'm her young, and to teach them to spring 

At once o'er the waves on their stormy wing ! 

O'er the deep ! — o'er the deep ! 
Where the whale and the shark and the sword- 
fish sleep, — 
Outflying the blast and the driving rain. 
The petrel telleth her tale — in vain ; 
For the mariner curseth the warning bird 
Which bringeth him news of the storm unheard ! 
Ah ! thus does the prophet of good or ill 
Meet hate from the creatures he serveth still ; 
Yet he ne'er falters, — so, petrel, spring 
Once more o'er the waves on thy stoimy wing ! 

BRYAN W. Procter (Bany CormuaU). 



LINES TO THE STORMY PETREL. 

The lark sings for joy in her own loved land, 
In the furrowed field, by the breezes fanned ; 

And so revel we 

In the furrowed sea, 
As joyous and glad as the lark can be. 

On the placid breast of the inland lake 
The wild duck delights her pastime to take ; 

But the petrel braves 

The wild ocean waves. 
His wing in the foaming billow he laves. 

The halcyon loves in the noontide beam 
To follow his sport on the tranquil stream : 

He fishes at ease 

In the summer breeze. 
But we go angling in stormiest seas. 



No song-note have we but a piping cr}^ 

That blends with the storm when the wind is high. 

When the land-birds wail 

We sport in the gale. 
And merrily over the ocean we sail. 

Anonymous. 



THE EAGLE. 

A FRAGMENT. 

He clasps the crag with hooked hands ; 
Close to the sun in lonely lands, 
Ringed with the azure world, he stands. 

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls ; 
He watches from his mountain walls, 
And like a thunderbolt he falls. 

Alfred Tennyson. 



[&- 



THE OWL. 

In the hollow tree, in the old gray tower, 

The spectral owl doth dwell ; 
Dull, hated, despised, in the sunshine hour. 

But at dusk he 's abroad and well ! 
Not a bird of the forest e'er mates with him ; 

All mock him outright by day ; 
But at night, when the woods grow still and dim. 

The boldest will slirink away ! 

0, when the night falls, and roosts the foivl, 
Then, then, is the reign of the horned owl ! 

And the owl hath a bride, who is fond and bold. 

And loveth the wood's deep gloom ; 
And, witli eyes like the shine of the moonstone 
cold. 
She awaiteth her ghastly groom ; 
Not a feather she moves, not a carol she sings, 

As she waits in her tree so still ; 
But when her heart heareth his flapping wings, 
She hoots out her welcome shrill ! 

0, ivhen the moon shines, and dogs do howl, 
Then, then, is the joy of the horned owl ! 

Mourn not for the owl, nor his gloomy plight ! 

The owl hath his share of good : 
If a prisoner he be in the broad daylight, 

He is lord in the dark greenwood ! 
Nor lonely the bird, nor his ghastly mate, 

They ai'e each unto each a pride ; 
Thrice fonder, perhaps, since a strange, dark fate 
Hath rent them from all beside ! 

So, lohen the night falls, and dogs do lioivl. 
Sing, ho / for the reign of the horned owl ! 
We know not alway 
Who are kings by day. 
But the king of the night is the bold brown owl! 

BRYAN W. PROCTER (Barry Corinuall). 



■ff 



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484 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



"H] 



U- 



TO THE HUMBLEBEE. 

Burly, dozing humblebee ! 
Where thoii art is clime for me ; 
Let them sail for Porto Rique, 
Far-off heats through seas to seek, 
I will follow thee alone, 
Thou animated torrid zone ! 
Zigziag steerer, desert cheerer, 
Let me chase thy waving lines ; 
Keep me nearer, me thy hearer. 
Singing over shrubs and vines. 

Insect lover of the sun, 
Joy of thy dominion ! 
Sailor of the atmosphere ; 
Swimmer through the waves of air, 
Voyager of light and noon. 
Epicurean of June ! 
Wait, I prithee, till I come 
Within earshot of thy hum, — 
All without is martyrdom. 

When the south-wind, in May days, 
With a net of shining haze 
Silvers the horizon wall ; 
And, with softness touching ail, 
Tints the human countenance 
With the color of romance ; 
And infusing subtle heats 
Turns the sod to violets, — 
Thou in sunny solitudes, 
Eover of the underwoods, 
The green silence dost displace 
With thy mellow breezy bass. 

Hot midsummer's petted crone, 
Sweet to m'e thy drowsy tone 
Tells of countless sunny hours. 
Long days, and solid banks of flowers ; 
Of gulfs of sweetness without bound, 
In Indian wildernesses found ; 
Of Syrian peace, immortal leisure, 
Firmest cheer, and birdlike pleasure. 

Aught unsavory or unclean 
Hath my insect never seen ; 
But violets, and bilberry bells. 
Maple sap, aud daffodels, 
Grass Avith green flag half-mast high, 
Succory to match the sky, 
Columbine with horn of honey, 
Scented fern, and agrimony. 
Clover, catchfly, adder's-tongue, 
And brier-roses, dwelt among : 
All beside was unknown waste, 
All was picture as he passed. 
Wiser far than human seer. 
Yellow-breeched pliilosopher. 



Seeing only what is fair. 

Sipping only what is sweet. 
Thou dost mock at fate and care. 

Leave the chaff" and take the wheat. 
When the fierce northwestern blast 
Cools sea and land so far and fast, — 
Thou already slumberest deep ; 
Woe and want thou canst outsleep ; 
Want and woe, which torture us, 
Thy sleep makes ridiculous. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



A SOLILOQUY: 

OCCASIONED BY THE CHIRPING OF A GRASSHOPPER. 

Happy insect ! ever blest 
With a more than mortal rest. 
Rosy dews the leaves among, 
Humble joys, and gentle song ! 
Wretched poet ! ever curst 
With a life of lives the worst. 
Sad despondence, restless fears, 
Endless jealousies and tears. 

In the burning summer thou 
Warblest on the verdant bough, 
Meditating cheerful play, 
Mindless of the piercing ray ; 
Scorched in Cupid's fervors, I 
Ever weep and ever die. 

Proud to gratify thy will. 
Ready Nature waits thee still ; 
Balmy wines to thee she pours, 
Weeping through the dewy flowers, 
Rich as those by Hebe given 
To the thirsty sons of heaven. 

Yet, alas, we both agree. 
Miserable thou like me ! 
Each, alike, in youth rehearses 
Gentle strains and tender verses ; 
Ever wandering far from home. 
Mindless of the days to come 
(Such as aged Winter brings 
Trembling on his icy wings), 
Both alike at last we die ; 
Thou art starved, and so am I ! 

AVALTER HARTE. 



THE GRASSHOPPER, 

Happy insect ! what can be 
In happiness compared to thee ? 
Fed with nourishment divine, 
The dewy morning's gentle wine ! 
Nature waits upon thee still. 
And thy verdant cup does fill ; 
'T is filled wlierever thou dost tread, 
Nature's self 's thy Ganymede. 



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POEMS OF NATURE. 



48 



r^ 



Thou dost drink and dance and sing, 

Happier than the happiest king ! 

All the lields which thou dost see, 

All the plants helong to thee ; 

All the summer hours produce, 

Fertile made with early juice. 

Man for thee does sow and plough, 

Farmer he, and landlord thou ! 

Thou dost innocentlj' joy, 

Nor does thy luxury destroy. 

The shepherd gladly heareth thee, 

More harmonious than he. 

Thee country hinds with gladness hear, 

Prophet of the ripened year ! 

Thee Phffibus loves, and does inspire ; 

Phcebus is himself thy sire. 

To thee, of all things u^wn earth. 

Life is no longer than thy mirth. 

Happy insect ! happy thou 

Dost neither age nor winter know ; 

But when thou 'st drunk and danced and sung 

Thy fill, the flowery leaves among, 

(Voluptuous and wise withal. 

Epicurean animal !) 

Sated with thy summer feast. 

Thou retir'st to endless rest. 

From the Greek of AnacrEON, Trans- 
lation of Abraham Cowley. 



THE GRASSHOPPER AND CRICKET. 

The poetry of earth is never dead ; 

When all the birds are faint with the hot sun 

And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run 

Frona hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead. 

That is the grasshopper's, — he takes the lead 

In summer luxury, — he has never done 

With his delights ; for, when tired out Avith fun. 

He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed. 

The poetry of earth is ceasing never. 

On a lone winter evening, when the frost 

Plas wrought a silence, from the stove there 

shrills 
The cricket's song, in warmth increasing ever. 
And seems, to one in drowsiness half lost. 
The grasshopper's among some grassy hills. 

John Keats. 

♦ 

TO THE GRASSHOPPER AND CRICKET. 

Gkeen" little vaulter in the sunny grass, 
Catching your heart up at the feel of June, — . 
Sole voice that's heard amidst the lazy noon, 
When even the bees lag at the summoning brass ; 
And you, warm little housekeeper, Avho class 
With those who think the candles come too soon. 
Loving the fire, and with your tricksome tune 
Nick the glad silent moments as they pass ! 



sweet and tiny cousins, that belong. 
One to the fields, the other to the hearth. 
Both have your sunshine ; both, though small, 

arc strong 
At your clear hearts ; and both seem given to 

earth 
To sing in thoughtful ears this natural song, — 
In doors and out, summer and winter, mirth. 

LEIGH HUNT. 



THE CRICKET. 

Little inmate, full of mirth, 
Chirping on my kitchen hearth, 
Wheresoe'er be thine abode 
Always harbinger of good. 
Pay me for thy warm retreat 
With a song more soft and sweet ; 
In return thou shalt receive 
Such a strain as I can give. 

Thus thy praise shall be expressed, 
Inofi'ensive, welcome guest ! 
While the rat is on the scout, 
And the mouse with curious snout. 
With what vermin else infest 
Every dish, and spoil the best ; 
Frisking thus before the fire, 
Thou hast all thy heart's desire. 

Though in voice and shape they be 
Formed as if akin to thee, 
Thou surpassest, happier far. 
Happiest grasshoppers that are ; 
Theirs is but a summer's soiig, — 
Thine endures the winter long, 
Unimpaired and shrill and clear, 
Melody throughout the year. 

Neither night nor dawn of day 
Puts a period to thy play : 
Sing then — and extend thy span 
Far beyond the date of man. 
Wretched man, whose years are spent 
In repining discontent, 
Lives not, aged though he be, 
Half a span, compared with thee. 

Vi^ILLIAM COWPER. 



KATYDID. 

I love to hear thine earnest voice, 

Wherever thou art hid. 
Thou testy little dogmatist. 

Thou pretty Katydid ! 
Thou mindest me of gentlefolks, — 

Old gentlefolks are they, — 
Thou say'st an undisputed thing 

In such a solemn way. 



— ff 



fi- 



486 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



"*~B] 



B- 



Thou art a female, Katydid ! 

I know it by the trill 
That quivers through thy piercing notes, 

So petulant and shrill. 
I think there is a knot of you 

Beneath the hollow tree, — 
A knot of spinster Katydids, — 

Do Katydids drink tea ? 

0, tell me where did Katy live, 

And what did Katy do ? 
And was she very fair and young, 

And yet so wicked too ? 
Did Katy love a naughty man. 

Or kiss more cheeks than one ? 
I warrant Katy did no more 

Than many a Kate has done. 

OLIVER Wendell Holmes. 



TO A LOUSE, 

ON SEEING ONE ON A LADY'S BONNET AT CHURCH. 

Ha ! whare ye gaun, ye crawlin' ferlie ? 
Your impudence protects you sairly : 
I canna say but ye strunt rarely 

Owre gauze an' lace ; 
Though, faith ! I fear ye dine but sparelj'' 

On sic a place. 

Ye uglj^ creepin', blastit wonner, 
Detested, shunned by saunt an' sinner. 
How dare you set your fit upon her, 

Sae fine a lady ? 
Gae soinewhere else, and seek your dinner 

On some poor body. 

Swith, in some beggar's haffet squattle ; 
There je may creep and sprawl and sprattle 
Wi' ither kindred, jumping. cattle, 

In shoals and nations : 
Whare horn nor bane ne'er daur unsettle 

Your thick plantations. 

Now hand you there, ye 're out o' sight, 
Below tlie fatt'rels, snug an' tight ; 
Na, faith ye yet ! ye '11 no be right 

Till ye 've got on it. 
The very tapmost tow'ring height 

0' Miss's bonnet. 

My sooth ; right bauld ye set your nose out. 
As plump and gray as ony grozet ; 

for some rank, mercurial rozet, 

Or fell, red smeddum ! 

1 'd gie you sic a hearty dose o't. 

Wad dress your droddum ! 



I wad na been sui'prised to spy 
You on an auld wife's flannen toy ; 
Or aiblins some bit duddie boy. 

On 's wyliecoat ; 
But Miss's fine Lunardi, fie ! 

How daur ye do 't ? 

Jenny, dinna toss your head, 
An' set your beauties a' abread ! 
Ye little ken what cursed speed 

The blastie 's makin' ! 
Thae winks and finger-ends, I dread, 

Are notice takin' ! 

Avad some power the giftie gie us 

To see oursel's as ithers see us ! 

It wad frae monie a blunder free us. 

And foolish notion : 
What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us, 

And ev'n devotion ! 

Robert Burns. 



EEMONSTEANCE WITH THE SNAILS. 

Ye little snails. 
With slippery tails. 
Who noiselessly travel 
Along this gravel, 
By a silvery path of slime unsightly, 
I learn that you visit my pea-rows nightly. 
Felonious j^our visit, I guess ! 
And I give you this warning. 
That, every morning, 

I '11 strictly examine the pods ; 
And if one I hit on, 
With slaver or spit on, 

Your next meal will be with the gods. 

I own you 're a very ancient race, 

And Greece and Babylon were amid ; 
You have tenanted many a royal dome. 

And dwelt in the oldest pyramid ; 
The source of the Nile ! — 0, you have been there ! 

In the ark was your floodless bed ; 
On the moonless night of Marathon 

You crawled o'ei' the mighty dead ; 

But still, though I reverence your ancestries, 
I don't see why you should nibble my peas. 

The meadows are yours, — the hedgerow and 
brook. 

You may bathe in their dews at morn ; 
By the aged sea you may sound your shells, 

On the mountains erect your Jwrn ; 
The fruits and theflowers areyour rightful dowers. 

Then Avhy — in the name of wonder — 
Should my six pea-rows be the only cause 

To excite your midnight plunder ? 



Si 



[&^ 



POEMS OF NxVrURE. 



487 



ra 



I liave never disturbed your slender shells ; 

You have hung round my aged walk ; 
And each might have sat, till he died in his fat, 

Beneath his own cabbage-stalk : 
But now you must fly from the soil of your sires ; 

Then put on your liveliest crawl, 
And think of your poor little snails at home, 

Now orphans or emigrants all. 

Utensils domestic and civil and social 
1 give you an evening to jjack up ; 
But if the moon of this night does not rise on 
3'our flight, 
To-morrow I '11 hang each man Jack up. 
You '11 think of my peas and your thievish 

tricks, 
With tears of slime, when crossing the Styx. 

Anonymous. 



THE HOUSEKEEBER. 

The fi'ugal snail, with forecast of I'epose, 

Carries his house with him where'er he goes ; 

Peeps out, — and if there comes a shower of 

rain. 

Retreats to his small domicile again. 

Touch but a tip of him, a horn, — 't is well, — 

He curls up in his sanctuary shell. 

He 's his own landlord, his own tenant ; stay 

Long as he will, he dreads no Quarter Day. 

Himself he boards and lodges ; both invites 

And feasts himself ; sleeps with himself o' nights. 

He spares the upholsterer trouble to procure 

Chattels ; himself is his own furniture, 

And his sole riches. Wheresoe'er he roam, — 

Knock when you will, — he 's sure to be at 

home. 

Charles Lamb. 



TO A MOSQUITO. 

Eair insect, that, with thread-like legs spread 
out, 
And blood-extracting bill, and filmy wing. 
Dost murmur, as thou slowly sail'st about. 

In pitiless ears, full many a plaintive thing. 
And tell'st how little our large veins should 

bleed, 
Would we but yield them freely in thy need ; 

I call thee stranger, for the town, I ween, 
Has not the honor of so proud a birth ; 

Thou coni'st from Jersey meadows,* broad and 
green. 
The offspring of the gods, though born on earth. 



e- 



At length thy pinions fluttered in Broadway, — 
All, there were fairy steps, and white necks 
kissed 
By wanton airs, and eyes whose killing ray 
Shone through the snowy veils like stars 
through mist ! 
And, fresh as morn, on many a cheek and chin. 
Bloomed the bright blood tlirough the transpar- 
ent skin. 

0, these were sights to touch an anchorite ! — 
What, do I hear thy slender voice complain 1 

Thou wail est, when I talk of beauty's light. 
As if it brought the memory of pain : 

Thou art a wayward being, — well, come near. 

And pour thy tale of sorrow in my ear. 

What say'st thou, slanderer? "Rouge makes 
thee sick, 
And China bloom at best is sorry food ; 
And Rowland's Kalydor, if laid on thick. 

Poisons the thirsty wretch that bores for 
blood " ? 
Go, 't was a just reward that met thy crime, — 
But shun the sacrilege another time. 

That bloom was made to look at, not to touch. 
To worship, not approach, that radiant white ; 

And well might sudden vengeance light on such 
As dared, like thee, most impiously to bite. 

Thou shouldst have gazed at distance, and ad- 
mired, 

Murmured thy adoration, and retired. 

Thou 'rt welcome to the town ; but why come here 
To bleed a brother poet, gaunt like thee ? 

Alas ! the little blood I have is dear, 

And thin will be tlie bancjuet drawn from me. 

Look round, — the pale-eyed sisters, in my cell, 
Thy old acquaintance. Song and Famine, dwell. 

Try some plump alderman : and suck the blood 
Enriched with generous wine and costly meat ; 

In well-filled skins, soft as thy native mud. 
Fix thy light pump, and raise thy freckled feet. 

Go to the men for whom, in ocean's halls. 

The oyster breeds, and the green turtle sprawls. 

There corks are drawn, and the red vintage flows. 

To fill the swelling veins for thee ; and now 
The ruddy cheelc, and now the ruddier nose, 
Shall tempt thee as thou flittest round the 
brow ; 
And when the hour of sleep its quiet brings, 
jSTo angry hand shall rise to brush thy wings. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



& 



[8^ 



488 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



-■-a 



It 



PAN IN LOVE. 

Nay ! if j'ou will not sit upon my knee, 
Lie on that bank, and listen while I play 
A sylvan song upon these i-eedy pipes. 
In the full moonrise as I lay last night 
Lender the alders on Peneus' banks, 
Dabbling my hoofs in the cool sti'eam that welled 
Wine-dark with gleamy ripples round their roots, 
I made the song the while I shaped the pipes. 
'T is all of you and love, as j'^ou shall hear. 
The drooj^ing lilies, as I sang it, heaved 
Upon their broad green leaves, and underneath. 
Swift silvery fishes, poised on quivering fins, 
Plung motionless to listen ; in the grass 
The crickets ceased to slirill their tiny bells ; 
And even the nightingale, that all the eve. 
Hid in the grove's deep green, had throbbed and 

thrilled, 
Paused in his strain of love to list to mine. 
Bacchus is handsome, but such songs as this 
He cannot shape, and better loves the clash 
Of brazen cymbals than my reedy pipes. 
Fair as he is without, he 's coarse within, — 
Gross in his nature, loving noise and wine, 
And, tipsjr, half the time goes reeling round 
Leaning on old Silenus' shoulders fat. 
But I have scores of songs that no one knows, 
Not even Apollo, no, nor Mercury, — 
Their strings can never sing like my sweet 

pipes, — 
Some, that will make fierce tigers rub their fur 
Against the oak-trunks for delight, or stretch 
Their ptlunip sides for my pillow on the sward. 
Some, that will make the satyrs' clattering hoofs 
Leap when they hear, and from their noonday 

dreams 
■ Start up to stamp a wild and frolic dance 
In the green shadows. Ay ! and better songs, 
Made for the delicate nice ears of nymphs. 
Which while I slug my pipes shall imitate 
The droning bass of honey-seeking bees. 
The tinkling tenor of clear pebbly streams, 
The breezy alto of the alder's sighs. 
And all the airy sounds that lull the grove 
When noon falls fast asleep among the hills. • 
Nor only these, — for I can pipe to you 
Songs that will make the slippery vipers pause, 
And 'stay the stags to gaze with their great eyes ; 
Such songs — and you shall hear them if you 

will — 
That Bacchus' self would give his hide to hear. 
If you '11 but love me every day, I '11 bring 
The coyest flowers, such as you never saw. 
To deck you with. I knoAV their secret nooks, — 
They cannot hide themselves away from Pan. 
And you shall have rare garlands ; and your bed 
Of fragrant mosses shall be sprinkled o'er 



With violets like your eyes, — just for a kiss. 
Love me, and you shall do whate'er you like. 
And shall be tended wheresoe'er you go. 
And not a beast shall hurt j^ou, — not a toad 
But at your bidding give his jewel up. 
The speckled shining snakes shall never sting. 
But twist like bracelets round your rosy arms. 
And keep your bosom cool in the hot noon. 
You shall have berries ripe of every kind. 
And luscious peaches, and wild nectarines. 
And sun-flecked apricots, and honeyed dates, 
And wine from bee-stung grapes, drunk with the 

sun 
(Such wine as Bacchus never tasted yet). 
And not a poisonous plant shall have the power 
To tetter your white flesh, if you '11 love Pan. 
And then I '11 tell you tales that no one knows ; 
Of what the pines talk in the summer nights. 
When far above you hear them mui'nniring, 
As they sway whisjjering to the lifting breeze ; 
And what the storm shrieks to the struggling 

oaks 
As it flies through them hurrying to the sea 
From mountain crags and cliffs. Or, when you 're 

sad, 
I '11 tell you tales that solemn cypresses 
Have whispered to me. There 's not anything 
Hid in the woods and dales and dark ravines. 
Shadowed in dripping caves, or by the shore. 
Slipping from sight, but I can tell to you. 
Plump, dull-eared Bacchus, thinking of himself, 
Never can catch' a syllable of this ; 
But with my shaggy ear against the grass 
I hear the secrets hidden underground. 
And know how in the inner forge of Earth, 
The pulse-like hammers of creation beat. 
Old Pan is ugl}', rough, and rude to see, 
But no one knows such secrets as old Pan. 

William Wetmore Story. 



GOD EVERYWHERE IN NATURE. 

Ho'W desolate were nature, and how void 
Of every charm, how like a naked waste 
Of Africa, were not a present God 
Beheld employing, in its various scenes, 
His active might to animate and adorn ! 
What life and beauty, when, in all that breathes, 
Or moves, or grows, his hand is viewed at work ! 
When it is viewed unfolding every bud. 
Each blossom tingeing, shaping every leaf. 
Wafting each cloud that passes o'er the sky, 
Rolling each billow, moving every wing 
That fans the air, and every warbling throat 
Heard in the tuneful woodlands ! In the least 
As well as in the greatest of his works 



tf- 



— ff 



FRAGMENTS. 



Is ever manifest his presence kind ; 
As well in swarms of glittering insects, seen 
Quick to and fro within a foot of air, 
Dancing a merry Ijonr, then seen no more, 
As in the systems of resplendent worlds. 
Through time revolving in unbounded space. 
His eye, while comprehending in one view 
The whole creation, fixes full on me ; 
As on me shines the sun with his full blaze. 
While o'er the hemisphere he spreads the same, 
His hand, while holding oceans in its palm, 
And compassing the skies, surrounds my life, 
Guards the poor rushlight from the blast of death. 

CARLOS Wilcox. 



FEAGMENTS. 

God and Nature. 
Nature, the vicar of the almightie Lord. 

Assembly ofFoules. CHAUCER. 

'T is elder Scripture, writ by God's own hand : 
Scripture authentic ! uncorrupt by man. 

Night Thottghts, Night ix. DR. E. YOUNG. 

To the solid ground 
Of nature trusts the Mind that builds for aye. 

Miscellaneous Soimets. WORDSWORTH. 

The course of nature is the art of God. 

Night Thoughts, Night ix. DR. E. YOUNG. 

For Art may err, but Nature cannot miss. 

The Cock and Fox. DRYDEN. 

Who can paint 
Like Nature ? Can imagination boast, 
Amid its gay creation, hues like hers ? 

The Seasons : Spring. THOMSON. 

All nature is but art, unknown to thee ; 

All chance, direction, which thou canst not see ; 

All discord, harmony not understood ; 

All partial evil, universal good ; 

And spite of pride, in erring reason's spite, 

One truth is clear. Whatever is, is right. 

Jissay 071 Man, Epistle I. POPE. 

What more felicitie can fall to creature 
Than to enjoy delight with libertie, 
And to be lord of all the workes of Nature, 
To raine in th' aire from earth to highest .skie. 
To feed on flowres and weeds of glorious feature. 

The Fate of the Bnttcrjly. SPENSER. 

Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze. 
Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees. 

Essay oti Man, Epistle I. POPE. 



The meanest floweret of the vale, 
The simplest note that swells the gale, 
The common sun, the air, the skies, 
To him are opening paradise. 

Ode : On the Pleasure arising from Vicissitnde. T. GRAY. 

All are but parts of one stupendous whole, 
Whose body Nature is, and God the soul. 

Essay on Man, Epistle I, POPE. 



Country Life. 

But on and up, where Nature's heart 
Beats strong amid the hills. 

Tragedy of the Lac de Gaiibe. LORD HOUGHTON. 

Far from gay cities and the ways of men. 

Odyssey, Book xiv. Translation of POPE. HOMER. 

I care not. Fortune, what you me deny : 
You cannot rob me of free Nature's grace. 

The Castle of htdolence, CaJit, ii. THOMSON. 

for a seat in some poetic nook. 

Just hid with trees and sparkling with a brook. 

Politics and Poetics. LEIGH HUNT. 

And this our life, exempt from public haunt, 
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running 

brooks, 
Sermons in stones, and good in everything. 

As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

As in the eye of Nature he has lived, 
So in the eye of Nature let him die ! 

The Old Cumberland Beggar. AVORDSWORTH. 



Fair Exchange no Robbery. 

I '11 example you with thievery : 
The sun 's a thief, and with his great attraction 
Robs the vast sea : the moon 's an arrant thief, 
And her pale fire she snatches from the sun : 
The sea 's a thief, whose liquid surge resolves 
The moon into salt tears : the earth 's a thief. 
That feeds and breeds by a composture stolen 
From general excrement : each thing 's a thief. 

Timon of Athens, Ad \v. Sc. -i- SHAKESPEARE. 



Light and the Sky. 

Sweet rhosj>hor, bring the day ; 
Light will repay 
The wrongs of night ; 

Sweet Phosphor, bring the day ! 

Emblems, Book i. F. QUARLES. 

But soft ! methinks I scent the morning air. 

Hamlet, Acti.Sc. $• SHAKESPEARE. 



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G 



490 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



a 



jSTight wanes, — tlie vapors round the mountains 

curled 
Melt into morn, and light awakes the world. 

Lara. BYRON. 

So sinks the day-star in the ocean-bed, 
And yet anon repairs his drooping head, 
And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore 
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky. 

Lycidas. MILTON. 

But yonder comes the powerful King of Day 
Ftejoicing in the east. 

The Seasons : Summer. THOMSON. 

Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day 
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain-tops. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act iii. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Clothing the palpable and familiar 
AVith golden exhalations of the dawn. 

The Death of lVaUe7istein,Act\.Sc.l. S. T. COLERIDGE. 

Oh ! "darkly, deeply, beautifully blue," 
As some one somewhere sings about the sky. 

Don Juan, Cant. iv. BYRON. 

The soft blue sky did never melt 
Into his heart ; he never felt 
The witchery of the soft blue sky ! 

Peter Bell. WORDSWORTH. 

One of those heavenly days that cannot die. 

Nutting. WORDSWORTH. 

By day or star light thus from ray first dawn 
Of childhood didst thou intertwine for me 
The passions that build up our human soul. 



The Excttrsioji : The Prelude. 



WORDSWORTH. 



S 



Morning. 

The glow-worm shows the matin to be near. 
And 'gins to pale his uneffectual fire. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Fled 
Murmuring, and with him fled the shades of night. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MILTON. 

Till morning fair 
Came forth with pilgrim steps in amice gray. 

Paradise Regained, Book iv. MILTON. 

Morn, 
"Waked by the circling hours, with rosy hand 
Unbarred the gates of light. 

Paradise Lost, Book vi. MiLTON. 

Under the opening eyelids of the morn. 

Lycidas. MiLTON. 



The sun had long since in the lap 
Of Thetis taken out his nap, 
And, like a lobster boiled, the morn 
From black to red began to turn. 

Hudibras, Part II. Cant. ii. DR. S. BUTLER. 

Now morn, her rosy steps in the eastern clime 
Advancing, sowed the earth with orient pearl, 
When Adam waked, so customed, for his sleep 
Was aery-light, from pure digestion bred. 

Paradise Lost, Book v. MILTON. 

Up rose the sonne, and up rose Emelie. 

Canterbury Tales : The Knightes Tale. CHAUCER. 

The meek-eyed Morn appears, mother of dews. 

The Seasons : Summer. THOMSON. 

Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet 
With charm of earliest birds ; pleasant the sun, 
Wlien first on this delightful land he spreads 
His orient beams, on herb, tree, fmit, and flower, 
Glistering with dew. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MILTON. 

No tears 
Dim the sweet look that Nature wears. 



Sunrise on the Hills. 



LONGFELLOW. 



This morning, like the spirit of a youth 
That means to be of note, begins betimes. 

Antony and Cleofatra, Act iv. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive. 
But to be young was very Heaven ! 

The Prelude, Book xi. WORDSWORTH. 



Evening. 

Behold him setting in his western skies. 
The shadows lengthening as the vapors rise. 

Absalom and Achitophel, Part I. DRYDEN. 

Now sunk the sun ; the closing hour of da}'' 
Came onward, mantled o'er with sober gray ; 
Nature in silence bid the world repose. 

The Hermit. T. PARNELL. 

Parting day 
Dies like the dolphin, whom each pang imbues 
With a new color as it gasps away. 
The last still loveliest, till — 't is gone — and all 
is gray. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 

The day is done, and the darkness 

Falls from the wings of Night, 
As a feather is M^afted downward 

From an eagle in his flight. 

Tlie Day is Done. LONGFELLOW. 



Ifl^ 



FRAGMENTS. 



en ' — I 



491 



Meek Nature's evening comment on the shows 
That for oblivion take their daily birth 
From all the fuming vanities of earth. 

Sky-Prospect from tlie Plain of Fratice. WORDSWORTH. 

Sweet the coming on 
Of grateful evening mild ; then silent night 
With this hex solemn bird and this fair moon, 
And these the gems of heaven, her starry train. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MILTON. 

The star that bids the shepherd fold. 

Comus. MILTON. 

The dews of the evening most carefully shun, — 
Those tears of the sky for the loss of the sun. 

Advice to a Lady in AiUiimn. CHESTERFIELD. 

It is the hour when from the boughs 
The nightingale's high note is heard ; 

It is the hour when lovers' vows 

Seem sweet in every whispered word. 



Now spurs the lated traveller apace, 
To gain the timely inn. 



Macdeth, Act iii. Sc. 3. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Night. 

How beautiful is night ! 
A dewy freshness fills the silent air ; 
No mist obscures, nor cloud, nor speck, nor 
stain, 
Breaks the serene of heaven : 
In full-orbed glory, yonder moon divine 
Piolls tlirough the dark-blue depths. 
Beneath her steady ray 
The desert-circle spreads, 
Like the round ocean, girdled with the sky. 
How beautiful is night ! 

Thalaba. SOUTHEY. 

This sacred shade and solitude, what is it ? 
'T is the felt presence of the Deity. 

By night an atheist half believes a God. 

Night Thoughts, Night v. DR. E. YOUNG, 

Night, sable goddess ! from her ebon throne, 
In rayless majesty, now stretche.^; forth 
Her leaden sceptre o'er a slumbering world. 

Night Thoughts, Night i. DR. E. YOUNG. 

All is gentle ; naught 
Stirs rudely ; but, congenial with the night, 
"Whatever walks is gliding like a spirit. 

Doge 0/ Vejiice. BYRON. 



In the dead vast and middle of the night. 

Hainiet, Act i. Sc. 2, SHAKESPEARE. 

'T is now the very witching time of night. 
When churchyards yawn, and Hell itself 

breathes out 
Contagion to this world. 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Ham. The air bites shrewdly ; it is very cold. 
HoR. It is a nipping and an eager air. 

Hamlet, Act \.Sc. ^. SHAKESPEARE. 



The Moon. 

There does a sable cloud 
Turn forth her silver lining on the night, 
And cast a gleam over this tufted grove. 

Comus. MILTON. 

The dews of summer nights did fall, 
The moon, sweet regent of the sky. 

Silvered the walls of Cumnor Hall 
And many an oak that grew thereby. 

Cumnor Hall. W. J. MICKLE. 

Faery elves, 
Whose midnight revels, by a forest-side, 
Or fountain, some belated peasant sees, 
Or dreams he sees, while overhead the moon 
Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth 
Wheels her pale course. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MILTON. 

I see them on their winding way. 
Above their ranks the moonbeams play. 

And waving arms and banners bright 
Are glancing in the mellow light. 

Lines -written to a March. BISHOP HEBER. 

The moon looks 

On many brooks, 

"The brook can see no moon but this." 

While gazing on the moons light. MOORE. 

Insatiate archer ! could not one suffice ? 

Thy shaft flew thrice : and thrice my peace was 

slain ; 
And thrice, ere thrice yon moon had filled her 

horn. 

Night Thoughts, Night i. DR. E. YOUNG. 



The Stars. 
That full star that ushers in the even. 



Sonnet CXXXH. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Her blue eyes sought the west afar, 
For lovers love the western star. 

Lay of the Last Minstrel, Cant. iii. 



^ 



\Br. 



492 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



a 



And fast by, hanging in a golden chain 
This pendent world, in bigness as a star 
Of smallest magnitude close by the moon. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON. 

An host 
Innumerable as the stars of night. 
Or stars of morning, dew-drops, which the sun 
Impearls on every leaf and every flower. 

Paradise Lost, Book v. MlLTON. 

Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of 
the angels. 

Evangeline, Part f. LONCFELLONN'. 

But I am constant as the northern star, 
Of whose true-fixed and resting quality 
There is no fellow in the firmament. 



Julius Ca 



Shakespeare. 



Devotion ! daughter of astronomy 
An undevout astronomer is mad. 

Night Tkonghts, Night ix. 



Dr. E. You.ng. 



The Seasons. 

So issued forth the seasons of the year ; 
First lusty S])ring, all dight in leaves of flowers 
That freshly budded, and new blossoms did bear. 
In which a thousand birds liad built their bowers, 
That sweetly sung to call forth paramours ; 
And in his hand a javelin he did bear, 
And on his head (as fit for warlike stores) 
A gilt engraven morion he did wear. 
That, as some did him love, so others did him 
fear. 

Faerie Qaeene, Book v!i. SPENSER. 

The stormy March has come at last, 

With winds and clouds and changing skies ; 

1 hear the rushing of the blast 

That through the snowy valley flies. 

March. W. C. BRYANT. 

When proud-pied April, dressed in all his trim, 
Hath put a spirit of youth in everytliing. 



Sonne! XCmi. 



Shakespeare. 



C& 



0, how this spring of love resembleth 
l^lie uncertain glory of an April day ! 

The Tempest. Act ,. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

As it fell upon a day 

In the meriy montli of May, 

7 he Paisionale Pilgrim. SHAKESPEARE. 

For May wol have no slogardie a-night. 
The seson priketh every gentil herte, 
And maketli him out of his slepe to sterte. 

Canterbury Tales : The Knightes Tale. CHAUCER. 



In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts 
Bring sad thoughts to the mind. 

Lines written in Early Spring. WORDSWORTH. 

Come, gentle Spring ! ethereal Mildness ! come. 

The Seasons : Spring, THOMSON. 

Then came the jolly Summer, being dight 
In a thin silken cassock colored green, 
That was unlined, all to be more light, 
And on his head a garland well beseene. 

Faerie Queejie, Book vii. SPENSER. 

Joy rises in me, like a summer's morn. 

.-/ Christmas Carol. S. T. COLERIDGE. 



Still as night 



Or summer's noontide air. 

Paradise Lost. Book ii. 



This bud of lovely Summer's ripening breath. 
May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Then came the Autumne, all in yellow clad, 
As though he joyed in his plenteous store. 
Laden with fruits that made him laugh, full glad 
That he had banished hunger, which to-fore 
Had by the belly oft him pinched sore ; 
Upon his head a wreath, that was enrold 
With ears of come of every sort, he bore, 
And in his hand a sickle he did holde. 
To reape the ripeneil fruit the which the earth 
had yold. 



Autumn nodding o'er the yellow j)lain. 



The Seasons : Autun 



Thomson. 



And the ripe harvest of the new-mown hay 
Gives it a sweet and wholesome odor. 

Richard HI. {Altered), Act v. Sc. 3. COLLEV ClBBER. 

Lastly came Winter, cloathed all in frize. 
Chattering his teeth for cold tliat did him chill ; 
Whilst on his hoary beard his breath did ireeze, 
And the dull drops that from Ids purple bill 
As from a limbeck did adown distill ; 
In his right hand a tipped stalf he held 
With which his feeble steps he stayed still, 
For he was faint with cold and weak with eld, 
That scarce his loosed limbs he able was to weld. 

Faerie Quecne, Book vii. SPENSER. 

Winter, ruler of the inverted year. 

1 love thee, all unlovely as thou seem'st, 
And dreaded as thou art ! 

The Task: Winter Evening. COWPER. 



&-- 



FRAGMENTS. 



493 



■a 



Chaste as the icicle, 
That 's curded by the frost from purest snow, 
And hangs on Dian's temple : dear Valeria ! 

Corwlamis, Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Silently as a dream the fabric rose, 
No sound of hammer or of saw was there. 
Ice upon ice, the well-adjusted parts 
Were soon conjoined. 

The Task: Winter Mortiins Walk. COWPER. 



Sounds of Nature. 

Nor rural sights alone, but rural sounds, 
Exhilarate the spirit, and restore 
The tone of languid nature. 

The Task : The So/a. COWPER. 

See where it smokes along the sounding plain, 
Blown all aslant, a driving, dashing rain ; 
Peal upon peal, redoubling all around. 
Shakes it again and faster to the ground. 

Truth. COWPER. 

In winter when the dismal rain 

Came down in slanting lines. 
And Wind, that grand old harper, smote 

His thunder-harp of pines. 

A Life Drama. A. SJtlTH. 

Under the yaller-pines I house. 

When sunshine makes 'em all sweet-scented. 
An' hear among their furry boughs 

The baskin' west-wind purr contented. 

Biglow Papers, Seeo7id Series, No. x. J. R. LOWELL. 

The current, that with gentle murmur glides. 
Thou know'st, being stopped, impatiently doth 

rage ; 
But, when his fair course is not hindered, 
He makes sweet music with the enamelled stones. 
Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge 
He overtaketh in his pilgrimage. 

Two Gentlemeti ofVero7ia, Act ii. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

Every sound is sweet ; 
Myriads of rivulets huriying through the lawn. 
The moan of doves in immemorial elms. 
And murmuring of innumerable bees. 

The Princess, Cant. vii. TENNYSON. 



The Mountains. 
Over the hills and far away. . 

The Beggar's Opera, Act i. Sc. 1. 



J. Gay. 



Two voices are there ; one is of the sea. 
One of the mountains ; each a mighty Voice. 

Thought of a Briton on the Snbjugatioji of Siuitzeriajid. 



f& 



WORDSWORTH. 



Who first beholds those everlasting clouds. 
Seedtime and harvest, morning, noon, and night. 
Still where they were, steadfast, immovable ; 
Who first beholds the Alps — that mighty chain 
Of mountains, stretching on from east to west, 
So massive, yet so shadowy, so ethereal. 
As to belong rather to heaven than earth — 
But instantly receives into his soul 
A sense, a feeling that he loses not, 
A something that informs him 't is a moment 
Whence he may date henceibrward and forever ! 
Italy. Rogers. 

Mont Blanc is the monarch of mountains ; 

They crowned him long ago 
On a throne of rocks, in a robe of clouds, 

With a diadem of snow. 

Manfred, Act i. Sc. i. BYRON. 

I live not in myself, but I become 
Portion of that around me ; and to me 
High mountains are a feeling, but the hum 
Of human cities torture. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iii. BYRO.N'. 



Water. 

Mine be the breezy hill that skirts the down ; 
Whei'e a green grassy turf is all I crave. 
With here and there a violet bestrewn, 
Fast by a brook or fountain's murmuring wave ; 
And many an evening sun shine sweetly on my 
grave. 

The Minstrel, Book ii. J. Beattie. 

With spots of sunny openings, and with nooks 
To lie and I'ead in, sloping into brooks. 

The Sloiy of Rimini. L. HUNT. 

Under the cooling shadow of a, stately elm. 
Close sat I by a goodly river's side, 

Where gliding streams the rocks did overwhelm ; 
A lonely place, with pleasures dignified. 

I, that once loved the shady woods so well. 
Now thought the rivers did the trees excel. 

And if the sun would ever shine, there would I 
dwell. 

Contemplations. ANNE BRADSTREET. 

Let beeves and home-bred kine partake 
The sweets of Burn-mill meadow ; 

The swan on still St. Mary's Lake 
Float double, swan and shadow ! 

Yarro-w Unvisited. WORDSWORTH. 

Ill habits gather by unseen degrees. 

As brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas. 

Metamorphoses, Book xv. Translation o/DRYOEN. OviD. 



^l 



[fl-* 



494 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



--a 



By happy chance we saw 
A twofold image ; on a grassy bank 
A snow-white ram, and in the crystal flood 
Another and the same ! 

The Excursion, Book ix. WORDSWORTH. 

Along thy wild and willowed shore ; 
Where'er thou wind'st, by dale or hill, 
All, all is peaceful, all is still. 

Lay of the Last Minstrel, Cant. iv. SCOTT. 

The torrent's smoothness, ere it dash below ! 

Gertrude, Part III. T. CAMPBELL. 



Rain and Stoem. 

The lowering element 
Scowls o'er the darkened landscape. 



Paradise Lost, Book ii. 



The hooded clouds, like friars, 
Tell their beads in drops of rain. 



Midjiight Mass. 



LONGFELLOW. 



The thirsty earth soaks up the rain. 
And drinks and gapes for drink again ; 
The plants suck in the earth, and are 
With constant drinking fresh and fair. 

Anacreontiques. A. COWLEY. 

When that I was and a little tiny boy. 
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, 

A foolish thing was but a toy. 
For the rain it raineth every day. 

Twelfth Night, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks ! rage ! 
blow ! 

King Lear, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are. 
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm, 
How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides, 
Your looped and windowed raggedness, defend 

you 
From seasons such as these ? 

King Lear, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

From cloud to cloud the rending lightnings rage, 
Till, in the furious elemental war 
Dissolved, the whole precipitated mass 
Unbroken floods and solid torrents pour. 

The Seasons : Summer. THOMSON. 



Trees. 

One impulse from a vernal wood 
May teach you more of man, 
Of moral evil and of good. 
Than all the sages can. 

The Tables Turjied, 



WORDSWORTH. 



Those green-robed senators of mighty woods. 
Tall oaks, branch-charmed by the earnest stars. 
Dream, and so dream all night without a stir. 

Hyperion, Book i. KEATS. 



A brotherhood of venerable Trees. 



Sonnet composed at • 



• Castle. 



Wordsworth. 



Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks 
In Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shades 
High overarched imbower. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MiLTON. 

But 'neath yon crimson tree. 
Lover to listening maid might breathe his flame, 
Nor mark, within its roseate canopy, 

Her blush of maiden shame. 



Autu-)n7i Woods. 



W. C. BRYANT. 



Flovv^ers. 

No daintie flowre or herbe that gi'owes on grownd. 
No arborett with painted blossoms drest 
And smelling sweete, but there it might be fownd 
To bud out faire, and throwe her sweete smels 
al arownd. 

Fa'erie Queene, Book ii. Ca7it. vi. SPENSER. 

Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use 
Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks 
On whose fresh lap the swart-star sparely looks ; 
Throw hither all your quaint enamelled eyes. 
That on the green turf suck the honied showers. 
And purple all the ground with vernal flowers. 
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies. 
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine, 
The white pink, and the pansy freaked with jet. 
The glowing violet. 

The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine, 
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head. 
And every flower that sad embroidery wears. 

Lycidas. MILTON. 

Spake full well, in language quaint and olden. 
One who dwelleth by the castled Rhine, 

When he called the flowers, so blue and golden. 
Stars, that in earth's firmament do shine. 

Flowers. LONGFELLOW. 



Triumphal arch, that fill'st the sky, 
When storms prepare to part ; 

I ask not proud Philosophy 
To teach me what thou art. 



t&^ 



To the Rainbow. 



With coronet of fresh and fragrant flowers ; 
The same dew, which sometimes on the buds 
Was wont to swell, like round and orient pearls. 
Stood now within the pretty flow'rets' eyes, 
Like tears that did their own disgrace bewail. 

T. Campbell. ' Midsummer Night's Dream, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



495 



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With little here to do or see 

Of things that in the great woi'ld be, 

Sweet daisy ! oft I talk to thee. 

For thou art worthy, 
Thou unassuming commonplace 
Of niiture, with that homely face. 
And yet with something of a grace 

Which love makes for thee ! 

To tlic Daisy. WORDSWORTH. 

Myriads of daisies have shone forth in flower 
Near the lark's nest, and in their natural hour 
Have passed away ; less happy than the one 
That, by the unwilling ploughshare, died to 

prove 
The tender charm of poetry and love. 

Poems composed in the Suvimer of iZyi,. WORDSWORTH. 

We meet thee, like a pleasant thought. 
When such are wanted. 

To the Daisji. WORDSWORTH. 

Dear common flower, that grow'st beside the 
way, 
Fringing the dusty road with harmless gold, 

First pledge of blithesome May, 
Which children pluck, and, full of pride, uphold, 
High-hearted buccaneers, o'erjoyed that they 
An El Dorado in the grass have found, 

Which not the rich earth's ample round 
May match in wealth — thou art more dear to me 
Than all the prouder summer-blooms may be. 

To the Dandelion. J. R. LOWELL. 

Proserpina ! 
For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou let'st fall 
From Dis's wagon ! daff'odils, 
That come before the swallow dares, and take 
The winds of March with beauty ; violets, dim. 
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes, 
Or Cytlierea's breath ; pale primroses, 
Tliat die unmarried ere they can behold 
Bright Phcebus in his strength — ■ . 

bold oxlips, and 
The crown imperial ; lilies of all kinds. 

The Winter's Tale, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

A primrose by a river's brim 
A yellow primrose was to him, 
And it was nothing more. 

Peter Bell. WORDSWORTH. 

I know a bank where the wild thyme blows. 
Where ox-lips and the nodding violet grows ; 
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine. 
With sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine. 

Midsummer Night's Dream, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Desert caves, 
With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergi'own. 

• Lycidas. MiLTON. 



There 's rosemary, that 's for remembrance ; 
pray you, love, remember : — and there is pansies, 
that 's for thoughts, 

Hamlet, Act'w. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

0, it came o'er my ear like the sweet South, 
That breathes upon a bank of violets, 
Stealing and giving odors. 

Twelfth Night, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

But earthlier happy is the rose distilled, 

Than that which, withering on the virgin thorn. 

Grows, lives, and dies, in single blessedness. 

Midsummer Night's Dream, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Then will I raise aloft the milk-white rose. 
With whose sweet smell the air shall be per- 
fumed. 

King Henry VI., Part II. Act i. Sc.i. SHAKESPEARE. 

The Frenchman's darling.* 

The Task : IVinter Evening. COWPER. 

And 't is my faith that every flower 
Enjoys the air it breathes. 



Lines written in Early Spring. 



WORDSWORTH. 



AxiMATE Nature. 

I shall not ask Jean Jaques Rousseau 
If birds confabulate or no. 
'T is clear that they were always able 
To hold discourse — at least in fable. 

Pairing Time Anticipated, COWPER. 

Rise with the lark, and with the lark to bed. 

The P'illage Curate. J. HURDIS. 

Call for the robin-redbreast and the wren. 
Since o'er shady groves they hover. 
And with leaves and flowers do cover 
The friendless bodies of unburied men. 

The White Devil, Act v. Sc. 2. J. WEBSTER. 

What bird so sings, yet so does wail ? 
0, 't is the ravished nightingale — 
Jug, jug, jug, jug — tereu^ — she cries. 
And still her woes at midnight rise. 
Brave prick-song ! who is 't now we hear ? 
None but the lark so shrill and clear. 
Now at heaven's gate she claps her wings. 
The morn not waking till she sings. 
Hark, hark ! but what a pretty note. 
Poor Robin-redbreast tunes his throat ; 
Hark, how the jolly cuckoos sing 
" Cuckoo ! " to welcome in the spring. 

Alexander and Campaspe, Act v. Sc. i. JOHN LYLV. 



* Bartlett says, '* It was Cowper who gave this i 
to the Mignonette." 



J common name 



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496 



POEMS OF NATURE. 



a 



nightingale, that on yon bloomy spray 

Warblest at eve, when all the woods are still ; 
Thou with fresh hope the lover's heart dost fill 

AVhile the jolly Hours lead on propitious May. 

Thy liquid notes, that close the eye of day, 

Portend success in love. 

To the NigJUiiigalc, MiLTON. 

The crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark 
When neither is attended ; and I think 
The nightingale, if she should sing by day. 
When every goose is cackling, would be thought 
No better a musician than the wren. 
How many things by season seasoned are 
To their right praise and true perfection. 

Mercha7it of Venice, Act v. 5c. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

So, naturalists observe, a flea 
Has smaller fleas that on him prey ; 
And these have smaller still to bite 'em ; 
And so proceed ad infinitum. 

Poetry, a Rhapsody. SWIFT. 



A harmless necessary cat. 

Merchant of Venice, Act iv. Sc. i. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



The spider's touch, how exquisitely fine ! 
Feels at each thread, and lives along the line. 

Essay on Afan, Epistle I. POPE. 

A poor sequestered stag. 
That from the hunter's aim had ta'en a hurt, 
Did come to languish ; . . . 

and the big round tears 
Coursed one another down his innocent nose 
In piteous chase. 

As Vou Like It, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to-day, 
Had he thy reason, would he skip and play ? 
Pleased to the last, he crops the flowery food, 
And licks the hand just raised to shed his blood. 

Essay on Man, Epistle I. POPE. 

Now half appeared 
The tawny lion,* pawing to get free 
His hinder parts, then springs as broke from 

bonds, 
And rampant shakes his brinded mane. 

Paradise Lost, Book vii. MiLTON. 

• See Mr. Bryant's Introductioji, page 32. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



AVAR. 



WAE FOR THE SAKE OF PEACE. 



FROM " BRITANNIA. 



FIRST of human blessings, and supreme ! 
Fair Peace ! how lovely, how delightful thou ! 
By whose wide tie the kindred sons of men 
Like brothers live, in amity combined 
And unsuspicious faith ; while honest toil 
Gives every joy, and to those joys a right 
Which idle, barbarous rapine but usurps. 
Pure is tliy reign. 

What would not. Peace ! the patriot bear for 
thee ? 
AVhat painful patience ? What incessant care ? 
Wliat mixed anxiety ? What sleepless toil ? 
p]'en from the rash protected, what reproach ? 
For he thy value knows ; thj' friendship he 
To human nature : but the better tliou, 
The richer of delight, sometimes the more 
Inevitable war, — when ruffian force 
Awakes the fury of an injured state. 
E'en the good patient man whom reason rules, 
Ptoused by bold insult and injurious rage. 
With sharp and sudden check the astonished sons 
Of violence confounds ; firm as his cause 
His bolder heart ; in awful justice clad ; 
His eyes effulging a peculiar fire : 
And, as he charges through the prostrate war, 
His keen arm teaches faithless men no more 
To dare the sacred vengeance of the just. 

Then ardent rise ! 0, great in vengeance rise ! 
O'erturn the proud, teach rapine to restore ; 
And, as you ride sublimely round the world, 
Make every vessel stoop, make every state 
At once their welfare and their duty know. 

James Thomson. 



WAR. 



Ah ! whence yon glare. 
That fires the arch of heaven ? — that dark-red 

smoke 
Blotting the silver moon ? The stars are quenched 



In darkness, and pure and spangling snow 
Gleams faintly through the gloom that gathers 

round ! 
Hark to that roar, whose swift and deafening 

peals 
In countless echoes through the mountains ring. 
Startling pale midniglit on her starry throne ! 
Now swells the intermingling din ; the jar 
Frequent and frightful of the bursting bomb ; 
The falling beam, the sliriek, the groan, the 

shout. 
The ceaseless clangor, and the rush of men 
Inebriate witli rage ; — loud, and more loud 
The discord grows ; till pale death shuts the 

scene. 
And o'er the conqueror and the conquered draws 
His cold and bloody shroud. — Of all the men 
Whom day's departing beam saw blooming there. 
In proud and vigorous health ; of all the hearts 
That beat with anxious life at sunset there. 
How few survive, how few are beating now ! 
All is deep silence, like the fearful calm 
That slumbers in the storm's portentous pause ; 
Save when the frantic wail of widowed love 
Comes shuddering on the blast, or the faint moan 
With which some soul bursts from the frame of 

clay 
Wrapt round its struggling powers. 

The gray morn 
Dawns on the mournful scene ; the sulphurous 

smoke 
Before the icy wind slow rolls away, 
And the bright beams of frosty morning dance 
Along the spangling snow. Tliere tracks of blood 
Even to the forest's depth, and scattered arms, 
And lifeless warriors, whose hard lineaments 
Death's self could change not, mark the dreadful 

path 
Of the outsallying victors ; far behind. 
Black ashes note where their proud city stood. 
Within yon forest is a gloomy glen, — 
Each tree which guards its darkness from the 

day 
Waves o'er a warrior's tomb. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



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War is the statesman's game, the priest's delight, 
The lawyer's jest, the hired assassin's trade. 
And to those royal murderers whose mean thrones 
Are bought by crimes of treachery and gore, 
The bread they eat, the staff on which they lean. 
Guards, garbed in blood-red livery, surround 
Their palaces, participate the crimes 
That force defends, and from a nation's rage 
Secure the crown, which all the curses reach 
That famine, frenzy, woe, and penury breathe. 
These are the hired bravos who defend 
The tyrant's throne. 

PERCY Bysshe Shelley. 



I& 



BATTLE OF THE ANGELS. 

FROM " PARADISE LOST," BOOK VI. 
THE ARRAY. 

Now went forth the morn, 
Such as in highest heaven, arrayed in gold 
Empyreal ; from before her vanished night. 
Shot through with orient beams ; when all the 

plain 
Covered with thick embattled squadrons bright, 
Chariots, and flaming arms, and fiery steeds. 
Reflecting blaze on blaze, first met his view. 

The apostate in his sun-bright chariot sat, 

Idol of majesty divine, enclosed 

With flaming cherubim, and golden shields ; 

Then lighted from his gorgeous throne, for now 

'Twixt host and host but narrow space was left, 

A dreadful interval, and front to front 

Presented stood in terrible array 

Of hideous length : before the cloudy van. 

On the rough edge of battle ere it joined, 

Satan, with vast and haughty strides advanced, 

Came towering, armed in adamant and gold. 

THE CONFLICT. 

Michael bid sound 
The archangel trumpet ; through the vast of 

heaven 
It sounded, and the faithful armies rung 
Hosanna to the Highest : nor stood at gaze 
The adverse legions, nor less hideous joined 
The horrid shock. Now storming fury rose. 
And clamor, such as heard in heaven till now 
Was never ; arms on armor clashing brayed 
Horrible discord, and the madding wheels 
Of brazen chariots raged ; dire was the noise 
Of conflict ; overhead the dismal hiss 
Of fiery darts in flaming volleys flew. 
And flying vaulted either host with fire. 
So under fiery cope together rushed 
Both battles main, with ruinous assault 



And inextinguishable rage. All heaven 
Resounded ; and had earth been then, all earth 
Had to her centre shook. 

Deeds of eternal fame 
Were done, but infinite : for wide was spread 
That war, and various: sometimes on firm ground 
A standing fight, then, soaring on main wing. 
Tormented all the air ; all air seemed then 
Conflicting fire. 

Forthwith (behold the excellence, the power 

Which God hath in his mighty angels pla(;ed !) 

Their arms awaj^ they threw, and to the hills 

(For earth hath this variety from heaven. 

Of pleasure situate in hill and dale), 

Light as the lightning glimpse they ran, they 

flew, 
From their foundations loosening to and fro. 
They plucked the seated hills, with all their load. 
Rocks, waters, woods, and by the shaggy tops 
Uplifting bore them in their hands : amaze. 
Be sure, and teri'or, seized the I'ebel host, 
W^hen coming towards them so dread they saw 
The bottom of the mountains upward tuined, 

and on their heads 
JMain promontories flung, which in the air 
Came shadowing, and oppressed whole legions 

armed ; 
Their armor helped their harm, crushed in and 

bruised 
Into their substance pent, which wrought them 

pain 
Implacable, and man_y a dolorous groan ; 
Long struggling underneath, ere they could wind 
Out of such prison, though spirits of purest light, 
Purest at first, now gross by sinning grown. 
The rest, in imitation, to like arms 
Betook them, and the neighboring hills uptore : 
So hills amid the air encountered hills. 
Hurled to and fro with jaculation dire. 
That underground they fought in dismal shade ; 
Infernal noise ! war seemed a civil game 
To this uproar ; horrid confusion heaped 
Upon confusion rose. 



THE VICTOR. 

So spake the Son, and into terror changed 
His countenance too severe to be beheld, 
And full of wrath bent on his enemies. 
At once the four spread out their starry wings 
With dreadful shade contiguous, and the orbs 
Of his fierce chariot rolled, as with the sound 
Of torrent floods, or of a numerous host. 
He on his impious foes right onward drove, 
Gloomy as night : under his burning wheels 
The steadfast empyrean shook throughout, 



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WAR. 



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All but the throne itself of God. Full soon 
Among them he arrived ; in his right hand 
Grasping ten thousand thunders, which he sent 
Before him, such as in their souls infixed 
Plagues : they, astonished, all resistance lost. 
All courage ; down their idle weapons dropt ; 
O'er shields, and helms, and helmed heads he 

rode 
Of thrones and mighty seraphim prostrate. 
That wished the mountains now might be again 
Thrown on them, as a shelter from his ire. 
Nor less on either side tempestuous fell 
His arrows, from the fourfold-visaged Four 
Distinct with eyes, and from the living wheels 
Distinct alike with multitude of eyes ; 
One sjjirit in them ruled ; and every eye 
Glared lightning, and shot forth pernicious fire 
Among the accursed, that withered all their 

strength. 
And of their wonted vigor left them drained. 
Exhausted, spiritless, aiflicted, fallen. 
Yet half his strength he put not forth, but 

checked 
His thunder in mid volley ; for he meant 
Not to destroy, but root them out of heaven : 
The oveithrown he raised, and as a herd 
Of goats or timoroirs flock together thronged. 
Drove them before him thunderstruck, pursued 
With terrors and with furies, to the bounds 
And crystal wall of heaven ; which, opening wide, 
Rolled inward, and a spacious gap disclosed 
Into the wasteful deep : the monstrous sight 
Struck them with horror backward, but far worse 
Urged them behind : headlong themselves they 

threw 
Down from the verge of heaven ; eternal wrath 
Burnt after them to the bottomless pit. 



THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB. 

FROM "HEBREW MELODIES." 

The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the 

fold, 
And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and 

gold ; 
And the sheen of their spears was like stars on 

the sea. 
When the blue wave rolls nightly on deejj 

Galilee. 

Like the leaves of the forest when summer is 

green. 
That host with their banners at sunset were seen: 
Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath 

blown, 
That host on the morrow lay withered and 

strown. 



For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the 

blast, 
And breatlied in the face of the foe as he passed; 
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and 

chill. 
And their hearts but once heaved, and forever 

grew still ! 

And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, 
But through it there rolled not the breath of his 

pride : 
And the foam of his gasping lay white on the 

turf. 
And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf 

And there lay the rider distorted and pale. 
With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his 

mail ; 
And the tents were all silent, the banners alone, 
The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown. 

And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail, 
And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal ; 
And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the 

sword, 
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord ! 

Lord Bvron. 



CATILINE TO THE ROMAN ARMY. 

from "CATILINE." ACT V. SO. 2. 

Sound all to arms ! {A flourish of trumpets. ) 
Call in the captains, — ( 7'o cm officer. ) 

I would speak with them ! 
{The officer goes.) 
Now, Hope ! away, — and welcome gallant 

Death ! 
Welcome the clanging shield, the trumpet's 

yell, - 

Welcome the fever of the mounting blood, 
That makes wounds light, and battle's crimson 

toil 
Seem but a sport, — and welcome the cold bed, 
Where soldiers with their upturned faces lie, — 
And welcome wolf's and vulture's hungry throats. 
That make their seiiulchres ! We fight to-night. 

{The soldiery enter.') 
Centurions ! all is ruined ! I disdain 
To hide the truth from j^ou. The die is thrown ! 
And now, let each that wishes for long life 
Put up his sword, and kneel for peace to Rome. 
Ye all are free to go. What ! no man stirs ! 
Not one ! a soldier's spiiit in you all ? 
Give me your hands ! (This moisture in my eyes 
Is womanish, — 't will jiass. ) ]\Iy noble hearts ! 
Well have you chosen to die ! For, m my mind, 
The grave is better than o'erburdened life ; 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



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Better the quick release of glorious wounds, 
Than the eternal taunts of galling tongues ; 
Better the spear-head quivering in the heart, 
Than daily struggle against fortune's curse ; 
Better, in manhood's muscle and high blood, 
To leap the gulf, than totter to its edge 
In poverty, dull pain, and base decay. 
Once more, I say, — are ye resolved ? 

{The soldiers shout, "All ! All ! ") 
Then, each man to his tent, and take the arms 
That he would love to die in, — for, this hour, 
We storm the Consul's camp. A last farewell ! 

{He takes their hands.) 
When next we meet, — we'll have no time to look, 
How parting clouds a soldier's countenance. 
Few as we are, we '11 rouse them with a peal 
That shall shake Rome ! 
Now to your cohorts' heads ; — the word 's — 

Revenge ! 

George Croly. 



u 



THE BALLAD OF AGINCOURT. 

Fair stood the wind for France, 
When we our sails advance, 
Nor now to prove our chance 

Longer will tarry ; 
But pi;tting to the main, 
At Kause, the mouth of Seine, 
With all his martial train. 

Landed King Harry, 

And taking many a fort. 
Furnished in warlike sort. 
Marched towards Agincourt 

In happy hour, — 
Skirmishing day by day 
With those that stopped his way, 
Where the French general lay 

With all his power. 

Which in his height of pride, 
King Henry to deride, 
His ransom to provide 

To the king sending ; 
Which he neglects the while, 
As from a nation vile. 
Yet, with an angiy smile. 

Their fall portending. 

And turning to his men, 
Quoth our brave Henry then : 
Though they to one be ten, 

Be not amazed ; 
Yet have we well begun, 
Battles so bravely won 
Have ever to the sun 

By fame been raised. 



And for myself, quoth he. 
This my full rest shall be ; 
England ne'er mourn for me. 

Nor more esteem me, 
Victor I will remain. 
Or on this earth lie slain ; 
Never shall she sustain 

Loss to redeem me. 

Poitiers and Cressy tell, 

When most their pride did swell, 

Under our swords they fell; 

No less our skill is 
Than when our grandsire great, 
Claiming the regal seat. 
By many a warlike feat 

Lopped the French lilies. 

The Duke of York so dread 
The eager vaward led ; 
With the main Henry sped. 

Amongst his henchmen, 
Excester had the rear, — 
A braver man not there : 
Lord ! how hot they were 

On the false Frenchmen ! 

They now to fight are gone ; 

Armor on armor shone ; 

Drum now to drum did groan, — 

To hear was wonder ; 
That with the cries they make 
The very earth did shake ; 
Trumpet to trumpet spake, 

Thunder to thunder. 

Well it thine age became, 
noble Erpingham ! 
Which did the signal aim ^ 

To our hid forces ; 
When, from a meadow by, 
Like a storm, siiddenly. 
The English archery 

Struck the French horses 

With Spanish yew so strong, 
Arrows a cloth-yard long. 
That like to serpents stung. 

Piercing the weather ; 
None from his fellow starts. 
But playing manly i)arts. 
And, like true English hearts. 

Stuck close together. 

When down their bows they threw. 
And forth tlieir bilboes drew. 
And on the French tliey (lew. 
Not one was tardy ; 



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503 



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Arms were from shoulders sent ; 
Scalps to the teeth were rent ; 
Down the French peasants went ; 
Our men were hardy. 

This while our noble king, 
His broadsword brandishing, 
Down the French host did ding, 

As to o'erwhelm it ; 
And many a deep wound lent, 
His arms with blood besprent, 
And many a cruel dent 

Bruised his helmet. 

Glo'ster, that duke so good, 
Next of the royal blood, 
For famous England stood 

"With his brave brother, 
Clarence, in steel so bright. 
Though but a maiden knight, 
Yet in that furious fight 

Scarce such another. 

Warwick in blood did wade ; 
Oxford the foe invade. 
And cruel slaughter made, 

Still as they ran up. 
Suffolk his axe did ply ; 
Beaumont and Willoughby 
Bare them right doughtily, 

Ferrers and Fanhope. 

Upon St. Crispin's day 
Fought was this noble fray, 
"Which fame did not delay 

To England to caiTy ; 
0, when shall Englishmen 
"W^ith such acts fill a pen. 
Or England breed again 

Such a King Harry ? 

MICHAEL DRAYTON. 



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THE KING TO HIS SOLDIERS BEFORE 
HARFLEUR. 

FROM "KING HENRY V.," ACT III. SC. I. 

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, 
once more ; 
Or close the wall up with our English dead ! 
In peace, there 's nothing so becomes a man. 
As modest stillness, and humility : 
But when the blast of war blows in our ears, 
Then imitate the action of the tiger ; 
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood. 
Disguise fair nature with hard-favored rage : 
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect ; 
Let it pry through the portage of the head, 



Like the brass cannon ; let the brow o'erwhelm it. 
As fearfully as doth a galled rock 
O'erhang and jutty his confounded base, 
Swilled with the wild and wasteful ocean. 
Now set the teeth, and stretch the nostril wide ; 
Hold hard the breath, and l^end up every spirit 
To his full height ! — On, on, you noblest 

English, 
"Whose blood is fet from fathers of war- proof ! 
Fathers, that, like so many Alexanders, 
Have, in these parts, from morn till even fought, 
Aud sheathed their swords for lack of argument. 
Dishonor not your mothers ; now attest. 
That those whom you called fathers, did beget 

you! 
Be copy now to men of grosser blood, 
And teach them how to war ! -— And you, good 

yeomen, 
"Whose limbs were made in England, show us 

here 
The mettle of your pasture ; let us swear 
That you are worth your breeding : which I 

doubt not ; 
For there is none of you so mean and base, 
That hath not noble lustre in your eyes. 
I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips, 
Straining upon the start. The game 's afoot ; 
Follow your spirit : and, upon this charge, 
Cry — God for Harry! England! and Saint 

Geoi'ge ! 

SHAKESPEARE. 



OF THE WARRES IN IRELAND. 

FROM •' EPIGRAMS," BOOK IV. EP. 6. 

I PRAISED the speech, but cannot now abide it, 
That warre is sweet to those that have not try'd it; 
For I have proved it now and plainly see 't, 
It is so sweet, it maketh all things sweet. 
Athome Canaric wines and Greek grow lothsome; 
Here milk is nectar, water tasteth toothsome. 
There without baked, rost, boyl'd, it is no cheere ; 
Bisket we like, and Bonny Clabo here. 
There we complaine of one wan rested chick ; 
Here meat worse cookt ne're makes us sick. 
At home in silken sparrers, beds of Down, 
"We scant can rest, but still tosse up and down ; 
Here we can sleep, a saddle to our pillow, 
A hedge the Curtaine, Canopy a "Willow. 
There if a child but cry, what a spite ! 
Here we can brook three larums in one night. 
There homely rooms must be perfumed with 

Roses ; 
Here match and powder ne're offend our noses. 
There from a storm of rain we run like Pullets ; 
Here we stand fast against a showre of bullets. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



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Lo, then how greatly their opinions erre, 
That think there is no great delight in warre ; 
But yet for this, sweet warre, lie be thy debtor, 
I shall forever love my home the better. 

Sir John Harrington. 



fe 



THE HEART OF THE BRUCE. 

It was upon an April morn, 

While yet the frost lay hoar. 
We heard Lord James's bugle-horn 

Sound by the rocky shore. 

Then down we went, a hundred knights. 

All in our dark array. 
And flung our armor in the ships 

That rode within the bay. 

We spoke not as the shore grew less, 

But gazed in silence back, 
AVhere the long billows swept away 

The foam behind our track. 

And aye the purple hues decayed 

Upon the fading hill. 
And but one heart in all that ship 

Was tranquil, cold, and still. 

The good Lord Douglas paced the deck. 

And 0, his face was Avan ! 
Unlike the flush it used to wear 

When in the battle-van. — 

" Come hither, come hither, my trusty knight. 

Sir Simon of the Lee ; 
There is a freit lies near my soul 

I fain would tell to thee. 

" Thou know'st the words King Robert spoke 

Upon his dying day : 
How he bade take his noble heart 

And carry it far away ; 

" And lay it in the holy soil 

Where once the Saviour trod. 
Since he might not bear the blessed Cross, 

Nor strike one blow for God. 

" Last night as in my bed I lay, 

1 dreamed a dreary dream : — 
Methought I saw a Pilgrim stand 

In the moonlight's (quivering beam. 

' ' His robe was of the azure dye, 

Snow-white his scattered hairs, 
And even such a cross he bore 

As good St. Andrew bears. 



" ' Why go ye forth. Lord James,' he said, 
' AVith spear and belted brand ? 

Wliy do you take its dearest pledge 
From this our Scottish land ? 

" 'The sultry breeze of Galilee 
Ci'eeps through its groves of palm. 

The olives on the Holy Mount 
Stand glittering in the calm. 

" ' But 'tis not there that Scotland's heart 

Shall rest, by God's decree. 
Till the great angel calls the dead 

To rise from earth and sea ! 

" ' Lord James of Douglas, mark my rede ! 

That heart shall pass once more 
In fiery fight against the foe, 

As it was wont of yore. 

' ' ' And it shall pass beneath the Cross, 
And save King Robert's vow ; 

But other hands shall bear it back. 
Not, James of Douglas, thou ! ' 

" Now, by thy knightly faith, I pray. 

Sir Simon of the Lee, — 
For truer friend had never man 

Than thou hast been to me, — 

"If ne'er upon the Holy Land 

'T is mine in life to tread, 
Bear thou to Scotland's kindly earth 

The relics of her dead." 

The tear was in Sir Simon's eye 
As he wrung the warrior's hand, - 

" Betide me weal, betide me woe, 
I '11 hold by thy command. 

" But if in battle-front, Lord James, 

'T is ours once more to ride, 
Nor force of man, nor craft of fiend. 

Shall cleave me from thy side ! " 

And aye we sailed and aye M'e sailed 

Across the weary sea. 
Until one morn the coast of Spain 

Rose grimly on our lee. 

And as we rounded to the port. 
Beneath the watch-tower's wall. 

We heard the clash of the atabals, 
And the trumpet's wavering call. 

" Why sounds j'on Eastern music here 

So wantonly and long, 
And whose the crowd of armed men 

That round yon standard throng ? " 



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" The Moors have come from Africa 

To spoil and waste and slay, 
And King Alonzo of Castile 

Must fight with them to-day," 

" Now shame it were," cried good Lord James, 

" Shall never be said of me 
That I and mine have turned aside 

From the Cross in jeopardie ! 

"Have down, have down, my merry men all, — 

Have down unto the plain ; 
We '11 let the Scottish lion loose 

"Within the fields of Spain ! " 

" ISTow welcome to me, nohle lord, 

Thou and thy stalwart power ; 
Dear is the sight of a Christian knight, 

Who comes in such an hour ! 

" Is it for bond or faith you come, 

Or yet for golden fee ? 
Or bring ye France's lilies here, 

Or the flower of Burgundie ? " 

" God greet thee well, thou valiant king, 

Thee and thy belted peers, — 
Sir James of Douglas am I called. 

And these are Scottish spears. 

"We do not fight for bond or plight, 

Nor yet for golden fee ; 
But for the sake of our blessed Lord, 

Who died upon the tree. 

" We bring our great King Robert's heart 

Across the weltering wave. 
To lay it in the holy soil 

Hard by the Saviour's grave. 

" True pilgrims we, by land or sea, 

Where danger bars the way ; 
And therefore are we here. Lord King, 

To ride with thee this day ! " 

The King has bent his stately head. 
And the tears were in his eyne, — 

" God's blessing on thee, noble knight, 
For this brave thought of thine ! 

" I know thy name full well, Lord James ; 

And honored may I be. 
That those who fought beside the Bruce 

Should fight this day for me ! 

" Take thou the leading of the van, 

And charge the Moors amain ; 
There is not such a lance as thine 

Li all the host of Spain ! " 



The Douglas turned towards us then, 

0, but his glance was high ! — 
" There is not one of all my men 

But is as bold as L 

" There is not one of all my knights 

Bi;t bears as true a spear, — 
Then onward, Scottish gentlemen. 

And think King Ptobert 's here ! " 

The trumpets blew, the cross-bolts flew, 

The arrows flashed like flame. 
As spur in side, and spear in rest. 

Against the foe we came. 

And many a bearded Saracen 

Went down, both horse and man ; 

For through their ranks we rode like com, 
So furiously we ran ! 

But in behind our path they closed. 

Though fain to let us through. 
For they were forty thousand men, 

And we were wondrous few. 

We might not see a lance's length, 

So dense was their array, 
But the long fell sweep of the Scottish blade 

Still held them hard at bay. 

"Make in ! make in ! " Lord Douglas cried — 

" Make in, my brethren dear ! 
Sir William of St. Clair is down ; 

We may not leave him here ! " 

But thicker, thicker grew the swarm, 

And sharper shot the rain. 
And the horses reared amid the press. 

But they would not charge again. 

" Now Jesu help thee," said Lord James, 
" Thou kind and true St. Clair ! 

An' if I may not bring thee ofl", 
I '11 die beside thee there ! " 

Then in his stirrups up he stood. 

So lion-like and bold, 
And held the precious heart aloft, 

All in its case of gold. 

He flung it from him, far ahead. 

And never spake he more, 
But — "Pass thoir first, thou dauntless heart, 

As thou wert wont of yore ! " 

The roar of fight rose fiercer yet. 

And heavier still the stour. 
Till the spears of Sjiain came shivering in, 

And swept away the Moor. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



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"Now praised be God, the day is won ! 

They fly, o'er flood and fell, — 
Why dost thou draw the rein so hard. 

Good knight, that fought so well ? " 

" 0, ride ye on, Lord King ! " he said, 

"And leave the dead to me. 
For I must keep the dreariest watch 

That ever I shall dree ! 

"There lies, above his master's heart, 
The Douglas, stark and grim ; 

And woe is me I should be here, 
Not side by side with him ! 

" The world grows cold, my arm is old, 

And thin my lyart hair. 
And all that I loved best on earth 

Is stretched before me there. 

" Bothwell banks, that bloom so hright 

Beneath the sun of May ! 
The heaviest cloud that ever blew 

Is bound for you this day. 

" And Scotland ! thou mayst veil thy head 

In sorrow and in pain 
The sorest stroke upon thy brow 

Hath fallen this day in Spain ! 

" We '11 bear them back unto our ship, 

We '11 bear them o'er the sea. 
And lay them in the hallowed earth 

Within our own countrie. 

" And be thou strong of heart, Lord King, 

For this I tell thee sure, 
The sod that drank the Douglas' blood 

Shall never bear the Moor ! " 

The King he lighted from his horse, 

He flung his brand away. 
And took the Douglas by the hand. 

So stately as he lay. 

"God give thee rest, thou valiant soul ! 

That fought so well for Spam ; 
I 'd rather half my land were gone, 

So thou wert here again ! " 

We bore the good Lord James away. 
And the priceless heart we bore, 

And heavily we steered our ship 
Towards the Scottish shore. 

No welcome greeted our return, 

Nor clang of martial tread. 
But all were dunil) and hushed as death 

Before the mighty dead. 



We laid our chief in Douglas Kirk, 

The heart in fair Melrose ; 
And woful men were we that day, — 

God grant their souls repose ! 

William Edmundstone Aytoun. 



HOTSPUR'S DESCRIPTION OF A FOP. 

FROM ".KING HENRY IV.," PART I. ACT I. SC. 3. 

But I remember, when the fight was done. 

When I was dry with rage and extreme toil, 

Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword, 

Came there a certain lord, neat, trimly dressed, 

Fresh as a bridegroom ; and his chin, new reaped. 

Showed like a stubble-land at harvest-home ; 

He was perfumed like a milliner ; 

And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held 

A pouncet-box which ever and anon 

He gave his nose, and took 't away again ; — 

Who, therewith angry, when it next came there, 

Took it in snuff: — and still he smiled and talked ; 

And, as the soldiers bore dead bodies by, 

He called them untaught knaves, unmannerly, 

To bring a slovenly unhandsome corse 

Betwixt the wind and his nobility. 

With many holiday and lady terms 

He questioned me ; among the rest, demanded 

M}'^ prisoners in your majesty's behalf. 

I tlien, all smarting, with my wounds being cold. 

To be so pestered with a popinjay, 

Out of my grief and my impatience. 

Answered neglectingly, I know not what, — 

He should, or he should not ; ibr he made me mad 

To see him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet. 

And talk so like a waiting gentlewoman. 

Of guns, and drums, and wounds, —God save 

the mark ! — 
And telling me, the sovereign'st thing on earth 
Was jiarmaceti for an inward bruise ; 
And that it was great pity, so it was. 
That villanous saltpetre should be digged 
Out of the bowels of tlie harmless earth, 
Which many a good tall fello«' had destroyed 
So cowardly, and, but for these vile guns. 
He would himself have been a soldier. 

SHAKESPHARE. 



HUDIBRAS' SWORD AND DAGGER. 

FROM " HUDIBRAS," PART I. 

His puissant sword unto his side 
Near his undaunted heart was tied, 
With basket hilt that would hold broth. 
And serve for fight and dinner both. 
In it lie melted lead for bullets 
To shoot at foes, and sometimes pullets. 



B^ 



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WAR. 



507 



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To whom he hore so fell a grutch 
He ne'er gave quarter to any such. 
The trenchant blade, Toledo trusty, 
For want of fighting was grown rusty, 
And ate into itself, for lack 
Of somebody to hew and hack. 
The peaceful scabbard, where it dwelt. 
The rancor of its edge had felt ; 
For of the lower end two handful 
It had devoured, it was so manful ; 
And so much scorned to lurk in case. 
As if it durst not show its face. 

This sword a dagger had, his page, 

That was but little for his age. 

And therefore waited on him so 

As dwarfs unto knight-errants do. 

It was a serviceable dudgeon, 

Either for fighting or for drudging. 

Wlien it had stabbed or broke a head. 

It would scrape trenchers or chip bread, 

Toast cheese or bacon, though it were 

To bait a mouse-trap 't would not care ; 

'T would make clean shoes, and in the earth 

Set leeks and onions, and so forth : 

It had been 'prentice to a brewer. 

Where this and more it did endure ; 

But left the trade, as many more 

Have lately done on the same score. 

DR. SAMUEL BUTLER. 



THE LORD OF BUTRAGO. 

FROM THE SPANISH. 

" Your horse is faint, my King, my Lord ! your 

gallant horse is sick, — 
His limbs are torn, his breast is gored, on his 

eye the film is thick ; 
Mount, mount on mine, 0, mount apace, I pray 

thee, mount and fly ! 
Or in my arms I'll lift your Grace, — their 

trampling hoofs are nigh ! 

' ' My King, my King ! you 're wounded sore, — 

the blood runs from your feet ; 
But only lay a hand before, and I '11 lift you to 

your seat ; 
Mount, Juan, for they gather fast ! — I hear 

their coming cry, — 
Mount, mount, and ride for jeopardy, — I '11 save 

you though I die ! 

"Stand, noble steed! this hour of need, — be 

gentle as a lamb ; 
I '11 kiss the foam from off thy mouth, — thy 

master dear I am, — 



Mount, Juan, mount ; whate'er betide, away the 

bridle fling. 
And plunge the rowels in his side. — My horse 

shall save my King ! 

"Nay, never speak ; my sires. Lord King, re- 
ceived their land from yours. 

And joyfully their blood shall spring, so be it 
thine secures ; 

If I should fly, and thou, my King, be found 
among the dead. 

How could I stand 'niong gentlemen, such scorn 
on my gray head ? 

"Castile's proud dames shall never point the 

finger of disdain. 
And say there 's one that ran away when our 

good lords were slain ! 
I leave Diego in your care, — you '11 fill his 

father's place ; 
Strike, strike the spur, and never spare, — God's 

blessing on your Grace ! " 

So spake the brave Montanez, Butrago's lord was 
he; 

And turned him to the coming host in steadfast- 
ness and glee ; 

He flung himself among them, as they came down 
the hill, — 

He died, God wot ! but not before his sword had 
drunk its fill. 

Translation of JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART. 



FLODDEN FIELD. 

FROM " MARMION," CANTO VL 

[The battle was fought in September, 1513, between the forces of 
England and Scotland. The latter were worsted, and King James 
slain with eight thousand of his men. Lord Surrey commanded the 
English troops.] 

A MOMENT then Lord Marmion stayed. 
And breathed his steed, his men arrayed, 

Then forwai'd moved his band, 
Until, Lord Surrey's rear-guard won, 
He halted by a cross of stone. 
That, on a hillock standing lone. 

Did all the field command. 

Hence might they see the full array 

Of either host for deadly fray ; 

Their marshalled lines stretched east and west, 

And fronted north and south, 
And distant salutation past 

From the loud cannon -mouth ; 
Not in the close successive rattle 
That breathes the voice of modern battle, 

But slow and far between. — 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



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The hillock gained, Lord Marmion stayed : 
" Here, by this cross," he gently said, 

" You well may view the scene ; 
Here shalt thou tarry, lovely Clare : 
0, think of Marmion in thy prayer ! — 
Thou wilt not ? — well, — no less my care 
Shall, watchful, for thy weal prepare. — • 
You, Blount and Eustace, are her guard, 

With ten picked archers of my train ; 
With England if the day go hard, 

To Berwick speed amain, — 
But, if we conquer, cruel maid. 
My spoils shall at your feet be laid, 

When here we meet again." 
He waited not for answer there. 
And would not mark the maid's despair, 

Nor heed the discontented look 
From either squire : but spurred amain. 
And, dashing through the battle-plain. 

His way to Surrey took. 

Blount and Fitz-Eustace rested still 
With Lady Clare upon the hill ; 
On which (for far the day was spent) 
The western sunbeams now were bent. 
The cry they heard, its meaning knew, 
Could plain their distant comrades view ; 
Sadly to Blount did Eustace say, 
" Unworthy office here to stay ! 
No hope of gilded spurs to-day. — 
But, see ! look up, — on Flodden bent 
The Scottish foe has lired his tent." — 

And sudden, as he spoke. 
From the sharp ridges of the hill, 
All downward to the banks of Till 

Was wreathed in sable smoke. 
Volumed and vast, and rolling far, 
The cloud enveloped Scotland's war, 

As down the hill they broke ; 
Nor martial shout, nor minstrel tone. 
Announced their march ; their tread alone. 
At times their warning trumpet blown, 

At times a stifled hum. 
Told England, from his mountain-throne 

King James did rushing come. — 
Scarce could they hear or see their foes, 
Until at weapon-point they close. — 
They close in clouds of smoke and dust, 
With sword-sway and with lance's thrust ; 

And such a yell was there, 
Of sudden and portentous birth. 
As if men fought upon the earth 

And fiends in upper air : 
0, life and death were in the shout. 
Recoil and rally, charge and rout. 

And triumph and despair. 
Long looked the anxious squires ; their eye 
Could in the darkness naught descry. 



At length the freshening western blast 
Aside the shroud of battle cast ; 
And, first, the ridge of mingled spears 
Above the brightening cloud appears ; 
And in the smoke the pennons flew. 
As in the storm the white sea-mew. 
Then marked they, dashing broad and far. 
The broken billows of the war, 
And plumed crests of chieftains brave 
Floating like foam upon the wave ; 

But naught distinct they see : 
Wide raged the battle on the plain ; 
Spears shook, and falchions flashed amain ; 
Fell England's arrow-flight like rain ; 
Crests rose, and stooped, and rose again, 

Wild and disorderly. 
Amid the scene of tumult, high 
They saw Lord Marmion's falcon fly : 
And stainless Tunstall's banner white, 
And Edmund Howard's lion bright. 
Still bear them bravely in the fight ; 

Although against them come 
Of gallant Gordons many a one. 
And many a stubborn Highlandman, 
And many a rugged Border clan, 

With Huntley and with Home. 

Far on the left, i;nseen the while, 
Stanley broke Lennox and Argyle ; 
Though there the western mountaineer 
Ptushed with bare bosom on the spear. 
And flung the feeble targe aside. 
And with both hands the broadsword plied, 
'T was vain : — But Fortune, on the right, 
With fickle smile, cheered Scotland's fight. 
Then fell that spotless banner white, 

The Howard's lion fell ; 
Yet still Lord Marmion's falcon flew 
With wavering flight, while fiercer grew 

Around the battle-yell. 
The Border slogan rent the sky ! 
A Home ! a Gordon ! was the cry : 
Loud were the clanging blows ; 
Advanced, — ■ forced back, — now low, now high. 

The pennon sunk and rose ; 
As bends the bark's mast in the gale, 
When rent are rigging, shrouds, and sail. 

It wavered mid the foes. 
No longer Blount the view could bear : — 
" By heaven and all its saints, I swear, 

I will not see it lost ! 
Fitz-Eustace, you with Lady Clare 
May bid your beads, and patter praj^er, — 

I gallop to the host." 
And to the fray he rode amain, 
Followed by all the archer train. 
The fiery youth, with desperate charge. 
Made, for a space, an opening large, — 



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The rescued banner rose, 
But darkly closed the war around, 
Like pine-tree, rooted from the ground, 

It sunk among the foes. 
Then Eustace mounted too ; — yet stayed. 
As loath to leave the helpless maid. 

When, fast as shaft can fly. 
Bloodshot his eyes, his nostrils spread, 
The loose rein dangling from his head, 
Housing and saddle bloody red. 

Lord Marmion's steed rushed by ; 
And Eustace, maddening at the sight, 

A look and sign to Clara cast. 

To mark he would return in haste, 
Then plunged into the fight. 

Ask me not what the maiden feels, 
Left in that dreadful hour alone : 

Perchance her reason stoops or reels ; 
Perchance a courage, not her own. 
Braces her mind to despei-ate tone. — 

The scattered van of England wheels ; — 
She only said, as loud in air 
The tumult roared, "Is Wilton there ? " — 
They fly, or, maddened by despair. 
Fight but to die, — " Is Wilton there ?" 

With that, straight up the hill there rode 
Two horsemen drenched with gore. 

And in their arms, a helpless load, 
A wounded knight they bore. 

His hand still strained the broken brand ; 

His arms were smeared with blood and sand. 

Dragged from among the horses' feet. 

With dinted shield, and helmet beat. 

The falcon-crest and plumage gone. 

Can that be haughty Marmion ! . . . . 

Young Blount his armor did unlace. 

And, gazing on his ghastly face. 

Said, — " By St. George, he 's gone ! 

That spear-wound has our master sped, — 

And see the deep cut on his head ! 
Good night to Marraion." — 

" Unnurtured Blount ! thy brawling cease : 

He opes his eyes," said Eustace ; "peace ! " 

AVhen, doffed his casque, he felt free air, 
Around 'gan Marmion wildly stare : — 
" Where 's Harry Blount ? Fitz- Eustace where ? 
Linger ye here, ye hearts of hare ! 
Eedeeni my pennon, — charge again ! 
Cry — ' Marmion to the rescue ! ' — vain ! 
Last of my race, on battle-plain 
That shout shall ne'er be heard again ! — - 
Yet my last thought is England's : — fly. 
To Dacre bear my signet-ring : 
Tell him his squadrons up to bring : — 
Fitz-Eustace, to Lord Surre}' hie ; 



Tunstall lies dead upon the field. 
His life-blood stains the spotless shield : 
Edmund is down ; — my life is reft ; — 
The Admiral alone is left. 
Let Stanley charge with spur of fire, — 
With Chester charge, and Lancashire, 
Full upon Scotland's central host. 
Or victory and England 's lost. — 
Must I bid twice ? — hence, varlets ! fiy ! 
Leave Marmion here alone — to die." 
They parted, and alone he lay : 
Clare drew her from the sight away. 
Till pain wrung forth a lowly moan, 
And half he murmured, — " Is there none, 

Of all my halls have nurst, 
Page, squire, or groom, one cup to bring. 
Of blessed water from the spring. 
To slake my dying thirst ? " 

woman ! in our hours of ease. 
Uncertain, coy, and hard to please, 
And variable as the shade 
By the light quivering aspen made ; 
When pain and anguish wring the brow, 
A ministering angel thou ! — 
Scarce were the piteous accents said, 
When, with the Baron's casque, the maid 

To the nigh streamlet ran ; 
Forgot were hatred, wrongs, and fears ; 
The plaintive voice alone she hears, 

Sees but the dying man. 
She stooped her by the runnel's side. 

But in abhorrence backward drew ; 
For, oozing from the mountain's side, 
Where raged the war, a dark-red tide 

Was curdling in the streamlet blue. 
Where shall she turn ! — behold her mark 

A little fountain cell. 
Where water, clear as diamond-spark. 

In a stone basin fell. 
Above, some half-worn letters say, 
HBrtnfe- bjEarjg* gtlgrim* tirtnfe- antf* prag* 
jFor^ tlje- Jttnti- soul- of- .Sgbil' ffircg' 

Mi\}0' built' ti]iS' crass* antr- torll' 
She filled the helm, and back she hied, 
And with surprise and joy espied 

A monk supporting Marmion's head ; 
A pious man whom duty brought 
To dubious verge of battle fought, 

To shrive the dying, bless the dead. 

Deep drank Lord Marmion of the wave. 
And, as she stooped his brow to lave, — 
" Is it the hand of Clare," he said, 
" Or injured Constance, bathes my head ? " 

Then, as remembrance rose, — 
" Speak not to me of shrift or prayer ! 

I must redress her woes. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR, 



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Short space, few words, are mine to spare ; 
Forgive and listen, gentle Clare ! " — 

"Alas ! " she said, "the while, — 
O, think of your immortal weal ! 
In vain for Constance is your zeal ; 

She — died at Holy Isle." — 
Lord Marmion started from the ground, 
As light as if he felt no wound ; 
Though in the action burst the tide 
In torrents from his wounded side. 
" Then it was truth ! " he said, — "I knew 
That the dark presage must be true. — 
I would the Fiend, to whom belongs 
The vengeance due to all her wrongs, 

Would spare me but a day ! 
For wasting fire, and dying groan. 
And priests slain on the altar stone, 

Might bribe him for delay. 
It may not be ! — this dizzy trance, — 
Curse on yon base marauder's lance. 
And doubly cursed my failing brand ! 
A sinful heart makes feeble hand." 
Then, fainting, down on earth he sunk, 
Supported by the trembling monk. 

With fruitless labor, Clara bound. 

And strove to stanch the gushing wound ; 

The monk, with unavailing cares. 

Exhausted all the Church's prayers. 

Ever, he said, that, close and near, 

A lady's voice was in his ear, 

And that the priest he could not hear, 

For that she ever sung, 
"In the lost battle, home down lij the flying. 
Where minrjles war's rattle with groans of the 
dying ! " 

So the notes rung : — 
" Avoid thee. Fiend ! — with cruel hand, 
Shake not the dying sinner's sand ! — 
0, look, my son, upon yon sign 
Of the Redeemer's grace divine : 

0, think on faith and bliss ! — 
By many a death-bed I have been, 
And many a sinner's parting seen. 

But never aught like this." 

The war, that for a space did fail, 
Now trebly thundering swelled the gale, 

And — Stanley ! was the cry : — 
A light on Marmion's visage spread. 

And fired his glazing eye : 
W^itli dying hand above his head 
He shook the fragment of his blade. 

And shouted " Victory ! — 
Charge, Cliester, charge ! On, Stanley, on ! " 
Were the last words of Mannion. 

SIR WALTER SCOTT. 



BEAL' AN DHUINE. 

FROM "THE LADY OF THE LAKE," CANTO VI. 

There is no breeze upon the fern, 

No ripple on the lake. 
Upon her eyrie nods the erne. 

The deer has sought the brake ; 
The small birds will not sing aloud. 

The springing trout lies still, 
So darkly glooms yon thunder-cloud. 
That swathes, as with a purple shroud, 

Benledi's distant hill. 
Is it the thunder's solemn sound 

That mutters deep and dread. 
Or echoes from the groaning ground 

The warrior's measured tread ? 
Is it the lightning's quivering glance 

That on the thicket streams, 
Or do they flash on spear and lance 

The sun's retiring beams ? 
I see the dagger crest of Mar, 

I see the Moray's silver star 
W^ave o'er the cloud of Saxon war. 

That up the lake comes winding far ! 
To hero bound for battle strife. 

Or bard of martial lay, 
'T were worth ten years of peaceful life. 

One glance at their array ! 

Their light-armed archers far and near 

Surveyed the tangled ground, 
Their centre ranks, with pike and spear, 

A twilight forest frowned, 
Their barbed horsemen, in the rear, 

The stern battalia crowned. 
No cymbal clashed, no clarion rang, 

Still were tlie pipe and drum ; 
Save heavy tread, and armor's clang. 

The sullen march was dumb. 
There breathed no wind their crests to shake, 

Or wave their flags abroad ; 
Scarce tlie frail aspen seemed to quake. 

That shadowed o'er their road. 
Their vaward scouts no tidings bring. 

Can rouse no lurking foe, 
N or spy a trace of living thing, 

Save when they stirred the roe ; 
The host moves like a deep sea wave, 
Where rise no rocks its pride to brave, 

High swelling, dark, and slow. 
The lake is passed, and now they gain 
A narrow and a broken plain. 
Before the Trosach's rugged jaws ; 
And here the horse and spearmen pause, 
While, to explore the dangerous glen. 
Dive through the pass the archer men. 



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At once there rose so wild a yell 
Within that dark and narrow dell, 
As all the fiends, from heaven that fell, 
Had pealed the banner cry of hell ! 
Forth from the pass in tumult driven. 
Like chaff before the wind of heaven. 

The archery appear : 
For life ! for life ! their flight they ply — 
And shriek, and shout, and battle-cry, 
And plaids and bonnets waving high. 
And broadswords flashing to the sky, 

Are maddening in the rear. 
Onward they drive, in dreadful race, 

Pursuers and pursued ; 
Before that tide of flight and chase, 
How shall it keep its rooted place. 

The spearmen's twilight wood ? 
— ' ' Down, down, " cried Mar, ' ' your lances down ! 

Bear back both friend and foe ! " 
Like reeds before the tempest's frown. 
That serried grove of lances brown 

At once lay levelled low ; 
And closely shouldering side to side, 
The bristling ranks the onset bide. — 
— " We '11 quell the savage mountaineer, 

As their Tinchel * cows the game ; 
They come as fleet as forest deer. 

We '11 drive them back as tame." 

Bearing before them, in their course, 
The relics of the archer force, 
Like wave with crest of sparkling foam. 
Right onward did Clan- Alpine come. 
Above the tide, each broadsword bright 
Was brandishing like bean) of light, 

Each targe was dark below ; 
And with the ocean's mighty swing, 
When heaving to the tempest's wing. 

They liui-led them on the foe. 
I heard the lance's shivering crash. 
As when the whirlwind rends the ash ; 
I heard the broadsword's deadly clang. 
As if a hundred anvils rang ! 
But Moray wheeled his rearward rank 
Of horsemen on Clan- Alpine's flank — 

" My bannerman, advance ! 
I see," he cried, " their columns shake. 
]SI"ow, gallants ! for your ladies' sake. 

Upon them with the lance ! " 
The horsemen dashed among the rout. 

As deer break through the broom ; 
Their steeds are stout, their swords are out, 

They soon make lightsome room. 
Clan-Alpine's best are baclvward borne — 

Where, where was Roderick then ? 
One blast upon his bugle-horn 

Were worth a thousand men ! 



And refluent through the pass of fear 

The battle's tide was poured ; 
Vanished the Saxon's struggling spear. 

Vanished the mountain sword. 
As Bracklinn's chasm, so black and steep. 

Receives her roaring linn, 
As the dark caverns of the deep 

Suck the wild whirlpool in. 
So did the deep and darksome pass 
Devour the battle's mingled mass ; 
None linger now upon the plain, 
Save those who ne'er shall fight again. 

Sir Walter Scott. 



t&^ 



• A circle of sportsmen, surrounding the deer. 



WATERLOO. 

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO III. 

There was a sound of revelry by night. 
And Belgium's capital had gathered then 
Her beauty and her chivalry, and bright 
The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave 

men ; 
A thousand hearts beat happily ; and when 
Music arose with its voluptuous swell, 
Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again, 
And all went merry as a marriage-bell ; 
But hush ! hark ! a deep sound strikes like a 

rising knell ! 

Did ye not hear it? — No; 'twas but the' 

wind. 
Or the car rattling o'er the stony street ; 
On with the dance ! let joy be unconfined ! 
No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure 

meet 
To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet, — 
But, hark ! — that heavy sound breaks in once 

more, 
As if the clouds its echo would I'epeat ; 
And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before ! 
Arm ! arm ! it is — it is — the cannon's opening 

roar ! 

Within a windowed niche of that high hall 
Sate Brunswick's fated cliieftain ; he did hear 
That sound the first amidst the festival, 
And caught its tone with Death's prophetic 

ear ; 
And when they smiled because he deemed it 

near. 
His heart more truly knew that peal too well 
Which stretched his father on a bloody bier, 
And roused the vengeance blood alone could 

quell : 
He rushed into the field, and, foremost fighting, 

fell. 



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Ah ! then and there was hurrying to and fro, 
And gathering tears, and tremblings of dis- 
tress, 
And cheeks all pale which but an hour ago 
Blushed at the praise of their own loveliness ; 
And there were sudden partings, such as press 
The life from out young hearts, and choking 

sighs 
Which ne'er might be repeated : who would 

guess 
If evermore should meet those mutual eyes 
Since upon night so sweet such awful morn could 
rise ! 

And there was mounting in hot haste : the 

steed, 
The mustering squadron, and the clattering car, 
Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, 
And swiftly forming in the ranks of war ; 
And the deep thunder peal on peal afar ; 
And near, the beat of the alarming drum 
Pioused up the soldier ere the morning star ; 
While thronged the citizens with terror dumb, 
Or whispering with white lips, — " The foe ! they 

come ! they come ! " 

And wild and high the " Cameron's gathering " 

rose. 
The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn's hills 
Have heard, — and heard, too, have her Saxon 

foes : 
How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills 
Savage and shrill ! But with the breath which 

fills 
Their mountain pipe, so fill the mountaineers 
With the fierce native daring which instills 
The stirring memory of a thousand years, 
And Evan's, Donald's fame, rings in each clans- 
man's ears ! 

And Ardennes waves above them her green 

leaves. 
Dewy with nature's tear-drops, as they pass, 
Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves, 
Over tlie unreturning brave, • — alas ! 
Ere evening to be trodden like the grass 
Which now beneath them, but above shall grow 
In its next verdure, when this fiery mass 
Of living valor, rolling on the foe, 
And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold 
and low. 

Last noon beheld them full of lusty life, '] 

Last eve in Beauty's circle proudly gay. 

The midnight brought the signal sound of 

strife. 
The morn the marshalling in arms, — the day 
Battle's magnificently stern array ! 



The thunder-clouds close o'er it, which when 

rent 
The earth is covered thick with other clay. 
Which her own clay shall cover, heaped and 

pent. 
Eider and horse, — friend, foe, — in one red 

burial blent ! 

Their praise is hymned by loftier harps than 

mine ; 
Yet one I would select from that proud throng. 
Partly because they blend me with his line. 
And partly that I did his sire some wrong. 
And partly that bright names will hallow song ! 
And his was of the bravest, and when showered 
The death-bolts deadliest the thinned files 

along. 
Even where the thickest of war's tempest 

lowered. 
They reached no nobler breast than thine, young, 

gallant Howard ! 

There have been tears and breaking hearts for 

thee. 
And mine were nothing, had I such to give ; 
But when I stood beneath the fresh green tree. 
Which living waves where thou didst cease to 

live, 
Aird saw around me the wide field revive 
With fruits and fertile promise, and the Spring 
Come forth her work of gladness to contrive. 
With all her reckless birds upon the wing, 
I turned from all she brought to those she could 

not bring. 

I turned to thee, to thousands, of whom each 
And one as all a ghastly gap did make 
In his own kind and kindred, whom to teach 
Forgetfulness Avere mercy for their sake ; 
The Archangel's trump, not glory's, must 

awake 
Those whom they thirst for ; though the sound 

of Fame 
May for a juoment soothe, it cannot slake 
The fever of vain longing, and the name 
So honored but assumes a stronger, bitterer claim. 

They mourn, but smile at length ; and, smil- 
ing, mourn : 

The tree will wither long before it fall ; 

The liull drives on, though mast and sail be torn ; 

The roof-tree sinks, but moulders on the hall 

In massy hoariness ; the ruined wall 

Stands when its wind-worn battlements arc 
gone ; 

The bars survive the captive they enthrall ; 

The day drags through though storms keep out 
the sun ; 
And thus the heart will break, yet brokenly live on ; 



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Even as a broken mirror, which the glass 
In every fragment multiplies, and makes 
A thousand images of one that was 
The same, and still the more, the more it 

breaks ; 
And thus the heart will do which not for- 
sakes, 
Living in shattered guise, and still, and cold, 
And bloodless, with its sleepless sorrow aches, 
Yet withers on till all without is old. 
Showing no visible sign, for such things are 

untold. 

Lord Byron. 



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HOHENLINDEN. 

On Linden, when the sun was low, 
All bloodless lay the untrodden snow. 
And dark as winter was the flow 
Of Iser, lolling rapidly. 

But Linden saw another sight 
When the drum beat, at dead of night. 
Commanding fires of death to light 
The darkness of her scenery. 

By torch and trumpet fast arrayed, 
Each horseman drew his battle-blade, 
And furious every charger neighed. 
To join the dreadful revelry. 

Then shook the hills witli thunder riven. 
Then rushed the steed to battle driven, 
And louder than the bolts of heaven 
Ear flashed the red artillery. 

But redder yet that light shall glow 
On Linden's hills of stained snow, 
And bloodier yet the torrent flow 
Of Iser, rolling rapidly. 

'T is morn, but scarce yon level sun 
Can pierce the war-clouds, rolling dun. 
Where furious Frank and fiery Hun 
Shout in their sulphurous canopy. 

The combat deepens. On, ye brave, 
Who rush to glory, or the gi-ave ! 
Wave, Munich ! all thy banners wave, 
And charge with all thy chivalry ! 

Few, few shall part where many meet ! 
The snow shall be their winding-sheet. 
And every turf beneath their feet 
Shall be a soldier's sepulchre. 

Thomas Campbell. 



INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP. 

You know we French stormed Ratisbon : 

A mile or so away. 
On a little mound. Napoleon 

Stood on our stonning-day ; 
With neck out-thrust, you fancy how, 

Legs wide, arms locked behind. 
As if to balance the prone brow, 

Oppressive with its mind. 

Just as perhaps he mused, " My plans 

That soar, to earth may fall. 
Let once my army-leader Lannes 

Waver at yonder wall," — 
Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew 

A rider, bound on bound 
Full -galloping ; nor bridle drew 

Until he reached the mound. 

Then off" there flung in smiling joy, 

And held himself erect 
By just his horse's mane, a boy : 

You hardly could suspect 
(So tight he kept his lips compressed, 

Scarce any blood came through). 
You looked twice ere you saw his breast 

Was all but shot in two. 

"Well," cried he, "Emperor, by God's grace 

We 've got you Ratisbon ! 
The marshal 's in the market-place. 

And you '11 be there anon 
To see your flag-bird flap his vans 

AVhere I, to heart's desire. 
Perched him ! " The chief's eye flashed ; his plans 

Soared up again like fire. 

The chief's eye flashed ; but presently 

Softened itself, as sheathes 
A film the mother-eagle's eye 

When her bruised eaglet breathes : 
" You 're wounded ! " " Nay," his soldier's pride 

Touched to the quick, he said : 
" I 'm killed, sire ! " And, his chief beside. 

Smiling, the boy fell dead. 

ROBERT BROWNING. 



HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS 
FROM GHENT TO AIX. 

I SPRANG to the stirrup, and Joris and he ; 

I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three ; 

" Good speed ! " cried the watch as the gate- 
bolts undrew, 

" Speed ! " echoed the wall to us galloping 
through. 

Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest, 

And into the midnight we galloped abreast. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAE. 



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Not a word to each other ; we kept the great 

pace, — 
Neck b}'- neck, stride by stride, never changing 

our place ; 
I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight, 
Then shortened each stirruj) and set the pique 

right, 
Eebuckled the check-strap, chained slacker the 

bit. 
Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit, 

'T was a moonset at starting ; but while we drew 

near 
Lokeren, the cocks crew and twilight dawned 

clear ; 
At Boom a great yellow star came out to see ; 
At Diiffeld 't was morning as plain as could be ; 
And from Mecheln church-steeple we heard the 

half-chime, — 
So Joris broke silence with " Yet there is time ! " 

At Aerschot up leaped of a sudden the sun, 
And against him the cattle stood black every one, 
To stare through the mist at us galloping past ; 
And I saw my stout galloper Roland at last, 
With resolute shoulders, each butting away 
The haze, as some bluff river headland its spray ; 

And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear 

bent back 
For my voice, and the other pricked out on his 

track ; 
And one eye's black intelligence, — ever that 

glance 
O'er its white edge at me, his own master, 

askance ; 
And the thick heavy spume-flakes, which aye 

and anon 
His fierce lips shook upward in galloping on. 

By Hasselt, Dirck groaned ; and cried Joris, 
" Stay spur ! 

Your Roos galloped bravely, the fault's not in 
her ; 

"We'll remember at Aix," — for one heard the 
quick Avheeze 

Of her chest, saw the stretched neck, and stag- 
gering knees, 

And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the flank, 

As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank. 

So we were left galloping, Joris and I, 
Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky ; 
The broad sun above laughed a pitiless laugh ; 
'Neath our feet broke the brittle, bright stubble 

like chaff ; 
Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang white. 
And "Gallop," gasped Joris, "for Aix is in 

sight ! " 



" How they '11 greet us ! " — and all in a moment 

his roan 
Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead as a stone ; 
And there was my Roland to bear the whole 

weight 
Of the news which alone could save Aix from 

her fate, 
With his nostrils like pits full of blood to the 

brim. 
And with cii'cles of red for his eye-sockets' rim. 

Then I cast loose my buff-coat, each holster let 

fall. 
Shook off both my jack-boots, let go belt and all, 
Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, patted his eai-, 
Called my Roland his pet name, my horse with- 
out peer, — 
Clapped my hands, laughed and sung, any noise, 

bad or good. 
Till at length into Aix Roland galloped and stood. 

And all I remember is, friends flocking round. 
As I sate with his head 'twixt my knees on the 

ground ; 
And no voice but was praising this Roland of 

mine, 
As I poured down his throat our last measure of 

wine. 

Which (the burgesses voted by common consent) 

Was no more than his due who brought good 

news from Ghent. 

Robert Browning. 



THE PRIVATE OF THE BUFFS;* OR, 
THE BRITISH SOLDIER IN CHINA. 

[" Some Seiks, and a private of the Buffs, having remained behind 
with tlie grog-carts, fell into the hands of the Chinese. On the next 
day they were brought before the authorities and ordered to per- 
form Kotou. The Seiks obeyed, but Moyse, the English soldier, 
declared he would not prostrate himself before any Chinaman alive, 
and was immediately knocked upon the head, and his body thrown 
upon a dunghill." — China Correspondent of the London Times. \ 

Last night, among his fellow roughs, 

He jested, quaffed, and swore ; 
A drunken private of the Buffs, 

Who never looked before. 
To-day, beneath the foeman's frown, 

He stands in Elgin's place. 
Ambassador from Britain's crown, 

And type of all her race. 

Poor, reckless, rude, low-born, untaught, 

Bewildered, and alone, 
A heart, with English instinct fraught, 

He yet can call his own. 
Ay, tear his body limb from limb, 

Bring cord or axe or flame. 
He only knows that not through him 

Shall England come to shame. 



The " Buffs" are the East Kent regiment. 



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Far Kentish hop-fields round him seemed, 

Like dreams, to come and go ; 
Bright leagues of cherry-blossom gleamed, 

One sheet of living snow ; 
The smoke above his father's door 

In gray soft eddyings hung ; 
Must he then watch it rise no more, 

Doomed by himself so young ? 

Yes, honor calls ! — with strength like steel 

He put the vision by ; 
Let dusky Indians whine and kneel, 

An English lad must die. 
And thus, with eyes that would not shrink, 

With knee to man unbent, 
Unfaltering on its dreadful brink, 

To his red grave he went. 

Vain mightiest fleets of iron framed. 

Vain those all -shattering guns. 
Unless proud England keep untamed 

The strong heart of her sons ; 
So let his name through Europe ring, — 

A man of mean estate. 
Who died, as firm as Sparta's king, 

Because his soul was great. 

Sir Francis Hastings Doyle. 



THE RELIEF OF LUCKNOW. 

0, THAT last day in Lucknow fort ! 

We knew that it was the last ; 
That the enemy's lines crept surely on, 

And the end was coming fast. 

To yield to that foe meant worse than death ; 

And the men and we all worked on ; 
It was one day more of smoke and roar, 

And then it would all be done. 

There was one of us, a corporal's wife, 

A fair, young, gentle thing. 
Wasted with fever in the siege. 

And her mind was wandering. 

She lay on the ground, in her Scottish plaid, 
And I took her head on my knee ; 

" W^hen my father comes hame frae the pleugh,' 
she said, 
"Oh ! then please wauken me." 

She slept like a child on her father's floor. 
In the flecking of woodbine-shade. 

When the house-dog sprawls by the open door. 
And the mother's wheel is stayed. 



It was smoke and roar and powder-stench, 

And hopeless waiting for death ; 
And the soldier's wife, like a full -tired child. 

Seemed scarce to draw her breath. 

I sank to sleep ; and 1 had my dream 

Of an English village-lane. 
And wall and garden ; — but one wild scream 

Brought me back to the roar again. 

There Jessie Brown stood listening 

Till a sudden gladness broke 
All over her face ; and she caught my hand 

And drew me near as she spoke : — 

" The Hielanders ! 0, dinna ye hear 

The slogan far awa ? 
The McGregor's, — 0, I ken it weel ; 

It 's the gi-andest o' them a' ! 

" God bless the bonny Hielanders ! 

W^e 're saved ! we 're saved ! " she cried ; 
And fell on her knees ; and thanks to God 

Flowed forth like a full flood-tide. 

Along the battery-line her cry 

Had fallen among the men. 
And they started back ; — they were there to die ; 

But was life so near them, then ? 

They listened for life ; the rattling fire 

Far off", and the far-oft' roar. 
Were all ; and the colonel shook his head. 

And they turned to their guns once more. 

But Jessie said, "The slogan 's done ; 

But winna ye hear it noo. 
The Cavijihells are comin' ? It 's no a dream ; 

Our succors hae broken through ! " 

We heard the roar and the rattle afar. 

But the pipes we coxild not hear ; 
So the men plied their work of hopeless war. 

And knew that the end was near. 

It was not long ere it made its way, — 

A thrilling, ceaseless sound : 
It was no noise from the strife afar, 

Or the sappers under ground. 

It was the pipes of the Highlanders ! 

And now they played Aidd Lang Syne! 
It came to our men like the voice of God, 

And they shouted along the line. 

And they wept, and shook one another's hands. 
And the women sobbed in a crowd ; 

And every one knelt down where he stood, 
And we all thanked God aloud. 



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516 



POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



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That happy time, when we welcomed them, 

Our men put Jessie first ; 
And the general gave her his hand, and cheers 

Like a storm from tlie soldiers burst. 

And the pipers' ribhons and tartan streamed, 
Marching round and round our line ; 

And our joyful cheers were broken with tears. 
As the pipes played Aidd Lang Syne. 

ROBERT T. S, LOWELL. 



y- 



BY THE ALMA RIVER. 

Willie, fold your little hands ; 

Let it drop, — that " soldier " toy ; 
Look where father's picture stands, — 

Father, that here kissed his boy 
Not a month since, — father kind. 
Who this night may (never mind 
Mother's sob, my Willie dear) 
Cry out loud that He may hear 
Who is God of battles, — cry, 
" God keep father safe this day 
By the Alma River ! " 

Ask no more, child. Never heed 
Either Russ, or Frank, or Turk ; 

Right of nations, tramjjled creed, 

Chance-poised victory's bloody work ; 

Any flag i' the wind may roll 

On thy heights, Sevastopol ! 

Willie, all to you and me 

Is tliat spot, whate'er it be, 

Where lie stands — no other word — 

Stands — God sure the child's prayers heard ■ 
Near the Alma River. 

Willie, listen to the bells 

Ringing in the town to-day ; 
That 's for victory. No knell swells 

For the many swept away, — 
Hundreds, thousands. Let us weep, 
We, who need not, — just to keep 
Reason clear in thought and brain 
Till the morning comes again ; 
Till the third dread morning tell 
Who they were that fought and — fell 
By the Alma River. 

Come, we '11 lay us down, my child ; 
Poor the bed is, — poor and hard ; 
But thy father, far exiled, 

Sleeps upon the open sward, 
'Dreaming of lis two at home ; 
Or, beneath the starry dome, 



Digs out trenches in the dark, 
Wliere he buries — Willie, mark ! — 
Where he buries those who died 
Fighting — fighting at his side — 
By the Alma River. 

Willie, Willie, go to sleep ; 

God will help us, my boy ! 
He will make the dull hours creep 

Faster, and send news of joy ; 
When I need not shrink to meet 
Those great placards in the street. 
That for weeks will ghastly stare 
In some eyes — child, say that prayer 
Once again, — a different one, — 
Say, " God ! Thy will be done 
By the Alma River." 

Dinah Maria mulock Craik. 



BALAKLAVA. 

THE charge at Balaklava ! 

that rash and fatalcharge ! 

Never was a fiercer, braver. 

Than that charge at Balaklava, 
On the battle's bloody marge ! 

All the day the Russian columns. 

Fortress huge, and blazing banks. 

Poured their dread destructive volumes 
On the French and English ranks, — 
On the gallant allied ranks ! 

Earth and sky seemed rent asunder 

By the loud incessant thunder ! 

When a strange but stern command — 

Needless, heedless, rash command — 

Came to Lucan's little band, — 

Scarce six hundred men and horses 

Of those vast contending forces : — 

" England 's lost unless j^ou save her ! 

Charge the pass at Balaklava ! " 

that rash and fatal charge. 
On the battle's bloody marge ! 

Far away the Russian Eagles 

Soar o'er smoking hill and dell, 

And their hordes, like howling beagles. 

Dense and countless, round them yell ! 

Thundering cannon, deadly mortal', 

Sweep the field in every quarter ! 

Never, since the days of Jesus, 

Trembled so the Chersonesus ! 

Here behold the Gallic Lilies — 
Stout St. Louis' golden Lilies — 
Float as erst at old Ramillies ! 
And beside them, lo ! tlie Lion ! 
With her trophied Cross, is flying ! 

Glorious standards ! — shall they waver 

On the field of Balaklava ? 



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No, by Heavens ! at that command — 
Sudden, rash, but stern command — 
Charges Lucan's little band ! 

Brave Six Hundred ! lo ! they charge, 
On the battle's bloody marge ! 

Down yon deep and skirted valley. 

Where the crowded cannon play, — 
Where the Czar's fierce cohorts rally, 
Cossack, Calmuck, savage Kalli, — 

Down that gorge they swept away ! 
Down that new Thermopylae, 
Flashing swords and helmets see ! 
Underneath the iron shower. 

To the brazen cannon's jaws, 
Heedless of their deadly power, 

Press they without fear or pause, — 

To the very cannon's jaws ! 
Gallant Nolan, brave as Roland 

At the field of Roncesvalles, 

Dashes down the fatal valley, 
Dashes on the bolt of death. 
Shouting with his latest breath, 
' ' Charge, then, gallants ! do not waver, 
Charge the pass at Balaklava ! " 

that rash and fatal charge. 
On the battle's bloody marge ! 

Now the bolts of volleyed thunder 
Rend that little band asunder, 
Steed and rider wildly screaming, 

Screaming wildly, sink away; 
Late so i>roudly, proudly gleaming, 

Now but lifeless clods of clay, — 

Now but bleeding clods of clay ! 
Never, since the days of Jesus, 
Saw such sight the Chersonesus ! 
Yet your remnant, brave Six Hundred, 
Presses onward, onward, onward. 

Till they storm the bloody pass, — 

Till, like brave Leonidas, 

They storm the deadly pass. 
Sabring Cossack, Calmuck, Kalli, 
In that wild shot-rended valley, — 
Drenched with fire and blood, like lava, 
Awful pass at Balaklava ! 

that rash and fatal charge, 
On the battle's bloody marge ! 

For now Russia's rallied forces. 
Swarming hordes of Cossack horses, 
Trampling o'er the reeking corses, 

Drive the thinned assailants back, 

Drive the feeble remnant back. 

O'er their late heroic track ! 
Vain, alas ! now rent and sundered. 
Vain your struggles, brave Two Hundred ! 

Thrice your number lie asleep, 

In t^iat vaUey dark and deep. 



Weak and wounded you retire 
From that hurricane of fire, — • 
That tempestuous storm of fire, — 
But no soldiers, firmer, braver. 
Ever trod the field of fame. 
Than the Knights of Balaklava, — 

Honor to each hero's name ! 
Yet their country long shall mourn 
For her rank so rashly shorn, — 
So gallantly, but madly shorn 

In that fierce and fatal charge. 
On the battle's bloody marge. 

Alexander Beaufort Meek. 



CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE. 

Half a league, half a league, 

Half a league onward. 
All in the valley of Death 

Rode the six hundred. 
" Forward, the Light Brigade ! 
Charge for the guns ! " he said ; 
Into the valley of Death 

Rode the six hundred. 

"Forward, the Light Brigade ! " 
Was there a man dismayed ? 
Not-though the soldier knew 

Some one had blundered : 
Theirs not to make reply. 
Theirs not to reason why. 
Theirs but to do and. die : 
Into the valley of Death 

Rode the six hundred. 

Cannon to right of them, 
Cannon to left of them. 
Cannon in front of them 

Volleyed and thundered ; 
Stormed at with shot and shell, 
Boldly they rode and well ; 
Into the jaAvs of Death, 
Into the mouth of Hell, 

Rode the six hundred. 

Flashed all their sabres bare. 
Flashed as they turned in air, 
Sabring the gunners there, 
Charging an army, while 

All the world wondered : 
Plunged in the battery-smoke, 
Right through the line they broke : 
Cossack and Russian 
Reeled from the sabre-stroke, 

Shattered and sundered. 
Then they rode back, but not — 

Not the six hundred. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



-"•-Q] 



Cannon to right of tliem, 
Cannon to left of them, 
Cannon behind them 

Volleyed and thundered : 
Stormed at with shot and shell, 
While horse and hero fell, 
They that had fought so well 
Came through the jaws of Death 
Back from the mouth of Hell, — 
All that was left of them, 

Left of six hundred. 

"When can their glory fade ? 
the wild charge they made ! 

All the world wondered. 
Honor the charge they made ! 
Honor the Light Brigade, 

Noble six hundred ! 

Alfred Tennyson. 



CAVALRY SONG. 

; FROM "ALICE OF MONMOUTH." 

Our good steeds snuft" the evening air, 

Our pulses with their purpose tingle ; 
The foeman's fires are twinkling there ; 
He leaps to hear our sabres jingle ! 

Halt ! 
Each carbine send its whizzing ball : 
Now, cling ! clang ! forward all, 
Into the fight ! 

Dash on beneath the smoking dome : 

Through level lightnings gallop nearer ! 
One look to Heaven ! No thoughts of home 
The guidons that we bear are dearer. 

Charge ! 
Cling ! clang ! forward all ! 
Heaven help those whose horses fall : 
Cut left and right ! 

They flee before our fierce attack ! 

They fall ! they spread in broken surges. 
Nov, comrades, bear our wounded back, 
AnO leave the foeman to his dirges. 

Wheel ! 
The bUfles sound the swift recall : 
Cling ! q.ang ! backward all ! 
Hc^e^ and good night ! 

Edmund Clarence Stedman. 



PIBROCH ->F DONUIL DHU.* 

Pibroch or)onuil Dhu, 

Pibroch c^onuil. 
Wake thy w. ^^j^g ^,^g^^ 

Summon C^^ Conuil. 

Gathering-song, j^^_^^,j the Black. 



Come away, come away. 

Hark to the summons ! 
Come in your war array, 

Gentles and commons. 

Come from deep glen, and 

From mountains so rocky ; 
The war-pipe and pennon 

Are at Inverlochy. 
Come every hill-plaid, and 

True heart that wears one. 
Come every steel blade, and 

Strong hand that bears one. 

Leave un tended the herd, 

The flock without shelter ; 
Leave the corpse uninterred, 

The bride at the altar ; 
Leave the deer, leave the steer, 

Leave nets and barges ; 
Come with your fighting gear, 

Broadswords and targes. 

Come as the winds come, when 

Forests are rended ; 
Come as the waves come, when 

Navies are stranded ; 
Faster come, faster come, 

Faster and faster. 
Chief, vassal, page and groom, 

Tenant and master. 

Fast they come, fast they come ; 

See how they gather ! 
Wide waves the eagle plume 

Blended with heather. 
Cast your plaids, draw your blades, 

Forward each man set ! 
Pibroch of Donuil Dhu, 

Knell for the onset ! 

Sir Walter Scott. 



THE TROOPER'S DEATH. 

The weary night is o'er at last ! 
W^e ride so still, we ride so fast ! 
We ride where Death is lying. 
The morning wind doth coldly pass. 
Landlord ! we '11 take another glass. 
Ere dying. 

Thou, springing grass, that art so green, 
Shalt soon be rosy red, 1 ween. 
My blood the hue supplying ! 
I drink the first glass, sword in hand. 
To him who for the Fatherland 
Lies dying ! 



-ff 




Now quickly conies the second draught, 
And that shall be to freedona quaffed 

While freedom's foes are flying ! 
The rest, land, our hope and faith ! 
We 'd drink to thee with latest breath, 
Though dying ! 

My darling ! — ah, the glass is out ! 
The bullets ring, the riders shout — 

No time for wine or sighing ! 
There ! bring my love the shattered glass — 
Charge ! on he foe ! no joys surpass 
Such dying ! 

From the German. Translation of 
R. w. Raymond. 



SONG OF CLAN-ALPINE. 

FROM "THE LADY OF THE LAKE," CANTO II. 

Hail to the Chief who in triumph advances ! 

Honored and blessed be the evergreen Pine ! 
Long may the tree, in his banner that glances, 
Flourish, the shelter and grace of our line ! 

Heaven send it happy dew, 

Earth lend it sap anew, 
Gayly to bourgeon, and broadly to grow, 

While every Highland glen 

Sends our shout back again, 
" Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho ! ieroe ! " 

Ours is no sapling, chance-sown by the fountain, 

Blooming at Beltane, in winter to fade ; 
When the whirlwind has stripped every leaf on 
the mountain. 
The more shall Clan- Alpine exult in her shade. 
Moored in the rifted rock, 
Proof to the tempest's shock, 
Firmer he roots him the ruder it blow ; 
Menteith and Breadalbane, then, 
Echo his praise again, 
" Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho ! ieroe ! " 

Pi'oudly our pibroch has thrilled in Glen Fruin, 
And Bannachar's groans to our slogan replied ; 
Glen LussandRoss-dhu, they are smoking in ruin. 
And the best of Loch-Lomond lie dead on her 
side. 
Widow and Saxon maid 
Long shall lament our raid. 
Think of Clan- Alpine with fear and with woe ; 
Lennox and Leveii-glen 
Shake when they hear again, 
" Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho ! ieroe ! " 

Row, vassals, row, for the pride of the Highlands ! 

Stretch to your oars for the evergreen Pine ! 
that the rosebud that graces yon islands 

Were wreathed in a garland around him to 
twine ! 



that some seedling gem, 

Worthy such noble stem. 
Honored and blessed in their shadow might gi'o w ! 

Loud should Clan-Alpine then 

Ring from her deepmost glen, 
" Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho ! ieroe ! " 
Sir WALTER Scott. 



THE BATTLE-SONG OF GUSTAVUS 
ADOLPHUS. 

Fear not, little flock ! the foe 
Who madly seeks your overthrow, 

Dread not his rage and power ; 
What though your courage sometimes faints ? 
His seeming triumph o'er God's saints 

Lasts but a little hour. 

Be of good cheer ; your cause belongs 
To him who can avenge your wrongs. 

Leave it to him, our Lord. 
Though hidden now from all our eyes, 
He sees the Gideon who shall rise 

To save us, and his word. 

As true as God's own word is true. 
Not earth or hell with all their crew 

Against us shall prevail. 
A jest and by-word are they grown ; 
God is with us, we are his own. 

Our victory cannot fail. 

Amen, Lord Jesus ; grant our prayer ! 
Great Captain, now thine arm make bare ; 

Fight for us once again ! 
So shall the saints and martyrs raise 
A mighty chorus to thy praise. 

World without end ! Amen. 

From the German of MICHAEL AlTENBURG. 



SWORD SONG. 

fCharles Theodore Korner was a youngf German soldier, scholar, 
poet, and patriot. He was born at Dresden in the autunm of 1791, 
and fell in battle for his country at the early age of twenty-two. The 
" Sword Song," so called, was written in his pocket-book only two 
hours before he fell, during- a halt in a wood previous to the engage- 
ment, and was read by him to a comrade just a$ the signal was 
given for battle. This bold song represents the soldier chiding his 
sword, which, under Ihe image of his iron bride, is hnpatient to 
come forth from her chamber, the scabbard, and be wedded to him 
on the field of battle, where each soldier shall press the blade to his 
lips. 

Korner fell in an engagement with superior numbers near a thicket 
in the neighborhood of Rosenburg. He had advanced in pursuit 
of the flying foe too far beyond his comrades. They buried him 
under an old oak on the site of the battle, and carved his name on 
the trunk.] 

Sword, on my left side gleaming. 
What means thy bright eye's beaming ? 
It makes my spirit dance 
To see thy friendly glance. 
Hurrah ! 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



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" A valiant rider Ibears me ; 
A free-born German wears me : 
That makes my eye so bright ; 
That is the sword's delight." 
Hurrah ! 

Yes, good sword, I am free. 
And love thee heartily, 
And clasp thee to my side, 
E'en as a plighted bride. 
Hurrah ! 

"And I to thee, by Heaven, 
My light steel life have given ; 
When shall the knot be tied ? 
When wilt thou take thy bride ? " 
Hurrah ! 

The trumpet's solemn warning 
Shall hail the bridal morning. 
When cannon-thunders wake 
Then my true-love I take. 
Hurrah ! 

•'0 blessed, blessed meeting ! 
My heart is wildly beating : 
Come, bridegroom, come for me ; 
My garland waiteth thee." 
Hurrah ! 

Why in the scabbard rattle, 
So wild, so fierce for battle ? 
What means this restless glow " 
My sword, why clatter so ? 
Hurrah ! 

"Well may thy prisoner rattle ; 
My spirit yearns for battle. 
Rider, 't is war's wild glow 
That makes me tremble so." 
Hurrah ! 

Stay in thy chamber near, 
My love ; what wilt thou here ? 
Still in thy chamber bide : 
Soon, soon I take my bride. 
Hurrah ! 

" Let me not longer wait : 
Love's garden blooms in state, 
With roses bloody-red, 
And many a bright death-bed." 
Hurrah ! 

Now, then, come forth,- my bride ! 
Come forth, thou rider's pride ! 
Come out, my good sword, come ! 
Forth to thy father's home ! 
Hurrah ! 



" 0, in the field to prance 
The glorious wedding dance ! 
How, in the sun's bright beams. 
Bride-like the clear steel gleams ! " 
Hurrah ! 

Then forward, valiant fighters ! 
And forward, German riders ! 
And when the heart grows cold, 
Let each his love infold. 
Hurrah ! 

Once on the left it hung, 
And stolen glances flung ; 
Now clearly on your right 
Doth God each fond bride plight. 
Hurrah ! 

Then let your hot lips feel 
That virgin cheek of steel ; 
One kiss, — and woe betide 
Him who forsakes the bride. 
Hurrah ! 

Now let the loved one sing ; 
Now let the clear blade ring. 
Till the bright sparks shall fly. 
Heralds of victory ! 
Hurrah ! 

For, hark ! the trumpet's warning 
Proclaims the marriage morning ; 
It dawns in festal pride ; 
Hurrah, thou Iron Bride ! 
Hurrah ! 

From the German of CHARLES THEODORE KORNER. 
Translation of CHARLES T. BROOKS. 



THE NOBLEMAN AND THE PENSIONER. 

"Old man, God bless you i does your i)ipe taste 
sweetly ? 

A beauty, by my soul ! 
A red-clay flower-pot, rimmed with gold so neatly ! 

What ask you for the bowl ? " 

' ' sir, that bowl for worlds I would not part 
with ; 
A brave man gave it me, 
W^ho won it — now what think you ? — of a ba- 
shaw 
At Belgrade's victory. 

" There, sir, ah ! there was booty worth the 
showing, — 

Long life to Prince Eugene ! 
Like after-grass you might have seen us mowing 

The Turkish ranks down clean.' 



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WAR. 



521 '— ^ 



la 



" Another time I '11 hear your stoiy ; — 

Come, old man, be no fool ; 
Take these two ducats, — gold for glory, — 

And let me have the bowl ! '" 

"I 'm a poor clmrl, as you may say, sir ; 

My pension 's all I 'ra worth : 
Yet I "d not give that bowl away, sir, 

For all the gold on earth. 

"Just hear now ! Once, as we hussars, all meny, 

Hard on the foe's rear pressed, 
A blundering rascal of a janizary 

Shot through our captain's breast. 

"At once across my horse I hove him, — 
The same would he have done, — 

And from the smoke and tumult drove him 
Safe to a nobleman. 

" I nursed him, and, before his end, bequeathing 

His money and this bowl 
To me, he pressed my hand, just ceased his 
breathing, 

And so he died, brave soul ! 

" Tlie money thou must give mine host, — so 
thought I, ■ — ■ 

Three plunderings siiflfered he : 
And, in rememlirance of my old friend, brought I 

The pipe away with me. * 

" Henceforth in all campaigns with me I bore it, 

In flight or in pursuit ; 
It was a holy thing, sir, and I wore it 

Safe-sheltered in my boot. 

"This very limb, I lost it by a shot, sir. 

Under the walls of Prague : 
First at my precious pipe, be sure, I caught, sir, 

And then picked up my leg." 

"You move me even to tears, old sire : 
What was the brave man's name ? 

Tell me, that I, too, may admire, 
And venerate his fame." 

" They called him only the brave Walter ; 

His farm lay near the Rhine." — 
" God bless your old eyes ! 't was my. father, 

And that same farm is mine. 

"Come, friend, you've seen some stormy weather, 

With me is now your bed ; 
We' 11 drink of W^alter's grapes together, 

And eat of Walter's bread." 



"JSTow, — done ! I march in, then, to-morrow ; 

You 're his triic heir, I see ; 
And when I die, your thanks, kind master. 

The Turkish pipe shall be." 

From tlic German of PFEFFEL. .Trans- 
lation of CHARLES T. BROOKS. 



BINGEN ON THE RHINE. 

A SOLDIER of the Legion lay dying in Algiers, 
There was lack of woman's nursing, there was 

dearth of woman's tears ; 
But a comrade stood beside him, while his life- 
blood ebbed away, 
And bent, with pitying glances, to hear what he 

might say. 
The dying soldier faltered, and he took that 

comrade's hand. 
And he said, "I nevermore shall see my own, 

my native land ; 
Take a message, and a token, to some distant 

friends of mine. 
For I was born at Bingen, — at Bingen on the 

Rhine. 

" Tell my brothers and companions, when they 

meet and crowd around. 
To hear my mournful story, in the pleasant 

vineyard ground, 
Tliat we fought the battle bravely, and when the 

day was done, 
Full many a corse lay ghastly pale beneath the 

setting sun ; 
And, mid the dead and dying, were some gi-own 

old in wars, — - 
The death-wound on their gallant breasts, the 

last of many scars ; 
And some were young, and suddenly beheld life's 

morn decline, — 
And one had come from Bingen, — fair Bingen 

on the Rhine. 

"Tell my mother that her other son shall com- 
fort her old age ; 

For I was still a truant bird, that thought his 
home a cage. 

For my father was a soldier, and even as a child 

My heart leaped forth to hear him tell of strug- 
gles fierce and wild ; 

And when he died, and left us to divide his 
scanty hoard, 

I let them take whate'er they would, — but kept 
my father's sword ;( 

And with boyish love I hung it where the bright 
light used to shine. 

On the cottage wall at Bingen, — calm Bingen 
on the Rhine. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



-Bi 



"Tell my sister not to weep for me, and sob 

with drooping head, 
When the troops come marching home again 

with glad and gallant tread. 
But to look upon them proudly, with a calm and 

steadfast eye. 
For her brother was a soldier too, and not afraid 

to die ; 
And if a comrade seek her love, I ask her in my 

name 
To listen to him kindly, without regret or shame. 
And to hang the old sword in its place (my fath- 
er's sword and mine) 
For the honor of old Bingen, — dear Bingen on 

the Rhine. 

"There 's another, — not a sister ; in theliappy 

days gone by 
You 'd have known her by the merriment that 

sparkled in her eye ; 
Too innocent for coquetry, — too fond for idle 

scorning, — 

friend ! I fear the lightest heart makes some- 

times heaviest mourning ! 
Tell her the last night of my life (for, ere the 

moon be risen. 
My body will be out of pain, my soul be out of 

prison) , — 

1 dreamed I stood with her, and saw the yellow 

sunlight shine 
On the vine-clad hills of Bingen, — fair Bingen 
on the Rhine. 

" I saw the blue Rhine sweep along, — I heard, 
or seemed to hear, 

The German songs we used to sing, in chorus 
sweet and clear ; 

And down the pleasant river, and up the slant- 
ing hill, 

The echoing choi'us sounded, through the evening 
calm and still ; 

And her glad blue eyes were on me, as we passed, 
with friendly talk, 

Down many a path beloved of yore, and well- 
remembered walk ! 

And her little hand lay lightly, confidingly in 
nunc, — 

But we '11 meet uo more at Bingen, — loved 
Bingen on the Rhine." 

His trembling voice grew faint and hoarse, — 

his grasp was childish weak, — 
His eyes put on a dying look, — he sighed and 

ceased to speak ; 
His comrade bent to lift him, but the sjiark of 

life had fled, — 
The soldier of the Legion in a foreign land is 

dead ! 



And the soft moon rose up slowly, and calmly 

she looked down 
On the red sand of the battle-field, with bloody 

corses strewn ; 
Yes, calmly on that dreadful scene her pale light 

seemed to shine. 
As it shone on distant Bingen, — fair Bingen on 

the Rhine. 

Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton. 



MY WIFE AND CHILD.* 

The tattoo beats, —the lights are gone, 
The camp around in slumber lies. 

The night with solemn pace moves on, 
The shadows thicken o'er the skies ; 

But sleep my weary eyes hath flown, 
And sad, uneasy thoughts arise. 

I think of thee, darling one, 

Whose love my early life hath blest — 

Of thee and him — our baby son — 
Who slumbers on thy gentle breast. 

God of the tender, frail, and lone, 
0, guard the tender sleeper's rest ! 

And hover gently, hover near 

To her whose Avatchful eye is wet, — 

To mothar, wife, — the doubly dear, 
In whose young heart have freshly met 

Two streams of love so deep and clear, 
And cheer her drooping spirits yet. 

Now, while she kneels before thy throne, 
0, teach her. Ruler of the skies, 

That, while by thy behest alone 

Earth's mightiest powers fall or rise, 

No tear is wept to thee unknown. 
No hair is lost, no sparrow dies ! 

That thou canst stay the ruthless hands 
Of dark disease, and soothe its pain ; 

That only by thy stern commands 
The battle 's lost, the soldier 's slain ; 

That from the distant sea or land 

Thou bring'st the wanderer home again. 

And when upon her pillow lone 

Her tear-wet cheek is sadly pressed. 

May happier visions beam upon 

The brightening current of her breast, 

No frowning look or angry tone 
Disturb the Sabbath of her rest ! 

• Written in the year 1846, in Mexico, tlie author beinj at that 
time Colonel of the 1st Regiment Georgia Volunteers. 



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Whatever fate these forms may show, 
Loved with a passion almost wild, 

By day, by night, in joy or woe, 

By fears oppressed, or hopes beguiled, 

From every dangei-, every foe, 

God, protect my wife and child ! 

HENRY R. Jackson. 



MONTEREY. 

We were not many, — we who stood 

Before the iron sleet that day ; 
Yet many a gallant spirit would 
Give half his years if but he could 

Have been with us at Monterey. 

Now here, now there, the shot it hailed 

In deadly drifts of fiery spray. 
Yet not a single soldier quailed 
When wounded comrades round them wailed 

Their dying shout at Monterey. 



And on, still on our column kept. 

Through walls of flame, its withering way ; 
Where fell the dead, the living stept. 
Still charging on the guns which swept 
The slippery streets of Monterey. 

The foe himself recoiled aghast. 

When, striking where he strongest lay, 
We swooped his flanking batteries past. 
And, braving full their murderous blast, 
Stormed home the towers of Monterej''. 

Our banners on those turrets wave. 

And there our evening bugles play ; 
Where orange boughs above their grave. 
Keep green the memory of the brave 
Who fought and fell at Monterey. 

We are not many, — we who pressed 

Beside the brave who fell that day ; 
But who of us has not confessed 
He 'd rather share their warrior rest 
Than not have been at Monterey ? 

Charles Fenno Hoffman. 



fe 



IN STATE. 



Keeper of the Sacred Key, 

And the Great Seal of Destiny, 

Whose eye is the blue canopy, 

Look down upon the warring world, and tell us 

what the end will be. 



"Lo, through the wintry atmosphere, 
On the white bosom of the sphere, 
A cluster of five lakes appear ; 
And all the land looks like a couch, or warrior's 
shield, or sheeted bier. 

" And on that vast and hollow field, 
With both lips closed and both eyes sealed, 
A mighty Figure is revealed, — 
Stretched at full length, and stiff and stark, as 
in the hollow of a shield. 

"The winds have tied the drifted snow 
Around the face and chin ; and lo. 
The sceptred Giants come and go. 
And shake their shadowy crowns and say : ' We 
always feared it would be so ! ' 

"^She came of an heroic race : 
A giant's strength, a maiden's grace. 
Like two in one seem to embrace, 
And match, and blend, and thorough-blend, in 
her colossal form and face. 

' ' Where can her dazzling falchion be ? 
One hand is fallen in the sea ; 
The Gulf Stream drifts it far and free ; 
And in that hand her shining brand gleams from 
the depths resplendently. 

" And by the other, in its rest, 
The stany banner of the West 
Is clasped forever to her breast ; 
And of her silver helmet, lo, a soaring eagle is 
the crest. 

" And on her brow, a softened light, 
As of a star concealed from sight 
By some thin veil of fleecy white. 
Or of the rising moon behind the raining vapors 
of the night. 

" The Sisterhood that was so sweet. 
The Starry System sphered complete, 
Which the mazed Orient used to greet. 
The Four-and-Thirty fallen Stars glimmer and 
glitter at her feet. 

" And over her, — and over all. 
For panoply and coronal, — 
The mighty Immemorial, 
And everlasting Canopy and Starry Arch and 
Shield of All. 



"Three cold, bright moons have marched and 

wheeled ; 
And the white cerement that revealed 
A Figure stretched upon a Shield, 
Is turned to verdure ; and the Land is now one 

mighty Battle-field. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND "WAR. 



■a 



I. 



br 



"And lo, the children which she bred, 
And more than all else cherished, 
To make them true in heart and head, 
Stand face to lace, as mortal foes, with their 
swords crossed above the dead. 

" Each hath a mighty stroke and stride : 
One true, — the more that he is tried ; 
The other dark and evil-eyed ; — • 
And by the hand of one of them, his own dear 
mother surely died ! 

" A stealthy step, a gleam of hell, — 
It is the simple truth to tell, — 
The Son stabbed and the Mother fell : 
And so she lies, all mute and pale, and pure and 
irreproachable ! 

" And then the battle-trumpet blew ; 
And the true brother sprang and drew 
His blade to smite the traitor through ; 
And so they clashed above the bier, and tlie 
Night sweated bloody dew. 

"And all their children, far and wide, 
That are so greatly multiplied, 
Eise up in frenzy and divide ; 
And choosing, each whom he will serve, un- 
sheathe the sword and take their side. 

"And in the low sun's bloodshot rays, 
Portentous of the coming days, 
The Two great Oceans blush an<l blaze, 
"With the emergent continent between them, 
Avrapt in crimson haze. 

" Now Avhichsoever stand or fall, 
As God is great, and' man is small. 
The Truth shall triunii)h over all : 
Forever and forevermore, the Truth shall triumph 
over all ! 

III. 
" I see the champion sword-strokes flash ; 
I see t]ien\ fall and hear then) clash ; 
I hear the murderous engines crash ; 
I see a brother stoop to loose a foeman-brother's 
bloody sash. 

" I see the torn and mangled corse. 
The dead and dying heaped in scores. 
The headless rider by his liorse, 
The wounded captive bayoneted through and 
through without remorse. 

" 1 hear the dying sufferer cry. 
With his crushed face turned to the sky, 
1 see him crawl in agony 
To the foul pool, and bow his head into 
bloody slime, and die. 



" I see the assassin crouch and fire, 
I see his victim fall, — expire ; 
I see the murderer creeping nigher 
To strip the dead. He turns the head, • 
face ! The son beholds his sire ! 



-the 



I hear the curses and the thanks ; 
I see the mad charge on the flanks, 
The i-ents, the gaps, the broken ranks, 
The van(|uished squadrons driven headlong down 
the river's bridgeless banks. 

" I see the death-gripe on the plain, 
The grappling monsters on the main, 
The tens of thousands that are slain. 
And all the speecliless suifering and agouy of 
heart and brain. 

"I see the dark and bloody spots, 
The crowded rooms and crowded cots, 
The bleaching bones, the battle blots, — 
And writ on many a nameless grave, a legend of 
forget-me-nots. 

"I see the gorged prison-den. 
The dead line and the pent-up pen. 
The thousands quartered in the fen. 
The living-deaths of skin and bone that were the 
goodly shapes of men. 

" And still the bloody Dew must foil ! 
And His great Darkness with the Pall 
Of His di'ead Judgment cover all, 
Till the Dead Nation rise Transformed by Truth 
to triumph over all ! " 

"And Last — and Last I" see — The Deed." 
Thus saith the Keeper of the Key, 
And the Great Seal of Destiny, 
Whose eye is the blue canopy, 
i.nd leaves the Pall of His great Darkness over 
all the Land and Sea. 

FORCEYTHIi WILLSON. 



.J:'- riCKET-GUAPvD. 

"All quiet along the Potomac," they say, 

" Excej)! now and then a stray pi(;ket 
Is shot, as he walks on his beat, to and fro, 

By a rilleman iiid in the thicket. 
"T is nothing : a private or two, now and then. 

Will not (jount in the news of the battle ; 
Not an officer lost, — only one of the men, 

Moaning out, all alone, the deatli-rattle." 

All quiet along the Potomac to-night. 

Where the soldiers lie peacefully dreaming ; 

Their tents in the rays of the clear autumn moon. 
Or the light of the watch-iires, are gleaming. 



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A tremulous sigli, as the geutle night-wiud 
Tlivougli the forest leaves softly is ereeping ; 

AVliile stars up above, with their glittering eyes, 
Keep guard, — for tlie army is sleeping. 

There 's ouly the sound of the lone sentry's tread 

As he tranips from the rock to the fountain, 
Aiul he thinks of the two in the low trundle-bed, 

Far away in the cot on the mountain. 
His musket falls slack ; his face, dark and grim. 

Grows gentle with memories tender, 
As he mutters a prayer for the children asleep, 

For their mother, — may Heaven defend her ! 

{The moon seems to shine just as brightly as then. 

That night when the love yet unspoken 
Leaped upto his lips, — wjien low, murmured vows 

"Were pledged to be evei' unbroken ; 
Then drawing his sleeve roughly over his eyes, 

He dashes off tears that are welling. 
And gathers his gun closer up to its i)lace, 

As if to keep down tlie heart-swelling. 

-<ITe passes the fountain, the blasted pine-tree, ■ — 

The footstep is lagging and weary ; 
Yet onward he goes, through the broad belt of 
light, 
vIToward the shades of the forest so dreary. 
Hark ! was it the night-wind that rustled the 
leaves ? 
Was it moonlight so wondrously flashing ? 
It looked like a rifle : " Ha ! Mary, good-by ! " 
And the life-blood is ebbing and plashing. 

All quiet along the Potomac to-night, — 
No sound save the rush of the river ; 

While soft falls the dew on the face of the dead, — 
The picket 's off duty forever. 

r.-niELiM ELIOT Beers 

CIVIL WAE. 

"Rifleman-, shoot me a fancy shot 

Straight at the heart of yon prowling vidette ; 

Eing me a ball in the glittering spot 

That shines on his breast like an amulet ! " 

" Ah, capjtain ! here goes for a fine-drawn bead. 
There 's music around when my barrel 's in 
tune ! " 

Crack ! went the I'ifle, the messenger sped, 
Anddead from his horse fell the ringing dragoon. 

"iS^'ow, rifleman, steal through the hushes, and 
snatch 
From your victim some trinket to handsel first 
blood ; 
A button, a loop, or that luminous patch 

That gleams in the moon like a diamond stud !" 



" O captain ! I staggered, and sunk on iny track. 
When 1 gazed on the face of that falloi vidette. 

For he looked so like you, as he lay on Jiis back, 
Tliat my heart rose upon me, and masters me 
yet. 

'•But I snatched ofT the trinket, — this locket 
of gold ; 

An inch from the centre my lead broke its way, 
Scarce grazing the picture, so fair to behold, 

Of a beautiful lady in bridal array." 

"Ha ! riUcman, fling me the locket ! — 't is she. 
My brother's young bride, and the fallen dra- 
goon 
Was her husband — Hush ! soldier, 'twas Heav- 
en's decree. 
We nnist bury him there, by the light of the 
moon ! 

"But, hark ! the far bugles their warnings unite ; 

War is a virtue, — weakness a sin ; 
There 's a lurking and loping around us to-night ; 

Load again, riileman, keep your hand in ! " 

CHARLES DAWSON SHANLY. 



THE BRIEK-W^OOD PIPE. 

Ha ! bully for me again, when my turn for 
picket is over. 

And now for a smoke as I lie, with the moon- 
light, out in the clover. 

My pipe, it's only a knot from the root of a 

brier-wood tree. 
But it turns my heart to the Northward — Harry 

gave it to me. 

And I 'm but a rough at best, bred up to the 

row and the riot ; 
But a softness comes over my heart, when all 

are asleep and quiet. 

For, many a time, in the night, strange things 

appear to my eye. 
As the breath from my brier- wood pipe curls up 

between me and the sky. 

Last night a beautiful spirit arose with the 

wisping smoke ; 
0, I shook, but my heart felt good, as it spi'ead 

out its hands and spoke ; 

Saying, " I am the soul of the brier ; we grew 

at the root of a tree 
W^hcre lovers would come in the twilight, two 

ever, for company. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



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' ' Where lovers would come in the morning — 

ever but two, together ; 
W^hen the flowers were full in their Wow ; the 

birds, in their song and feather. 

" Where lovers would come in the noontide, 

loitering — never but two, 
Looking in each other's eyes, like pigeons that 

kiss and coo. 

" And 0, the honeyed words that came when 

the lips were parted, 
And the passion that glowed in the eyes, and the 

lightning looks that darted ! 

" Enough : Love dwells in the pipe — so ever it 

glows with fire ! 
I am the soul of the bush, and the spirits call 

me Sweet Brier." 

That 's what the brier-wood said, as nigh as my 

tongue can tell, 
And the words went straight to my heart, like 

the stroke of the fire-bell. 

To-night I lie in the clover, watching the blos- 

somy smoke ; 
I 'm glad the boys are asleep, for I ain't in the 

humor to joke. 

I lie in the hefty clover : up between me and 

the moon 
The smoke of my pipe arises : my heart will be 

quiet, soon. 

My thoughts are back in the city, I 'm every- 
thing I 've been ; 

I hear the bell from the tower, I run with the 
swift machine, 

I see the red shirts crowding around the engine- 
house door, 

The foreman's hail through the trumpet comes 
with a hollow roar. 

The reel in the Bowery dance-house, the row in 
the beer-saloon, 

W^here 1 put in my licks at Big Paul, come be- 
tween me and the moon. 

I hear the drum and the bugle, the tramp of the 

cow-skin boots, 
We are marching on our muscle, the Fire-Zouave 

lecruits ! 

White handkerchiefs wave before me — 0, but 

the sight is pretty 
On the wliite marble steps, as we march through 

the heart of the city. 



Bright eyes and clasping arms, and lips that 

bade us good hap ; 
And the splendid lady who gave me the havelock 

for my cap. 

0, up from my pipe-cloud rises, there between 

me and the moon, 
A beautiful white-robed lady ; my heart will be 

quiet, soon. 

The lovely golden-haired lady ever in dreams I 

see. 
Who gave me the snow-white havelock — but 

what does she care for me ? 

Look at my grimy features ; mountains between 

us stand : 
I with my sledge-hammer knuckles, she with 

her jewelled hand ! 

What care I ? — the day that 's dawning may see 

me, wlien all is over. 
With the red stream of my life-blood staining 

the hefty clover. 

Hark ! the reveille sounding out on the morning 

air ; 
Devils are we for the battle — Will there be 

angels there ? 

Kiss me again, Sweet Brier, the touch of your 

lip to mine 
Brings back the white-robed lady with hair like 

the golden wine ! 

Charles Dawson Shanly. 



WOUNDED TO DEATH. 

Steady, boys, steady ! 

Keep your arms ready, 
God only knows whom we may meet here. 

Don't let me be taken ; 

I 'd rather awaken. 
To-morrow, in — no matter where, 
Than lie in that foul prison-hole — over there. 
Step slowly ! 
Speak lowly ! 

These rocks may have life. 
Lay me down in this hollow ; 

We are out of the strife. 
By heavens ! the focmen may track me in blood, 
For this hole in my breast is outpouring a flood. 
No ! no surgeon for me ; he can give me no aid ; 
The surgeon 1 M'ant is ])ickaxe and spade. 
What, Morris, a tear? Why, shame on ye, man ! 
I thought you a hero ; but since you began 
To whimi)er and cry like a girl in her teens. 
By George ! 1 don't know what the devil it means '• 



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ca 



Well ! well ! I am rough ; 't is a very rough school. 
This life of a trooper, — but yet I 'm no fool ! 
I know a brave man, and a friend from a foe ; 
And, boys, that you love me I certainly know ; 

But was n't it grand 
When they came down the hill over sloughing 

and sand ! 
But we stood — did we not ? — like immovable 

rock, 
Unheeding their balls and repelling their shock. 

Did you mind the loud cry 

When, as tuiiiing to fly, 
Our men sprang upon them, determined to die ? 

0, was n't it grand ! 

God help the poor wretches that fell in that fight ; 
No time was there given for prayer or for flight ; 
They fell by the score, in, the crash, hand to hand, 
And they mingled their blood with the sloughing 
and sand. 

Huzza ! 
Great Heavens ! this bullet-hole gapes like a 

grave ; 
A curse on the aim of the traitorous knave ! 
Is there never a one of ye knows how to pray, 
Or speak for a man as his life ebbs away ? 
Pray ! 

Pray ! 

Our Father ! our Father ! . . . why don't ye pro- 
ceed ? 
Can't you see I am dying ? Great God, how I 

bleed ! 
Ebbing away ! 

Ebbing away ! 

The light of the day 
Is turning to gray. 

Pray ! 

Pray ! 
Our Father in Heaven, — boys, tell me the rest, 
While I stanch the hot blood from this hole in 

my breast. 
There 's something about the forgiveness of sin — 
Put that in ! put that in ! — and then 
I '11 follow your words and say an amen. 

Here, Morris, old fellow, get hold of my hand ; 

And, Wilson, my comrade — 0, was n't it grand 

When they came down the hill like a thunder- 
charged cloud ! 

Where 's Wilson, my comrade ? — Here, stoop 
down your head ; 

Can't yo2(, say a short prayer for the dying and 
dead ! 

"Christ God, who died for sinners all, 
Hear thou this suppliant wanderer's cry ; 

Let not e'en this poor sparrow fall 
Unheeded by thy gracious eye. 



" Throw wide thy gates to let him in. 
And take him, pleading, to thine arms ; 

Forgive, Lord ! his life-long sin. 
And quiet all his fierce alarms." 

God bless you, my comrade, for saying that 

hymn ; 
It is light to my path when my eye has grown 

dim. 
I am dying — bend down till I touch you once 

more — 
Don't forget me, old fellow, — God prosper this 

war ! 
Confusion to traitors ! — keep hold of my hand — 
And float the old flag o'er a prosperous land ! 
John w. Watson, 



LEFT ON" THE BATTLE-FIELD. 

What, was it a dream ? am I all alone 

In the dreary night and the drizzling rain ? 

Hist ! — ah, it was only the river's moan ; 
They have left me behind with the mangled 
slain. 

Yes, now I remember it all too well ! 

We met, from the battling ranks apart ; 
Together our weapons flashed and fell, 

And mine was sheathed in his quivering heart. 

In the cypress gloom, where the deed was done, 
It was all too dark to see his face ; 

But I heard his death-groans, one by one, 
And he holds me still in a cold embrace. 

He spoke but once, and I could not hear 
The words he said, for the cannon's roar ; 

But my heart grew cold with a deadly fear, — 
God ! 1 had heard that voice before ! 

Had heard it before at our mother's knee. 

When we lisped the words of our evening 
prayer ! 

My brother ! would I had died for thee, — 
This burden is more than my soul can bear ! 

I pressed my lips to his death-cold cheek, 

And begged him to show me, by word or sign, 

That he knew and forgave me : he could not 
speak. 
But he nestled his poor cold face to mine. 

The blood flowed fast from my wounded side, 
And then for a while I forgot my pain, 

And over the lakelet we seemed to glide 
In our little boat, two boys again. 



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POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



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And then, in my dream, we stood alone 
On a forest path where the shadows fell ; 

And I heard again the tremulous tone, 
And the tender words of his last farewell. 

But that parting was years, long years ago, 
He wandered away to a foreign land ; 

And our dear old mother will never know 
That he died to-night by his brother's hand. 

The soldiers who buried the dead away 

Disturbed not the clasp of that last embrace, 

But laid them to sleep till the judgment-day, 
Heart folded to heart, and face to face. 

SARAH T. BOLTON. 



THE DRUMMER-BOY'S BURIAL. 

All day long the storm of battle through the 

startled valley swept ; 
All night long the stars in heaven o'er the slain 

sad vigils kept. 

0, the ghastly iipturned faces gleaming whitely 
through the night ! 

0, the heaps of mangled corses in that dim sepul- 
chral light ! 

One by one tlie pale stars faded, and at length 

the morning broke ; 
But not one of all the sleepers on that field of 

death awoke. 

Slowly passed the golden hours of that long 

bright summer day, 
And upon that field of carnage still the dead 

unburied lay. 

Lay there stark and cold, but pleading with a 

dumb, unceasing prayer, 
For a little dust to hide them from the staring 

sun and air. 

But tlie foeman lield possession of that hard-won 

battle-plain, 
In imholy wrath denying even burial to our 

slain. 

Once again the night dropped round them, — 

night so hoi}' and so calm 
That the moonbeams hushed the spirit, like the 

sound of prayer or psalm. 

On a couch of trampled grasses, just apart from 

all the rest. 
Lay a fair young boy, with small hands meekly 

folded on his breast. 



Death had touched him very gently, and he lay 

as if in sleep ; 
Even his mother scarce had shuddered at that 

slumber calm and deep. 

For a smile of wondrous sweetness lent a radi- 
ance to the face. 

And the hand of cunning sculptor could have 
added naught of grace 

To the marble limbs so perfect in their passion- 
less repose. 

Robbed of all save matchless purity by hard, 
unpitying foes. 

And the broken drum beside him all his life's 

short storj' told : 
How he did his duty bravely till the death-tide 

o'er him rolled. 

Midnight came with ebon garments and a diadem 

of stars, 
"While right upward in the zenith hung the fiery 

planet Mars. 

Hark ! a sound of stealthy footsteps and of voices 

whispering low, 
Was it nothing but the j'oung leaves, or the 

brooklet's murmuring flow ? 

Clinging closely to each other, striving never to 

look round 
As they passed with silent shudder the pale 

corses on the ground, 

Came two little maidens, — sisters, — with a 

light and hastj' tread. 
And a look upon their faces, half of sorrow, half 

of dread. 

And they did not pause nor falter till, with 
throbbing hearts, they stood 

Where the drummer-boy was lying in that par- 
tial solitude. 

They had brought some simple garments from 

their wardrobe's scanty store. 
And two heavy iron shovels in their slender 

hands they bore. 

Then they quickly knelt beside him, crushing 

back the pitying tears. 
For they had no time for weeping, nor for any 

girlish fears. 

And they robed the icy body, while no glow of 

maiden sliame 
Changed the pallor of their foreheads to a flush 

of lambent flame. 



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For their saintly hearts yearned o'er it in that 
hour of sorest need, 

And they felt that Death was holy, and it sanc- 
tified the deed. 

But they smiled and kissed each other when 
their new strange task was o'er. 

And the form that lay before them its unwonted 
garments wore. 

Then with slow and weary lahor a small grave 

they hollowed out, 
And they lined it with the withered grass and 

leaves that lay about. 

But the day was slowly breaking ere their holy 

work was done. 
And in crimson pomp the morning heralded 

again the sun. 

Gently then those little maidens — they were 
children of our foes — 

Laid the body of our drummer-boy to undis- 
turbed repose. 

Anonymous. 



m-^ 



BEFORE SEDAN". 

" The dead hand clasped a letter." — Special Correspon 

Here in this leafy place, 

Quiet he lies, 
Cold, with his sightless face 

Turned to the skies ; 
'T is but another dead ; — 
All you can say is said. 

Carry his body hence, — 
Kings must have slaves ; 

Kings climb to eminence 
Over men's graves. 

So this man's eye is, dim ;' — 

Throw the earth over him. 

What was the white you touched, 

There at his side ? 
Paper his hand had clutched 

Tight ere he died ; 
Message or wish, may be : — 
Smootli out the folds and see. 

Hardly the Avorst of lis 

Here could have smiled ! — 

Only the tremulous 
Words of a child : — 

Prattle, that had for stops 

Just a few ruddy drops. 



Look. She is sad to miss, 

Morning and night. 
His — her dead father's — kiss, 

Tries to be bright. 
Good to mamma, and sweet. 
That is all. "Marguerite." 

Ah, if beside the dead 

Slumbered the pain ! 
Ah, if the hearts that bled 

Slept with the slain ! 
If the grief died ! — But no : — 
Death will not have it so. 

Austin Doeson. 



THE SOLDIER'S DREAM. 

Our bugles sang truce, — for the night-cloud had 
lowered. 
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the 
sky ; 
And thousands had sunk on the ground over- 
powered. 
The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die. 

When reposing that night on my pallet of straw, 
By the wolf-scaring fagot that guarded the 
slain ; 

At the dead of the night a sweet vision I saw, 
And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again. 

Methought from the battle-field's dreadful array. 
Far, far I had roamed on a desolate track : 

'T was autumn, — and sunshine arose on the way 
To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me 
back. 

I flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft 
In life's morning march, when my bosom was 
young ; 
I heard my own mountain -goats bleating aloft, 
And knew the sweet strain that the corn- 
reapers sung. 

Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I 
swore, 
From my home and my weeping friends never 
to part ; 
My little ones kissed me a thousand times o'er, 
And my wife sobbed aloud in her fulness of 
heart. 

" Stay, stay with us, — rest, thou art weary and 

worn ; " 

And fain wastheirwar-broken soldier to stay ; — 

But sorrow returned with the dawning of morn, 

And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away. 

Thomas Campbell. 



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WHERE ARE THE MEN? 

Where are the men who went forth in the 
morning, 

Hope brightly beaming in every face ? 
Fearing no danger, — the Saxon foe scorning, — 

Little thought they of defeat or disgrace ! 
Fallen is their chieftain — his glory departed — 

Fallen are the heroes who fought by his side ! 
Fatherless children now weep, broken-hearted, 

Mournfully wandering by Rhuddlan's dark 
tide! 

Small was the band that escaped from the 
slaughter, 

Flying for life as the tide 'gan to flow ; 
Hast thou no pity, thou dark rolling water ? 

More cruel still than the merciless foe ! 
Death is behind them, and death is before them ; 

Faster and faster rolls on the dark wave ; 
One wailing cry — and the sea closes o'er them ; 

Silent and deep is their watery grave. 

From the Welsh of TALHAIARN. Trans- 
lation of THOMAS OLIPHANT. 



m- 



THE SOLDIER'S RETURN". 

How sweet it was to breathe that cooler air, 
And take possession of my father's chair ! 
Beneath my elbow, on the solid frame, 
Appeared the rough initials of my name, 
Cut forty years before ! The same old clock 
Struck the same bell, and gave my heart a shock 
I never can forget. A short breeze sprung. 
And while a sigh was trembling on my tongue, 
Caught the old dangling almanacs behind. 
And up they flew like banners in the wind ; 
Then gently, singly, down, down, down they 

went, 
And told of twenty years that I had spent 
Far from my native land. That instant came 
A robin on the threshold ; though so tame, 
At first he looked distrustful, almost shy. 
And cast on me his coal-black steadfast eye. 
And seemed to say, — past friendship to renew, — 
" Ah ha ! old worn-out soldier, is it you ? " 
While thus I mused, still gazing, gazing still, 
On beds of moss that spread the window-sill, 
I deemed no moss my eyes had ever seen 
Had been so lovely, brilliant, fi-esh, and green. 
And guessed some infant hand had placed it 

there, 
And prized its hue, so exquisite, so rare. 
Feelings on feelings mingling, doubling rose ; 
My heart felt everything but calm repose ; 
I could not reckon minutes, hours, nor years, 
But rose at once, and bursted into tears ; 



Then, like a fool, confused, sat down again, 
And thought upon the past with shame and pain ; 
I raved at war and all its horrid cost. 
And glory's quagmire, where the brave are lost. 
On carnage, fire, and i)lunder long I mused. 
And cursed the murdei-ing weapons I had used. 

Two shadows then I saw, two voices heard, 
One bespoke age, and one a child's appeared. 
In stepped my father with convulsive start, 
And in an instant clasped me to his heart. 
Close by him stood a little blue-eyed maid ; 
And stooping to the child, the old man said, 
"Come hither, Nancy, kiss me once again; 
This is your Uncle Charles, come home from 

Spain." 
The child approached, "and with her fingers light 
Stroked my old eyes, almost deprived of sight. 
But why thus spin my tale, — thus tedious be ? 
Happy old soldier ! what 's the world to me ? 

Robert Blooiifield. 



SOLDIER, REST! THY WARFARE O'ER. 

FROM "THE LADY OF THE LAKE," CANTO I. 

Soldier, rest ! thy warfare o'er. 

Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking ; 
Dream of battled fields no more. 

Days of danger, nights of waking. 
In our isle's enchanted hall, 

Hands unseen thy couch are strewing, 
Fairy strains of music fall, 

Every sense in slumber dewing. 
Soldier, rest !, thy warfare o'er. 
Dream of fighting fields no more ; 
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking, 
Morn of toil, nor night of waking. 

No rude sound shall reach thine ear. 

Armor's clang, or war-steed champing, 
Trump nor pibroch summon here 

Mustering clan, or squadron tramping. 
Yet the lark's shrill fife may come 

At the daybreak from the fallow, 
And the bittern sound his drum. 

Booming from the sedgy shallow. 
Ruder sounds shall none be near. 
Guards nor warders challenge here ; 
Here 's no war-steed's neigh and champing, 
Shouting clans or squadrons stamping. 

Huntsman, rest ! thy chase is done. 

While our slumberous spells assail ye, 
Dream not, with the rising sun. 

Bugles here shall sound reveille. 
Sleep ! the deer is in his den ; 

Sleep ! thy hounds are by thee lying ; 
Sleep ! nor dream in yonder glen 

How thy gallant steed lay dying. 



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Huntsman, rest ! thy chase is done ; 
Think not of the rising sun, 
For, at dawning to assail ye, 
Here no bugles sound reveille. 

Sir Walter Scott. 



DRIVING HOME THE COWS. 

Out of the clover and blue-eyed grass 
He turned them into the river-lane ; 

One after another he let them pass, 
Then fastened the meadow bars again. 

Under the willows, and over the hill, 
He patiently followed their sober pace ; 

The merry whistle for once was still, 

And something shadowed the sunny face. 

Only"a boy ! and his father had said 
He never could let his youngest go ; 

Two already were lying dead 

Under the feet of the trampling foe. 

But after the evening work was done. 

And the frogs were loud in the meadow-swamp. 

Over his shoulder he slung his gun 

And stealthily followed the foot-path damp. 

Across the clover and through the wheat 
With resolute heart and purpose grim. 

Though cold was the dew on his hurrying feet. 
And the blind bat's flitting startled him. 

Thrice since then had the lanes been white. 
And the orchards sweet with apple-bloom ; 

And now, when the cows came back at night. 
The feeble father drove them home. 

For news had come to the lonely farm 

That three were lying where two had lain ; 

And the old man's tremulous, palsied arm 
Could never lean on a sou's again. 

The summer day greAV cool and late. 

He went for the cows when the work was done ; 
But down the lane, as he opened the gate, 

He saw them coming one by one, — 

Brindle, Ebony, Speckle, and Bess, 

Shaking their horns in the evening wind ; 

Cropping the buttercups out of the grass, — 
But who was it following close behind ? 

Loosely swung in the idle air 

The empty sleeve of army blue ; 
And worn and pale, from the crisping hair. 

Looked out a face that the father knew. 



For Southern prisons will sometimes yawn, 
And yield their dead unto life again ; 

And the day that comes with a cloudy dawn 
In golden glory at last may wane. 

The gi-eat tears sprang to their meeting eyes ; 

For the heart must speak when the lips are dumb; 
And under the silent evening skies 

Together they followed the cattle home. 

Kate Putnam Osgood. 



DIRGE FOR A SOLDIER.* 

Close his eyes ; his work is done ! 
What to him is friend or foeman, 
Rise of moon or set of sun. 

Hand of man or kiss of woman ? 
Lay him low, lay him low. 
In the clover or the snow ! 
What cares he ? he cannot know ; 
Lay him low ! 

As man may, he fought his fight. 

Proved his truth by his endeavor ; 
Let him sleep in solemn night, 
Sleej) forever and forever. 
Lay him low, lay him low, 
In the clover or the snow ! 
What cares he ? he cannot know ; 
Lay him low ! 

Fold him in his country's stars, 

Roll the drum and fire the volley ! 
What to him are all our wars ? — • 
What but death-bemocking folly ? 
Lay liim low, lay him low. 
In the clover or the snow ! 
What cares he ? he cannot know ; 
Lay him low ! 

Leave him to God's watching eye ; 

Trust him to the hand that made him. 
Mortal love weeps idly by ; 
God alone has power to aid him. 
Lay him low, lay him low. 
In the clover or the snow ! 
What cares he ? he cannot know ; 
Lay him low ! 

George Henry Boker. 



B^ 



SOMEBODY'S DARLING. 

FROM "SOUTH SONGS." 

Into a ward of the whitewashed walls 
Where the dead and the dying lay — • 

Wounded by bayonets, shells, and balls — • 
Somebody's darling was borne one day. 

• Major-General Philip Kearney, U. S. V., killed at Chantilly, 
Va., Sept, 1, 1862. 



•ff 



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532 



POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



"^ 



B- 



Somebodj^'s darling ! so young and so brave, 
Wearing still on his pale, sweet face — 

Soon to be hid by the dust of the grave — ■ 
The lingering light of his boyhood's grace. 

Matted and damp are the curls of gold, 

Kissing the snow of that fair young brow ; 
Pale are the lips of delicate mould — 

Somebody's darling is dying now. 
Back from the beautiful blue- veined face 

Brush every wandering, silken thread ; 
Cross his hands as a sign of grace — 

Somebody's darling is still and dead ! 

Kiss him once for Somebody's sake ; 

Murmur a praj^er, soft and low ; 
One bright curl from the cluster take — 

They were Somebody's pride, you know. 
Somebody's hand hath rested there ; 

Was it a mother's, soft and white ? 
And have the lips of a sister fair 

Been baptized in those waves of light ? 

God knows best. He Avas Somebody's love ? 

Somebody's heart enshrined him here ; 
Somebody wafted his name above. 

Night and morn, on the wings of prayer. 
Somebody wept when he marched awa_y. 

Looking so handsome, brave, and grand ; 
Somebody's kiss on his forehead lay ; 

Somebody clung to his parting hand — 

Somebody 's watching and waiting for him, 

Yearning to hold him again to her heart : 
There he lies — with the blue eyes dim, 

And smiling, child-like lips apart. 
Tendeily bury the fair young dead, 

Pausing to drop on his grave a tear, 
Carve on the wooden slab at his head, 

" Somcbudy's darling lies buried here ! " 

ANONYMOUS. 



SENTINEL SONGS. 

When falls the soldier brave 
Dead — at the feet of wrong, — 

The poet sings, and guards his grave 
With sentinels of song. 

Songs, march ! he gives conrmand. 

Keep faithful watch and true ; 
The living and dead of the Conquered Land 

Have now no guards save you. 

Grave Ballads ! mark ye well ! 

Thrice holy is your trust ! 
Go ! halt ! by the fields where warriors fell, 

Rest arms ! and 2;uard their dust. 



List, Songs ! your watch is long ! 

The soldiers' guard was brief. 
Whilst right is right, and wrong is wrong, 

Ye may not seek relief. 

Go ! wearing the gray of grief ! 

Go ! watch o'er the Dead in Gray ! 
Go guard the private and guard the chief, 

And sentinel their clay ! 

And the songs, in stately rhyme, 
And with softly sounding tread, 

Go forth, to watch for a time — a time. 
Where sleep the Deathless Dead. 

And the songs, like funeral dirge, 

In music soft and low. 
Sing round the graves, — whilst hot tears surge 

From hearts that are homes of woe. 

What though no sculptured shaft 

Immortalize each brave ? 
What though no monument epitaphed 

Be built above each grave ? 

When marble wears away. 

And monuments are dust, — 
The songs that guard our soldiers' clay 

Will still fulfil their trust. 

With lifted head, and steady tread, 

Like stars that guard the skies, 
Go watch each bed, where rest the dead. 

Brave Songs ! with sleepless eyes. 

ABRAM J. Ryan. 



ODE. 



[Sung on the occasion of decorating tlie graves of tlie Confederate 
dead, at Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston, S. C.J 

Sleep sweetly in your humble graves, — 
Sleep, martyrs of a fallen cause ! 

Though yet no marble column craves 
The pilgrim here to pause. 

In seeds of laurel in the earth 

The blossom of your fame is blowp, 

And somewhej'e, waiting for its birth, 
The shaft is in the stone ! 

Meanwhile, behalf the tardy years 

AVhich kee]) in trust your storied tombs. 

Behold ! your sisters bring their tears. 
And these memorial blooms. 

Small tributes ! but your shades will smile 
More proudly on these wreaths to-day, 

Thau when some cannon-moulded pile 
Shall overlook this bay. 



-[? 



&- 



WAR. 



; o o I — -i 



Stoop, aiigcls, hither from the skies ! 

There is no holier spot of ground 
Than where defeated valor lies, 

By mourning beauty crowned ! 

HENRY TIMROD. 



THE BLUE AND THE GRAY. 

[The women of Columbus, MississiiJpi, slrewec! flowers alike on 
tile graves of the Confederate aiiJ the National soldiers. J 

By the flow of the inland river, 

Whence the fleets of iron have fled, 
Where the blades of the grave-grass quiver, 
Asleep are the ranks of the dead ; — 
Under the sod and the dew, 

AVaiting the judgment-day ; — 
Under the one, the i>lue ; 
Under the other, the Gray. 

These in the robings of glory. 

Those in the gloom of defeat, 
All with the battle-blood gory. 
In the dusk of eternity meet ; — 
Under the sod and the dew. 

Waiting the judgment-day ; — 
Under the laurel, the Blue ; 
Under the willow, the Gray. 

From the silence of sorrowful hours 

The desolate mourners go. 
Lovingly laden with flowers 

Alike for the friend and the foe, — 
L'^mler the sod and the dew. 

Waiting the judgment-day ; — 
Under the roses, the Ijlue ; 
Under the lilies, the Gray. 

So with an equal splendor 

The morning sun-rays fall, 
With a touch, impartially tender. 
On the blossoms bloonung for all ; — 
Under the sod and the dew, 

Waiting the judgment-day ; — ■ 
'Broidered with gold, the Blue ; 
Mellowed with gold, the Gray. 

So, when the summer calleth, 
On forest and field of grain 
W^ith an equal murmur fallefh 
The cooling drip of the rain ; — 
Under the sod and the dew. 

Waiting the judgment-day ; — 
"Wet with the rain, the Blue ; 
Wet with the rain, the Gray, 

Sadly, but not with upbraiding. 

The generous deed was done ; 
Li the storm of the years that are fading. 

No braver battle was won ; — 



Untler the sod and the d(nv, 
Waiting the judgment-day ; — 

Under the l^lossoms, the Blue ; 
Under the garlands, the Gray. 

No more shall the war-cry sever. 
Or the winding rivers be red ; 
They banish our anger forever 

When they laurel the graves of our dead ! 
Uaider the sod and the dew. 

Waiting the judgment-day ; — 
Love and tears for the Blue, 
Tears and love for the Gray. 

FRANCIS MILES FINCH. 



PEACE. 



Land, of every land the best, — 
Land, whose glory shall increase ; 

Now in your whitest raimenX ilrest 
For the great festival of peace : 

Take from your flag its fold of gloom, 
And let it float undimmed above, 

Till over all our vales shall bloom 
The sacred colors that we love. 

On mountain high, in valley low. 
Set Freedom's living fires to burn ; 

Until the nudinglit sky shall show 
A redder glory than the morn. 

Welcome, with shouts of joy and pride, 
Your veterans from the war-patii's track : 

You gave j'our boj's, untrained, untried ; 
You bring them men and heroes back ! 

And shed no tear, Ihough think you must 
With sorrow of the martyred band ; 

Not even for him whose hallowed dust 
Has made our prairies holy land. 

Though by the places where they fell, 
The places that are sacred ground. 

Death, like a sullen sentinel. 
Paces his everlasting round. 

Yet when they set their country free. 
And gave her traitors fitting doom, 

They left their last great enemy. 
Baffled, beside an empty tomb. 

Not there, but risen, redeemed, they go 

Where all the paths are sweet with flowers ; 

They fought to give us peace, and lo ! 
They gained a better peace than ours. 

PHinr.E Cakv. 



-j:] 



\B 



534 



POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



PEACE. 



a 



ODE TO PEACE. 

Daughter of God ! that sitt'st on high 
Amid the dances of the sky, 
And guidest with thy gentle sway 
The planets on their tuneful way ; 

Sweet Peace ! shall ne'er again 
The smile of thy most holy face, 
From thine ethei-eal dwelling-place, 
Rejoice the wretched, weary race 

Of discord-breathing men ? 
Too long, gladness-giving Queen ! 
Thy tarrying in heaven has been ; 
Too long o'er this fair blooming world 
The flag of blood has been unfurled, 

Polluting God's pure day ; 
Whilst, as each maddening people reels. 
War onward drives his scythed wheels. 
And at his horses' bloody heels 

Shriek Murder and Dismay. 

Oft have I wept to hear the cry 

Of widow wailing bitterly ; 

To see the parent's silent tear 

For children fallen beneath the spear ; 

And I have felt so sore 
The sense of human guilt and woe, 
That I, in Virtue's passioned glow, 
Have cursed (my soul was wounded so) 

The shape of man I bore ! 
Then come from thy serene abode. 
Thou gladness-giving child of God ! 
And cease the world's ensanguined strife, 
And reconcile my soul to life ; 

For much I long to see. 
Ere I shall to the grave descend. 
Thy hand its blessed branch extend. 
And to the world's remotest end 

Wave Love and Harmony ! 

William Tennant. 



B- 



THE BATTLE-FIELD. 

Once this soft turf, this rivulet's sands, 
AVere trampled by a hurrying crowd. 

And fiery hearts and armed hands 
Encountered in the battle-cloud. 

Ah ! never shall the land forget 

How gushed the life-blood of her brave, - 
Gushed, warm with hope and courage yet, 

Upon the soil they fought to save. 



Now all is calm and fresh and still ; 

Alone the chirp of flitting bird, 
And talk of children on the hill, 

And bell of wandering kine, are heard. 

No solemn host goes trailing hy 

The black-mouthed gun and staggering wain 
Men start not at the battle-cry, — 

0, be it never heard again ! 

Soon rested those who fought ; but thou 
Who miuglest in the harder strife 

For truths which men receive not now, 
Thy warfare only ends with life. 

A friendless warfare ! lingering long 
Through weary day and weary year ; 

A wild and niany-weaponed throng 
Hang on thy front and flank and rear. 

Yet nerve thy spirit to the proof. 
And blench not at thy chosen lot ; 

The timid good may stand aloof. 

The sage may frown, — yet faint thou not. 

Nor heed the shaft too surely cast. 
The foul and hissing bolt of scorn ; 

For with thy side shall dwell, at last. 
The victory of endurance born. 

Truth, crushed to earth, shall rise again, — 
The eternal j^eai-s of God are hers ; 

But Error, wounded, writhes in pain, 
And dies among his worshippers. 

Yea, though thou lie upon the dust. 

When they who helped thee flee in fear. 

Die full of hope and manly trust. 
Like those who fell in battle here ! 

Another hand thy sword shall wield. 
Another hand the standard wave. 

Till from the trumpet's mouth is pealed 
The blast of triumph o'er thy grave. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



NOT ON THE BATTLE-FIELD. 

" To fall on the battle-field fighting- for my dear country, — tliat 
would not be hard." — The Neighbors. 

NO, no, — let me lie 
Not on a field of battle when I die ! 

Let not the iron tread 
Of the mad war-horse crush my helmed head ; 



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m- 



PEACE. 



535 



rft 



m- 



Nor let the reeking knife, 
That I have drawn against a brother's life, 

Be in my hand when Death 
Thunders along, and tramples me beneath 

His heavy sffuadron's heels, 
Or gory felloes of his cannon's wheels. 

From such a dying bed, 
Though o'er it float the stripes of white and red, 

And the bald eagle brings 
The clustered stars upon his wide-spread wings 

To sparkle in my sight, 
0, never let my spirit take her flight ! 

I know that beauty's eye 
Is all the brighter where gay pennants fly, 

And brazen helmets dance. 
And sunshine flashes on the lifted lance ; 

I know that bards have sung. 
And people shouted till the welkin rung, 

In honor of the brave 
Who on the battle-field have found a grave ; 

I know that o'er their bones 
Have grateful hands piled monumental stones. 

Some of those piles I 've seen : 
The one at Lexington upon the green 

Where the first blood was shed, 
And to my country's independence led ; 

And others, on our shore, 
The " Battle Monument " at Baltimore, 

And that on Bunker's Hill. 
Ay, and abroad, a few more famous still ; 

Thy "tomb," Themistocles, 
That looks out yet upon the Grecian seas. 

And which the waters kiss 
That issue from the gulf of Salamis. 

And thine, too, have I seen. 
Thy mound of earth, Patroclus, robed in green, 

That, like a natural knoll. 
Sheep climb and nibble over as they stroll, 

Watched by some turban ed boy, 
Upon the margin of the plain of Troy. 

Such honors grace the bed, 
I know, whereon the warrior lays his head. 

And hears, as life ebbs out. 
The conquered flying, and the conqueror's shout ; 

But as his eye grows dim, 
What is a column or a mound to him ? 

What, to the parting soul. 
The mellow note of bugles ? What the roll 

Of drums ? No, let me die 
Wheie the blue heaven bends o'er me lovingly, 

And the soft summer air, 
As it goes by me, stirs my thin white hair. 

And from my forehead dries 
The death-damp as it gathers, and the skies 

Seem waiting to receive 
My soul to their clear depths ! Or let me leave 



The world when round my bed 
Wife, children, weeping friends are gathered, 

And the calm voice of prayer 
And holy hymning shall my soul prepare 

To go and be at rest 
With kindred spirits, — spirits who have blessed 

The human brotherhood 
By labors, cares, and counsels for their good. 

John pierpont. 



MY AUTUMN WALK. 

On woodlands ruddy with autumn 

The amber sunshine lies ; 
I look on the beauty roimd me. 

And tears come into my eyes. 

For the wind that sweeps the meadows 
Blows out of the far Southwest, 

Where our gallant men are fighting, 
And the gallant dead are at rest. 

The golden-rod is leaning, 
And the purple aster waves 

In a breeze from the land of battles, 
A breath from the land of graves. 

Full fast the leaves are dropping 
Before that wandering breath ; 

As fast, on the field of battle. 
Our brethren fall in death. 

Beautiful over my pathway 

The forest spoils are shed ; 
They are spotting the grassy hillocks 

With purjile and gold and red. 

Beautiful is the death-sleep 

Of those who bravely fight 
In their country's holy quarrel, 

And perish for the Eight. 

But who shall comfort the living, 
The light of whose homes is gone : 

The bride that, early widowed, 
Lives broken-hearted on ; 

The matron whose sons are lying 
In graves on a distant shore ; 

The maiden, whose promised husband 
Comes back from the war no more ? 

I look on the peaceful dwellings 
Whose windows glimmer in sight, 

With croft and garden and orchard 
That bask in the mellow light ; 



— Pj 



[H~t 



536 



POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



-^ 



And I knoAv that, when our couriers 

With news of victorj^ come, 
They will bring a bitter message 

Of hoiieless grief to some. 

Again I turn to the woodlands, 

And 1 shudder as I see 
The mock-grape's * blood-red banner 

Hung out on the cedar-tree ; 

And I think of days of slaughter. 
And the night-sky red with flames, 

On the Chattahoochee's meadows. 
And the wasted banks of the James. 

for the fresh spring-season. 

When the groves are in their prime, 

And far away in the future 
I's the frosty autumn-time ! 

for that better season. 

When the pride of the foe shall yield, 
And the hosts of God and Freedom 

March back from the well-won field ; 

And the matron shall clasp her first-born 

AVith tears of joy and pride : 
And the scarred and war-worn lover 

Shall claim his promised bride ! 

The leaves are swept from the branches ; 

But the living buds are there, 
With folded flower and foliage. 

To sprout in a kinder air. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



BARCLAY OF URY. 

Up the streets of Aberdeen, 
By the kirk and college green, 

Rode the laird of Ury ; 
Close behind him, close beside, 
Foul of mouth and evil-eyed, 

Pressed the mob in fury. 

Flouted him the drunken churl, 
Jeered at him the serving-girl. 

Prompt to please her master ; 
And the begging carlin, late 
Fed and clotlied at Ury's gate. 

Cursed him as he passed her. 

Yet with calm and stately mien 
Up the streets of Alierdeen 
Came he slowly riding ; 

Ajnp.clopsis, mock-grape; the botanical name of the Virsinia 



And to all he saw and heard 
Answering not with bitter word. 
Turning not for chiding. 

Came a troop with broadswords swinging, 
Bits and bridles sharply ringing, 

Loose and free and froward : 
Quoth the foremost, "Ride him down ! 
Push him ! piick him ! through the town 

Drive the Quaker coward ! " 

But from out the thickening crowd 
Cried a sudden voice and loud : 

" Barclay ! Ho ! a Barclay ! " 
And the old man at his side 
Saw a comrade, battle-tried. 

Scarred and sunburned darkly ; 

Who, with ready weapon bare, 
Fronting to the troopers there, 

Cried aloud : " God save us ! 
Call ye coward him who stood 
Ankle-deep in Lutzen's blood. 

With the brave Gustavus ? " 

" Nay, I do not need thy sw^ord, 
Comrade mine," said Ury's lord ; 

" Put it up, I pray thee. 
Passive to his holy will, 
Trust I in my Master still. 

Even though he slay me. 

" Pledges of thy love and faith, 
Proved on many a field of death. 

Not by me are needed." 
Marvelled much that henchman bold, 
That his laird, so stout of old. 

Now so meekly pleaded. 

"AVoe 's the day," he sadly said. 
With a slowly shaking head. 

And a look of pity ; 
" Ury's honest lord reviled. 
Mock of knave and sport of child. 

In his own good city ! 

" Speak the word, and, master mine, 
As we charged on Tilly's line. 

And his Walloon lancers. 
Smiting through their midst, we '11 teach 
Civil look and decent speech 

To these boyish prancers ! " 

" Marvel not, mine ancient friend, — 
Like beginning, like the cud ! " 

Quoth the laird of Ury ; 
"Is the sinful servant more 
Than his gracious Lord who boro 

Bonds and stripes in Jewry ? 



J 



fi^ 



PEACE. 



a 



u 



" Give me joy that in liis name 
I can bear, with patient frame, 

All these vain ones offer ; 
While for them he suffered long, 
Shall I answer wrong with wrong, 

Scoffing with the scoffer ? 

" Happier I, with loss of all, — 
Hunted, outlawed, held in thrall. 

With few friends to greet me, — 
Than when reeve and squire were seen 
Riding out from Aberdeen 

With bared heads to meet me ; 

" When each good wife, o'er and o'er, 
Blessed me as I passed her door ; 

And the snooded daughter. 
Through her casement glancing down, 
Smiled on him who bore renown 

From red fields of slaughter. 

" Hard to feel the stranger's scoff, 
Hard the old friends' falling off, 

Hard to learn forgiving ; 
But the Lord his own rewards. 
And his love with theirs accords 

Warm and fresh and living. 

" Through this dark and stormy night 
Faith beholds a feeble light 

Up the blackness streaking ; 
Knowing God's own time is best, 
In a patient hope I rest 

For the full day-breaking ! " 

So the laird of Ury said. 
Turning slow his horse's head 

ToAvards the Tolbooth prison. 
Where, through iron gates, he heard 
Poor disciples of the Word 

Preach of Christ arisen ! 

Not in vain, confessor old. 
Unto us the tale is told 

Of thy day of trial ! 
Every age on him who strays 
From its broad and beaten ways 

Pours its seven-fold vial. 

Happy he whose inward ear 
Angel comfortings can hear, 

O'er the rabble's laughter ; 
And, while hatred's fagots burn, 
Glimpses through the smoke discern, 

Of the good hereafter. 

Knowing this, — that never j'et 
Share of truth was vainly set 
In the world's wide fallow ; 



After hands shall sow the seed, 

After hands from hill and mead 

Reap the harvests yellow. 

Thus, with somewhat of the seer. 
Must the moral pioneer 

From the future borrow, — 
Clothe the waste with dreams of grain, 
And, on midnight's sky of rain. 

Paint the golden morrow ! 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIEB 



TUBAL CAIN. 

Old Tubal Cain was a man of might, 

In the days when earth was young ; 
By the fierce red light of his furnace bright. 

The strokes of his hammer rung : 
And he lifted high his brawny hand 

On the iron glowing clear. 
Till the sparks rushed out in scarlet showers. 

As he fashioned the sword and the spear. 
And he sang : " Hurrah for my handiwork ! 

Hurrah for the spear and the sword ! 
Hurrah for the hand that shall wield them well. 

For he shall be king and lord." 

To Tubal Cain came many a one. 

As he wrought by his roaring fire. 
And each one prayed for a strong steel blade 

As the crown of his desire : 
And he made them weapons sharp and strong. 

Till they shouted loud for glee. 
And gave him gifts of pearl and gold, 

And spoils of the forest free. 
And they sang : " Hurrah for Tubal Cain, 

Who hath given us strength anew ! 
Hurrah for the smith, hurrah for the fire, 

And hun-ah for the metal true ! " 

But a sudden change came o'er his heart. 

Ere the setting of the sun, 
And Tubal Cain was filled with pain 

For the evil he had done ; 
He saw that men, with rage and hate, 

Made war upon their kind. 
That the land was red with the blood they shed. 

In their lust for carnage blind. 
And he said : " Alas ! that ever I made. 

Or that skill of mine should plan. 
The spear and the sword for men whose joy 

Is to slay their fellow-man 1 " 

And for many a day old Tubal Cain 

Sat brooding o'er his woe ; 
And his hand forbore to smite the ore, 

And his furnace smouldered low. 



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538 



POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR. 



^ 



But he rose at last with a cheerful face, 

And a bright courageous eye, 
And bared his strong right arm for work, 

While the quick flames mounted high. 
And he sang : " Hurrah for my handiwork !" 

And the red sparks lit the air ; 
"Not alone for the blade was the bright steel 
made," — 

And he fashioned the first ploughshare. 

And men, taught wisdom from the past. 

In friendship joined their hands, 
Hung the sword in the hall, the spear on the wall. 

And ploughed the willing lands ; 
And sang : " Hurrah for Tubal Cain ! 

Our stanch good friend is he ; 
And for the ploughshare and the |)lough 

To him our praise shall be. 
But while oppression lifts its head. 

Or a tyrant would be lord, 
Though we may thank him for the plough, 

We '11 not forget the sword ! " 

° CHARLES MACKAY. 



THE BATTLE OF BLENHEIM. 

[The battle of Blenheim in Bavaria was fought Aug. 13, 1704, 
between the troops of the English and Austrians on one side, under 
the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene, and the French and 
Bavarians on the other side, led by Marshal Tallart and the Elec- 
tor of Bavaria. The latter party was defeated, and the sciiemes of 
Louis XIV. of France were materially checked thereby.] 

It was a summer evening, — 

Old Kaspar's work was done, 
And he before his cottage door 

Was sitting in the sun ; 
And by him sported on the green 
His little grandchild Wilhelmine. 

She saw her brother Peterkin 
Roll something large and round, 

Which he beside the rivulet, 
In playing there, had found ; 

He came to ask what he had found 

That was so large and smooth and round. 

Old Kaspar took it from the boy. 

Who stood expectant by ; 
And then the old man shook his head, 

And, with a natural sigh, — 
" 'T is some poor fellow's skull," said he, 
"Who fell in the great victory. 

" I find them in the garden, 
For there's many hereabout ; 

And often, when I go to plough. 
The ploughshare turns them out ; 
' For many thousand men," said he, 

" Were slain in the great victory." 



" Now tell us what 'twas all about," 

Young Peterkin he cries ; 
And little Wilhelmine looks up 

With wonder-waiting eyes, — 
"Now tell us all about the war. 
And what they fought each other for." 

"It was the English," Kaspar cried, 

" Who put the French to rout ; 
But what they fought each other for 

I could not well make out ; 
But everybody said," quoth he, 
"That 'twas a famous victory. 

" My father lived at Blenheim then. 

Yon little stream hard by ; 
They burnt his dwelling to the ground. 

And he was forced to fly ; 
So with his wife and child he fled, 
Nor had he where to rest his head. 

" With fire and sword the country round 

Was wasted far and wide ; 
And many a childing mother there. 

And new-born baby died ; 
But things like that, you know, must be 
At every famous victory. 

" They say it was a shocking sight 
After the field was won, — 
For many thousand bodies here 

Lay rotting in the sun ; 
But things like that, you know, must be 
After a famous victory. 

" Great praise the Duke of Marlborough won, 

And our good Prince Eugene." 
" Why. 't was a very wicked thing ! " 

Said little Wilhelmine. 
" Nay, nay, my little girl ! " quoth he, 
"It was a famous victory. 

" And everybody praised the duke 

Who this great fight did win." 
" But what good came of it at last ? " 

Quoth little Peterkin. 
" Why, that I cannot tell," said he ; 
" But 'twas a famous victory." 

ROBERT SOUTHEY. 



THE KNIGHT'S TOMB. 

AVhere is the grave of Sir Arthur O'Kellyn ? 
Where may the grave of that good man be ? — 
By the side of a spring, on the breast of Hel- 

4 vellyn, 
Under the twigs of a young birch-tree ! 



^ 



[& 



FRAGMENTS. 



zrOi 



539 



The oak that in summer was sweet to hear, 

And rustled its leaves in the fall of the year, 

And whistled and roared in the winter alone, 

Is gone, — and the birch in its stead is grown. — 

The knight's bones are dust, 

And his good sword rust ; — 

His soul is with the saints, I trust. 

SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. 



FEAGMENTS. 

Warfare. 

In every heart 
Are sown the sparks that kindle fiery war ; 
Occasion needs but fan them, and they blaze. 

The Task : Winter Morning Walk. COWPER. 

And Ctesar's spirit, ranging for revenge. 

Cry " Havock ! " and let slip the dogs of war. 

Julius Casar, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

My sentence is for open war ; of wiles 
More unexpert I boast not : them let those 
Contrive who need, or when they need, not now. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MlLTON. 

A weak invention of the enemy. 

Richard III., Act. v. Sc. 3. COLLEY ClBBER. 

All delays are dangerous in war. 

Tyrannic Love, Act\. Sc i. DrYDEN. 



Dangers of Peace. 

Long peace, I find. 
But nurses dangerous humors up to strength, 
License and wanton rage, which war alone 
Can purge away. 

Mzcstaplia. D. MALLET. 

They sit them down just where they were before. 
Till for new scenes of Avoe peace shall their force 
restore. 

Castle of Indolence, Cant. 1. J. THOMSON. 

War its thousands slays. Peace its ten thousands. 

Death- B. PORTEUS. 



y- 



Pleasures of War. 

War ! thou hast thy fierce delight. 
Thy gleams of joy intensely bright ! 
Such gleams as from thy polished shield 
Fly dazzling o'er the battle-field ! 

Lord oj the Isles. SCOTT. 



0, the sight entrancing. 

When morning's beam is glancing 

O'er files arrayed 

With helm and blade. 
And plumes, in the gay wind dancing ! 
When hearts are all high beating, 
And the trumpet's voice repeating 

That song, whose breath 

May lead to death, 
But never to retreating. 
0, the sight entrancing. 
When morning's beam is glancmg 

O'er files arrayed 

With helm and blade. 
And plumes, in the gay wind dancing. 

O, the si^^ht efttrancing: T. MOORE. 

The tyrant custom, most gi-ave senators, 
•Hath made the flinty and steel couch of war 
My thrice-driven bed of down. 

Othello, Act i. Sc. 3- SHAKESPEARE. 



The True Soldier. 

Unbounded courage and compassion joined. 
Tempering each other in the victor's mind. 
Alternately proclaim him good and great. 
And make the hero and the man complete. 

And, pleased the Almighty's orders to perform, 
Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm. 

The Ca>7ipaign. ADDISO.N. 

So restless Cromwell could not cease 
In the inglorious arts of peace. 

But through adventurous war 

Urged his active star. 



A Horatian Ode : Upon Cro)nweir s Retur 



i/rotn Ireland. 

A. MARVEIvL. 



Wut 's words to them whose faith an' truth 
On War's red techstone rang true metal, 

Who ventered life an' love an' youth 
For the gret prize o' death in battle ? 

The Biglorv Papers, Second Series, No. n. J. R- LOWELL. 

^^^lo, doomed to go in company with Pain, 
And Fear, and Bloodshed, miserable train ! 
Turns his necessity to glorious gain. 
In face of these doth exercise a power 
Which is our human nature's highest dower ; 
Controls them and subdues, transmutes, bereaves 
Of their bad influence, and their good receives. 

But who, if he be called upon to face 

Some awful moment to which Heaven has joined 

Great issues, good or bad for humankind, 

Is happy as a Lover ; and attired 

With sudden brightness, like a Man in.spired ; 



540 



P0E31S OF PEACE AND WAR. 



n 



And, through the heat of conflict, keeps the law 
In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw. 

Who, not content that former worth stand fast. 
Looks forward persevering to the last 
From well to better, daily self-surpast ; 

Finds comfort in himself and in liis cause ; 
And while the mortal mist is gathering, draws 
His breath in confidence of Heaven's applause. 

Character of the Happy Warrior- WORDSWORTH. 



Challenge and Defiance. 
Under which king, Bezoniau ? speak, or die. 

King Henry IV., Part 11. Act v. Sc 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Fly they that need to fly ; 
Wordes fearen babes. I meane not to thee enti'eat 
To passe ; but maugre thee will passe or dy. 

Fairic Queene. SPENSER. 

Hang out our banners on the outward walls ; 
The cry is still. They come. Our castle's strength 
Will laugh a siege to scorn : here let them lie 
Till famine and the ague eat them up. 

Macbeth, Act V. Sc s- SHAKESPEARE. 



c& 



Preparation and Battle. 

Beware 
Of entrance to a o[uarrel ; but, being in. 
Bear 't that the opposed may beware of thee. 

Hamlet, Act i.Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

From the tents, 
Tlie armorers, accomplishing the knights. 
With busy hammers closing rivets up. 
Give dreadful note of preparation. 

King Henry K, Act iv. Chorus. SHAKESPEARE. 

Now the storm begins to lower, 

(Haste, the loom of hell prepare, ) 
Iron .sleet of arrowy shower 

Hurtles in the darkened air. 

Glittering lances arc the loom, 

Where tlie dusky warp Ave strain, 
AVeaving many a soldier's doom, 

Orkney's woe, and liandoer's baiic. 

The J' atat Sisters. T.GRAY 

That voice . . . heard so oft 

In worst extremes, and on the perilous edge 

Of battle when it raged. 

P.il-adise Lost, Book i. MiLTON. 

Lay on, Macdufl" ; 
And damned be him that first cries, " Hold, 
enough ! " 

Macbeth, Act v. ir. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 



Give me another horse ! — bind up my wounds ! 

King Richard HI., Act. v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

A horse ! a horse ! My kingdom for a horse ! 

Ki7ig Richard HI., Act v. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

In the lost battle, 

Borne down by tlie flying. 

Where mingles war's rattle 
With groans of the dying, 

Eleuloro 
There shall he be lying. 

The Lay of tlie Last Minstrel, Cant. iii. SCOTT. 



Defeat. 

What though the held be lost? 
All is not lost ; the unconquerable will. 
And study of revenge, immortal hate. 
And courage never to submit or yield. 
And what is else not to be overcome. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MILTON. 

At a frown they in their glory die. 
The painful warrior, famoused for fight, 
After a thousand victories once foiled, 
Is IVoni the books of honor luzed quite, 
And all the rest forgot for which he toiled. 

Sonnet XXV. SHAKESPEARE. 



Courage and Fear. 

He called so loud that all the liollow deep 
Of Hell j'esounded. 

Awake, arise, or be forever fallen ! 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MiLTON. 

Ay me ! what perils do environ 

The man that meddles with cold iron. 

Hudibras, Part /. Cant. iii. S. BUTLER. 

For he who fights and runs away * 
May live to fight another day ; 
But he who is in battle slain 
Can never rise and fight again. 

The Art of Poetry on a New Plan. GOLDSM ITH. 

• Bai-tlett, in his Familiar Quotations, groups with tliis stanza 
tlie following : — 

He that fights and runs away 
May turn and fight anotlier day , 
But he that ib in battle slain 
Will never rise to fight again. 
Ray's History of the Rehellion, p. 48. Bristol, 1752. 

That same man, that rimnith awaie, 
Maie again fight an other daie. 
Hrasmus, Apothegms, Trans, by Udall, 1542. 

For those that fly may figlit again, 
Which lie can never do that 's slain. 

Butler, Hudibras. Part HI. Cant. 3. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



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Nevei' be it said 
That Fate itself could awe the soul of Richard. 
Hence, babbling dreams ; you threaten here in 

vain ; 
Conscience, avaunt, Richard -'s himself again ! 
Hark ! the shrill trumpet sounds. To horse ! 

away ! 
My soul 's iu arms, and eager for the fray. 



ShaAes^nt 



e's Richard IU. (Altered), Act. v. Sc. 3. 

COLLEY ClBBER. 



When Greeks joined Greeks, then was the tug 
of war. 

Alexander the Great, Act iv. Sc. 2, N. LEE. 

War, war is still the cry, — "war even to the 
knife! " 

Chitde Harold, Cant. i. BYRON. 

By how much unexpected, by so much 
We must awake endeavor for defence. 
For courage mounteth with occasion. 

KtHZ John, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Blow, wind! come, wrack! 
At least we '11 die with harness on our back. 

Macbeth, Act v. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 



Horrors of War. 

He is come to ope 
The purple testament of bleeding war ; 
But ere the crown he looks for live in peace, 
Ten thousand bloody crowns of mothers' sons 
Shall ill become the flower of England's face. 
Change the complexion of her maid-pale peace 
To scarlet indignation, and bedew 
Her pastures' grass with faithful English blood. 

King Richard II., Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Some undone widow sits upon mine arm, 
And takes away the use of it ; and my sword. 
Glued to my scabbard with wronged orphans' 

tears. 
Will not be drawn. 

A New IVay to fay Old Debts, Act v. Sc, 1. P. MASSINGER. 

Mark where his carnage and his conquest cease ! 
He makes a solitude, and calls it — peace ! 

The Bride of Abydos. Cant. ii. BYRON. 

Criminality of War. 

One to destroy is murder by the law ; 
And gibbets keep the lifted hand in awe ; 
To murder thousands takes a specious name, 
War's glorious art, and gives immortal fame. 

Love o/Fame, Satire vii. Dr. E. YOUNG. 



Ez fer war, I call it murder, — 
There you hev it plain an' flat ; 

I don't want to go no furder 
Than my Testyment fer that. 

The Big-low Papers, First Series, No. i. 



J. R. Lowell. 



One murder made a villain. 
Millions a hero. Princes were privileged 
To kill, and numbers sanctified the crime. 

Death. B. PORTEUS. 

Great princes have great playthings. 

But war 's a game which, were their subjects wise. 
Kings would not play at. 

The Task : Winter Morning Walk. COWPER. 



Peace. 



Take away the sword ; 
States can be saved without it. 

Richelieu, Act ii. Sc. 2. E. BULWER-LYTTON. 

Now is the winter of our discontent 

Made glorious summer by this sun of York, 

And all the clouds that lowered upon our house 

In the deep bosom of the ocean buried. 

Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths ; 

Our bruised arms hung up for monuments ; 

Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings. 

Our dreadful marches to delightful measures. 

Grim-visaged War hath smoothed his wrinkled 

front. 
And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds 
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries. 
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber. 
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute. 

King Richard III., Acti. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 

Ay, but give me worship and quietness ; 
I like it better than a dangerous honor. 

King Henry VI., Part III. Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Peace ! thou source and soul of social life ; 
Beneath whose calm inspiring influence 
Science his views enlarges. Art refines. 
And swelling Commerce opens all her ports. 

Britantiia. J. THOMSON. 

Till each man finds his own in all men's good, 
And all men work in noble brothei'hood. 
Breaking their mailed fleets and armed towers. 
And ruling by obeying Nature's powers. 
And gathering all the fruits of peace and crowned 
with all her flowers. 

Ode, sung at the Openijtg o/the International Fxhihition. 

TENNYSON. 



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fi- 



-a 



POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOPv. 



TEMPERANCE. 



MORAL COSMETICS. 

Ye who would have your features florid, 
Lithe limbs, bright eyes, unwrinkled forehead, 
F-rom age's devastation horrid, 

Adopt this plan, — 
'T will make, in climate cold or torrid, 

A hale old man : 

Avoid in youth luxurious diet, 
Restrain the passions' lawless riot ; 
Devoted to domestic quiet. 

Be wisely gay ; 
So shall ye, spite of age's fiat, 

Resist decay. 

Seek not in Mammon's worship pleasure, 
But find your richest, dearest treasure 
In God, his word, his work, not leisure ; 

The mind, not sense, 
Is the sole scale by which to measure 

Your opulence. 

This is the solace, this the science, 
Life's pirrest, sweetest, best appliance, 
That disappoints not man's reliance, 

Whate'er his state ; 
But challenges, with calm defiance, 

Time, fortune, fate. 

HORACE SMITH. 



THE WATER-DRINKER. 

0, WATER for me ! Bright water for me ! 

Give wine to the tremulous debauchee ! 

It cooleth the brow, it cooleth the brain, 

It maketh the faint one strong again ; 

It conies o'er the sense like a breeze from the sea, 

All freshness, like infant purity. 

0, water, bright water, for me, for me ! 

Give wine, give wine to the debauchee ! 

Fill to the brim ! Fill, fill to the brim ! 
Let the flowing crystal kiss the rim ! 



My hand is steady, my eye is true. 

For I, like the flowers, drink naught but dew. 

0, water, bright water 's a mine of wealth. 

And the ores it yieldeth are vigor and health. 

So water, pure water, for me, for me ! 

And wine for the tremulous debauchee ! 

Fill again to the brim ! again to the brim ! 
For water strengtheneth life and limb. 
To the days of the aged it addeth length ; 
To the might of the strong it addeth strength ; 
It freshens the heart, it brightens the sight ; 
'T is like quafl[ing a goblet of morning light. 
So, water, I will drink naught but thee, 
Thou parent of health and energy ! 

Edward Johnson. 



THE OLD MAN'S COMFORTS, 

AND HOW HE GAINED THEM. 

" You are old. Father William," the young man 
cried ; 

" The few locks which are left you are gray ; 
You are hale. Father William, a hearty old man ; 

Now tell me the reason, I pray." 

"In the days of my youth," Father William 
replied, 

" I remembered that youth would fly fast. 
And abused not my health and my vigor at first. 

That I never might need them at last." 

" You are old. Father William," the young man 
cried, 

" And pleasui'es with youth pass away ; 
And yet you lament not the days that are gone ; 

Now tell me the reason, I pray." 

"In the days of my youth," Father William 
I'eplied, 

" I remembered that youth could not last ; 
I thought of the future, whatever I did. 

That I never might grieve for the past." 



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546 



POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR. 



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" You are old, Father William," the young man 
cried, 
" And life must be hastening away ; 
You are cheerful, and love to converse upon death ; 
« Now tell me the reason, I pray." 

" I am cheerful, young man," Father William 
replied ; 

" Let the cause thy attention engage ; 
In the days of my youth I remembered my God ! 

And he hath not forgotten my age." 

ROBERT SOUTHEY. 



OLD AGE OF TEMPERANCE. 

FROM "AS YOU LIKE IT," ACT II. SC. 2. 

Adam. Let me be your sei'vant ; 
Though I look old, yet am I strong and lusty : 
For in my youth I never did apply 
Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood ; 
Nor did not with unbashful forehead woo 
The means of weakness and debility. 
Therefore my age is as a lusty winter, 
Frosty, but kindly : let me go with you ; 
I '11 do the service of a younger man 
In all your business and necessities. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



■e- 



TEMPERANCE, OR THE CHEAP 
PHYSICIAN. 

Go now ! and with some daring drug 

Bait thy disease ; and, whilst they tug. 

Thou, to maintain their precious strife, 

Spend the dear treasures of thy life. 

Go ! take physic — dote upon 

Some big-named composition. 

The oraculous doctor's mystic bills — 

Certain hard words made into pills ; 

And what at last shalt gain by these ? 

Only a costlier disease. 

That which makes us have no need 

Of physic, that's physic indeed. 

Hark, hither, reader ! wilt thou see 

Nature her own physician be ? 

Wilt see a man all his own wealth, 

His own music, his own health — 

A man whose sober soul can tell 

How to wear her garments well — 

Her garments that upon her sit 

As garments should do, close and fit — 

A well-clothed soul that 's not oppressed 

Nor choked with what she should be dressed- 

A soul sheathed in a crystal shrine. 

Through which all her briglit features shine : 

As when a piece of wanton lawn, 

A thin aerial veil, is drawn 



O'er beauty's face, seeming to hide, 

More sweetly shows the blushing bride — 

A soul whose intellectual beams 

No mists do mask, no lazy streams — 

A happy soul, that all the way 

To heaven hath a summer's day ? 

Wouldst see a man whose well-warmed blood 

Bathes him in a genuine flood ? — 

A man whose tuned humors be 

A seat of rarest harmony ? 

Wouldst see blithe looks, fresh cheeks beguile 

Age ? Wouldst see December smile ? 

Wouldst see nest of new roses grow 

In a bed of reverend snow ? 

Warm thoughts, free spirits flattering 

Winter's self into a spring ? — 

In sum, wouldst see a man that can 

Live to be old, and still a man ? 

Whose latest and most leadened hours 

Fall with soft wings, stuck with soft flowers ; 

And when life's sweet fable ends, 

Soul and body part like friends — 

No quarrels, murmurs, no delay — 

A kiss, a sigh, and so away ? 

This rare one, reader, wouldst thou see ? 

Hark, hither ! and thyself be he ! 

Richard Crasha' 



GO, FEEL WHAT I HAVE FELT. 

[By a young lady, who was told that she was a monomaniac ,in her 
hatred of alcoholic liquors.] 

Go, feel what I have felt. 

Go, bear what I have borne ; 
Sink 'neath a blow a father dealt, 
And the cold, proud world's scorn : 
Thus struggle on from year to year, 
Thy sole relie'f the scalding tear. 

Go, weep as I have wept 

O'er a loved father's fall ; 
See every cherished promise swept. 
Youth's sweetness turned to gall ; 
Hope's faded flowers strewed all the way 
That led me up to woman's day. 

Go, kneel as I have knelt ; 

Imploi'e, beseech, and pray. 
Strive the besotted heart to melt, 
The downward course to stay ; 
Be cast with bitter curse aside, — 
Thy prayers burlesqued, thy tears defied. 

Go, stand where I have stood. 

And see the strong man bow ; 
With gnashing teeth, lips bathed in blood. 
And cold and livid brow ; 
Go, catch his wandering glance, and see 
There mirrored his soul's misery. 



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TEMPERANCE. 



547 



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Go, hear what I have heard, — 

The sobs of sad despair, 
As memory's i'eeling-tbunt hath stirred, 
And its revealings there 
Have told him what he might have been, 
Had he the drunkard's fate foreseen. 

Go to a mother's side. 

And her crushed spirit cheer ; 
Thine own deep anguish hide, 
Wipe from her cheek the tear ; 
Mark her dimmed eye, her furrowed brow, 
The gray that streaks her dark hair now, 
The toil-worn frame, the trembling limb, 
And trace the ruin back to him 
Whose plighted faith, in early youth, 
Promised eternal love and truth. 
But who, forsworn, hath yielded up 
This promise to the deadly cup, 
And led her down from love and light, 
From all that made her pathway bright, 
And chained her there mid want and strife. 
That lowly thing, — a drunkard's wife ! 
And stamped on childhood's brow, so mild. 
That withering blight, — a drunkard's child ! 

Go, hear, and see, and feel, and know 

All that my soul hath felt and known. 
Then look within the wine-cup's glow ; 
See if its brightness can atone ; 
Thirk if its flavor you would try. 
If all proclaimed, — ' T is drink and die. 

Tell me I hate the bowl, — 

Hate is a feeble word ; 
I loathe, abhor, — my very soul 

By strong disgust is stirred 
Whene'er I see, or hear, or tell 

Of the DARK BEVERAGE OF HELL ! 

Anonymous. 



[& 



THE VAGABONDS. 

We are two travellers, Roger and I. 

Roger 's my dog : — come here, you scamp ! 
Jump for the gentlemen, — mind your eye ! 

Over the table, — look out for the lamp ! — 
The rogue is growing a little old ; 

Five years we 've tramped through wind and 
weather, 
And slept out-doors when nights were cold. 

And ate and drank — and starved together. 

We 've learned what comfort is, I tell you ! 

A bed on the floor, a bit of rosin, 
A Are to thaw our thu7'nbs (poor fellow ! 

The paw he holds up there 's been frozen), 



Plenty of catgut for my fiddle 

(This out-door business is bad for the strings). 
Then a few nice buckwheats hot from the griddle. 

And Roger and I set up for kings ! 

No, thank ye, sir, — I never drink ; 

Roger and I are exceedingly moral, — 
Are n't we, Roger ? — see him wink ! — 

Well, something hot, then — we won't quarrel. 
He 's thirsty too, — see him nod his head ? 

What a pity, sir, that dogs can't talk ! 
He understands every word that 's said, — 

And he knows good milk from water-and-chalk. 

The truth is, sir, now I reflect, 

I 've been so sadly given to grog, 
I wonder I 've not lost the respect 

(Here 's to you, sir !) even of my dog. 
But he sticks by through thick and thin ; 

And this old coat, with its empty pockets, 
And rags that smell of tobacco and gin, 

He '11 follow while he has eyes in his sockets. 

There is n't another creature living 

Would do it, and prove, through every disaster, 
So fond, so faithful, and so forgiving 

To such a miserable, thankless master ! 
No, sir ! — see him wag his tail and grin ! 

Byj,George ! it makes my old eyes water ! — 
That is, there 's something in this gin 

That chokes a fellow. But no matter ! 

We '11 have some music, if you 're willing. 
And Roger (hem ! what a plague a cough is, 
sir !) 
Shall march a little. Start, you villain ! 

Stand straight ! 'Bout face ! Salute your ofli- 
cer ! 
Put up that paw ! Dress ! Take your rifle ! 
(Some dogs have arms, you see !) Now hold 
your 
Cap while the gentlemen give a trifle, 
To aid a poor old patriot soldier ! 

March ! Halt ! Now show how the rebel shakes 

When he stands up to hear his sentence. 
Now tell us how many drams it takes 

To honor a jolly new acquaintance. 
Five yelps, — that 's five ; he 's mighty knowing ! 

The night 's before us, fill the glasses ! — 
Quick, sir ! I 'm ill, — ■ my brain is going ! 

Some brandy, — thank you, — there ! — it 
passes ! 

Why not reform ? That 's easily said. 

But I 've gone through such wretched treat- 
ment. 

Sometimes forgetting the taste of bread. 
And scarce remembering what meat meant, 



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548 



POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR. 



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B- 



That my poor stomach 's past reform ; 

And there are times when, mad with thinking, 
I 'd sell out heaven for something warm 

To prop a horrible inward sinking. 

Is there a way to forget to think ? 

At your age, sir, home, fortune, friends, 
A dear girl's love, — but I took to drink, — 

The same old story ; you know how it ends. 
If you could have seen these classic features, — 

You need n't laugh, sir ; they were not then 
Such a burning libel on God's creatures ; 

I was one of your handsome men ! 

If you had seen hei", so fair and young, 

Whose head was happy on this breast ! 
If you could have heard the songs I sung 

When the wine went round, you would n't 
have guessed 
That ever I, sir, should be straying 

From door to door, with fiddle and dog. 
Ragged and penniless, and playing 

To you to-night for a glass of grog ! 

She 's married since, — a parson's wife ; 

'T was better for her that we should part, — 
Better the soberest, prosiest life 

Than a blasted home and a broken heart. 
I have seen her ? Once : I was weak and spent 

On the dusty road, a carriage stopped ; 
But little she dreamed, as on she went. 

Who kissed the coin that her fingers dropped ! 

You 've set me talking, sir ; I 'm sorry ; 

It makes me wild to think of the change ! 
What do you care for a beggar's story ? 

Is it amusing ? you find it strange ? 
I had a mother so proud of me ! 

'T was well she died before — Do you know 
If the happy spirits in heaven can see 

The ruin and wretchedness here below ? 

Another glass, and strong, to deaden 

This pain ; then Roger and I will start. 
I wonder, has he such a lumpish, leaden, 

Aching thing in jdace of a heart ? 
He is sad sometimes, and would weep, if he could. 

No doubt, remembering things that were, — ' 
A virtuous kennel, with plenty of food, 

And himself a sober, resj)ectable cur. 

I 'm better now ; that glass was warming. 

You rascal ! limber your lazy feet ! 
We must be fiddling and performing 

For supper and bed, or starve in the street. 
Not a very gay life to lead, you think ? 

But soon we shall go where lodgings are free, 
And the sleepers need neither victuals nor drink ; — 

The sooner the better for Roger and me ! 

John Townsend Trowbridge. 



A FAREWELL TO TOBACCO. 

May the Babylonish curse 
Straight confound my stammering verse, 
If I can a passage see 
In this word-perplexity, 
Or a fit expression find. 
Or a language to my mind 
(Still the phrase is wide or scant), 
To take leave of thee, great plant ! 
Or in any terms relate 
Half my love, or half my hate ; 
For I hate, yet love, thee so. 
That, whichever thing I show. 
The plain truth will seem to be 
A constrained hyi)erbole. 
And the passion to proceed 
More from a mistress than a weed. 

Sooty retainer to the vine ! 
Bacchus' black servant, negro fine ! 
Sorcerer ! that mak'st us dote upon 
Thy begrimed complexion, 
And, for thy pernicious sake, 
More and greater oaths to break 
Than reclaimed lovers take 
'Gainst women ! Thou thy siege dost lay 
Much, too, in the female way, 
While thou suck'st the laboring breath 
Faster than kisses, or than death. 

Thou in such a cloud dost bind us 
That our worst foes cannot find us. 
And ill fortune, that would thwart us. 
Shoots at rovers, shooting at us ; 
While each man, through th}^ heightening steam. 
Does like a smoking Etna seem ; 
And all about us does express 
( Fancy and wit in richest dress) ' 
A Sicilian fruitfulness. 

Thou through such a mist dost show us 
That our best friends do not know us, 
And, for those allowed features 
Due to reasonable creatures, 
Liken'st us to fell chimeras. 
Monsters, — that who see us, fear us ; 
Worse than Cerberus or Geryon, 
Or, who first loved a cloud, Ixion. 

Bacchus we know, and we allow 
His tipsy rites. But what art thou. 
That but by reflex canst show 
What his deity can do, — 
As the false Egyptian spell 
Aped the true Hebrew miracle ? 
Some few vapors thou mayst raise 
The weak brain may serve to amaze ; 



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TEMPERANCE. 



549 



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But to the reins and nobler heart 
Canst nor life nor heat impart. 

Brother of Bacchus, later born ! 
The old world was sure forlorn, 
Wanting thee, that aidest more 
The god's victories than, before, 
All his panthers, and the brawls 
Of his piping Bacchanals. 
These, as stale, we disallow. 
Or judge of thee meant : only thou 
His true Indian conquest art ; 
And, for ivy round his dart, 
The reformed god now weaves 
A finer thyrsus of thy leaves. 

Scent to match thy rich perfume 
Chemic art did ne'er presume, 
Through her quaint alembic strain, 
None so sovereign to the bi-ain. 
Nature, that did in thee excel, 
Framed again no second smell. 
Roses, violets, but toys 
For the smaller sort of boys, 
Or for greener damsels meant ; 
Thou art the only manly scent. 

Stinkingest of the stinking kind ! 
Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind ! 
Africa, that brags her foison. 
Breeds no such prodigious poison ! 
Henbane, nightshade, both together, 
Hemlock, aconite — 

N'ay, rather, 
Plant divine, of rarest virtue ; 
Blisters on the tongue would hurt you ! 
'T was but in a sort I blamed thee ; 
None e'er prospered who defamed thee ; 
Irony all, and feigned abuse, 
Such as perplexed lovers use 
At a need, when, in despair 
To paint forth their fairest fair, 
Or in part biit to express 
That exceeding comeliness 
"Which their fancies doth so strike, 
They borrow language of dislike ; 
And, instead of deai-est Miss, 
Jewel, honey, sweetheart, bliss, 
And those forms- of old admiring, 
Call her cockatrice and siren, 



Basilisk, and all that 's evil. 
Witch, hyena, mermaid, devil, 
Etliioji, wencli, and blackamoor, 
Monkey, ape, and twenty more ; 
Friendly trait'ress, loving foe, — 
Not that she is truly so. 
But no other way they know, 
A contentment to express 
Borders so upon excess 
That they do not rightly wot 
Whether it be from pain or not. 

Or, as men, constrained to part 
With what 's nearest to their heart. 
While their sorrow 's at the height 
Lose discrimination quite. 
And their hasty wrath let fall. 
To appease their frantic gall. 
On the darling thing, whatever. 
Whence they feel it death to sever. 
Though it be, as they, perforce, 
Guiltless of the sad divorce. 

For I must (nor let it grieve thee, 
Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee. 
For thy sake, Tobacco, I 
Would do anything but die. 
And but seek to extend my days 
Long enough to sing thy praise. 
But, as she who once hath been 
A king's consort is a queen 
Ever after, nor will bate 
Any tittle of her state 
Though a widow, or divorced, 
So I, from thy converse forced. 
The old name and style retain, 
A right Katherine of Spain ; 
And a seat, too, 'mongst the joys 
Of the blest Tobacco Boys ; 
Where, though I, by sour physician. 
Am debarred the full fruition 
Of thy favors, I may catch 
Some collateral sweets, and snatch 
Sidelong odors, that give life 
Like glances from a neighbor's wife ; 
And still live in the by-places 
And the suburbs of thy graces ; 
And in thy borders take delight. 
An unconqi;ered Canaanite. 

Charles Laiib. 



[& 



^ 



[8~* 



550 



POEMS 0¥ TEMPERANCE AND LABOR. 



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LABOR. 



THE HAPPY HEART. 

FROM " PATIENT GRFSSELL," ACT I, SC. 1. 

Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden shimbers ? 

sweet content ! 
Alt thou rich, yet is thy mind perplexed ? 

])unishment ! 
Dost thou laugli to see how fools are vexed 
To add to goiden numbers, golden numbers ? 
sweet content ! sweet, sweet content ! 

Work apace, apace, apace, apace ; 

Honest labor bears a lovely face ; 
Then hey nonny nonny, hey nonny nonny ! 
Canst drink the waters of the crisped spring ? 

sweet content ! 
Swimm'st thou in wealth, yet sink'st in thine 
own tears ? 
punishment ! 
Then he that patiently want's burden bears 
No burden bears, but is a king, a king ! 
sweet content ! sweet, sweet content ! 
Work apace, apace, apace, apace ; 
Honest labor bears a lovely face ; 
Then hey nonny nonny, hey nonny nonny ! 

Thomas Dekker. 



t& 



THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH. 

Under a spreading chestnut-tree 

The village smithy stands ; 
The smith, a mighty man is he, 

With large and sinewy hands ; 
And the muscles of his brawny arms 

Are strong as iron bands. 

His hair is crisp and black and long ; 

His face is like the tan ; 
His brow is wet with honest sweat, — 

He earns whate'er he can. 
And looks the whole world in the face. 

For he owes not any man. 

^Veek in, week out, from morn till night. 
You can hear his bellows blow ; 

You can hear him swing his heavy sledge, 
With measured beat and slow. 

Like a sexton ringing the village bell, 
When the evening sun is low. 

And children coming home from school, 

Look in at the open door ; 
Tlicy love to see the flaming forge. 

And hear the bellows roar, 



Ancj catch the burning sparks that fly 
Like chaff" from the threshing-floor. 

He goes on Sunday to the church, 

And sits among his boys ; 
He hears the parson pray and preach ; 

He hears his daughter's voice, 
Singing in the village choir. 

And it makes his heart rejoice. 

It sounds to him like her mother's voice. 

Singing in Paradise ! 
He needs must think of her once more, 

How in the grave she lies ; 
And with his hard, rough hand he wipes 

A tear out of his ej^es. 

Toiling, rejoicing, sorrowing, 

Onward through life he goes ; 
Each morning sees some task begin. 

Each evening sees it close ; 
Something attempted, something done. 

Has earned a night's repose. 

Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend. 
For the lesson thoii hast taught ! 

Thus at the flaming forge of life 
Our fortunes must be wrought ; 

Thus on its sounding anvil shaped 
Each burning deed and thought ! 

HENRY WADSWORTH LO.NGFELLGW. 



TO THE HARVEST MOON. 

Pleasing 't is, modest Moon ! 
Now the night is at her noon, 
'Neath thy sway to musing lie. 
While around the zephyrs sigh, 
Fanning soft the sun-tanned wheat. 
Ripened by the summer's heat ; 
Picturing all the rustic's joy 
When boundless plenty greets his eye, 

And thinking soon, 

modest Moon ! 
How many a female eye will roam 

Along the road. 

To see the load, 
The last dear load of harvest home. 

Storms and temp'ests, floods and rains. 
Stern despoilers of the plains, 



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LABOR. 



551 



Hence, away, the season flee, 

Foes to light-heart jollity ! 

May no winds careering high 

Drive the clouds along the sky, 
Bnt may all Nature smile with aspect boon, 
When in the heavens thou show'st thy face, 
harvest Moon ! 

'Neath j'on lowly roof he lies, 
The husbandman, with sleep-sealed eyes ; 
He dreams of crowded barns, and round 
The yard he hears the flail resound ; 
0, may no hurricane destroy 
His visionary views of joy ! 
God of the winds ! 0, hear his humble prayer, 
And while the Moon of Harvest shines, thy blus- 
tering whirlwind spare ! 

Sons of luxury, to you s 

Leave I Sleep's dull power to woo ; 
Press ye still the doAvny bed. 
While feverish dreams surround your head ; 
I will seek the woodland glade. 
Penetrate the thickest shade, 
Wrapped in Contemplation's dreams. 
Musing high on holy themes, 

While on the gale 

Shall softly sail 
The nightingale's enchanting tune, 

And oft my eyes 

Shall grateful rise 
To thee, the modest Harvest Moon ! 

Henry Kirke White. 



THE USEFUL PLOUGH. 

A COUNTRY life is sweet ! 
In moderate cold and heat. 

To walk in the air how pleasant and fair ! 
In every field of wheat, 

The fairest of flowers adorning the bowers. 
And every meadow's brow ; 

So that 1 say, no courtier may 

Comjjare with them who clothe in gray, 
And follow the useful plough. 

They rise with the morning lark. 
And labor till almost dark, 

Then, folding their sheep, they hasten to 
sleep 
While every pleasant park 

Next morning is ringing with birds that arc 
singing 
On each green, tender bough. 

With what content and merriment 

Their days are spent, whose minds are bent 
To follow the iTseful ]»lougli. 



tj^- 



THE PLOUGHMAN. 

Clear the brown path to meet his coulter's 

gleam ! 
Lo ! on he comes, behind his smoking team, 
With toil's bright dew-drops on his sunburnt 

brow, 
The lord of earth, the hero of the plough ! 

First in the field before the reddening sun. 
Last in the shadows when the day is done. 
Line after line, along the bursting sod, 
Marks the broad acres where his feet have trod. 
Still where he treads the stubborn clods divide. 
The smooth, fresh furrow opens deep and wide ; 
Matted and dense the tangled turf upheaves. 
Mellow and dark the ridgy cornfield cleaves ; 
Up the steep hillside, where the laboring train 
Slants the long track that scores the level plain, 
Through the moist valley, clogged with oozing 

clay, 
The patient convoy breaks its destined way ; 
At every turn the loosening chains resound. 
The swinging ploughshare circles glistening 

round, 
Till the wide field one billowy waste appears. 
And wearied hands unbind the panting steers. 

These are the hands whose sturdy labor brings 
The peasant's food, the golden pomp of kings ; 
This is the page whose letters shall be seen. 
Changed by the sun to words of living green ; 
This is the scholar whose immortal pen 
Spells the first lesson hunger taught to men ; 
These are the lines that heaven-commanded Toil 
Shows on his deed, — the charter of the soil ! 

gracious Mother, whose benignant breast 
Wakes us to life, and lulls us all to rest, 
How thy sweet features, kind to every clime, 
Mock with their smile the wrinkled front of 

Time ! 
We stain thy flowers, — they blossom o'er the 

dead ; 
We rend thy bosom, and it gives us bread ; 
O'er the red field that trampling strife has torn. 
Waves the green plumage of thy tasselled corn ; 
Our maddening conflicts scar thy fairest plain, 
Still thy soft answer is the growing grain. 
Yet, our ]\Iother, while uncounted charms 
Steal round our hearts in thine embracing arms, 
Let not our virtues in thy love decay. 
And thy fond sweetness waste our strength away. 

No, by these hills whose Ijanners now displayed 
In blazing cohorts Autumn has arrayed ; 
By yon twin summits, on whose splintery crests 
The tossing hemlocks hold the eagles' nests ; 



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ifl-^ 



552 



POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR. 



--a 



By these fair plains the mountain circle screens, 
And feeds with streamlets from its dark ra- 
vines, — • 
True to their home, these faithful arms shall toil 
To crown with peace their own untainted soil ; 
And, true to God, to freedom, to mankind. 
If her chained ban-dogs Faction shall unbind, 
These stately forms, that, bending even now, 
Bowed their strong manhood to the humble 

plough. 
Shall rise erect, the guardians of the land. 
The same stern iron in the same right hand, 
Till o'er their hills the shouts of triumph run, — 
The sword has rescued what the ploughshare 

won ! 

Oliver Wendell Holmes. 



B- 



THE MOWERS. 

The sunburnt mowers are in the swath — 
Swing, swing, swing ! — 
The towering lilies loath 
Tremble, and totter, and fall ; 
The meadow-rue 
Dashes its tassels of golden dew ; 

And the keen blade sweeps o'er all — 
Swing, swing, swing ! 

The flowers, the berries, the plumed grass, 

Fall in a smothered mass ; 
Hastens away the butterfly ; 
Y\"ith half their burden the brown bees hie ; 

And the meadow-lark shrieks distrest, 
And leaves the poor younglings all in the nest. 
Totters the Jacob's-ladder tall, 

And sadly nod 
The royal crowns of the golden-rod : — 
The keen blade mowetli all ! 

7^non, the chiming whetstones ring — 

Ting-a-ling, ting-a-Ung ! 

And the mower now 
Pauses and wipes his beaded brow. 
A moment he scans the fleckless sky, 
A moment, the fish-hawk soaring high. 
And watches the swallows dip and dive 

Anear and far ; 
They whisk and glimmer, and chatter and strive 
What do they gossip together ? 

Cunning fellows they are, — 

Wise prophets to hive ; 
" Higher or lower they circle and skim, 
Fair or foul to-morrow's hay-weather ! " 
Tallest primroses or loftiest daisies 

Not a steel-blue feather 

Of slim winn- frrazcs ! 



"Fear not ! fear not ! " cry the swallows. 

Each mower tightens his snath-ring's wedge, 
And his finger daintily follows 
The long blade's tickle-edge ; 

Softly the whetstone's last touches ring, - 
Ting-a-ling, ting-a-ling ! 

" Perchance the swallows, that flit in their glee. 
Of to-morrow's weather know little as we," 
Says Farmer Russet ; "'tis hidden in shower 
Or sunshine ; to-morrow we do not own ; 

To-day is ours alone. 
Not a twinkle we '11 waste of the golden hour. 
Grasp tightly the nibs, t— give heel and give 

toe. 
Lay a goodly swath shaved smooth and low ! 

Piime is the day, — 

Swing, swing, swing ! " 
(Farmer Russet is aged and gray, — 
Gray as the frost, but fresh as the spring ; 

Straight is he 

As a balsam-tree, 
And with heart most blithe and sinews lithe. 
He leads the row with his merry scythe). 
"Come, boys ! strike up the old song 

While we circle around, — 
The song we alwaj'^s in hay-time sing ; 

And let the woods ring. 

And the echoes prolong 

The merry sound ! " 



June is too early for richest haj'' 

(Fair weather, fair weather) ; 

The corn stretches taller the livelong day, 

But grass is ever too sappy to lay 
(Clip all together) ; 

June is too early for richest hay. 

( Chorus. ) 
0, we will make hay now while the sun 
shines — 
We '11 waste not a golden minute ! 
Tlie blue arch to-day no storm-shadow lines — 
We '11 waste not a minute. 
For the west-wind is fair ; 
0, the hay-day is rare ! 
The sky is without a brown cloud in it ! 

August 's a month that too far goes by 
( Late weather, late weather) ; 

Gi'asshoppers are chipper and kick too high. 

And grass, that 's standing, is fodder scorched dry 
(Pull altogether) ; 

August 's a month that too far goes by. 

{Chorus.) 



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LABOR. 



553 ^ 



July is just in the nick of time ! 

(Best weather, best weather ;) 
The midsummer month is the golden prime 
For haycocks smelling of clover and thyme 

(Strike all together) ; 
July is just in the nick of time ! 
{Chorus.) 

Still hiss the scythes ! 
Shudder the grasses' defenceless blades, — 

The lily-throng writhes : 
And, as a phalanx of wild-geese streams 
Where the shore of April's cloud-land gleams 
On their dizzy way in serried grades, — 
Wing on wijig, wing on wing, — 
The mowers, each a step in advance 
Of his fellow, time their stroke with a glance 

Of swerveless force ; 
And far through the meadow leads their course,— 

Swing, swing, swing ! 

Myron Buell Benton. 



FROM "THE FARMER'S BOY." 

Fled now the sullen murmurs of the north. 
The splendid raiment of the Spring peeps forth ; 
Her universal green and the clear sky 
Delight still more and more the gazing eye. 
Wide o'er the fields, in rising moisture strong, 
Shoots up the simple flower, or creeps along 
The mellowed soil, imbibing fairer hues 
Or sweets from frequent showers and evening 

dews 
That summon from their sheds the slumbering 

ploughs, 
While health impregnates every breeze that blows. 
No wheels support the diving, pointed share ; 
No groaning ox is doomed to labor there ; 
No helpmates teach the docile steed his road 
(Alike unknown the ploughboy and the goad) : 
But unassisted, through each toilsome day. 
With smiling brow the ploughman cleaves his 

way. 
Draws his fresh parallels, and, widening still. 
Treads slow the heavy dale, or climbs the hill. 
Strong on the wing his busy followers play. 
Where writhing earthworms meet the unwelcome 

day. 
Till all is changed, and hill and level down 
Assume a livery of sober brown ; 
Again disturbed, when Giles with wearying strides 
From ridge to ridge the ponderous harrow guides. 
His heels deep sinking, every step he goes, 
Till dirt adhesive loads his clouted shoes. 
Welcome, green headland ! firm beneath his feet : 
Welcome, the friendly bank's refreshing seat ; 



la-^ 



There, warm with toil, his panting horses browse 
Their sheltering canopy of pendent boughs ; 
Till rest delicious chase each transient pain, 
And new-born vigor swell in every vein. 
Hour after hour and day to day succeeds, 
Till every clod and deep-drawn furrow spreads 
To crumbling mould, — a level surface clear. 
And strewed with corn to crown the rising year ; 
And o'er the whole Giles, once transverse again. 
In earth's moist bosom buries up the grain. 
The work is done ; no more to man is given ; 
The grateful farmer trusts the rest to Heaven. 

His simple errand done, he homeward hies ; 
Another instantly its place supplies. 
The clattering dairy-maid, immersed in steam. 
Singing and scrubbing midst her milk and cream, 
Bawls out, "Go fetch the cows!" — he hears 

no more ; 
For pigs and ducks and turkeys throng the door. 
And sitting hens for constant war prepared, — 
A concert strange to that which late he heard. 
Straight to the meadow then he whistling goes ; 
With well-known halloo calls his lazy cows ; 
Down the rich pasture heedlessly they graze. 
Or hear the summons with an idle gaze. 
For well they know the cow-yard yields no more 
Its tempting fragrance, nor its wintry store. 
Reluctance mai-ks their steps, sedate and slow, 
The right of conquest all the law they know ; 
The strong press on, the weak by turns succeed, 
And one superior always takes the lead, 
Is ever foremost wheresoe'er they stray. 
Allowed precedence, undisputed sway : 
With jealous pride her station is maintained, 
For many a broil that post of honor gained. 
At home, the yard affords a grateful scene, 
For spring makes e'en a miry cow-yard clean. 
Thence from its chalky bed behold conveyed 
The rich manure that drenching winter made. 
Which, piled near home, grows green with many 

a weed, 
A promised nutriment for autumn's seed. 
Forth comes the maid, and like the morning 

smiles ; 
The mistress too, and followed close by GileSo 
A friendly tripod forms their humble seat, 
With pails bright scoured and delicately sweet. 
Where shadowing elms obstruct the morning ray 
Begins the work, begins the simple lay ; 
The full-charged udder yields its willing stream 
While Mary sings some lover's amorous dream ; 
And crouching Giles, beneath a neighboring tree, 
Tugs o'er his pail, and chants with equal glee ; 
Whose hat with battered brim, of nap so bare. 
From the cow's side purloins a coat of hair, — 
A mottled ensign of his harmless trade. 
An unambitious, peaceable cockade. 



^^ 



tfi-n 



554 



POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR. 



^a 



As unambitious, too, that cheerful aid 
The mistress yields beside her rosy maid ; 
With joj' she views her plenteous reeking store, 
And bears a brimmer to the dairy door ; 
Her cows dismissed, the luscious mead to roam, 
Till eve again recall them loaded home. 

ROBERT BLOOMFIELD. 



m- 



THE FORGING OF THE ANCHOR. 

Come, see the Dolphin's anchor forged ; 't is at 

a white heat now : 
The bellows ceased,' the flames decreased ; though 

on the forge's brow 
The little flames still fitfully play through the 

sable mound ; 
And fitfully you still may see the grim smiths 

ranking round, 
All clad in leathern panoply, their broad hands 

only bare ; 
Some rest upon their sledges here, some work 

the windlass there. 

The windlass strains the tackle-chains, the black 

mound heaves below, 
And red and deep a hundred veins burst out at 

every throe ; 
It rises, roars, rends all outright, — Vulcan, 

what a glow ! 
'T is blinding white, 't is blasting bright, the 

high sun shines not so ! 
The high sun sees not, on the earth, such a fiery, 

fearful show, — 
The roof-ribs swarth, the candent hearth, the 

ruddy, lurid row 
Of smiths that stand, an ardent band, like men 

before the foe. 
As, quivering through his fleece of flame, the 

sailing monster slow 
Sinks on the anvil, — all about the faces fiery 

grow. 
" Hurrah ! " they shout, "leap out, leap out ; " 

bang, bang, the sledges go ; 
Hurrah ! the jetted lightnings are hissing high 

and low ; 
A hailing fount of fire is struck at every squash- 
ing blow ; 
The leathern mail rebounds the hail ; the rattling 

cinders strew 
The ground around ; at every bound the swelter- 
ing, fountains flow ; 
And thick and loud the swinking crowd, at every 

stroke, pant "Ho ! " 

Leap out, leap out, my masters ; leap out and 

lay on load ! 
Let 's forge a goodly anchor, a bower, thick and 

broad ; 



For a heart of oak is hanging on every blow, I 

bode. 
And I see the good ship riding, all in a perilous 

road, — 
The low reef roaring on her lee, the roll of ocean 

poured 
From stem to stern, sea after sea ; the mainmast 

by the board ; 
The bulwarks down, the rudder gone, the boats 

stove at the chains, — 
But courage still, brave mariners, the bower still 

remains, 
And not an inch to flinch he deigns save when 

ye pitch sky-high. 
Then moves his head, as though he said, " Fear 

nothing, — here am I ! " 

Swing in your strokes in order, let foot and hand 

keep time ; 
Your blows make music sweeter far than any 

steeple's chime. 
But while you sling your sledges, sing ; and let 

the burden be. 
The Anchor is the Anvil King, and royal crafts- 
men we ! 
Strike in, strike in, the sparks begin to dull 

their rustling red ! 
Our hammers ring with sharjDer din, our work 

will soon be sped ; 
Our anchor soon must change his bed of fiery 

rich array 
For a hammock at the roaring bows, or an oozy 

couch of clay ; 
Our anchor soon must change the lay of merry 

craftsmen here. 
For the Yeo-heave-o, and the Heave-away, and 

the sighing seaman's cheer ; 
When, weighing slow, at eve they go — far, far 

from love and home. 
And sobbing sweethearts, in a row, wail o'er the 

ocean foam. 

In livid and obdiirate gloom, he darkens down 

at last : 
A shapely one he is, and strong as e'er from cat 

was cast. 
trusted and trustworthy guard, if thou hadst 

life like me. 
What pleasures would thy toils reward beneath 

the deej) green sea ! 
deep-sea diver, wlio might then behold such 

sights as thou ? 
The hoary monsters' palaces ! methinks what joy 

't were now 
To go plumb plunging down amid the assembly 

of the ^^■hales, 
And feel the churned sea round me boil beneath 

their scourging tails ! 



e- 



LABOR. 



^ra 



000 



t 



Then deep in tangle-woods to fight the fierce sea 
unicorn, 

And send him foiled and bellowing back, for all 
his ivory horn ; 

To leave the subtle sworder-fish of bony blade for- 
lorn ; 

And for the ghastly-grinning shark, to laugh his 
jaws to scorn ; 

To leap down on the kraken's back, where mid 
Norwegian isles 

He lies, a lubber anchorage for sudden shallowed 
miles. 

Till snorting, like an under-sea volcano, ofi" he 
rolls ; 

ileanwhile to swing, a-buffeting the far-aston- 
ished shoals 

Of his back-browsing ocean calves ; or, haply in 
a cove, 

Shell-strewn, and consecrate of old to some Un- 
dine's love. 

To find the long-haired mermaidens ; or, hard 
by icy lands. 

To wrestle with the sea-serpent upon cerulean 
sands. 

broad-armed fisher of the deep, whose sports 

can equal tliine ? 
The Dolphin weighs a thousand tons that tugs 

thy cable line ; 
And night by night 't is thy delight, thy glory 

day by day, 
Through sable sea and breaker white, the giant 

game to play ; 
But, shamer of our little sports ! forgive the 

name I gave, — 
A fisher's joy is to destroy, thine office is to save. 

lodger in the sea-king's halls, couldst thou but 

understand 
Whose be the white bones by thy side, or who 

that dripping band. 
Slow swaying in the heaving waves that round 

about thee bend. 
With sounds like breakers in a dream, blessing 

their ancient friend : 
0, couldst thou know what heroes glide with 

larger steps round thee. 
Thine ii'on side would swell with pride ; thou 'dst 

leap within the sea ! 

Give honor to their memories who left the pleas- 
ant strand 

To shed their blood so freely for the love of 
fatherland, — 

Who left their chance of quiet age and grassy 
churchyard grave 

So freely for a restless bed amid the tossing 
wave : " 



0, though our anchor may not be all I liave 

fondly sung. 
Honor him for their memory whose bones he 

goes among ! 

SAMUEL FERGUSON. 



THE SONG OF STEAM. 

Harness me down with your iron bands. 

Be sure of your curb and rein, 
For I scorn the strength of your puny hands 

As a tempest scorns a chain. 
How I laughed as I lay concealed from sight 

For many a countless hour. 
At the childish boasts of human might, 

And the pride of human power ! 

When I saw an army upon the land, 

A navy upon the seas. 
Creeping along, a snail-like band, 

Or waiting the wayward breeze ; 
When I marked the peasant faintly reel 

With the toil that he daily bore, 
As he feebly turned the tardy wheel, 

Or tugged at the weary oar ; 

When I measured the panting courser's speed. 

The flight of the carrier dove. 
As they bore the law a king decreed. 

Or the lines of impatient love, 
I could bat think how the world would feel, 

As these were outstripped afar, 
When I should be bound to the rushing keel. 

Or chained to the flying car. 

Ha ! ha ! ha ! they found me at last, 

They invited me forth at length. 
And I rushed to my throne with a thunder blast, 

And laughed in my iron strength ! 
0, then ye saw a wondrous change 

On the earth and ocean wide. 
Where now my fiery armies range. 

Nor wait for wind or tide ! 

Hurrah ! hurrah ! the waters o'er, 

The mountain's steep decline ; 
Time — space — have yielded to my power : 

The world, the world is mine ! 
The rivers the sun hath earliest blest. 

Or those where his beams decline, 
The giant streams of the queenly West, 

Or the Orient floods divine. 

The ocean pales wherever I sweep 

To hear my strength rejoice. 
And monsters of the briny deep 

Cower trembling at my voice. 



^ 



[fi-: 



556 



POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR. 



-^ 



I carry the Avealth of the lord of earth, 
The thoughts of liis godlike mind ; 

The wind lags after my going forth, 
The lightning is left behind. 

In the darksome depths of the fathomless mine 

My tireless arm doth play, 
Where the rocks ne'er saw the sun's decline 

Or the dawn of the glorious day ; 
I bring earth's glittering jewels up 

From the hidden caves below, 
And I make the fountain's granite cup 

With a crystal gush o'erliow. 

I blow the bellows, I forge the steel, 

In all the shops of trade ; 
I hammer the ore and turn the wheel 

Where my arms of strength are made ; 
I manage the furnace, the mill, the mint, 

I carry, I spin, I weave. 
And all my doings I put into print 

On every Saturday eve. 

I 've no muscles to weary, no brains to decay, 

N"o bones to be laid on the shelf, 
And soon I intend you may go and play, 

While I manage the world myself. 
But harness me down with your iron bands. 

Be sure of your curb and rein. 
For I scorn the strength of your puny hands 

As the tempest scorns the chain. 

George W. Cutter. 



ffl 



LABOR SONG. 

FROM " THE BELL-FOUNDER." 

Ah ! little they know of true happiness, they 

whom satiety fills. 
Who, flung on the rich breast of luxury, eat of 

the rankness that kills. 
Ah ! little they know of the blessedness toil- 
purchased slumber enjoys 
Who, stretched on the hard rack of indolence, 

taste of the sleep that destroys ; 
Nothing to hope for, or labor for ; nothing to 

sigh for, or gain ; 
Nothing to light in its vividness, lightning-like, 

bosom and brain ; 
Nothing to break life's monotony, rippling it o'er 

with its breath ; — 
Nothing but dulness and lethargy, weariness, 

sorrow, and death ! 

But blessed that child of humanity, happiest 

man among men, 
Who, with hammer or chisel or pencil, with 

rudder or ploughshare or pen. 



Laboreth ever and ever with hope through the 
morning of life. 

Winning home and its darling divinities, — love- 
worshipped children and wife. 

Round swings the hammer of industry, quickly 
the sharp chisel rings. 

And the heart of the toiler has throbbings that 
stir not the bosom of kings, — 

He the true ruler and conqueror, he the true 
king of his race, 

Who nerveth his arm for life's combat, and looks 
the strong world in the face. 

DENIS FLORENCE MAC-CARTHY. 



A LANCASHIRE DOXOLOGY. 

" Some cotton has lately been imported into Farringdon, where 
the mills have been closed for a considerable time. The people, 
who were previously in the deepest distress, went out to meet tlie 
cotton : the women wept over the bales and kissed them, and 
finally sang the Doxology over them." — Spectator of May 14, 1863. 

" Praise God from whom all blessings flow," 
Praise him who sendeth joy and woe. 
The Lord who takes, the Lord who gives, 
0, praise him, all that dies, and lives. 

He opens and he shuts his hand. 
But why we cannot understand : 
Pours and dries up his mercies' flood, 
And yet is still All-perfect Good. 

We fathom not the mighty plan. 
The mystery of God and man ; 
We women, when afflictions come, 
We only suffer and are dumb. 

And when, the tempest passing by. 
He gleams out, sunlike, through our sky, 
We look up, and through black clouds riven 
We recognize the smile of Heaven. 

Ours is no wisdom of the wise, 
We have no deep philosophies ; 
Childlike we take both kiss and rod, 
For he who loveth knoweth God. 

DINAH MARIA MULOCK CRAIK- 



TO LABOR IS TO PRAY. 

Pause not to dream of the future before us ; 
Pause not to weep the wild cares that come o'er us ; 
Hark, how Creation's deep musical chorus, 

Unintermitting, goes up into heaven ! 
Never the ocean wave falters in flowing ; 
Never the little seed stops in its growing ; 
More and more richly the rose-heart keeps glow- 
ing, 

Till from its nourishing stem it is riven. 



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LABOR. 



557 



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" Labor is worship ! " tlie robin is singing ; 
" Labor is worship ! " the wild, bee is ringing ; 
Listen ! that eloquent whisper, upspringing, 
Speaks to thy soul from out Nature's great 

heart. 
From the dark cloud flows the life-giving shower ; 
From the rough sod blows the soft-breathing 

flower ; 
From the small insect, the rich coral bower ; 
Only man, in the plan, shrinks from his part. 

Labor is life ! 't is the still water faileth ; 

Idleness ever despaireth, bewaileth ; 

Keep the watch wound, or the dark rust assail- 

eth; 
Flowers droop and die in the stillness of noon. 
Labor is glory ! — the flying cloud lightens ; 
Only the waving wing changes and brightens ; 
Idle hearts only the dark future frightens ; 
Play the sweet keys, wouldst thou keep them 

in tune ! 

Labor is rest — from the sorrows that greet us ; 

Rest from all petty vexations that meet us ; 

Rest from sin-promptings that ever entreat us ; 
Rest from world-sirens that lure us to ill. 

"Work, — and pure slumbers shall wait on thy 
pillow ; 

Work, — thou shalt ride over Care's coming bil- 
low ; 

Lie not down wearied 'neath "Woe's weeping wil- 
low, 
"Work with a stout heart and resolute will ! 

Labor is health ! Lo, the husbandman reaping, 
How through his veins goes the life-current 

leaping ! 
How his strong arm in its stalworth pride 

sweeping. 
True as a simbeam the swift sickle guides. 
Labor is wealth, — in the sea the pearl groweth ; 
Rich the queen's robe from the frail cocoon 

fioweth ; 
From the fine acorn the strong forest bloweth ; 
Temple and statue the marble block hides. 

Droop not, — though shame, sin, and anguish 

are round thee ! 
Bravely fling ofl" the cold chain that hath bound 

thee ! 
Look to the pure heaven smiling beyond thee ! 
Rest not content in thy darkness, — a clod ! 
"Work for some good, be it ever so slowly ! 
Cherish some flower, be it ever so lowly ! 
Labor ! — all labor is noble and holy ; 

Let thy great deed be thy prayer to thy God. 
• Frances Sargent Osgood. 



, THE LABORER. 

Toiling in the naked fields, 
"Where no bush a shelter yields, 
Needy Labor dithering stands, 
Beats and blows his numbing hands, 
And upon the crumping snows 
Stamps in vaiu to warm his toes. 

Though all 's in vain to keep him warm. 
Poverty must brave the storm. 
Friendship none its aid to lend. 
Constant health his only friend, 
Granting leave to live in pain. 
Giving strength to toil in vain, 

JOHN Clare. 



CORN-LA"W HYMN. 

Lord ! call thy pallid angel. 

The tamer of the strong ! 
And bid him whip with want and woe 

The champions of the wrong ! 
0, say not thou to ruin's flood, 

" Up, sluggard ! why so slow ? " 
But alone, let them groan, 

The lowest of the low ; 
And basely beg the bread they curse, 

Where millions curse them now ! 

No ; wake not thou the giant 

Who drinks hot blood for wine ; 
And shouts unto the east and west, 

In thunder-tones like thine ; 
Till the slow to move rush all at once. 

An avalanche of men, 

While he raves over waves 

That need no whirlwind then ; 
Though slow to move, moved all at once, 

A sea, a sea of men ! 

Ebenezer Elliott. 



DUTY. 



I SLEPT and dreamed that life was Beauty ; 
I woke and found that life was Duty : 
Was then thy dream a shadowy lie ? 
Toil on, sad heart, courageously, 
And thou shalt find thy dream to be 
A noonday light and. truth to thee. 

Anonymous. 



TRUE REST. 

Sweet is the pleasure 
Itself cannot spoil ! 

Is not true leisure 
One with true toil ? 






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POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOIl. 



a 



Thou that wouldst taste it, 

Still do thy best ; 
Use it, not waste it, — 

Else 't is no rest. 

Wouldst behold beauty 

Near thee ? all round ? 
Only hath duty 

Such a sight found, 

Kest is not quitting 

The busy career ; 
Eest is the fitting 

Of self to its sphere. 

'T is the brook's motion, 

Clear without strife, 
Fleeing to ocean 

After its life. 

Deeper devotion 

Nowhere hath knelt ; 
Fuller emotion 

Heart never felt. 

'T is loving and serving 

The highest and best ; 
*T is onwards ! unswerving, — 

And that is true rest. 

JOHN SULLIVAN DWIGHT. 



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GOOD NIGHT. 

Good night, 
To each weary, toil-worn wight ! 
Now the day so sweetly closes, 
Every aching brow reposes 
Peacefully till morning light. 
Good night ! 

Home to rest ! 
Close the eye and calm the breast ; 
Stillness through the streets is stealing, 
And the watchman's horn is pealing, 
And the night calls softly, " Haste ! 
Home to rest ! " 

Sweetly sleep ! 
Eden's breezes round ye sweep. 
O'er the peace-forsaken lover 
Let the darling image hover. 
As he lies in transport deep. 
Sweetly sleep I 

So, good night ! 
Slumber on till morning light : 



Slumber till another morrow 
Brings its stores of joy and sorrow ; 
Fearless, in the Father's sight, 

Slumber on. Good night ! 



From the German of KORNER. Trans- 
lation of CHARLES T. Brooks. 



FEAGMENTS. 

The Intoxicating Cup. 

Bacchus, that first from out the purple grape 
Ci'ushed the sweet poison of misused wine. 
Comus. Milton. 



Ah ! sly deceiver ; branded o'er and o'er. 
Yet still believed ! Exulting o'er the wreck 
Of sober vows. 

The Arl 0/ Preservins; Health. T. ARMSTRONG. 

In courts and palaces he also reigns, 
And in luxurious cities, where the noise 
Of riot ascends above their loftiest towers, 
And injury, and outrage : and when night 
Darkens the streets, then wander forth the sons 
Of Belial, flown with insolence and wine. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MILTON. 

0, when we swallow down 
Intoxicating wine, we drink damnation ; 
Naked we stand, the sport of mocking fiends, 
Who grin to see our nobler nature vanquished, 
Subdued to beasts. 

JVi/e's Reick. C. JOHNSON. 

A drunkard clasp his teeth, and not undo 'em. 
To suffer wet damnation to run through 'em. 

The Revengers Tragedy, Act iii. Sc. i. C. TOURNEUR. 



Temperance. 

Of my merit 
On tliet point you yourself may jedge ; 
All is, I never drink no sperit. 

Nor I haint never signed no pledge. 

The Biglow Papers, First Series, No. vii. J. R. LOWELL. 



Tobacco Smokees. 

Such often, like the tube they so admire. 
Important triflers ! have more smoke than fire. 
Pernicious weed ! whose scent the fair annoys, 
Unfriendly to society's chief jo)% 
Thy worst effect is banishing for hours 
The sex whose presence civilizes ours. 

Conversation. COWPER. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



559 



a 



Labor. 

From labor health, frora health contentment 
springs. 

The Minstrel. BEATTIE. 

• 

Like a lackey, from the rise to set. 
Sweats in the eye of Phoebus, and all night 
Sleeps in Elysium ; next day after dawn 
Doth rise and help Hyperion to his horse, 
And follows so the ever-running year 
"With profitable labor to his grave. 
And, but for ceremony, such a wretch 
Winding up days with toil and nights with sleep. 
Hath the forehand and vantage of a king. 

King Henry V., Aciiv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Cheered with the view, man went to till the 

ground 
From whence he rose ; sentenced indeed to toil. 
As to a punishment, yet (even in wrath. 
So merciful is heaven) this toil became 
The solace of his woes, the sweet employ 
Of many a liveloug hour, and surest guard 
Against disease and death. 

Death. B. PORTEUS. 

Macduff. I know this is a joyful trouble to 
you, 
But yet, 't 'is one. 
Macbeth. The labor we delight in physicspain. 

Macbeth, Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



Overwork. 

Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore 

task 
Does not divide the Sunday from the week ? 
What might be toward, that this sweaty haste 
Doth make the night joint-laborer with the day ? 

Hamlet, Act L Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Work and Song. 

Verse sweetens toil, however rude the sound, 
She feels no biting pang the while she sings ; 

Nor, as she turns the giddy wheel around, 
Revolves the sad vicissitudes of things. 

Contemplation. R. GIFFORD. 

There was a jolly miller once. 

Lived on the river Dee ; 
He worked and sung from morn till night, 

No lark more blithe than he. 

Love in a Village, Act i. Sc- 2. I. BiCKERSTAFF. 

Feels, and owns in carols rude 
That all the circling joys are his 

Of dear Vicissitude. 
From toil he wins his spirits light. 
From busy day the peaceful night ; 
Rich, from the very want of wealth. 
In heaven's best treasures, peace and health. 

Ode on the Pleasure arising J^rom Vicissitude- T. GRAY. 



Prudence. 

And for my means, I '11 husband them so well 
They shall go far with little. 

Hamlet, Act iv. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



Nobility of Labor. 

When Adam dolve, and Eve span. 
Who was then the gentleman '\ * 



J. BALL. 



* " Lines used by John Ball, to encourage (he Rebels hi Wat 
Tyler's Rebellion. Hume's History 0/ P.yigland, Vol- i. Ch. 17, 
Note 8," says BARTLETT. 



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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



BREATHES THERE THE MAN. 

FKOM "THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL," CANTO VL 

Breathes there the man with soul so dead 
Who never to himself hath said, 

Tliis is my own, my native land ! 
"Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned, 
As home his footsteps he hath turned 

From wandering on a foreign strand ? 
If such there breathe, go, mark him well ; 
For him no minstrel raptures swell ; 
High tliough his titles, proud his name, 
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim. 
Despite those titles, power, and pelf. 
The wretch, concentred all in self. 
Living, shall forfeit fair renown. 
And, doubly dying, shall go down 
To the vile dust from whence he sprung, 
Unwept, unhonored, and unsung. 

Sir Walter Scott. 



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MY COUNTRY. 

There is a land, of every land the pride. 
Beloved by Heaven o'er all the world beside. 
Where brighter suns dispense serener liglit. 
And milder moons imparadise the night ; 
Aland of beauty, virtue, valor, truth. 
Time-tutored age, and love-exalted youth : 
The wandering mariner, whose eye explores 
The wealthiest isles, the most enchanting shores, 
Views not a realm so bountiful and fair, 
Nor breathes the spirit of a purer air. 
In every clime, the magnet of his soul, 
Touched by remembrance, trembles to that pole ; 
For in this land of Heaven's peculiar race. 
The heritage of nature's noblest grace, 
There is a spot of earth supremely blest, 
A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest, 
Where man, creation's tyrant, casts aside 
His sword and sceptre, pageantry and pride. 
While in his softened looks benignly blend 
The sire, the son, the husband, brother, friend. 
Here woman reigns ; the mother, daughter, wife, 
Strew with fresh flowers the narrow way of life : 



In the clear heaven of her delightful eye 
An angel-guard of love and graces lie ; 
Around her knees domestic duties meet. 
And fireside pleasures gambol at her feet. 
"Where shall that land, that spot of earth be 

found ? " 
Art thou a man ? — a patriot ? — • look around ; 
0, thou shalt find, howe'er thy footsteps roam, 
That land thy country, and that spot tliy home ! 

Man, through all ages of revolving time. 
Unchanging man, in every varying clime, 
Deems his own land of every land the pride. 
Beloved by Heaven o'er all the world beside ; 
His home the spot of earth siipremely blest, 
A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest. 

James Montgomery. 



HOW SLEEP THE BRAVE. 

How sleep the brave, who sink to rest 
By all their country's wishes blest ! 
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold, 
Returns to deck their hallowed mould, 
She there shall dress a sweeter sod 
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod. 

By fairy hands their knell is rung ; 
By forms unseen their dirge is sung ; 
There Honor comes, a pilgrim gray. 
To bless the turf that wraps their clay ; 
And Freedom shall awhile repair. 
To dwell a weeping hermit there ! 

William Collins. 



THE BRAVE AT HOME. 

The maid who binds her warrior's sash 

With smile that well her pain dissembles, 
The while beneath her drooping lash 

One starry tear-drop hangs and trembles, 
Though Heaven alone records the tear. 

And Fame shall never know her story, 
Her heart has shed a drop as dear 

As e'er bedewed the field of glory ! 



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564 



POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



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The wife who girds her husband's sword, 

Mid little ones who weep or wonder, 
And bravely speaks the cheering word, 

What though her heart be rent asunder. 
Doomed nightly in her dreams to hear 

The bolts of death around him rattle, 
Hath shed as sacred blood as e'er 

Was poured upon the field of battle ! 

The mother who conceals her grief 

While to her breast her son she presses, 
Then breathes a few brave words and brief, 

Kissing the patriot brow she blesses. 
With no one but her secret God 

To know the pain that weighs upon her, 
Sheds holy blood as e'er the sod 

Received on Freedom's field of honor ! 

Thomas Buchanan Read. 



u- 



THE DEATH OF LEONIDAS. 

It was the wild midnight, — 
A storm was on the sky ; 

The lightning gave its light. 
And the thunder echoed by. 



The torrent swept the glen. 
The ocean laslied the shore ; 

Then rose the Spartan men. 
To make their bed in gore ! 

Swift from the deluged ground 
Three hundred took the shield ; 

Then, silent, gathered round 
The leader of the field ! 

He spake no warrior word, 
He bade no trumpet blow. 

But the signal thunder roared, 
And they rushed upon the foe. 

The fiery element 

Showed, with one mighty gleam. 
Rampart, and flag, and tent, 

Like the spectres of a dream. 

All up the mountain's side. 
All down the woody vale, 

All by the rolling tide 

Waved the Persian banners pale. 

And foremost from the pass, 
Among the slumbering band, 

Sprang King Leonidas, 

Like the lightning's living brand. 



Then double darkness fell, 

And the forest ceased its moan ; 

But there came a clash of steel. 
And a distant dying groan. 

Anon, a trumpet blew. 

And a fiery sheet burst high, 

That o'er the midnight threw 
A blood-red canopy. 

A host glared on the hill ; 

A host glared by the bay ; 
But the Greeks rushed onward still. 

Like leopards in their play. 

The air was all a yell, 

And the earth was all a flame. 
Where the Spartan's bloody steel 

On the silken turbans came ; 

And still the Greek rushed on 
Where the fiery torrent rolled. 

Till like a rising sun 

Shone Xerxes' tent of gold. 

They found a royal feast. 

His midnight banquet, there ; 

And the treasures of the East 
Lay beneath the Doric spear. 

Then sat to the repast 
The bravest of the brave ! 

That feast must be their last. 
That spot must be their grave. 

They pledged old Sparta's name 

In cups of Syrian wine, 
And the warrior's deathless fame 

Was sung in strains divine. 

They took the rose-wreathed lyres 
From eunuch and from slave. 

And taught the languid wires 
The sounds that Freedom gave. 

But now the morning star 

Crowned Q2ta's twilight brow ; 

And the Persian horn of war 
From the hills began to blow. 

Up rose the glorious rank. 
To Greece one cup poured high. 

Then hand in hand they drank, 
" To immortality ! " 

Fear on King Xerxes fell. 

When, like spirits from the tomb. 
With shout and trumpet knell, 

He saw the warriors come. 



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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



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565 



But down swept all his power, 
"With chariot and with cliarge ; 

Down poured the arrows' shower, 
Till sank the Dorian's targe. 

They gathered round the tent. 

With all their strength unstrung ; 

To Greece one look they sent. 
Then on high their torches flung. 

The king sat on the throne, 

His captains by his side, 
"While the flame rushed roaring on, 

And their Psean loud replied. 

Thus fought the Greek of old ! 

Thus will he fight again ! 
Shall not the self-same mould 

Bring forth the self-same men ? 

GEORGE CROLY. 



HORATIUS AT THE BRIDGE. 

Lars Poesena of Clusium, 

By the Nine Gods he swore 
That the great house of Tarquin 

Should suffer wrong no more. 
By the Nine Gods he swore it. 

And named a trj'sting-day. 
And bade his messengers ride forth, 
East and west and south and north, 

To summon his array. 

East and west and south and north 

The messengers ride fast, 
And tower and town and cottage 

Have heard the trumpet's blast. 
Shame on the false Etruscan 

"W'ho lingers in his home, 
"When Porsena of Clusium 

Is on tlie march for Rome ! 

Tlie horsemen and the footmen 

Are pouring in amain 
From man}' a stately market-place. 

From many a fruitful plain, 
From many a lonely hamlet, 

"Which, hid by beech and ])ine. 
Like an eagle's nest hangs on the crest 

Of purple Apennine : 

From lordly Volaterrae, 

AVliere scowls the far-famed hold 
Piled by the hands of giants 

For godlike kings of old ; 
From sea-girt Populonia, 

"Whose sentinels descry 
Sardinia's snowy mountain-tops 

Fringing the southern sky ; 



From the proud mart of Pisse, 

Queen of the western waves, 
"Where ride Massilia's triremes, 

Heavy with fair-haired slaves ; 
From where sweet Clanis wanders 

Through corn and vines and flowers. 
From where Cortona lifts to heaven 

Her diadem of towers. 

Tall are the oaks whose acorns 

Drop in dark Auser's rill ; 
Fat are the stags that champ the boughs 

Of the Ciminian hill ; 
Beyond all streams, Clitumnus 

Is to the herdsman dear ; 
Best of all pools the fowler loves 

The great "Volsinian mere. 

But now no stroke of woodman 

Is heard by Auser's rill ; 
No hunter tracks the stag's green path 

Up the Ciminian hill ; 
Unwatched along Clitumnus 

Grazes the milk-white steer ; 
Unharmed the water-fowl may dip 

In the Volsinian mere. 

The harvests of An'etium, 

This year, old men shall reap ; 
This year, young boys in Umbro 

Shall ])lunge the struggling sheep ; 
And in the vats of Luna, 

This year, the must shall foam 
Round the white feet of laughing girls 

Whose sires have marched to Rome. 

There be thirty chosen prophets, 

The wisest of the land, 
Who always by Lars Porsena 

Both morn and evening stand. 
Evening and morn the Thirty 

Have turned the verses o'er. 
Traced from the right on linen white 

By mighty seers of yore ; 

And with one voice the Thirty 

Have their glad answer given : 
' ' Go forth, go forth, Lars Porsena, — 

Go forth, beloved of Heaven ! 
Go, and return in glory 

To Clusium's royal dome. 
And hang round Nurscia's altars 

The golden shields of Rome ! " 

And now hath every city 

Sent up her tale of men ; 
The foot are fourscore tliousand, 

The horse are thousands ten. 



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566 



POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



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Before the gates of Siitrium 

Ismet the great array ; 
A proud man was Lars Porsena 

Upon the trysting-day. 

For all the Etruscan armies 

Were ranged beneath his eye, 
And many a banished Roman, 

And many a stout ally ; 
And with a mighty following, 

To join the muster, came 
The Tusculan Mamilius, 

Prince of the Latian name. 

But by the yellow Tiber 

Was tumult and affright ; 
From all the spacious champaign 

To Rome men took their flight. 
A mile around the city 

The throng stopped up the ways ; 
A fearful sight it was to see 

Through two long nights and days. 

For aged folk on crutches, 

And women great with child. 
And mothers, sobbing over babes 

That clung to them and smiled, 
And sick men borne in litters 

High on the necks of slaves. 
And troops of sunburned husbandmen 

With reaping-hooks and staves, 

And droves of mules and asses 

Laden with skins of wine. 
And endless flocks of goats and sheep, 

And endless herds of kine. 
And endless trains of wagons. 

That creaked beneath the weight 
Of corn-sacks and of household goods, 

Choked every roaring gate. 

K"ow, from the rock Tarpeian, 

Could the wan burghers spy 
The line of blazing villages 

Red in the midnight sky. 
The Fathers of the City, 

They sat all night and day, 
For every hour some horseman came 

With tidings of dismay. 

To eastward and to westward 

Have spread the Tuscan bands, 
Nor house, nor fence, nor dovecote 

In Crustumerium stands. 
Verbenna down to Ostia 

Hath wasted all the plain ; 
Astur hath stormed Janiculum, 

And the stout guards are slain. 



I wis, in all the Senate 

There was no heart so bold 
But sore it ached, and fast it beat. 

When that ill news was told. 
Forthwith up rose the Consul, 

Up rose the Fathers all ; 
In haste they girded up their gowns, 

And hied them to the wall. 

They held a conncil, standing 

Before the River-gate ; 
Short time was there, ye well may guess, 

For musing or debate. 
Out spake the Consul roundly : 

" The bridge must straight go down ; 
For, since Janiculum is lost, 

Naught else can save the town." 

Just then a scout came flying. 

All wild with haste and fear : 
" To arms ! to arms ! Sir Consul, — 

Lars Porsena is here." 
On the low hills to westward 

The Consul fixed his eye, 
And saw the swarthy storm of dust 

Rise fast along the sky. 

And nearer fast and nearer 

Doth the red whirlwind come ; 
And louder still, and still more loud. 
From imderneath that rolling cloud, 
Is heard the trumpets' war-note proud, 

The trampling and the hum. 
And plainly and more plainly 

Now through the gloom appears. 
Far to left and far to right, 
In broken gleams of dark-blue light. 
The long array of helmets bright. 

The long array of spears. 

And plainly and more plainly. 

Above that glimmering line. 
Now might ye see the banners 

Of twelve fair cities shine ; 
But the banner of proud Clusium 

Waii highest of them all, — 
The terror of the Umbrian, 

The terror of the Gaul. 

And plainly and more plainly 

Now might the burghers know. 
By port and vest, by horse and crest, 

Each warlike Lucumo : 
There Cilnius of Arretium 

On his fleet roan was seen ; 
And Astur of the fourfold shield. 
Girt with the brand none else may wield ; 
Tolumnius with the belt of gold. 
And dark Verbenna from the hold 

By reedy Thrasymene. 



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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



567 



_ I i 



Fast by the royal standard, 

O'erl coking all the war, 
Lars Porsena of Clusium 

Sat in his ivory car. 
By the right wheel rode Mamilius, 

Prince of the Latian name ; 
And by the left false Sextus, 

That wrought the deed of shame. 

But when the face of Sextus 

Was seen among the foes, 
A yell that rent the firmament 

From all the town arose. 
On the house-tops was no woman 

But spat towards him and hissed, 
No child but screamed out ciirses. 

And shook its little fist. 

But the Consul's brow was sad. 

And the Consul's speech was low, 
And darkly looked he at the wall. 

And darkljr at the foe : 
" Their van will be upon us 

Before the bridge goes down ; 
And if they once may win the bridge, 

What hope to save the town 1 " 

Then out spake brave Horatius, 

The Captain of the gate : 
"To every man upon this earth 

Death cometh soon or late. 
And how can man die better 

Than facing fearful odds 
For the ashes of his fathers 

And the temples of his gods, 

"And for the tender mother 

Who dandled him to rest, 
And for the wife who nurses 

His baby at her breast, 
And for the holy maidens 

Who feed the eternal flame, — 
To save them from false Sextus 

That wrought the deed of shame ? 

" Hew down the bridge. Sir Consul, 

With all the speed ye may ; 
I, with two more to help me, 

Will hold the foe in play. 
In yon strait path a thousand 

May well be stopped by three : 
Now who Avill stand on either hand, 

And keep the bridge with me ? " 

Then out spake Spurius Lartius, — 
A Ramnian proud was he : 

" Lo, I will stand at thy right hand, 
And keep the bridge with thee." 



And out spake strong Herminius, — 

Of Titian blood was he : 
"I will abide on thy left side, 

And keep the bridge with thee." 

" Horatius," quoth the Consul, 

" As thou sayest so let it be." 
And straight against that great array 

Went forth the dauntless three. 
For Romans in Rome's quarrel 

Spared neither land nor gold. 
Nor son nor wife, nor limb nor life. 

In the brave days of old. 

Then none was for a party — 

Then all were for the state ; 
Then the great man helped the poor, 

And the poor man loved the great ; 
Then lands were fairly portioned ! 

Then spoils were fairly sold : 
The Romans were like brothers 

In the brave days of old. 

Now Roman is to Roman 

More hateful than a foe, 
And the tribunes beard the high, 

And the fathers grind the low. 
As we wax hot in faction, 

In battle we wax cold ; 
Wherefore men fight not as they fought 

In the brave days of old. 

Now while the three were tightening 

Their harness on their backs. 
The Consul was the foremost man 

To take in hand an axe ; 
And fathers, mixed with commons, 

Seized hatchet, bar, and crow, 
And smote upon the planks above. 

And loosed the props below. 

Meanwhile the Tuscan army. 

Right glorious to behold, 
Came flashing back the noonday light. 
Rank behind rank, like surges bright 

Of a broad sea of gold. 
Four hundred trumpets sounded 

A peal of warlike glee, 
As that great host with measured tread, 
And spears advanced, and ensigns spread, 
Rolled slowly towards the bridge's head, 

Where stood the dauntless three. 

The three stood calm and silent. 

And looked upon the foes. 
And a great shout of laughter 

From all the vanguard rose ; 



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And forth three chiefs came spurring 

Before that deep array ; 
To earth they sprang, their swords tliey drew, 
And lifted high their shields, and flew 

To will the narrow way. 

Annus, from green Tifernum, 

Lord of the Hill of Vines ; 
And Seius, whose eight hundred slaves 

Sicken in Ilva's mines ; 
And Picus, long to Clusium 

Vassal in peace and war, 
Who led to fight his Umbrian powers 
From that gray crag where, girt with towers. 
The fortress of Nequinum lowers 

O'er the pale waves of Nar. 

Stout Lartius hurled down Aunus 

Into the stream beneath ; 
Henninius struck at Seius, 

And clove him to the teeth ; 
At Picus brave Horatius 

Darted one fiery thrust, 
And the proud Umbrian's gilded arms 

Clashed in the bloody dust. 

Then Ocnus of Falerii 

Rushed on the Roman three ; 
And Lausulus of Urgo, 

The rover of the sea ; 
And Aruns of Volsiniuin, 

Who slew the great wild boar, — 
The great wild boar that had his den 
Amidst the reeds of Cosa's fen. 
And wasted fields, and slaughtered men. 

Along Albinia's shore. 

Herminius smote down Aruns ; 

Lartius laid Ocnus low ; 
Right to the heart of Lausulus 

Horatius sent a blow : 
"Lie there," he cried, "fell pirate ! 

No more, aghast and pale. 
From Ostia's walls the crowd shall mark 
The track of thy destroying bark ; 
No more Campania's hinds shall fly 
To woods and caverns, when they spy 

Thy thrice-accursed sail ! " 

P>ut now no sound of laughter 

Was heard among the foes ; 
A wild and wrathful clamor 

From all the vanguard i-ose. "■ 
Six spears' length from the entrance, 

Halted that mighty mass. 
And for a space no man came forth 

To win the narrow pass. 



But, hark ! the cry is Astur : 

And lo ! the ranks divide ; 
And the great lord of Luna 

Comes with his stately stride. 
Upon his ample shoulders 

Clangs loud the fourfold shield. 
And in his hand he shakes the brand 

Which none but he can wield. 

He smiled on those bold Romans, 

A smile serene and high ; 
He eyed the flinching Tuscans, 

And scorn was in his eye. 
Quoth he, "The she-wolf's litter 

Stand savagely at bay ; 
But will ye dare to follow. 

If Astur clears the way ? " 

Then, whirling up his broadsword 

With both hands to the height. 
He rushed against Horatius, 

And smote with all his might. 
With shield and blade Horatius 

Right deftly turned the blow. 
The blow, though turned, came yet too nigh 
It missed his helm, but gashed his thigh. 
The Tuscans raised a joyful cry 

To see the red blood flow. 

He reeled, and on Herminius 

He leaned one breathing-space, 
Then, like a wild-cat mad with wounds, 

Sprang right at Astur's face. 
Through teeth and skull and helmet 

So fierce a thrust he sped. 
The good sword stood a handbreadth out 

Behind the Tuscan's head. 

And the great lord of Luna 

Fell at that deadly stroke. 
As falls on Mount Avernus 

A thunder-smitten oak. 
Far o'er the crashing forest 

The giant arms lie spread ; 
And the pale augurs, muttering low, 

Gaze on the blasted head. 

On Astur's throat Horatius 

Right firmly pressed his heel. 
And thrice and four times tugged amain, 

Ere he wrenched out the steel. 
And "See," he cried, "the welcome, 

Fair guests, that waits you here ! 
AVhat noble Lucumo comes next 

To taste our Roman cheer ? " 

But at his haughty challenge 

A sullen murmur ran. 
Mingled with wrath and shame and dread, 

Along that glittering van. 



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569 



rQj 



There lacked not men of prowess, 

Nor men of lordly race, 
For all Etruria's noblest 

"Were round the fatal place. 

But all Etruria's noblest 

Felt their hearts sink to see 
On the earth the bloody corpses, 

In the path tlie dauntless three ; 
And from the ghastly entrance, 

Where those bold Romans stood. 
All shrank, — like boys who, unaware. 
Ranging the woods to start a hare, 
Come to the mouth of the dark lair 
Where, growling low, a fierce old bear 

Lies amidst bones and blood. 

Was none who would be foremost 

To lead such dire attack ; 
But those behind cried " Forward ! " 

And those before cried " Back !" 
And backward now and forward 

Wavers the deep array ; 
And on the tossing sea of steel 
To and fro the standards reel. 
And the victorious trumpet-peal 

Dies fitfully away. 

Yet one man for one moment 

Strode out before the crowd ; 
Well known was he to all the three, 

And they gave him greeting loud : 
"Now welcome, welcome, Sextus ! 

Now welcome to thy home ! 
Why dost thou stay, and turn away ? 

Here lies the road to Rome." 

Thrice looked he at the city ; 

Thriee looked he at the dead ; 
And thrice came on in fury, 

And thrice turned back in dread ; 
And, white with fear and hatred, 

Scowled at the narrow way 
Where, wallowing in a pool of blood. 

The bravest Tuscans lay. 

But meanwhile axe and lever 

Have manfully been plied ; 
And now the bridge hangs tottering 

Above the boiling tide. 
"Come back, come' back, Horatius ! " 

Loud cried the Fathei's all, — 
"Back, Lartius ! back, Herminius ! 

Back, ere the ruin fall ! " 

Back darted Spurius Lartius, — 

Herminius darted back ; 
And, as they passed, beneath their feet 

They felt the timbers crack. 



But when they turned their faces, 

And on the farther shore 
Saw brave Horatius stand alone. 

They would have crossed once more ; 

But with a crash like thunder 

Fell every loosened beam. 
And, like a dam, the mighty wreck 

Lay right athwart the stream ; 
And a long shout of triumph 

Rose from the walls of Rome, 
As to the highest turret-tops 

Was splashed the yellow foam. 

And like a horse imbroken, 

When first he feels the rein, 
The furious river struggled hard. 

And tossed his tawny mane, 
And burst the curb, and bounded. 

Rejoicing to be free ; 
And whirling down, in fierce career, 
Battlement and plank and pier, 

Rushed headlong to the sea. 

Alone stood brave Horatius, 

But constant still in mind, — 
Thrice tliirty thousand foes before. 

And the broad flood behind. 
" Down with him ! " cried false Sextus, 

With a smile on his pale face ; 
"Now yield thee," cried Lars Porsena, 

" Now yield thee to our grace ! " 

Round turned he, as not deigning 

Those craven ranks to see ; 
Naught spake he to Lars Porsena, 

To Sextus naught spake he ; 
But he saw on Palatinus 

The white porch of his home ; 
And he spake to the noble river 

That rolls by the towers of Rome : 

" Tiber ! Father Tiber ! 

To whom the Romans pi'ay, 
A Roman's life, a Roman's arms. 

Take thou in charge this day ! " 
So he spake, and, speaking, sheatlied 

The good sword by his side, 
And, with his harness on his back. 

Plunged headlong in the tide. 

No sound of joy or sorrow 
Was heard from either bank, 

But friends and foes in dumb surprise,- 

With parted lips and straining eyes. 
Stood gazing where he sank ; 

And when above the surges 



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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



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They saw his crest appear, 
All Rome sent forth a rapturous cry, 
And even the ranks of Tuscany 

Could scarce forbear to cheer. 

But fiercely ran the current. 

Swollen high by months of rain ; 
And fast his blood was flowing, 

And he was sore in pain, 
And heavy with his armor, 

And spent with changing blows ; 
And oft they thought him sinking. 

But still again he rose. 

Never, I ween, did swimmer. 

In such an evil case. 
Struggle through such a raging flood 

Safe to the landing-place ; 
But his limbs were borne up bravely 

By the brave heart within, 
And our good Father Tiber 

Bare bravely up his chin. 

" Curse on him ! " quoth false Sextus, — 

" Will not the villain drov/n ? 
But for this stay, ere close of day 

We should have sacked the town ! " 
" Heaven help him ! " quoth Lars Porsena, 

"And bring him safe to shore ; 
For such a gallant feat of arms 

Was never seen before." 

And now he feels the bottom ; 

Now on dry earth he stands ; 
Now round him throng the Fathers 

To press his gory hands ; 
And now, with shouts and clapping, 

And noise of weeping loud. 
He enters through the River-gate, 

Borne by the joyous crowd. 

They gave him of the corn-land, 

That was of public right, 
As much as two strong oxen 

Could plough from morn till night ; 
And they made a molten image, 

And set it up on high, — 
And there it stands unto this day 

To witness if I lie. 

It stands in the Comitium, 

Plain for all folk to see, — 
Horatius in his harness, 

Halting upon one knee ; 
And underneath is written. 

In letters all of gold, 
How valiantly he kept the bridge 

In the brave days of old. 



And still his name sounds stirring 

Unto the men of Rome, 
As the trumpet-blast that cries to them 

To charge the Volscian home ; 
And wives still pray to Juno 

For boys with hearts as bold 
As his who kept the bridge so well 

In the brave days of old. 

And in the nights of winter. 

When the cold north-winds blow, : 
And the long howling of the wolves 

Is heard amidst the snow ; 
When round the lonely cottage 

Roars loud the tempest's din, 
And the good logs of Algidus 

Roar louder yet within ; 

When the oldest cask is opened, 

And the largest lamp is lit ; 
When the chestnuts glow in the embers, 

And the kid turns on the spit ; 
When young and old in circle 

Around the firebrands close ; 
When the girls are weaving baskets, 

And the lads are shaping bows ; 

When the goodman mends his armor, 

And trims his helmet's plume ; 
When the goodwife's shuttle merrily 

Goes flashing through the loom ; 
With weeping and with laughter 

Still is the story told. 
How well Horatius kept the bridge 

In the brave days of old. 

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY, 



SEMPRONIUS'S SPEECH FOR WAR. 

FROM " CATO,'" ACT II. SC. I. 

My voice is still for war. 
Gods ! can a Roman senate long debate 
Which of the two to choose, slavery or death ? 
No ; let us lise at once, gird on our swords. 
And at the head of our remaining troops 
Attack the foe, break through the thick array 
Of his thronged legions, and charge home upon 

him. 
Perhaps some arm, more lucky than the rest. 
May reach his heart, and free the world from 

bondage. 
Rise ! Fathers, rise ! 't is Rome demands your 

help : 
Rise, and revenge her slaughtered citizens, 
Or share their fate ! The corpse of half her 

senate 



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571 



n 



Manures the fields of Thessaly, while we 
Sit here deliberating, in cold debate, 
If we should sacrifice our lives to honor, 
Or wear them out in servitude and chains. 
Eouse up, for shame ! our brothers of Pharsalia 
Point at their wounds, and cry aloud, — "To 

battle ! " 
Great Pompey's shade complains that we are 

slow, 
And Scipio's ghost walks unrevenged amongst us. 

JOSEPH ADDISON. 



CARACTACUS. 

Befoke prond Rome's imperial throne 

In mind's unconquered mood. 
As if the triumph were his own, 

The dauntless captive stood. 
None, to have seen his free-born air, 
Had fancied him a captive there. 

Though, through the crowded streets of Rome, 

With slow and stately tread, 
Far from his own loved island home. 

That day in triumph led, — 
Unbound his head, unbent his knee, 
Undimmed his eye, his aspect free. 

A free and fearless glance he cast 

On temple, arch, and tower, 
By which the long procession passed 

Of Rome's victorious power ; 
And somewhat of a scornful smile 
Upcurled his haughty lip the while. 

And now he stood, with brow serene, 
Where slaves might prostrate fall, 

Bearing a Briton's manly mien 
In CfEsar's palace hall ; 

Claiming, with kindled brow and cheek, 

The liberty e'en there to speak. 

Nor could Rome's haughty lord withstand 

The claim that look preferred, 
But motioned with uplifted hand 

The suppliant should be heard, — 
If he indeed a suppliant were 
Whose glance demanded audience there. 

Deep stillness fell on all the crowd, 

From Claudius on his throne 
Down to the meanest slave that bowed 

At his imperial throne ; 
Silent his fellow-captive's grief 
As fearless spoke the Island Chief : 



" Think not, thou eagle Lord of Rome, 

And master of the world, 
Though victory's banner o'er thy dome 

In triumph now is furled, 
I would address thee as thy slave, 
But as the bold should greet the brave ! 

" I might, perchance, could I have deigned 

To hold a vassal's throne. 
E'en now in Britain's isle have reigned 

A king in name alone. 
Yet holding, as thy meek ally, 
A monarch's mimic pageantry. 

" Then through Rome's crowded streets to-day 

I might have rode with thee, 
Not in a captive's base array, 

But fetterless and free, — 
If freedom he could hope to find, 
Whose bondage is of heart and mind. 

" But canst thou marvel that, freeborn, 

With heart and soul unquelled, 
Throne, crown, and sceptre I should scorn, 

By thy permission held ? 
Or that I should retain my right 
Till wrested by a conqueror's might ? 

" Rome, with her palaces and towers. 

By us unwished, unreft. 
Her homely huts and woodland bowers 

To Britain might have left ; 
Worthless to you their wealth must be, 
But dear to us, for they were free ! 

"I might have bowed before, but where 

Had been thy triumph now ? 
To my resolve no yoke to bear 

Thou ow'st thy laurelled brow ; 
Inglorious victory had been thine. 
And more inglorious bondage mine. 

"Now I have spoken, do thy will ; 

Be life or death my lot, 
Since Britain's throne no more I fill. 

To me it matters not. 
My fame is clear ; but on my fate 
Thy glory or thy shame must wait." 

He ceased ; from all around upsprung 

A murmur of applause. 
For well had truth and freedom's tongue 

Maintained their holy cause. 
The conqueror was the captive then ; 
He bade the slave be free again. 

BERNARD BARTOM. 



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BOADICEA. 

When the British warrior queen, 
Bleeding from the Roman rods, 

Sought, witli an indignant mien, 
Counsel of her country's gods, 

Sage beneath the spreading oak 

Sat the Druid, hoary chief ; 
Every burning word he spoke 

Full of rage and full of grief. 

" Princess ! if our aged eyes 
Weep upon thy matchless wrongs, 

'Tia because resentment ties 
All the terrors of our tongues. 

" Rome shall perish — write that word 
In the blood that she has spilt, — • 

Perish, hopeless and abhorred. 
Deep in ruin as in guilt. 

"Rome, for empire far renowned. 
Tramples on a thousand states ; 

Soon her pride shall kiss the ground, — 
Hark ! the Gaul is at her gates ! 

" Other Romans shall arise. 

Heedless of a soldier's name ; 
Sounds, not arms, shall win the prize. 

Harmony the path to fame. 

" Then the urogeny that springs 

From the forests of our land, 
Armed with thunder, clad with wings, 

Shall a wider world command. 

" Regions Coesar never knew 

Thy posterity shall sway ; 
Where his eagles never Hew, 

None invincible as they." 

Such the bard's prophetic words. 

Pregnant with celestial fire, 
Bending as he swept the chords 

Of his sweet but awful lyre. 

She, with all a monarch's pride, 
Felt them in her bosom glow ; 

Rushed to battle, fought, and died, — 
Dying, hurled them at the foe. 

Ruffians, pitiless as proud, 

Heaven awards the vengeance due ; 
Empire is on us bestowed, 

Shame and ruin wait for you ! 

William Cowper. 



RIENZI TO THE ROMANS. 

FROM " RIENZI." 

Friends ! 
I come not here to talk. Ye know too well 
The stoi'y of our thraldom. We are slaves ! 
The bright sun rises to his course, and lights 
A race of slaves ! he sets, and his last beam 
Falls on a slave ! Not such as, swept along 
By the full tide of power, the conqueror leads 
To crimson glory and undying fame. 
But base, ignoble slaves ! — slaves to a hoi'de 
Of petty tyrants, feudal despots ; lords 
Rich in some dozen paltry villages, 
Strong in some hundred spearmen, only great 
In that strange spell, — a name ! Each hour, 

dark fraud, 
Or open rapine, or protected murder. 
Cries out against them. But this very day 
An honest man, my neighbor {pointing to Pa- 
olo), — there he stands, — 
Was struck — struck like a dog — by one who 

wore 
The badge of Ursini ! because, foi'sooth, 
He tossed not high his ready cap in air, 
Nor lifted up his voice in servile shouts. 
At sight of that great ruffian ! Be we men. 
And suff'er such dishonor ? men, and wash not 
The stain away in blood ? Such shames are com- 
mon. 
I have known deeper wrongs. I, that speak to ye. 
I had a brother once, a gracious boy. 
Full of all gentleness, of calmest hope. 
Of sweet and quiet joy ; there Avas the look 
Of Heaven upon his face which limners give 
To the beloved disciple. How I loved 
That gracious boy ! younger by fifteen years. 
Brother at once and son ! He left my side ; 
A summer bloom on his fair cheeks, a smile 
Parting his innocent lips. In one short hour 
The pretty, harmless boy was slain ! I saw 
The corse, the mangled corse, and then I cried 
For vengeance ! Rouse ye, Romans ! Rouse 

ye, slaves ! 
Have ye brave sons ? — Look in the next fierce 

brawl 
To see them die ! Have ye fair daughters ? — Look 
To see them live, torn from your arms, distained, 
Dishonored ; and, it' ye dare call for justice, 
Be answered by the lash ! Yet this is Rome, 
That sat on her seven hills, and from her throne 
Of beauty ruled the world ! Yet we are Romans ! 
Why, in that elder day, to be a Roman 
Was greater than a king ! And once again — ■ 
Hear me, ye walls, that echoed to the tread 
Of either Brutus ! — once again, I swear. 
The eternal city shall be free ; her sons shall 
walk with princes. 

MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. 



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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



573 



■a 



BRUCE AND THE SPIDER. 

For Scotland's and for freedom's right 

The Bruce his part had played, 
In five successive fields of fight 

Been conquered and dismayed ; 
Oiice more against the English host 
His hand he led, and once more lost 

The meed for which he fought ; 
And now from battle, faint and worn, 
The homeless fugitive forlorn 

A hut's lone shelter sought. 

And cheerless was that resting-place 

For him who claimed a throne : 
His canopy, devoid of grace. 

The rude, rough beams alone ; 
The heather couch Ids only bed, — 
Yet well I ween had slumber fled 

From couch of eider-down ! 
Througli darksome night till dawn of day, 
Absorb^-d in wakeful thoughts ha lay 

Of Scotland and her crown. 

The sun rose brightlj', and its gleam 

Fell on that hapless bed. 
And tinged with light cacli shapeless beam 

Which roofed the lowly shed ; 
When, looking up with wistful eye, 
The Bruce beheld a spider tr}'' 

His filmy thread to fling 
From beam to beam of that rude cot ; 
And well the insect's toilsome lot 

Taught Scotland's future king. 

Six times his gossamery thread 

The wary spider threw ; 
In vain the filmy line was sped, 
For powerless or untrue 
Each aim appeared, and back recoiled 
The patient insect, six times foiled. 

And yet uncon([uercd still ; 
And soon the Bruce, with eager eye. 
Saw him prepare once more to try 

His courage, strength, and skill. 

One effort more, his seventh and last — 

Tlie hero hailed the sign ! — 
And on the wished-for beam hung fast 

That slender, silken line ! 
Slight as it was, his spirit caught 
The more than omen, for his thought 

The lesson well could trace. 
Which even "he who runs may read," 
That Perseverance gains its meed. 

And Patience wins the race. 

BERNARD Barton. 



BANNOCKBURN. 

At Bannockburn the English lay, — 
The Scots they were ua far away, 
But waited for the break o' day 
That glinted in the east. 

But soon the sun broke through the heath 
And lighted up that field o' death. 
When Bruce, wi' saul-in spiring breath, 
His heralds' thus addressed : — 

Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled, 
Scots, wham Bruce has aften led ; 
Welcome to your gory bed, 
Or to victorie. 

Now 's the day, and now 's the hom* 
See the fi-ont o' battle lour : 
See approach proud Edward's power, — 
Chains and slaverie ! 

Wha will be a traitor knave ? 
Wha can fill a coward's grave ? 
Wha sae base as be a slave ? 
Let him turn and flee ! 

Wha for Scotland's king and law 
Freedom's sword will strongly draw. 
Freeman stand, or freeman fa' ? 
Let him follow me ! 

By Oppression's woes and pains ! 
By your sons in servile chains, 
We will drain our dearest veins, 
But they shall be free ! 

Lay the proud usurpers low ! 
Tyrants fall in every foe ! 
Liberty 's in every blow ! 
Let us do, or die ! 

Robert Burns. 



LOCHIEL'S WARNING. 



WIZARD. — LOCHIEL. 



LocHiEL, Lochiel ! beware of the day 

When the Lowlands shall meet thee in battle 

array ! 
For a field of the dead rushes red on my sight. 
And the clans of CuUoden are scattered in fight. 
They rally, they bleed, for their kingdom and 

crown ; 
Woe, woe to the riders that trample them down ! 
Proud Cumberland prances, insulting the slain. 
And their hoof- beaten bosoms are trod to the 

plain. 



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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



h 



But hark ! through the fast-flashing lightnhig of 

war, 
What steed to the desert flies frantic and far ? 
'T is thine, Glenullin ! whose bride shall await, 
Like a love-lighted watch-fire, all night at the 

gate. 
A steed comes at morning : no rider is there ; 
But its bridle is red with the sign of despair. 
Weep, Albin ! to death and captivity led ! 
O, weep ! but thy tears cannot number the dead ; 
For a merciless sword on CuUoden shall wave, 
CuUodeu ! that reeks with the blood of the brave. 



Go, preach to the coward, thou death-telling 

seer ! 
Or, if gory Culloden so dreadful appear, 
Draw, dotard, around thy old wavering sight 
This mantle, to cover the phantoms of fright. 



Ha ! laugh'st thou, Lochiel, my vision to scorn ? 
Proud bird of the mountain, thy plume shall be 

torn ! 
Say, rushed the bold eagle exultingly forth 
From his home in the dark rolling clouds of the 

north ? 
Lo ! the death-shot of foemen outspeeding, he 

rode 
Companionless, bearing destruction abroad ; 
But down let him stoop from his havoc on high ! 
Ah ! home let him speed, — for the spoiler is 

nigh. 
Why flames the far summit ? Why shoot to the 

blast 
Those embers, like stars from the Armament cast ? 
'T is the fire-shower of rain, all dreadfully driven 
From his eyrie, that beacons the darkness of 

heaven. 
crested Lochiel ! the peerless in might, 
Whose banners arise on the battlements' height, 
Heaven's fire is around thee, to blast and to burn ; 
Return to thy dwelling ! all lonely return ! 
For the blackness of ashes shall mark where it 

stood, 
And a wild mother scream o'er her famishing 

brood. 

LOCHIEL. 

FalseWizard, avaunt ! I have marshalled my clan, 
Their swords are a thousand, their bosoms are 

one ! 
They are true to the last of their blood and their 

breath, 
And like reapers descend to the harvest of death. 
Then welcome be Cumberland's |^steed to the 

shock ! 



Let him dash his proud foam like a wave on the 

rock ! 
But woe to his kindred, and woe to his cause, 
When Albin her claymore indignantly draws ; 
When her bonneted chieftains to victory crowd, 
Clanronald the dauntless, and Moray the proud. 
All plaided and plumed in their tartan array — 



— Lochiel, Lochiel ! beware of the day ; 

For, dark and despairing, my sight I may seal, 

But man cannot cover what God would reveal ; 

'T is the sunset of life gives me mystical lore, 

And coming events cast their shadows before. 

I tell thee, Culloden's dread echoes shall ring 

With the bloodhounds that bark for thy fugitive 
king. 

Lo ! anointed by Heaven with the vials of wrath, 

Behold where he flies on his desolate path ! 

Now in darkness and billows he sweeps from my 
sight ■ — ■ 

Rise, rise ! ye wild tempests, and cover his flight ! 

'T is finished. Their thunders are hushed on the 
moors : 

Culloden is lost, and my countrj'^ deplores, 

But where is the iron-bound prisoner ? Where ? 

For the red eye of battle is shut in despair. 

Say, mounts he the ocean -wave, banished, for- 
lorn, 

Like a limb from his country cast bleeding and 
torn ? 

Ah no ! for a darker departure is near ; 

The war-drum is muflled, and black is the bier ; 

His death-bell is tolling : mercy, dispel 

Yon sight, that it freezes my spirit to tell ! 

Life flutters convulsed in his quivering limbs, 

And his blood-streaming nostril in agony swims. 

Accursed be the fagots that blaze at his feet, 

Where his heart shall be thrown ere it ceases to 
beat, 

With the smoke of its ashes to poison the gale — 



— Down, soothless insulter ! I trust not the tale ; 

For never shall Albin a destiny meet, 

So black with dishonor, so foul with retreat ! 

Though my perishing ranks should be strewed 

in their gore, 

Like ocean-weeds heaped on the surf-beaten shore, 

Lochiel, untainted by flight or by chains, 

While the kindling of life in his bosom remains, 

Shall victor exult, or in death be laid low, 

With his back to the field, and his feet to the foe ; 

And leaving in battle no blot on his name, 

Look proudly to Heaven from the death-bed of 

fame ! 

Thomas Campbell. 



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SCOTLAND. 

FROM " THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL," CANTO VL 

Caledonia ! stern and wild, 

Meet nurse for a poetic child ! 

Land of brown heath and shaggy wood, 

Land of the mountain and the Hood, 

Land of my sires ! what mortal hand 

Can e'er untie the filial band 

That knits me to thy rugged strand ? 

Still, as I view each well-known scene. 

Think what is now, and what hath been, 

Seems as, to me, of all bereft. 

Sole friends thy woods and streams were left ; 

And thus I love them better still. 

Even in extremity of ill. 

By Yarrow's stream still let me stray. 

Though none should guide my feeble way ; 

Still feel the breeze down Ettrick break. 

Although it chilled my withered cheek ; 

Still lay my head by Teviot stone, 

Though there, forgotten and alone. 

The bard may draw his parting groan. 

SIR WALTER SCOTT. 



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ENGLAND. 

FROM "THE TIMEPIECE": "THE TASK," BOOK II. 

England, with all thy faults, I love thee still, — 
My country ! and, while yet a nook is left 
Where English minds and manners may be found, 
Shall be constrained to love thee. Though thy 

clime 
Be fickle, and thy year most part deformed 
With dripping rains, or withered by a frost, 
I would not yet exchange thy sullen skies, 
And fields without a flower, for warmer France 
With all her vines ; nor for Ausonia's groves 
Of golden fruitage and her myrtle bowers. 
To shake thy senate, and from height sublime 
Of patriot eloquence to flash down fire 
Upon thy foes, was never meant my task : 
But I can feel thy fortunes, and partake 
Thy joys and sorrows with as true a heart 
As any thunderer there. And I can feel 
Thy follies too ; and with a just disdain 
Frown at effeminates whose very looks 
Reflect dishonor on the land I love. 
How, in the name of soldiership and sense. 
Should England prosper, when such things, as 

smooth 
And tender as a girl, all essenced o'er 
With odors, and as profligate as sweet. 
Who sell their laurel for a myrtle wreath. 
And love when they should fight, — when such 

as these 



Presume to lay their hand upon the ark 

Of her magnificent and awful cause 1 

Time was when it was praise and boast enough 

In every clime, and travel where we might. 

That we were born her children. Praise enough 

To fill the ambition of a private man. 

That Chatham's language was his mother 

tongue. 
And Wolfe's gi-eat name compatriot with his 

own. 

William Cowper, 



THE ROAST BEEF OF OLD ENGLAND. 

When mighty roast beef was the Englishman's 

food, 
It ennobled our hearts, and enriched our blood ; 
Our soldiers were brave, and our courtiers were 
good. 

0, the Roast Beef of old England, 
And 0, the old English Roast Beef J 

But since we have learned from effeminate 

France 
To eat their ragouts, as well as to dance. 
We are fed up with nothing but vain complai- 
sance. 

0, the Roast Beef, etc. 

Henry Fielding. 



Our fathers of old were robust, stout, and strong. 
And kept open house with good cheer all day 

long, 
Which made their plump tenants rejoice in this 

song. 

0, the Roast Beef, etc. 

When good Queen Elizabeth sat on the throne. 
Ere coffee and tea, and such slip-slops, werd 

known, 
The world was in terror, if e'en she did frown. 
0, the Roast Beef, etc. 

In those days, if fleets did presume on the main, 
They seldom or never returned back again ; 
As witness the vaunting Armada of Spain. 
0, the Roast Beef, etc. 

0, then we had stomachs to eat and to fight, 
And when wrongs were cooking, to set ourselves 

right ; 
But now we're a — hum? — I could, but — 

good night ! 

0, the Roast Beef, etc. 

The four last sia}izas added by RICHARD LOVERIDGE. 



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EULE, BRITANNIA. 

FROM "ALFRED," ACT II. SC. J. 

When Britain first, at Heaven's command, 

Arose from out tte azure main, 
This was the charter of the land, 

And guardian angels sung the strain : 
Hide, Britannia, rule the vxtves ! 
For Britons never ivill be slaves. 

The nations not so blest as thee 

Must, in their turns, to tyrants fall ; 

Whilst thou shalt flourish, great and free, 
The dread and envy of them all. 
liule, Britannia ! etc. 

Still more majestic shalt thou rise, 
More dreadful from each foreign stroke ; 

As the loud blasts that tear the skies 

Serve but to root thy native oak. 

Bide, Britannia ! etc. 

Thee haughty tyrants ne'er shall tame ; 

All their attempts to bend thee down 
Will but arouse thy generous flame. 

And work their woe — but thy renown. 
BmU, Britannia ! etc. 

To thee belongs the rural reign ; 

Thy cities shall with commerce shine ; 
All thine shall be the subject main. 

And every shore it circles thine. 
Rule, Britannia ! etc. 

The Muses, still with Freedom found, 

Shall to thy happy coast repair ; 
Blest Isle ! with matchless beauty crowned, 
Aadu manly hearts to guard the fair. 
Rule, Britannia ! etc. 

James Thomson. 



NASEBY. 

By Obadiah BIND-THEIR-KINGS-IN-CHAINS-AND-THEIR-NO- 
BLES-WITH-LINKS-OF-IRON j SERGEANT IN IRETON'S 
REGIMENT. 

0, WHEREFORE comc ye forth, in triumph from 
the north. 

With your hands and your feet and j^our raiment 
all red ? 

And wherefore doth your rout send forth a joy- 
ous shout ? 

And whence be the grapes of the wine-press that 
ye tread ? 

0, evil was the root, and bitter was the fruit, 
And crimson was the juice of the vintage that we 
trod ; 



For we trampled on the throng of the haughty 

and the strong, 
Who sate in the high places and slew the saints 

of God. 

It was about the noon of a glorious day of June, 
That we saw their banners dance and their 

cuirasses shine, 
And the man of blood was there, with his long 

essenced hair. 
And Astley, and Sir Marmaduke, and Rupert of 

the Rhine. 

Like a servant of the Lord, with his Bible and 

his sword. 
The General rode along us to form us to the fight ; 
When a murmuring sound broke out, and swelled 

into a shout 
Among the godless horsemen upon the tyrant's 

right. 

And hark ! like the roar of the billows on the 

shore. 
The cry of battle rises along their charging line ! 
For God ! for the cause ! — for the Church ! for 

the laws ! 
For Charles, king of Eiigland, and Rupert of the 

Rhine ! 

The furious German comes, with his clarions and 

his drums. 
His bravoes of Alsatia, and pages of Whitehall ; 
They are bursting on our ilanks. Grasp your 

pikes ! Close your ranks ! 
For Rupert never comes but to conquer, or to 

fall. 

They are here ! They rush on ! We are broken ! 

We are gone ! 
Our left is borne before them like stubble on the 

blast. 
Lord, put forth thy might ! Lord, defend 

the right ! 
Stand back to back, in God's name ! and fight it 

to the last ! 

Stout Skippon hath a woirnd ; the centre hath 

given ground : 
Hark ! hark ! wliat means the trampling of 

horsemen on our rear ? 
Whose banner do I see, boys ? 'T is he ! thank 

God ! 't is he, boys ! 
Bear up another minute ! Brave Oliver is here. 

Their heads all stooping low, their points all in 

a row, 
Like a whirlwind on the trees, like a deluge on 

the dikes. 



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Our cuirassiers have burst on tlie raulcs of tlie 

Accurst, 
And at a shock have scattered the forest of his 

pilies. 

Fast, fast the gallants ride, in some safe nook to 
hide 

Their coward heads, predestined to rot on Tem- 
ple Bar ; 

And he, — he turns, he flies : — shame on those 
cruel eyes 

That bore to look on torture, and dare not look 
on war ! 

Ho ! comrades, scour the plain ; and, ere ye strip 
the slain. 

First give another stab to make your search se- 
cure ; 

Then shake from sleeves and pockets their broad- 
pieces and lockets. 

The tokens of the wanton, the plunder of the 
poor. 

Fools ! your doublets shone with gold, and your 

hearts were gay and bold, 
When j-^ou kissed your lily hands to your lemans 

to-day ; 
And to-morrow shall the fox, from her chambers 

in the rocks, 
Lead forth her tawny cubs to howl above the prey. 

Where be your tongues that late mocked at 
heaven and hell and fate ? 

And the fingers that once were so busy with your 
blades. 

Your perfumed satin clothes, your catches and 
your oaths ! 

Your stage-plaj^s and your sonnets, your dia- 
monds and your spades ? 

Down ! down ! forever down, with the mitre and 

the crown ! 
With the Belial of the court, and the Mammon 

of the Pope ! 
There is woe in Oxford halls ; there is wail in 

Durham's stalls ; 
The Jesuit smites his bosom ; the bishop rends 

his cope. 

And she of the seven hills shall mourn her chil- 
dren's ills, 

And tremble when she thinks on the edge of 
Englaiul's sword ; 

And the Icings of earth in fear shall shudder 
when they hear 

What the hand of God hath wrought for the 
Houses and the Word ! 

THOMAS BaBIXGTOX MACAULAV. 



THE HARP THAT ONCE THROUGH 
TAKA'S HALLS. 

The harp that once through Tara's halls 

The soul of music shed, 
Now hangs as mute on Tara's walls 

As if that soul were fled. 
So sleeps the pride of former days, 

So glory's thrill is o'er, 
And hearts that once beat high for praise 

Now feel that pulse no more ! 

No more to chiefs and ladies bright 

The harp of Tara swells ; 
The chord alone that breaks at night 

Its tale of ruin tells. 
Thus Freedom now so seldom wakes, 

The only throb she gives 
Is when some heart indignant breaks, 

To show that still she lives. 

THOMAS MOORE. 



AS BY THE SHORE AT BREAK OF 
DAY. 

As by the shore, at break of day, 
A vanquished chief expiring lay, 
Upon the sands, with broken sword. 

He traced his farewell to the free ; 
And there the last unfinished word 

He dying wrote, was " Liberty ! " 

At night a sea-bird shrieked the knell 
Of him who thus for freedom fell : 
The words he wrote, ere evening came. 

Were covered by the sounding sea ; — 
So pass away the cause and name 

Of him who dies for liberty ! 

THOMAS MOORE. 



GOUGAUNE BARRA. 

[Tlie lake of Gougauiie Barra, i. e. the hollow, or recess of St. 
Finn Bar, in the ruggetl territory of Uih-Laogiiairc (the O'l.'jarys' 
country) in tlie west end of tlie county of Cork, i., the parent of the 
ri\er Lee. Us \\'aters embrace a small but verdant Lsland of about 
half an acre in extent, which approaches its eastern shore. The 
lake, as its name implies, is situate in a deep hollow, surrounded on 
every side (save the east, -where its sujierabundant waters arc dis- 
charc^ed) by vast and almost perjjendicular inoinitains, whose dark 
inverted shadows are gloomily reflected in its still waters beneath.J 

There is a green island in lone Gougaune Barra, 
Where Allua of songs rushes forth ns an ai'iow ; 
In deep-valleyed Desmond — a thousand wild 

fountains 
Come down to that lake from their home in the 

mountains. 
There grows the wild ash, and a time-stricken 

willow 
Looks chidinglj'' down on the mirth of the billow ; 



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As, like some gay child, that sad monitor scorn- 
ing, 
It lightly laughs back to the laugh of the morning. 

And its zone of dark hills, — 0, to see them all 
brightening, 

When the tempest flings out its red banner of 
lightning. 

And the waters rush down, mid the thunder's 
deep rattle, 

Like clans from their hills at the voice of the 
battle ; 

And brightly the fire-crested billows are gleaming, 

And wildly from Mullagh the eagles are scream- 
ing ! 

0, where is the dwelling, in valley or highland. 

So meet for a bard as this lone little island ? 

How oft, when the summer sun rested on Clara, 
And lit the dark heath on the hills of Ivera, 
Have I sought thee, sweet spot, from my home 

by the ocean. 
And trod all thy wilds with a minstrel's devotion, 
And thought of thy bards, when assembling to- 
gether. 
In the cleft of thy rocks, or the depth of thy 

heather ; 
They fled from the Saxon's dark bondage and 

slaughter. 
And waked their last song by the rush of thy 
water. 

High sons of the lyre, 0, how proud was the 
feeling. 

To think while alone through that solitude steal- 
ing, 

Though loftier minstrels green Erin can number, 

I only awoke your wild harp from its slumber. 

And mingled once more with the voice of those 
fountains 

The songs even Echo forgot on her mountains ; 

And gleaned each gray legend that darkly was 
sleeping 

Where the mist and the rain o'er their beauty 
were creeping ! 

Least bard of the hills, — were it mine to inherit 
The fire of thy harp and the wing of thy spirit. 
With the wrongs which like thee to our country 

have bound me, 
Did your mantle of song fling its radiance around 

me, 
Still, still in those wilds might young Liberty 

rally, 
And send her strong shout over mountain and 

valley. 
The star of the west might yet lise in its glory, 
And the land that was darkest be brightest in 

story. 



I too shall be gone ; — but my name shall be 

spoken 
When Erin awakes and her fetters are broken. 
Some minstrel will come, in the summer eve's 

gleaming, 
When Freedom's young light on his spirit is 

beaming, 
And bend o'er my grave with a tear of emotion, 
Where calm Avon-Buee seeks the kisses of ocean, 
Or plant a wild wreath, from the banks of that 

river, 
O'er the heart and the harp that are sleeping 

forever. 

JAMES JOSEPH CALLANAN. 



EXILE OF ERIN. 

There came to the beach a poor exile of Erin, 

The dew on his thin robe was heavy and chill ; 
For his countiy he sighed, when at twilight re- 
pairing 
To wander alone by the wind-beaten hill. 
But the day-star attracted his eye's sad devotion, 
For it rose o'er his own native isle of the ocean. 
Where once, in the fire of his youthful emotion. 
He sang the bold anthem of Erin go bragh. 

Sad is my fate ! said the heart-broken stranger ; 

The wild deer and wolf to a covert can flee. 
But I have no refuge from famine and danger, 

A home and a country remain not to me. 
Never again in the green sunny bowers 
Where my forefathers lived shall I spend the 

sweet hours. 
Or cover my harp with the wild-woven flowers. 

And strike to the numbers of Erin go bragh ! 

Erin, my country ! though sad and forsaken. 
In dreams I revisit thy sea-beaten shore ; 

But, alas ! in a far foreign land I awaken. 

And sigh for the friends who can meet me no 
more ! 

cruel fate ! wilt thou never I'eplace me 

In a mansion of peace, where no perils can chase 
me? 

Never again shall my brothers embrace me ? 
They died to defend me, or live to deplore ! 

Where is my cabin door, fast by the wildwood ? 

Sisters and sire, did ye weep for its fall ? 
Where is the mother that looked on my child- 
hood ? 

And where is the bosom-friend, dearer than all ? 
my sad heart ! long abandoned by pleasure, 
Why did it dote on a fast-fading treasure ? 
Tears, like the rain-droi^, may fall without 
measure. 

But rapture and beauty they cannot recall. 



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Yet, all its sad recollections suppressing, 

One dying wish my lone bosom can draw, — 

Erm, an exile bequeaths thee his blessing ! 
Land of my forefathers, Erin go bragh ! 

Buried and cold, when my heart stills her motion, 

Green be thy fields, sweetest isle of the ocean ! 

And thy harp-striking bards sing aloud with 
devotion, — 
Erin mavourneen, Erin go bragh ! * 

Thomas Campbell. 



MY NATIVE LAND. 

It chanced to me upon a time to sail 

Across the Southern ocean to and fro ; 
And, landing at fair isles, by stream and vale 

Of sensuous blessing did we ofttimes go. 
And mouths of dreamy joys, like joys in sleep, 

Or like a clear, calm stream o'er mossy stone. 
Unnoted passed our hearts with voiceless sweep, 

And left us yearning still for lands unknown. 

And when we found one, ~- for 't is soon to find 

In thousand-isled Cathay another isle, — ■ 
For one short noon its treasures filled the mind. 

And then again we yearned, and ceased to 
smile. 
And so it was, from isle to isle we passed. 

Like wanton bees or boys on flowers or lips ; 
And when that all was tasted, then at last 

We thirsted still for draughts instead of sips. 

I learned from this there is no Southern land 

Can fill with love the hearts of Northern men. 
Sick minds need change ; but, when in health 
they stand 

'Neath foreign skies, their love flies home. agen. 
And thus with me it was : the yeaniing turned 

From laden airs of cinnamon away. 
And stretched far westward, while the full heart 
burned 

With love for Ireland, looking on Cathay ! 

My first dear love, all dearer for thy grief ! 

My land, that has no peer in all the sea 
For verdure, vale, or river, flower or leaf, — 

If first to no man else, thou 'rt first to me. 
New loves may come with duties, but the first 

Is deepest yet, — the mother's breath and 
smiles : 
Like that kind face and breast where I was nursed 

Is my poor land, the Niobe of isles. 

JOHN BovLE O'Reilly. 



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Ireland my darling, Ireland forever I 



IRELAND. 



1847. 



They are dying ! they are dying ! where the 

golden corn is growing ; 
They are dying ! they are dying ! where the 

crowded herds are lowing ; 
They are gasping for existence where the streams 

of life are flowing. 
And they perish of the plague where the breeze 

of health is blowing ! 

God of justice ! God of power ! 

Do we dream ? Can it be, 
In this land, at this hour. 

With the blossom on the tree, 
In the gladsome month of May, 
AVhen the young lambs play, 
When Nature looks around 

On her waking children now, 
The seed within the ground, 

The bud upon the bough ? 
Is it right, is it fair. 
That we perish of despair 
In this land, on this soil. 

Where our destiny is set, 
Which we cultured with our toil, 

And watered with our sweat ? 
We have ploughed, we have sown 
But the crop was not our own ; 
We have reaped, but harpy hands 
Swept the harvest from our lands ; 
We were perishing for food. 
When lo ! in pitying mood, 
Our kindly rulers gave 
The fat fluid of tlie slave. 
While our corn filled the manger 
Of the war-horse of the stranger ! 

God of mercy ! must this last ? 

Is this land preordained, 
For the present and the past 

And the future, to be chained, — • 

To be ravaged, to be drained, 
To be robbed, to be spoiled. 

To be hushed, to be whipt. 

Its soaring pinions dipt. 
And its every eff'ort foiled ? 

Do our numbers multiply 
But to perish and to die ? 

Is this all our destiny below, — 
That our bodies, as they rot, 
May fertilize the spot 

Where the harvests of the stranger grow? 



If this be, indeed, our fate, 
Far, far better now, thougli late. 



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That we seek some other land and try some other 
zone ; 
The coldest, bleakest shore 
Will surely yield us more 
Than the storehouse of the stranger that we dare 
not call our own. 

Kindly brothers of the West, 
Who from Liberty's fall breast 
Have fed us, who are orphans beneath a step- 
dame's frown. 
Behold our happy state, ^ 

And weep your wretched fate 
That you share not in the splendors of our em- 
pire and our crown ! 

Kindly brothers of the East, — 
Thou great tiaraed priest. 
Thou sanctified Eienzi of Rome and of the 
earth, — 
Or thou who bear'st control 
Over golden Istambol, 
Who felt for our misfortunes and helped us in 
our dearth, — 

Turn here your wondering eyes, 
Call your wisest of the wise. 
Your muftis and your ministers, your men of 
deepest lore ; 
Let the sagest of your sages 
Ope our island's mystic pages. 
And explain unto your highness the wonders of 
our shore. 

A fruitful, teeming soil, 

Where the patient peasants toil 
Beneath the summer's sun and the watery winter 
sky ; 

AVhere they tend the golden grain 

Till it bends upon the plain, 
Then reap it for the stranger, and turn aside to die; 

Where they watch their flocks increase, 
And store the snowy fleece 
Till they send it to their masters to be woven 
o'er the waves ; 
Where, having sent their meat 
For the foreigner to eat, 
Their mission is fulfilled, and they creep into 
their graves. 

'T is for this they are dying where the golden 

corn is growing, 
'T is for this they are dying where the crowded 

herds are lowing, 
'T is for this they are dying where the streams 

of life are flowing. 
And they perish of the plague where the breeze 

of health is blowing ! 

Denis Florence Mac-Carthy. 



SONG OF THE GREEK POET. 

FROM "DON JUAN," CANTO III. 

The isles of Greece, the isles of Greece ! 

Where burning Sappho loved and sung, — 
Where grew the arts of war and peace, — 

Where Delos rose, and Phoebus sprung ! 
Eternal summer gilds them yet ; 
But all, except their sun, is set. 

The Scian and the Teian muse. 
The hero's hai'p, the lover's lute, 

Have found the fame y(jur shores refuse ; 
Their place of birth alone is mute 

To sounds which echo farther west 

Than your sires' "Islands of the Blest." 

The mountains look on Marathon, 
And Maiathon looks on the sea ; 

And musing there an hour alone, 

I dreamed that Greece might still be free ; 

For, standing on the Persians' grave, 

I could not deem myself a slave. 

A king sat on the rocky brow 

Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis ; 

And ships by thousands lay below. 
And men in nations, — all were his ! 

He counted them at break of day, — 

And when the sun set, where were they ? 

And where are they ? and where art thou, 
My country ? On thy voiceless shore 

The heroic lay is tuneless now, — • 
The heroic bosom beats no more ! 

And must thy lyre,, so long divine, 

Degenerate into hands like mine ? 

'T is something, in the dearth of fame, 
Though linked among a fettered race. 

To feel at least a patriot's shame. 
Even as I sing, suffuse my face ; 

For what is left the poet here ? 

For Greeks a blush, — for Greece a tear. 

Must we but weep o'er days more blest ? 

Must we but blush ? — our i'athers bled. 
Earth ! render back from out thy breast 

A remnant of our Spartan dead! 
Of the three hundred, grant but three 
To make a new Thermopylaj ! 

AVhat, silent still ? and silent all ? 

Ah, no ! the voices of the dead 
Sound like a distant torrent's fall. 

And answer, " Let one living head, 
But one, arise, — we come, we come ! " 
'T is but the living who are dumb. 



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In vain, — in vain ; strike other chords ; 

Fill high the cup with Samian wine ! 
Leave battles to the Turkish liordes, 

And shed the blood of Scio's vine ! 
Hark ! rising to the ignoble call, 
How answers each bold Bacchanal ! 

You have the Pyridiic dance as yet, — 
Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx gone ? 

Of two such lessons, why forget 
The nobler and the manlier one ? 

You have the letters Cadnuis gave, — 

Think ye he meant them for a slave ? 

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine ! 

We will not think of themes like these ! 
It made Anacreon's song divine : 

He served, but served Polyc rates, — 
A tyrant ; but our masters then 
Were still, at least, oui- countrymen. 

The tyrant of the Chersonese 

Was freedom's best and bravest friend ; 
That tyrant was Miltiades ! 

that the present hour would lend 
Another despot of the kind I 
Such chains as his were sure to bind. 

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine ! 

On Snli's rock and Parga's shore 
Exists the i-emnant of a line 

Sucli as the Doric mothers bore ; 
And there perhaps some seed is sown 
The Heracleidan blood might own. 

Trust not for freedom to the Franks, — • 
They have a king who buys and sells : 

In native swords, and native ranks. 
The only hope of courage dwells ; 

But Turkish force, and Latin fraud, 

Would break your shield, however broad. 

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine ! 

Our virgins dance beneath the shade, — 
I see their glorious black eyes shine ; 

But, gazing on each glowing maid, 
My own the burning tear-drop laves. 
To think such breasts must suckle slaves. 

Place me on Sunium's marbled steep, 
Where nothing, save the waves and I, 

May hear our mutual murmurs sweep ; 
There, swan-like, let me sing and die. 

A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine, — 

Dash down yon cup of Samian wine ! 

Lord Byron. 



GREECE. 

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO. II. 

Fair Gi'eece ! sad relic of departed worth ! 
Immortal, though no moi'e ; though fallen, 

great ! 
Who now shall lead thy scattered children forth, 
And long-accustomed bondage uncreate ? 
Not such thy sons who whilom did await, 
The hopeless warriors of a willing doom, 
In bleak Thermopylai's sepulchral strait, — 
0, who that gallant spirit shall resume, 
Leap from Eurotas' banks, and call thee from 
the tomb ? 

Spirit of Freedom ! when on Phyle's brow 
Thou sat'st with Thrasybulus and his train, 
Couldst thou forebode the dismal hour which 

now 
Dims the green beauti(;s of thine Attic plain ? 
Not thirty tyrants now enforce the chain, 
But every carle can lord it o'er thy land ; 
Nor rise thy sons, but idly rail in vain, 
Trembling beneath the scoui'ge of Turkish hand, 
From birth till death enslaved ; in word, in deed, 

unmanned. 

In all save form alone, how changed ! and who 
That marks the lire still sparkling in each eye. 
Who but would deem their bosoms burned anew 
With thy nnquenched beam, lost Liberty ! 
And many dream withal the hour is nigh 
That gives them back their fathers' heritage ; 
For foi-eign arms and aid they fondly sigh, 
Nor solely dare encounter hostile rage, 
Or tear their name defiled from Slavery's nrourn- 
ful page. 

Hereditary bondsmen ! know ye not. 

Who would be free themselves must strike the 

blow ? 
By their right arms the conr^uest must be 

wrought ? 
Will Gaul or Muscovite redress ye ? No ! 
True, they may lay your proud despoilers low, 
But not for you will Freedom's altars Hame. 
Shades of the Helots ! triumph o'er your foe ! 
Greece ! change thy lords, thy .state is still the 

same ; 
Thy glorious day is o'er, but not thy years of 

shame ! 

LORD BYRON. 



GREECE. 

FROM "THE GIAOUR.' 

Climf, of the unforgotten brave ! 
Whose land, from plain to mountain-cave, 
Was Freedom's home or Glory's grave ! 
Shrine of the mighty ! can it be 



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That this is all remains of thee ? 
Approach, then craven, crouching slave ; 

Say, is not this Thermopylffi ? 
These waters blue that round you lave, 

servile offspring of the free, — 
Pronounce what sea, what shore is this? 
The gulf, the rock of Salamis ! 
These scenes, their story not unknown, 
Arise, and make again your own ; 
Snatch from the ashes of your sires 
The embers of their former fires ; 
And he who in the strife expires 
Will add to theirs a name of fear 
That Tyranny shall quake to hear, 
And leave his sons a hope, a fame. 
They too will rather die than shame ; 
For Freedom's battle once begun, 
Bequeathed by bleeding sire to son, 
Though baffled oft is ever won. 
Bear witness, Greece, thy living page ; • 
Attest it, many a deathless age : 
While kings, in dusty darkness hid. 
Have left a nameless pyramid. 
Thy heroes, though the general doom 
Hath swept the column from their tomb, 
A mightier monument command. 
The mountains of their native land ! 
There points thy Muse to stranger's eye 
The graves of those that cannot die ! 
'T were long to tell, and sad to trace, 
Each step from splendor to disgrace : 
Enough, — no foreign foe could quell 
Thy soul, till from itself it fell ; 
Yes ! self-abasement paved the way 
To villain-bonds and despot sway. 

What can he tell who treads thy shore ? 

No legend of thine olden time. 
No theme on which the Muse might soar. 
High as thine own in daj's of yore. 

When man was worthy of thy clime. 
The hearts within thy valleys bred, 
The liery souls that might have led 

Thy sons to deeds sublime. 

Now crawl from cradle to the gi'ave, 

Slaves — nay, the bondsmen of a slave. 

And callous save to crime. 

Lord Byron. 



t& 



MARCO BOZZARIS. 

[Marco Bozzaris, the Epaminondas of modern Greece, fell in a 
niijlit attack upon the Turkish camp at Laspi, the site of the an- 
cient Plat^ea, Aug-. 20, 1823, and expired in the moment of victory. 
His last words were : "To die for liberty is a pleasure, and not a 
pain."] 

At midnight, in his guarded tent, 
The Turk was dreaming of the hour 

AVhen Greece, her knee in suppliance bent, 
Should tremble at his power. 



In dreams, through camp and court, lie bore 
The trophies of a conqueror ; 

In dreams his song of triumph heard ; 
Then wore his monarch's signet-ring, 
Then pressed that monarch's throne — a king ; 
As wild his thoughts, and gay of wing, 

As Eden's garden bird. 

At midnight, in the forest shades, 

Bozzaris ranged his Suliote band, -— 
True as the steel of their tried blades, 

Heroes in heart and hand. 
There had the Persian's thousands stood, 
There had the glad earth drunk their blood, 

On old Plataea's day ; 
And now there breathed that haiinted air 
The sons of sires who conquered there, 
With arm to strike, and soul to dare, 

As quick, as far, as they. 

An hour passed on, the Turk awoke : 

That bright dream \^^as his last ; 
He woke — to hear his sentries shriek, 

' ' To arms ! they come ! the Greek ! the Greek ! ' 
He woke — to die midst flame, and smoke, 
And shout, and groan, and sabre-stroke. 

And death-shots falling thick and fast 
As lightnings from the mountain-cloud ; 
And heard, with voice as trumpet loud, 

Bozzaris cheer his band : 
"Strike — till the last armed foe expires ; 
Strike — for your altars and your fires ; 
Strike — for the green graves of your sires, 

God, and your native land ! " 

They fought — like brave men, long and well ; 

They piled that ground with Moslem slain : 
They conquered — but Bozzaris fell, 

Bleeding at every vein. 
His few surviving comrades saw 
His smile when rang their proud hurrah, 

And the red field was won ; 
Then saw in death his eyelids close 
Calmly, as to a night's repose, 

Like flowers at set of sun. 

Come to the bridal chamber. Death, 
Come to the mother, when she feels. 

For the first time, her first-born's breath ; 
Come when the blessed seals 

That close the pestilence are broke. 

And crowded cities wail its stroke ; 

Come in consumption's ghastly form, 

The earthquake shock, the ocean storm ; 

Come when the heart beats high and warm, 
With banquet song and dance and wine, — 

And thou art terrible ; the tear. 



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The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier, 
And all we know, or dream, or fear 
Of agony, are thine. 

But to the hero, when his sword 

Has won the battle for the free. 
Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word, 
And in its hollow tones are heard 

The thanks of millions yet to be. 
Come when his task of fame is wrought ; 
Come with her laurel-leaf, blood-bought ; 

Come in her crowning hour, — and then 
Thy sunken eye's unearthly light 
To him is welcome as the sight 

Of sky and stars to prisoned men ; 
Thjr grasp is welcome as the hand 
Of brother in a foreign land ; 
Thy summons welcome as the cry 
That told the Indian isles were nigh 

To the world-seeking Genoese, 
When the land-wind, from woods of palm, 
And orange-groves, and fields of balm. 

Blew o'er the Haytian seas. 

Bozzaris ! with the storied brave 

Greece nurtured in her glory's time, 
Rest thee ; there is no prouder grave, 

Even in her own proud clime. 
She wore no funeral weeds for thee. 

Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume. 
Like torn branch from death's leafless tree, 
In sorrow's pomp and pageantry. 

The heartless luxury of the tomb. 
But she remembers thee as one 
Long loved, and for a season gone. 
For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed. 
Her marble wrought, her music breathed ; 
For thee she rings the birthday bells ; 
Of thee her babes' first lisping tells ; 
For thine her evening prayer is said 
At palace couch and cottage bed. 
Her soldier, closing with the foe, 
Gives lor thy sake a deadlier blow ; 
His plighted maiden, when she fears 
For him, the joy of her young years. 
Thinks of thy fate, and checks her tears. 

And she, the mother of thy boys, 
Tliough in her eye and faded cheek 
Is read the grief she will not speak. 

The memory of her buried joys, — 
And even she who gave thee birth, — 
Will, by her pilgrim-circled hearth. 

Talk of thy doom without a sigh ; 
For thou art freedom's now, and fame's, — 
One of the few, the immortal names 

That were not born to die. 

Fitz-Greene Halleck. 



POLAND. 

FROM "THE PLEASURES OF HOPE," PART I. 

Warsaw's last champion from her height sur- 
veyed. 
Wide o'er the fields, a waste of ruin laid ; 
"0 Heaven !" he cried, "my bleeding country 

save ! — 
Is there no hand on high to shield the brave ? 
Yet, though destruction sweep these lovelyplains, 
Rise, fellow-men ! our country yet remains ! 
Bj' that dread name, we wave the sword on high. 
And swear for her to live — with her to die ! " 

He said, and on the rampart-heights arraj'^ed 
His trusty warriors, few, but undismayed ; 
Firm-paced and slow, a horrid front they form, 
Still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm ; 
Low murmuring sounds along their banners fly, 
Revenge, or death, — the watchword and reply ; 
Then pealed the notes, omnipotent to charm. 
And the loud tocsin tolled their last alarm ! — 

In vain, alas ! in vain, ye gallant few ! 
Fram rank to rank your volleyed thunder flew : — 
0, bloodiest picture in the book of Time ! 
Sarmatia fell, unwept, without a crime ; 
Found not a generous friend, a pitying foe, 
Strength in her arms, nor mercy in her woe ! 
Dropped from her nerveless grasp the shattered 

s]Dear, 
Closed her bright eye, and curbed her high career ; 
Hope, for a season, bade the world farewell, 
And Freedom shrieked — as Kosciusko fell ! 

Thomas Campbell. 



MEN AND BOYS. 

The storm is out ; the land is roused ; 
Where is the coward who sits well housed ? 
Fie on thee, boy, disguised in curls. 
Behind the stove, 'mong gluttons and girls ! 

A graceless, worthless wight thou must be ; 

No German maid desires thee. 

No German song inspires thee. 

No German Rhine- wine fires thee. 
Forth in the van, 
Man by man, 

Swing the battle-sword who can ! 

When we stand watching, the livelong night. 
Through piping storms, till morning light, 
Thou to thj' downy bed canst creep, 
And there in dreams of rapture sleep. 
A graceless, worthless wight, etc. 

When, hoarse and shrill, the trumpet's blast. 
Like the thunder of God, makes our hearts beat 
fast, 



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Thou in the theatre lov'st to appear, 
Where trills and quavers tickle the ear, 
A graceless, worthless wight, etc. 

Wlien the glare of noonday scorches the brain, 
"When our parched lips seek water in vain, 
Thou canst make champagne corks ily 
At the groaning tables of luxury. 

A graceless, worthless wight, etc. 

"When we, as we rush to the strangling fight. 
Send home to our true-loves a long " Good- 
night," 
Thou canst hie thee where love is sold, 
And buy thy pleasure with paltry gold. 
A graceless, worthless wight, etc. 

"When lance and bullet come whistling by. 
And death in a thousand shapes draws nigh. 
Thou canst sit at thy cards, and kill 
King, queen, and knave with thy spadille. 
A graceless, worthless wight, etc. 

If on the red held our bell should toll. 
Then welcome be death to the patriot's soul ! 
Thy pampered Hesh shall quake at its doom, 
And crawl in silk to a hopeless tomb. 
A pitiful exit thine shall be ; 
No German maid shall weep for thee. 
No German song shall they sing for thee. 
No German goblets shall ring for thee. 
Perth in the van, 
Man for man. 
Swing the battle-sword who can ! 

From the German of KORNER. Trans- 
lation of Charles T. Brooks. 



B- 



THE MARSEILLAISE. 

Ye sons of freedom, wake to glory ! 

Hark ! hark ! what myriads bid you rise ! 
Your children, wives, and grandsires hoary, 

Behold their tears and hear their cries ! 
Shall hateful tyrants, mischiefs breeding. 
With hii'eling hosts, a ruffian band, 
Affright and desolate the land. 
While peace and liberty lie bleeding ? 
To arms ! to arms ! ye brave ! 

The avenging sword unsheathe ; 
March on ! march on ! all hearts resolved 
On victory or death. 

Now, now the dangerous storm is rolling, 
Wlucli treacherous kings confederate raise ; 

The dogs of war, let loose, arc liowling, 
And lo ! our fields and cities blaze ; 



And shall we basel}' view the ruin. 

While lawless force, with guilty stride, 
Spreads desolation far and wide, 

With crimes and blood his hands imbniing. 
To arms ! to arms ! ye brave, etc. 

Liberty ! can man resign thee, 

Once having felt thy generous flame ? 
Can dungeons, bolts, or bars confine thee ? 

Or whips tliy noble spirit tame ? 
Too long the world has wept, bewailing 
That falsehood's dagger tyrants wi(dd, 
But freedom is our sword and shield. 
And all their arts are unavailing. 

To arms ! to arms ! ye brave, etc. 

Abbreviated, from the French of ROL'GET DE LISLE. 



MAKE WAY FOR LIBERTY. 

fOn the exploit of Arnold AVinkelried at the battle of Sempach, 
in the fourteenth century, in which the Swiss, fighting for their in- 
dependence, totally deleated the Austrians.] 

" Make way for Liberty ! " — he cried ; 
Made way for Liberty, and died ! 

In arms the Austrian phalanx stood, 
A living wall, a human wood ! 
A wall, where every conscious stone 
Seemed to its kindred thousands grown ; 
A rampart all assaults to bear. 
Till time to dust their frames should wear ; 
A wood, like that enchanted grove 
In which with fiends Rinaldo strove, 
Where every silent tree possessed 
A spirit jirisoned in its breast. 
Which the first stroke of coming strife 
Would startle into hideous life : 
So dense, so still, the Austrians stood, 
A living wall, a human wood ! 
Impregnable their front appears. 
All horrent with projected spears, 
Whose polished points before them shine. 
From Hank to fiank, one brilliant line. 
Bright as the breakers' splendors run 
Along the billows to the sun. 

Opposed to these, a hovering band 
Contended for their native land : 
Peasants, whose new-found strength had broke 
From manly necks the ignoble yoke. 
And forged their fetters into swords. 
On e(iual terms to fight their lords. 
And what insurgent rage had gained 
In many a mortal fray maintained : 
Marshalled once more at Freedom's call. 
They came to conquer or to fall, 
AVhei'e he who conquered, he who fell, 
Was deemed a dead, or living. Tell ! 



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Such viiiue had that patriot breathed, 
So to the soil his soul bequeathed, 
That wheresoe'er his arrows flew 
Heroes in his own likeness grew. 
And warriors sprang from every sod 
Which his awakening footstep trod. 

And now the work of life and death 
Hung on the passing of a breath ; 
The iire of conflict burnt within, 
The battle trembled to begin : 
Yet, while the Austrians held their ground. 
Point for attack was nowhere found ; 
Where'er the impatient Switzers gazed, 
The unbroken line of lances blazed : 
That line 't were suicide to meet, 
And perish at their tyrants' feet, — 
How could they rest within their graves. 
And leave their homes the homes of slaves ? 
Would they not feel their children tread 
With clanging chains above their head ? 

It must not be : this day, this hour. 
Annihilates the oppressor's power ; 
All Switzerland is in the field, 
She will not fly, she cannot yield, — 
She must not fall ; her better fate 
Here gives her an immortal date. 
Few were the numbers she could boast ; 
But every freeman was a host. 
And felt as though himself were he 
On whose sole arm hung victory. 

It did depend on one indeed ; 
Behold him, — Arnold Winkelried ! 
There sounds not to the trump of fame 
The echo of a nobler name. 
Unmarked he stood amid the throng. 
In rumination deep and long, 
Till you might see, with sudden grace. 
The very thought come o'er his face, 
And by the motion of his form 
Anticipate the bursting storm. 
And by the uplifting of his brow 
Tell where the bolt would strike, and how. 

But 't was no sooner thought than done. 
The field was in a moment won : — 

"Make way for Liberty ! " he cried, 
Then ran, with arms extended wide. 
As if his dearest friend to clasp ; 
Ten spears he swept within his grasp. 

" Make way for Liberty ! " he cried ; 
Their keen points met from side to side ; 
He bowed amongst them like a tree, 
And thus made way for Liberty. 



Swift to the breach his comrades fly ; 
"Make way for Liberty ! " they cry, 
And through the Austrian phalanx dart, 
As rushed the spears through Arnold's heart : 
While, instantaneous as his fall, 
Rout, ruin, panic, scattered all : 
An earthquake could not overthrow 
A city with a surer blow. 

Thus~ Switzerland again was free ; 
Thus Death made way for Liberty ! 

James Montgomery. 



SWITZERLAND. 



FROM "WILLIAM TELL." 



Once Switzerland was free ! With what a pride 
I used to walk these hills, — look up to heaven, 
And bless God that it was so ! It was free 
From end to end, from clitt' to lake 't was free ! 
Free as our torrents are, that leap our rocks. 
And plough our valleys, without asking leave ; 
Or as our peaks, that wear their caps of snow 
In very presence of the regal sun ! 
How happy was I in it then ! I loved 
Its very storms. Ay, often have I sat 
In my boat at night, when, midway o'er the lake, 
The stars went out, and down the mountain gorge 
The wind came roaring, — I have sat and eyed 
The thunder breaking from his cloud, and smiled 
To see him shake his lightnings o'er my head, 
And think — Ihad no master save his own ! 

James Sheridan Knowles. 



A COURT LADY. 

Her hair was tawny with gold, her eyes with 
purple were dark. 

Her cheeks' pale opal burnt with a red and rest- 
less spark. 

Never was lady of Milan nobler in name and in 

race ; 
Never was lady of Italy fairer to see in the face. 

Never was lady on earth more true as woman and 

wife, 
Larger in judgment and instinct, j)rouder in 

manners and life. 

She stood in the early morning, and said to her 

maidens, " Bring 
That silken robe made ready to wear at the court 

of the kins. 



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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



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' ' Brizig me tlie clasps of diamond, lucid, clear 

of the mote, 
Clasp me the large at the waist, and clasp me 

the small at the throat. 

" Diamonds to fasten the hair, and diamonds to 

fasten the sleeves, 
Laces to drop from their rays, like a powder of 

snow from the eaves." 

Gorgeous she entered the sunlight which gath- 
ered her up in a flame, 

While straight, in her open carriage, she to the 
hospital came. 

In she went at the door, and gazing, from end 

to end, 
"Many and low are the pallets, hut each is the 

place of a friend." 

Up she passed through the wards, and stood at 

a young man's bed : 
Bloody the hand on his brow, and livid the 

droop of his head. 

"Art thou a Lombard, my brother? Happy 

art thou ! " she cried. 
And smiled like Italy on him : he dreamed in 

her face and died. 

Pale with his passing soul, she went on still to 
a second : 

He was a grave, hard man, whose years by dun- 
geons were reckoned. 

Wounds in his body were sore, wounds in his 

life were sorer. 
"Art thou a Romagnole?" Her eyes drove 

lightnings before her. 

"Austrian and priest had joined to double and 

tighten the cord 
Able to bind thee, strong one, — free by the 

stroke of a sword. 

" Now be grave for the rest of us, using the life 

overcast 
To ripen our wine of the present (too new) in 

glooms of the past." 

Down she stepped to a pallet where lay a face 

like a gii'l's. 
Young, and pathetic with dying, — a deep black 

hole in the curls. 

' ' Art tliou from Tuscany, brother ? and seest 

thou, dreaming in pain. 
Thy mother stand in the piazza, searching the 

list of the skin ? " 



Kind as a mother herself, she touched his cheeks 

with her hands : 
"Blessed is she who has borne thee, although 

she should weep as she stands." 

On she passed to a Frenchman, his arm carried 

off by a ball : 
Kneeling, . . " more than my brother ! how 

shall I thank thee for all ? 

"Each of the heroes around us has fought for 

his land and line. 
But tliou hast fought for a stranger, in hate of a 

wrong not thine. 

" Happy are all free peoples, too strong to be dis- 
possessed ; 

But blessed are those among nations who dare to 
be strong for the rest ! " 

Ever she > passed on her way, and came to a 

couch where pined 
One with a ; face from Venetia, white with a 

hope out of mind. 

Long she stood and gazed, and twice she tried at 

the name, 
But two' great crystal tears were all that faltered 

and came. 

Only a tear for Venice ? — she turned as in pas- 
sion and loss. 

And stooped to his forehead and kissed it, as if 
she were kissing the cross. 

Faint with that strain of heart, she moved on 

then to another. 
Stern and strong in his death. "And dost thou 

suffer, my brother ? " 

Holding his hands in hers : — " Out of the Pied- 
mont lion 

Cometh the sweetness of freedom ! sweetest to 
live or to die on." 

Holding his cold, rough hands, — " Well, 0, 

well have ye done 
In noble, noble Piedmont, who would not be 

noble alone." 

Back he fell while she spoke. She rose to her 

feet with a spring, — 
"That was a Piedmontese ! and this is the 

Court of the King." 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning 



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THE LANDING OF THE PILGRIM 
FATHERS IN NEW ENGLAND. 

The breaking waves dashed high 
On a stern and rock-bound coast, 

And the woods against a stormy sky 
Their giant branches tossed ; 

And the heavy night hung dark 

The hills and waters o'er, 
"When a band of exiles moored their bark 

On the wild New England shore. 

Not as the conqueror comes, 

They, the true-hearted, came ; 
Not with the roll of the stirring drums, 

And the trmnpet that sings of fame : 

Not as the flying come, 

In silence and in fear ; — 
They shook the depths of the desert gloom 

With their hymns of lofty cheer. 

Amidst the storm they sang, 

And the stars heard, and the sea ; 

And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang 
To the anthem of the free. 

The ocean eagle soared 

From his nest by the white wave's foam. 
And the rocking pines of the forest roared, — 

This was their welcome home. 

There were men with hoary hair 

Amidst that pilgrim-band : 
Why had they come to wither there. 

Away from their childhood's land ? 

There was woman's fearless eye, 

Lit by her deep love's truth ; 
There was manhood's brow serenely high. 

And the fiery heart of youth. 

What sought they thus afar ? 

Bright jewels of the mine ? 
The wealth of seas, the spoils of war ? — 

They sought a faith's pure shrine ! 

Ay, call it holy groirnd. 

The soil where first they trod ; 
They have left unstained what there they found, — 
Freedom to worship God. 

Felicia Hemans. 
♦ 

ON THE PROSPECT OF PLANTING ARTS 
AND LEARNING IN AMERICA. 

The Muse, disgusted at an age and clime 

Barren of every glorious theme. 
In distant lands now waits a better time. 

Producing subjects worthy fame. 



In happy climes, where from the genial sun 
And virgin earth such scenes <3nsue, 

The force of art by nature seems outdone. 
And fancied beauties by the true : 

In happy climes, the seat of innocence. 
Where nature guides and virtue rules. 

Where men shall not impose for truth and sense 
The pedantry of courts and schools : 

There shall be sung another golden age. 

The rise of empire and of arts, 
The good and great inspiring epic rage. 

The wisest heads and noblest hearts. 

Not such as Europe breeds in her decay : 
Such as she bred when fresh and young. 

When heavenly flame did animate her clay. 
By future poets shall be sung. 

Westward the course of empire takes its way ; 

The first four acts already past, 
A fifth shall close the drama with the day ; 

Time's noblest offspring is the last. 

Bishop George Berkeley. 



AMERICA. 

MOTHER of a mighty race. 
Yet lovely in thy youthful grace ! 
The elder dames, thy haughty peers. 
Admire and hate thy blooming years ; 

With words of shame 
And taunts of scorn they join thy name. 

For on thy cheeks the glow is spread 
That tints thy morning hills with red ; 
Thy step, — the wild deer's rustling feet 
Within thy woods are not more fleet ; 

Thy hopeful eye 
Is bright as thine own sunny sky. 

Ay, let them rail, those haughty ones. 
While safe thou dwellest with thy sons. 
They do not know how loved thou art, 
How many a fond and fearless heart 

Would rise to throw 
Its life between thee and the foe. 

They know not, in their hate and pride, 
What virtues with thy children bide, — 
How true, how good, thy graceful maids 
Make bright, like flowers, the valley shades ; 

What generous men 
Spring, like thine oaks, by hill and glen ; 

What cordial welcomes greet the guest 
By thy lone rivers of the west ; 



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How faith is kept, and truth revered, 
And man is loved, and God is feared, 

In woodland homes, 
And where the ocean border foams. 

There 's freedom at thy gates, and rest 
For earth's down-trodden and opprest, 
A shelter for the hunted head, 
For the starved laborer toil and bread. 

Power, at thy bounds. 
Stops, and calls back his baffled hounds. 

fair young mother ! on thy brow 
Shall sit a nobler grace than now. 
Deep in the brightness of thy skies, 
The thronging years in glory rise. 

And, as they fleet, 
Dro}) strength and riches at thy feet. 

Thine eye, with every coming hour. 
Shall brighten, and thy form shall tower ; 
And when thy sisters, elder born, 
"Would brand thy name with words of scorn. 
Before thine eye 

Upon their lips the taunt shall die. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



B- 



COLUMBIA. 

Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise. 
The queen of the world, and the child of the' skies ! 
Thy genius commands thee ; with rapture behold. 
While ages on ages thy splendors unfold. 
Thy reign is the last and the noblest of time, 
Most fruitful thy soil, most inviting thy clime ; 
Let the crimes of the east ne'er encrimson thy 

name. 
Be freedom and science and virtue thy fame. 

To conquest and slaughter let Europe aspire ; 
Whelm nations in blood, and wrap cities in fire ; 
Thy heroes the rights of mankind shall defend. 
And triumph pursue them, and glory attend. 
A world is thy realm ; for a world be thj- laws 
Enlarged as thine empire, and just as thy cause ; 
On Freedom's broad basis that empire shall rise. 
Extend with the main, and dissolve with the skies. 

Fair Science her gates to thy sons shall unbar, 
And the East see thy morn hide the beams of her 

star ; 
New bards and new sages unrivalled shall soar 
To fame unextinguished when time is no more ; 
To thee, the last refuge of virtue designed. 
Shall fly from all nations the best of mankind ; 
Here, gi-ateful to Heaven, with transport shall 

bring 
Their incense, more fragrant than odors of spring. 



Nor less shall thy fair ones to glory ascend. 
And genius and beauty in harmony blend ; 
The graces of form shall awake p)ure desire. 
And the charms of the soul ever cherish the fire ; 
Theirsweetness unmingled, their manners refined, 
And virtue's bright image, enstamped on the 

mind. 
With peace and soft rapture shall teach life to 

_ glow. 
And light up a smile on the aspect of woe. 

Thy fleets to all regions thy power shall display, 
The nations admire, and the ocean obey ; 
Each shore to thy glory its tribute unfold. 
And the East and the South yield their spices and 

gold. 
As the dayspring unbounded thy splendor shall 

flow, 
And earth's little kingdoms before thee shall bow, 
Wliile the ensigns of union, in triumph unfurled. 
Hush the tumult of war, and give peace to the 

world. 

Thus, as down a lone valley, with cedars o'er- 

spread, 
Fromwar'sdreadconfusion, I pensively strayed, — 
The gloom from the face of fair heaven retired ; 
The wind ceased to murmur, the thunders ex- 
pired ; 
Perfumes, as of Eden, flowed sweetly along, 
And a voice, as of angels, enchantingly sung : 
"Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise. 
The queen of the world, and the child of the 

skies ! " 

Timothy Dwight. 



AMERICA TO GREAT BRITAIN. 

All hail ! thou noble land, 
Our Fathers' native soil ! 
0, stretch thy mighty hand. 
Gigantic grown by toil, 
O'er the vast Atlantic wave to our shore ! 
For thou with magic might 
Canst reach to where the light 
Of Phojbus travels bright 
The world o'er ! 

The genius of our clime 

From his pine-embattled steep 
Shall hail the guest sublime ; 
While the Tritons of the deep 
With their conchs the kindred league shall pro- 
claim. 
Then let the world combine, — 
O'er the main our naval line 
Like the Milky Way shall shine 
Bright in fame ! 



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Though ages long have passed 

Since our Fathers left their home, 
Their pilot in the blast, 

O'er untravelled seas to roam. 
Yet lives the blood of England in our veins ! 
And shall we not proclaim 
That blood of honest fame 
"Which no tyrannj^ can tame 
By its chains ? 

"While the language free and bold 
"Which the Bard of Avon sung, 
In which our Milton told 

How the vault of heaven rung 
When Satan, blasted, fell with his host ; 
"While this, with reverence meet, 
Ten thousand echoes greet, 
From rock to rock repeat 
Round our coast ; 

While the manners, while the arts. 

That mould a nation's soul. 
Still cling around our hearts, — ■ 
Between let Ocean roll. 
Our joint communion breaking with the sun : 
Yet still from either beach 
The voice of blood shall reach. 
More audible than speech, 
"We are One." 

WASHINGTON ALLSTON. 



SONG OF MARION'S MEN. 

Our band is few, but true and tried. 

Our leader frank and bold ; 
The British soldier trembles 

When Marion's name is told. 
Our fortress is the good greenwood. 

Our tent the cypress-tree ; 
We know the forest round us. 

As seameir know the sea ; 
We know its walls of thorny vines, 

Its glades of reedy grass. 
Its safe and silent islands 

Within the dark morass. 

Woe to the English soldiery 

That little dread us near ! 
On them shall light at midnight 

A strange and sudden fear ; 
When, waking to their tents on fire. 

They grasp their arms in vain. 
And they who stand to face us 

Are beat to earth again ; 
And they who fly in terror deem 

A mighty host behind, 
And hear the tramp of thousands 

Upon tlie hollow wind. 



Then sweet the hour that brings release 

From danger and from toil ; 
We talk the battle over. 

And share the battle's spoil. 
The woodland rings with laugh and shout. 

As if a hunt were up. 
And woodland flowers are gathered 

To crown the soldier's cuj:). 
With merry songs Ave mock the wind 

That in the pine-toji grieves. 
And slumber long and sweetly 

On beds of oaken leaves. 

Well knows the fair and friendly moon 

The band that Marion leads, — 
The glitter of their rifles, 

The scampering of their steeds. 
'T is life to guide the fiery barb 

Across the moonlight plain ; 
'T is life to feel the night-wind 

That lifts his tossing mane. 
A moment in the British camp — 

A moment — and away 
Back to the pathless forest. 

Before the peep of day. 

Grave men there are by broad Santee, 

Grave men with hoary hairs ; 
Their hearts are all with Marion, 

For Marion are their prayers. 
And lovely ladies greet our band 

Witli kindliest welcoming. 
With smiles like those of summer. 

And tears like those of spring. 
For them we wear these trusty arms, 

And lay them down no more 
Till we have driven the Briton 

Forever from our shore. 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 



HYMN; 



SUNG AT THE COMPLETION OF THE CONCORD MONUMENT, 
APRIL 19, 1836. 

By the rude bridge that arched the flood, 
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled, 

Here once the embattled fanners stood, 
And tired the shot lieard round the world. 

The foe long since in silence slept ; 

Alike the conqueror silent sleeps ; 
And Time the ruined bridge has swept 

Down the dark stream which seaward creeps. 

On this green bank, by this soft sti'eam. 

We set to-day a votive stone ; 
That memory may their deed redeem, 

"W^lien, like our .sires, our sons are gone. 



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Spirit, that made those heroes dare 
To die, or leave their children free, 

Bid Time and Nature gently spare 
The shaft we raise to them and thee. 

RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 



WARREN'S ADDRESS. 

Stand ! the ground 's your own, my hrayos ! 
"Will ye give it up to slaves ? 
Will ye look for greener graves ? 

Hope ye mercy still ? 
What 's the mercy despots feel ? 
Hear it in that battle-peal ! 
Read it on yon bristling steel ! 

Ask it, — ye who will. 

Fear ye foes who kill for hire ? 
Will ye to your homes retire ? 
Look behind you ! — they 're afire ! 

And, before you, see 
Who have done it ! From the vale 
On they come ! — and will ye quail ? 
Leaden rain and iron hail 

Let their welcome be ! 

In the God of battles trust ! 
Die we may, — and die we must : 
But, 0, where can dust to dust 

Be consigned so well, 
As where heaven its dews shall shed 
On the martyred patriot's bed. 
And the rocks shall raise their head. 

Of his deeds to tell ? 

JOHN PlERPONT. 



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CARMEN BELLICOSUM. 

In their ragged regimentals 
Stood the old Continentals, 

Yielding not, 
AVhen the grenadiers were lunging. 
And like hail fell the plunging 
Cannon-shot ; 
When the files 
Of the isles. 
From the smoky night encampment, bore the 
banner of the rampant 
Unicorn, 
And grummer, grummer, grummer rolled the 
roll of the drummer, 
Through the morn ! 

Then with eyes to the front all. 
And with guns horizontal. 

Stood our sires ; 
And the balls whistled deadly, 
And in streams flashing redly 

Blazed the fires ; 



As the roar 
On the shore. 
Swept the strong battle-breakers o'er the green- 
sodded acres 
Of the plain ; 
And louder, louder, louder, cracked the black 
gunpowder. 
Cracking amain ! 

Now like smiths at their forges 
Worked the red St. George's 

Cannoneers ; 
And the " villanous saltpetre" 
Rung a fierce, discordant metre 
Round their ears ; 
As the swift 
Storm -drift, 
With hot sweeping anger, came the horseguards' 
clangor 
On our flanks ; 
Then higher, higher, higher, burned the old- 
fashioned fire 
Through the ranks ! 

Then the old-fashioned colonel 
Galloped through the white infernal 

Powder-cloud ; 
And his broad sword was swinging. 
And his brazen throat was ringing 
Trumpet-loud. 
Then the blue • 
Bullets flew. 
And the trooper-jackets redden at the touch of 
the leaden 
Rifle-breath ; 
Arid rounder, roimder, rounder, roared the iron 
six-pounder, 
Hurling death ! 

Guy Humphrey McMaster. 



PAUL REVERE' S RIDE. 

Listen, my children, and you shall hear 

Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere, 

On the eighteenth of April, in 'Seventy-five : 

Hardly a man is now alive 

Who remembers that famous day and year. 

He said to his friend, " If the British march 
By land or sea from the town to-night. 
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch 
Of the North Church tower as a signal light, ■ 
One, if by land, and two, if by sea ; 
And I on the opposite shore will be. 
Ready to ride and spread the alarm 
Through every Middlesex village and farm. 
For the country folk to be up and to arm." 



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Then he said, " Good night ! " and with muffled 

oar 
Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore, 
Just as the moon rose over the bay. 
Where swinging wide at her moorings lay 
The Somerset, British man-of-war ; 
A phantom ship, with each mast and spar 
Across the moon like a prison bar. 
And a huge black hulk, that was magnified 
B}"- its own reflection in the tide. 

Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street, 
Wanders and watches with eager ears, 
Till in the silence around him he hears 
The muster of men at the barrack door, 
The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet. 
And the measured tread of the grenadiers. 
Marching down to their boats on the shore. 

Then he climbed the tower of the Old North 

Church 
By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread, 
To the belfry-chamber overhead. 
And startled the pigeons from their perch 
On the sombre rafters, that round him made 
Masses and moving shapes of shade, — 
By the trembling ladder, steep and tall. 
To the highest Avindow in the wall, 
Where he paused to listen and look down 
A moment on the roofs of the town, 
And the moonlight flowing over all. 

Beneath, in the churchyard, lay the dead. 

In their night-encampment on the hill. 

Wrapped in silence so deep and still 

That he could hear, like a sentinel's tread. 

The watchful night-wind, as it went 

Creeping along from tent to tent, 

And seeming to whisper, "All is well ! " 

A moment only he feels the spell 

Of the place and the hour, and the secret dread 

Of the lonely belfry and the dead ; 

For suddenly all his thoughts are bent 

On a shadowy something far away, 

Where the river widens to meet the bay, — 

A line of black that bends and floats 

On the rising tide, like a bridge of boats. 

Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride. 
Booted and spurred, with a heavy sti'ide, 
On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere. 
Now he patted his horse's side, 
Now gazed at the landscajie far and near. 
Then, impetuous, stamped the earth. 
And turned and tightened his saddle-girth ; 
But mostly he watched with eager search 
The belfry-tower of the Old North Church, 



As it rose above the graves on the hill. 
Lonely and spectral and sombre and still. 
And lo ! as he looks, on the belfry's height 
A glimmer, and then a gleam of light ! 
He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns. 
But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight 
A second lamp in the belfry burns ! 

A hurry of hoofs in a village sti'eet, 

A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark, 

And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a 

spark 
Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet : 
That was all ! And yet, through the gloom and 

the light. 
The fate of a nation was riding that night ; 
And the spark struck out by that steed, in his 

flight. 
Kindled the land into flame with its heat. 

He has left the village and mounted the steep. 
And beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep. 
Is the Mj^stic, meeting the ocean tides ; 
And under the alders, that skirt its edge, 
Now soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge. 
Is heard the tramp of his steed as he rides. 

It was twelve bj^ the village clock 

When he crossed the bridge into Medford town. 

He heard the crowing of the cock. 

And the barking of the farmer's dog. 

And felt the damp of the river fog. 

That rises after the sun goes down. 

It was one by the village clock 

\AT.ien he galloped into Lexington. 

He saw the gilded weathercock 

Swim in the moonlight as he passed. 

And the meeting-house windows, blank and bare. 

Gaze at him ■\\'ith a spectral glare. 

As if they already stood aghast 

At the bloody work they would look upon. 

It was two by the village clock 

When he came to the bridge in Concord town. 

He heard the bleating of the flock. 

And the twitter of birds among the trees, 

And felt the breath of the morning breeze 

Blowing over the meadows brown. 

And one was safe and asleep in his bed 

Who at the bridge would be first to fall, 

Who that day would be lying dead. 

Pierced by a British musket-ball. 

You know the rest. In the books you have read. 
How the British Regulars fired and fled, — 
How the farmers gave them ball for ball, 
From behind each fence and farm-yard wall, 



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Chasing the redcoats down the lane, 
Then crossing the iields to emerge again 
Under the trees at the turn of the road, 
And only pausing to lire and load. 

So through the night rode Paul Revere ; 

And so through the night went his cry of alarm 

To every Middlesex village and farm, ■ — 

A cry of defiance and not of fear, 

A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door, 

And a word that shall echo forevermore ! 

Foi', borne on the night-wind of the Past, 

Through all our history, to the last, 

In the hour of darkness and peril and need. 

The people will waken and listen to hear 

The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed 

An d the midnight message of Paul Revere. 

Henry wadsworth Longfellow. 



THE AMERICAN FLAG. 

When Freedom, from her mountain height, 
Unfurled her standard to the air, 

She tore the azure robe of night, 
And set the stars of glory there ! 

She mingled with its gorgeous dyes 

The milky baldric of the skies, 

And striped its pure, celestial white 

With streakings of the morning light ; 

Then, from his mansion in the sun. 

She called her eagle-bearer down. 

And gave into his mighty hand 

The symbol of her chosen land ! 

Majestic monarch of the cloud ! 

Who rear'st aloft thy regal form, 
To hear the tempest trumping loud. 
And see the lightning lances driven, 

When strive the warriors of the storm. 
And rolls the thunder-drum of heaven, — 
Child of the Sun ! to thee 't is given 

To guard the banner of the free, 
To hover in the sulphur smoke. 
To ward away the battle-stroke, 
And bid its blendings shine afar, 
Like rainboAvs on the cloud of war, 

The harbingers of victory ! 

Flag of the brave ! thy folds shall fly, 
The sign of hope and triumph high ! 
When speaks the signal-trumpet tone, 
And the long line comes gleaming on, 
Ere yet the life-blood, warm and wet, 
Has dimmed the glistening bayonet. 
Each soldier's eye shall brightly turn 
To where thy sky-born glories burn. 
And, as his springing steps advance, 
Catch war and vengeance from the glance. 



And when the cannon-mouthings loud 
Heave in wild wreaths the battle shroud, 
And gory sabres rise and fall 
Like shoots of flame on midnight's pall. 
Then shall thy meteor glances glbw, 

And cowering foes shall shrink beneath 
Each gallant arm that strikes below 

That lovely messenger of death. 

Flag of the seas ! on ocean wave 
Thy stars shall glitter o'er the brave ; 
When death, careering on the gale. 
Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail. 
And frighted waves rush wildly back 
Before the broadside's reeling rack, 
Each dying wandez'er of the sea 
Shall look at once to heaven and thee, 
And smile to see thy splendors fly 
In triumph o'er his closing eye. 

Flag of the free heart's hoj^e and home, 

By angel hands to valor given ! 
Thy stars have lit the welkin dome. 

And all thy hues were born in heaven. 
Forever float that standard sheet ! 

Where breathes the foe but falls before us. 
With Freedom's soil beneath our feet, 

And Freedom's banner streamiug o'er us ! 

JOSEPH Rodman Drake. 



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THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER. 

SAY, can you see by the dawn's early light 
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last 

gleaming ? — 
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through 

the perilous fight 
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly 

streaming ! 
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting 

in air. 
Gave proof through the night that our flag was 

still there ; 
say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave 
O'er the land of the free and the home of the 

brave ? 

On that shore, dimly seen through the mists of 

the deep. 
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence 

reposes, 
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering 

steep. 
As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses ? 
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first 

beam. 
In full glory reflected, now shines on the stream ; 



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'T is the star-spangled banner ! 0, long may it 

wave 
O'er tlie land of the free and the home of the 

brave ! 

And wliere is that band who so vauntingly swore 
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion 
A home and a country should leave us no more ? 
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' 

pollution. 
No refuge could save the hireling and slave 
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the 

grave ; 
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth 

wave 
O'er the land of the free and the home of the 

brave ! 

0, thus be it ever when freemen shall stand 
Between tlieir loved homes and the war's desola- 
tion ! 
Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the Heaven- 
rescued land 
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved 

us a nation. 
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, 
And this be our motto, "In God is our trust ; " 
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall 

wave 
O'er the land of the free and the home of the 

brave. 

Francis Scott Key. 



THE LITTLE CLOUD. 

[i853-] 

As when, on Carrael's sterile steep, 
The ancient prophet bowed the knee. 

And seven times sent his servant forth 
To look toward the distant sea ; 

There came at last a little cloud. 
Scarce larger than the human hand. 

Spreading and swelling till it broke 
In showers on all tlie herbless land ; 

And hearts were glad, and shouts went i;p, 
And })raise to Israel's mighty God, 

As the sear hills grew bright with flowers. 
And verdure clothed the valley sod, — 

Even so oiir eyes have waited long ; 

But now a little cloud appears, 
Spreading and swelling as it glides 

Onward into the coming years. 

Bright cloud of Liberty ! full soon. 
Far stretching from the ocean strand, 

Thy glorious folds shall spread abroad, 
Encircling our beloved land. 



Like the sweet rain on Judah's hill.s, 
The glorious boon of love shall fall, 

And our bond millions shall arise. 
As at an angel's trumpet-call. 

Then shall a shout of joy go up, — 
The wild, glad cry of freedom come 

From hearts long crushed by cruel hands, 
And songs from lips long sealed and dumb 

And every bondman's cliain be broke. 
And every soul that moves abroad 

In this wide realm shall know and feel 
The blessed Liberty of God. 

John Howard BRYAr^T, 



SONNET. 

WRITTEN WHILE IN PRISON FOR DENOUNCING THE 
DOJIE3TIC SLAVE-TRADE. 

High walls and huge the body may confine, 

And iron gates obstruct the prisoner's gaze, 
And massive bolts may baffle liis design. 

And vigilant keepers watch his devious ways ; 
But scorns the immortal mind such base control : 

No chains can bind it and no cell enclose. 
Swifter than light it flies fi'om pole to pole. 

And in a flasli from earth to heaven it goes. 
It leaps from mount to moiTut ; from vale to vale 

Itwanders, pluckinghoneyed fruits and flowers ; 
It visits home to hear the fireside tale 

And in sweet converse pass the joyous hours ; 
'T is up before the sun, roaming afar. 
And in its watches wearies every star. 

WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



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SLAVERY. 

FROM "THE TIMEPIECE": "THE TASK," BOOK II. 

FOR a lodge in some vast wilderness, 
Some boundless contiguity of shade, 
Where rumor of oppression and deceit. 
Of unsuccessful or successful war, 
JMight never reach me more ! My ear is pained. 
My soul is sick, with every day's report 
Of wrong and outrage with wliich earth is filled. 
There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart ; 
It does not feel for man ; the natural bond 
Of brotherhood is severed as the flax. 
That falls asunder at the touch of fire. 
He finds his fellow guilty of a skin 
Not colored like his own, and, having power 
To enforce the wrong, for sucli a worthy cause 
Dooms and devotes liim as his lawful prey. 
Lands intersected by a narrow frith 
Abhor each other. Mountains interposed 



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Make enemies of nations, who had else 
Like kindred drops been mingled into one. 
Thns man devotes his brother, and destroys ; 
And, worse than all, and most to be deplored 
As hnman nature's broadest, foulest blot, 
Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat 
With stripes, that Mercy, with a bleeding heart. 
Weeps, when she sees inflicted on a beast. 
Then what is man ? And what man, seeing this. 
And having human feelings, does not blush. 
And hang his head, to think himself a man ? 
I would not have a slave to till my ground, 
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep, 
And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth 
That sinews bought and sold have ever earned. 
'No ; dear as freedom is, and in my heart's 
Just estimation prized above all price, 
I had much rather be myself the slave. 
And wear the bonds, than fasten them on him. 
We have no slaves at home. — Then why abroad ? 
And they themselves once ferried o'er the wave 
That parts us are emancipate and loosed. 
Slaves cannot breathe in England ; if their lungs 
Receive our air, that moment they are free ; 
They touch onr country, and their shackles fall. 
That 's noble, and bespeaks a nation proud 
And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then, 
And let it circulate through every vein 
Of all your empire ; that, where Britain's power 
Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too. 

William Cowper. 



BATTLE-HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC. 

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of 
the Lord : 

He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes 
of wrath are stored ; 

He hath loosed the fateful lightning of his terri- 
ble swift sword : 
His truth is marching on. 

I have seen him in the watch-fires of a hundred 

circling camps ; 
They have builded him an altar in the evening 

dews and damps ; 
I can read his righteous sentence by the dim and 

flaring lamps : 
His day is marching on. 

I have read a fiery gospel, writ in burnished rows 

of steel : 
"As ye deal with my contemners, so with you 

my grace shall deal ; 
Let the Hero, l.iorn of woman, crush the serpent 

with his heel, 
Since God is marchins; on." 



He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall 

never call retreat ; 
He is sifting out the hearts of men before his 

judgment-seat ; 
0, be swift, my soul, to answer him ! be jubilant, 

my feet ! 
Our God is marching on. 

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across 

the sea, 
With a glory in his bosom that transfigures you 

and me ; 
As he died to make men holy, let us die to make 
riien free. 
While God is marching on. 

Julia Ward Howe. 



SHERIDAN'S RIDE. 

Up from the South at break of day. 

Bringing to Winchester fresh dismay, 

The affrighted air with a shudder bore, 

Like a herald in haste, to the chieftain's door, 

The terrible grumble and I'umble and roar, 

Telling the battle was on once more, 

And Sheridan twenty miles away. 

And wider still those billows of war 

Thundered along the horizon's bar ; 

And louder yet into Winchester rolled 

The roar of that red sea uncontrolled. 

Making the blood of the listener cold 

As he thought of the stake in that fiery fray, 

With Sheridan twenty miles away. 

But there is a road from Winchester town, 

A good, broad highway, leading down ; 

And there, through the flash of the morning light, 

A steed as black as the steeds of niglit 

Was seen to pass as with eagle flight. 

As if he knew the terrible need, 

He stretched away with the utmost speed ; 

Hills rose and fell, — but his heart was gay, 

With Sheridan fifteen miles away. 

Still sprung from those swift hoofs, thundering 

South, 
The dust, like smoke from the cannon's mouth ; 
Or the trail of a comet, sweeping faster and faster, 
Foreboding to traitors the doom of disaster. 
The heart of the steed and the heart of the master 
Were beating, like prisoners assaulting their 

walls. 
Impatient to be where the battle-field calls ; 
Every nerve of the charger was strained to full 

play, 
With Sheridan only ten miles away. 



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Under his spurning feet, the road 

Like an arrowy Alpine river flowed, 

And the landscape sped away behind. 

Like an ocean flying before the wind ; 

And the steed, like a bark fed with furnace ire, 

Swept on, with his wild eyes full of fire ; 

But, lo ! he is nearing his heart's desire, 

He is snuffing the smoke of the roaring fray, 

With Sheridan only five miles away. 

The first that the General saw were the groups 
Of stragglers, and then the retreating troops ; 
What was done, — what to do, — a glance told 

him both. 
And, striking his spurs with a terrible oath. 
He dashed down the line mid a storm of huzzas. 
And the wave of retreat checked its course there, 

because 
The sight of the master compelled it to pause. 
With foam and with dust the black charger was 

gray ; 
By the flash of his eye, and his nostril's play, 
He seemed to the whole great army to say, 
" I have brought you Sheridan all the way 
From Winchester down, to save the day ! " 

Hurrah, hurrah for Sheridan ! 
Hurrah, hurrah for horse and man ! 
And when their statues are placed on high. 
Under the dome of the Union sky, — 
The American soldier's Temple of Fame, — 
There with the glorious General's name 
Be it r id in letters both bold and bright : 
" Here is the steed that saved the day 
By carrying Sheridan into the fight. 
From Winchester, — twenty miles away ! " 

Thomas Buchanan Read. 



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THE BLACK REGIMENT. 

[May 27, 1863.] 

Dark as the clouds of even. 
Ranked in the western heaven, 
Waiting the breath that lifts 
All the dead mass, and drifts 
Tempest and falling brand 
Over a ruined land, — 
So still and orderly, 
Arm to arm, knee to knee, 
Waiting the great event. 
Stands the black regiment. 

Down the long dusky line 
Teeth gleam and eyeballs shine ; 
And the bright bayonet. 
Bristling and firmly set. 



Flashed with a purpose grand. 
Long ere the sliarp command 
Of the fierce rolling drum 
Told them their time had come, 
Told them what work was sent 
For the black regiment. 

"Now," the flag-sergeant cried, 
"Though death and hell betide. 
Let the whole nation see 
If we are fit to be 
Free in this land ; or bound 
Down, like the whining hound, — 
Bound with red stripes of pain 
In our cold chains again ! " 
0, what a shout there went 
From the black regiment ! 

" Charge ! " Trump and drum awoke 
Onward the bondmen broke ; 
Bayonet and sabre-stroke 
Yainly opposed their rush. 
Through the wild battle's crush. 
With but one thought aflush. 
Driving their lords like chaff, 
In the guns' mouths they laugh ; 
Or at the slippery brands 
Leaping ^\'ith open hands, 
Down tliey tear man and horse, 
Down in their awful course ; 
Trampling with bloody heel 
Over the crashing steel, — 
All their eyes forward bent. 
Rushed the black regiment. 

" Freedom ! " their battle-cry, — 
"Freedom ! or leave to die ! " 
Ah ! and they meant the word, 
Not as with us 't is heard. 
Not a mere party shout ; 
They gave their spirits out. 
Trusted the end to God, 
And on the gory sod 
Rolled in triumphant blood. 
Glad to strike one free blow. 
Whether for weal or woe ; 
Glad to breathe one free breath, 
Though on the lips of death ; 
Praying, — alas ! in vain ! — 
That they might fall again, 
So they could once more see 
That burst to liberty ! 
This was what " freedom " lent 
To the black regiment. 

Hundreds on hundreds fell ; 
But they are resting well ; 
Scourges and shackles strong 
Never shall do them wronjr. 



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0, to the living few, 
Soldiers, be just and true ! 
Hail them as comrades tried ; 
Fight with them side by side ; 
Never, in field or tent, 
Scorn the black regiment ! 

George Henry Boker. 



BARBARA FRIETCHIE. 

Up from the meadows rich with corn, 
Clear in the cool September morn. 

The clustered spires of Frederick stand 
Green-walled by the hills of Maryland. 

Round about them orchards sweep, 
Apple and peach tree fruited deep, 

Fair as a garden of the Lord 

To the eyes of the famished rebel horde, 

On that pleasant morn of the early fall 
When Lee marched over the mountain wall, — 

Over the mountains, winding down. 
Horse and foot into Frederick town. 

Forty flags with their silver stars. 
Forty flags with their crimson bars. 

Flapped in the morning wind ; the sun 
Of noon looked down, and saw not one. 

Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then , 
Bowed with her fourscore years and ten ; 

Bravest of all in Frederick town. 

She took up the flag the men hauled down ; 

In her attic-window the staff" she set, 
To show that one heart was loyal yet. 

Up the street came the rebel tread, 
Stonewall Jackson riding ahead. 

Under his slouched hat left and right 
He glanced : the old flag met his sight. 

" Halt ! " — the dust-brown ranks stood fast ; 
" Fire ! " — out blazed the rifle-blast. 

It shivered the window, pane and sash ; 
It rent the banner with seam and gash. 

Quick, as it fell, from the broken staff 
Dame Barbara snatched the silken scarf ; 

She leane<l far out on the window-sill. 
And shook it forth with a royal will. 



"Shoot, if you must, this old gray head. 
But spare your country's flag," she said. 

A shade of sadness, a blush of shame, 
Over the face of the leader came ; 

The nobler nature within him stirred 
To life at that woman's deed and word : 

" Who touches a hair of yon gray head 
Dies like a dog ! March on ! " he said. 

All day long through Frederick street 
Sounded the tread of marching feet ; 

All day long that free flag tost 
Over the heads of the rebel host. 

Ever its torn folds rose and fell 

On the loyal winds that loved it well ; 

And through the hill-gaps sunset light 
Shone over it with a warm good-night. 

Barbara Fi'ietchie's woi'k is o'er, 

And the rebel rides on his raids no more. 

Honor to her ! and let a tear 

Fall, for her sake, on Stonewall's bier. 

Over Barbara Frietchie's grave. 
Flag of freedom and union, wave ! 

Peace and order and beauty draw 
Round thy symbol of light and law ; 

And ever the stars above look down 
On thy stars below in Frederick town ! 

John Greenleaf Whittier. 



THE CAUSE OF THE SOUTH. 

FROM " SENTINEL SONGS." 

The fallen cause still waits, — 

Its bard has not come yet. 
His song — through one of to-morrow's gates 

Shall shine — but never set. 

But M'hen he comes — he '11 sweep 

A harp with tears all stringed. 
And the very notes he strikes will weep. 

As they come, from his hand, woe-winged. 

Ah ! grand shall be his strain, 
And his songs shall fill all climes. 

And the Rebels shall rise and march again 
Down the lines of his glorious rhymes. 



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And through his verse shall gleam 

The swords that flashed in vain, 
And the men who wore the gray shall seem 

To be marshalling again. 

But hush ! between his words 

Peer faces sad and pale, 
And you hear the sound of broken chords 

Beat through the poet's wail. 

Through his verse the orphans cry — ■ 

The terrible undertone ! 
And the father's curse and the mother's sigh, 

And the desolate young wife's moan. 

I sing, with a voice too low 

To be heard beyond to-day, 
In minor keys of my people's woe ; 

And my songs pass away. 

To-morrow hears them not — 

To-morrow belongs to fame : 
My songs — like the birds' — ■ will be forgot, 

And forgotten shall be my name. 

And yet who knows ! betimes 

The grandest songs depart, 
While the gentle, humble, and low-toned rhymes 

Will echo from heart to heart. 

Abram J. Ryan. 



B^ 



LAUS DEO ! 

[On hearing the bells ring on the passage of the Constitutional 
Amendment abolishing slavery.] 

It is done ! 

Clang of bell and roar of gun 
Send the tidings up and down. 

How the belfries rock and reel ! 

How the great guns, peal on peal. 
Fling the joy from town to town ! 

Ring, bells ! 

Every .stroke exulting tells 
Of the burial hour of crime. 

Loud and long, that all may hear, 

Ring for every listening ear 
Of Eternity and Time ! 

Let us kneel : 

God's own voice is in that peal, 
And this spot is holy ground. 

Lord, forgive us ! What are we. 

That our eyes this glory see, 
That our ears have heard the sound ! 



For the Lord 

On the M'hirlwind is abroad ; 
In the earthquake he has spoken ; 

He has smitten with his thunder 

The iron walls asunder. 
And the gates of brass are broken ! 

Loud and long 

Lift the old exulting song ; 
Sing with Miriam by the sea : 

He has cast the mighty down ; 

Horse and rider sink and drown ; 
He has triumphed gloriously ! 

Did we dare. 

In our agony of prayer. 
Ask for more than He has done ? 

When was ever his right hand 

Over any time or land 
Stretched as now beneath the sun ? 

How they pale. 
Ancient myth and song and tale. 

In this wonder of our days. 
When the cruel rod of war 
Blossoms white with rigliteous law, 

And the wrath of man is praise ! 

Blotted out ! 

All within and all about 
Shall a fresher life begin ; 

Freer breathe the universe 

As it rolls its heavy curse 
On the dead and buried sin. 

It is done ! 
In the circuit of the sun 

Shall the sound thereof go forth. 
It shall bid the sad rejoice. 
It shall give the dumb a voice, 

It shall belt with joy the earth ! 

Ring and swing, 
Bells of joy ! On morning's wing 
Send the song of praise abroad ! 

With a sound of broken chains, 
Tell the nations that He reigns. 
Who alone is Lord and God ! 

John Greenleaf Whittier. 



BOSTON HYMN. 

READ IN MUSIC HALL, JAN. I, 1863. 

The word of the Lord by night 
To the watching Pilgrims came. 
As they sat by the seaside. 
And filled their hearts with flame. 



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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM. 



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God said, I am tii-ed of kings, 
I siiffer tliem no more ; 
Up to my ear the morning Tarings 
The outrage of the poor. 

Think ye I made this ball 

A field of havoc and war, 

Where tyrants great and tyrants small 

Might harry the weak and poor ? 

' My angel, — his name is Freedom, — 
Choose him to be your king ; 
He shall cut pathways east and west, 
And fend you with his wing. 

Lo ! I uncover the land 
Which I hid of old time in the West, 
As the sculptor uncovers the statue 
When he has wrought his best ; 

I show Columbia, of the rocks 
Which dip their foot in the seas, 
And soar to the air-borne flocks 
Of clouds, and the boreal fleece. 

I will divide my goods ; 
Call in the wretch and slave : 
None shall rule but the humble. 
And none but Toil shall have. 

I will have never a noble, 
No lineage counted great ; 
Fishers and choppers and ploughmen 
Shall constitute a state. 

Go, cut down trees in the forest, 
And trim the straightest boughs ; 
Cut down trees in the forest. 
And build me a wooden house. 

Call the people together, 
The young men and the sires. 
The digger in the harvest-field, 
Hireling, and him that hires ; 

And here in a pine state-house 
They shall choose men to rule 
In every needful faculty. 
In church and state and school. 

Lo, now ! if these poor men 
Can govern the land and sea, 
And make just laws below the sun, 
As planets faithful be. 

And ye shall succor men ; 

'T is nobleness to serve ; 

Help them who cannot help again : 

Piewarc from ri^ht to swerve. 



I break your bonds and masterships, 
And I unchain the slave ; 
Free be his heart and hand henceforth 
As wind and wandering wave. 

I cause from every creature 
His proper good to flow ; 
As much as he is and doeth, 
So much he shall bestow. 

But, laying hands on another 
To coin his labor and sweat. 
He goes in pawn to his victim 
For eternal years in debt. 

To-day unbind the captive. 
So only are ye unbound ; 
Lift up a people from the dust. 
Trump of their rescue, sound ! 

Pay ransom to the owner. 

And fill the bag to the brim. 

Who is the owner ? The slave is owner, 

And ever was. Pay him. 

North ! give him beauty for rags, 
And honor, South ! for his shame ; 
Nevada ! coin thy golden crags 
With Freedom's image and name. 

Up ! and the dusky race 
That sat in darkness long, 
Be swift their feet as antelopes. 
And as behemoth strong. 

Come, East and West and North, 
By races, as snow-flakes, 
And carry my purpose forth, 
Wliich neither halts nor shakes. 

My will fulfilled shall be. 
For, in daylight or in dark, 
My thunderbolt has e3'es to see 
His way honre to the rnark. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



THE PEOPLE'S SONG OF PEACE. 

FROM THE "SONG OF THE CENTENNIAL." 

The grass is green on Bunker Hill, 
The waters sweet in Brandywine ; 

The sword sleeps in the scabbard still. 
The farmer keeps his flock and vine ; 

Then who would mar the scene to-da}' 

With vaunt of battle-field or fray ? 



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The brave corn lifts in regiments 
Ten thousand sabres in the sun ; 

The ricks replace the battle-tents, 
The bannered tassels toss and run. 

The neighing steed, the bugle's blast, 
. Tliese be but stories of the past. 

The earth has healed her wounded breast, 
The cannons plough the field no more ; 

The heroes rest ! 0, let them rest 
In peace along the peaceful shore ! 

They fought for peace, for peace they fell ; 

They sleep in peace, and all is well. 

The fields forget the battles fought, 
The trenches wave in golden grain : 

Shall we neglect the lessons taught, 
And tear the wounds agape again ? 

Sweet Mother Nature, nurse the land. 

And heal lier wounds with gentle hand. 

Lo ! peace on eartli ! Lo ! floclv and fold ! 

Lo ! rich abundance, fat increase, 
And valleys clad in sheen of gold ! 

0, rise and sing a song of peace ! 
For Theseus roams the land no more. 
And Janus rests with rusted door. 

, JOAQUIN Miller. 



Perish with him the folly that seeks through 
evil good ! 

Long live the generous purpose unstained with 
human blood ! 

Not the raid of midnight terror, but the thought 
which underlies ; 

Not the borderer's pride of daring, but the Chris- 
tian's sacrifice. 

Nevermore may j'on Blire Eidges the Northern 
rifle hear, 

Nor see the light of blazing homes flash on the 
negro's spear; 

But let the free-winged angel Truth their guarded 
passes scale. 

To teach that right is more than might, and jus- 
tice more than mail ! 

So vainly shall Virginia set her battle in array ; 

In vain her trampling squadrons knead the win- 
ter snow with clay ! 

She may strike the pouncing eagle, but she dares 
not harm the dove ; 

And every gate she bars to Hate shall open wide 

to Love ! 

John Greenleaf Whittier. 



BROWN OF OSSAWATOMIE. 

John Brown of Ossawatomie spake on his 

dying day : 
' ' I will not have to shrive my soul a priest in 

Slavery's pay ; 
But let some poor slave-mother whom I have 

striven to free. 
With her children, from the gallows-stair put up 

a prayer for me ! " 

John Brown of Ossawatomie, they led him out 

to die ; 
And lo ! a poor slave-mother with her little child 

pressed nigh : 
Then the bold, blue eye grew tender, and the old 

harsh face grew mild, 
As he stooped between the jeeiing i-auks and 

kissed the negro's child ! 



The shado' '^^ of his stormj^ life that moment fell 

apa] |- 
And they -. - o blamed the bloody hand forgave 

the J ; iving lieart ; 
That kiss fi'om all its guilty means redeemed the 

good intent. 
And round the grisly fighter's hair the martyr's 

aureole bent ! 



B— 



And sovereign law, that State s colicctea wiu, 

O'er thrones and globes elate 
Sits empress, crowning good, repressing ill. 

Smit by her sacred frown. 
The fiend. Dissension, like a vapor sinks ; 

And e'en the all-dazzling crown 
Hides his faint rays, and at lier bidding shrinks. 



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Such was this heaven-loved isle, 
Than liBshos fairer and the Cretan shore ! 

No more shall freedom smile ? 
Shall Britons languish, and be men no more ? 

Since all must life resign. 
Those sweet rewards which decorate the brave 

'T is folly to decline, 
And steal inglorious to the silent gi'ave. 

Sir William Jones. 



THE FREEMAN. 

FROM "THE WINTER MORNING WALK:" 
"THE TASK," BOOK \'I. 

He is the freeman whom the truth makes free. 
And all are slaves beside. There 's not a chain 
That hellish foes confederate for his harm 
Can wind around him, but he casts it off 
With as much ease as Samson his green withes. 
He looks abroad into the varied field 
Of nature ; and though poor, perhaps, compared 
With those whose mansions glitter in his sight. 
Calls the delightful scenery all his own. 
His are the mountains, and the valley his. 
And the resplendent rivers. His to enjoy 
With a propriety that none can feel 

But who. with filial rnnf^^^or^na iv,„™S,„^ 



With ease, and is at large. The oppressor holds 
His body bound ; but knows not what a range 
His spirit takes, unconscious of a chain ; 
And that to bind him is a vain attemj)t, 
Whom God delights in, and in whom he dwells, 

WILLIAM COWPER. 



THE REFORMER. 

All grim and soiled and brown with tan, 

I saw a Strong One, in his wrath, 
Smiting the godless shrines of man 
Along his path. 

The Church beneath her trembling dome 

Essayed in vain her ghostly charm : 
Wealth shook within his gilded home 
With strange alarm. 

Fraud from his secret chambers fled 
Before the sunlight bursting in : 
Sloth drew her pillow o'er her head 
To drown the din. 

" Spare," Art implored, "yon holy pile ; 
That gi'and old time-worn turret spare ; 
Meek Reverence, kneeling in the aisle. 
Cried out, " Forbear ! " 

Gray-bearded Use, who, deaf and blind, 
Groped for his old accustomed stone, 
Leaned on his staff, and wept to find 
His seat o'erthrown. 

Young Romance raised his dreamy eyes, 

O'erhung with paly locks of gold, — ■ 

"Why smite," he asked ,in sad surprise, 

"The fair, the old?" 

Yet louder rang the Strong One's stroke. 

Yet nearer flashed his axe's gleam ; 
Shuddering and sick of heart I A\'oke, 
As from a dream. 

I looked : aside the dust-cloud rolled, — 

The Waster seemed the Builder too ; 
Upspringing from the ruined Old 
I saw the New. 



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id- 



nia ireetlom is the same 'm every state ; 
And no condition of tliis changeful life. 
So manifold in cares, whose every day 
Brings its own evil with it, makes it less. 
For he has wings that neither sickness, pain, 
Nor penury can cripple or confine ; 
No nook so narrow but he spreads them there 



'T was but the ruin of the bad, 

The wasting of the wrong and i' 
Whate'er of good the old time hai 
Was living still. 



Calm grew the brows of him I feared ; 

The frown whicli awed me passed away, 
And left behind a .smile which clieered 
Like breaking day. 



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The grain grew green on battle-plains, 

O'er swarded war-mounds grazed the cow ; 
The slave stood forging from his chains 
The spade and plough. 

Where frowned the fort, pavilions gay 

And cottage windows, Hower-entwined, 
Looked out upon the peaceful bay 
And hills behind. 

Through vine-wreathed cups with wine once red. 

The lights on brimming crystal fell. 
Drawn, sparkling, from the rivulet head 
And mossy well. 

Through prison-walls, like Heaven-sent hope, 
Fresh breezes blew, and sunbeams strayed. 
And with the idle gallows-rope 

The young child played. 

Where the doomed victim in his cell 
Had counted o'er the weary hours. 
Glad school-girls, answering to the bell, 
Came crowned with flowers. 

Grown wiser for the lesson given, 

I fear no longer, for I know 
That where the share is deepest driven 
The best fruits grow. 

The outworn rite, the old abuse. 

The pious fraud transparent grown, 
The good held captive in the use 
Of wrong alone, — ■ 

These wait their doom, from that great law 
Which makes the past time serve to-day ; 
And fresher life the world shall draw 
From their decay. 

backward-looking son of time ! 
The new is old, the old is new, 
The cycle of a change sublime 

Still sweeping through. 

So wisely taught the Indian seer ; 

Destroying Seva, forming Brahm, 
Who wake by turn Earth's love and fear. 
Are one, the same. 

Idly as thou, in that old day 

Thou mourn est, did thy sire repine ; 
So, in his time, thy child grown gray 
Shall sigh for thine. 

But life shall on and upward go ; 

Th' eternal step of Progress beats 

To that great anthem, calm and slow. 

Which God repeats. 



Take heart ! — the Waster builds again, — 

A charmed life old Goodness hath ; 
The tares may perish, — but the grain 
Is not for death. 

God works in all tilings ; all obey 

His first propulsion from the night : 
Wake thou and watch ! — the world is gray 
With morning light ! 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 



FEAGMEISTTS. 

The Love of Country. 

No factious voice 
Called them unto the field of generous fame. 
But the poor consecrated love of home ; 
No deeper feeling sways us, when it wakes 
In all its greatness. 

T/ie Graves of the Patriots. J. G. PERCIVAL. 

What pity is it 
That we can die but once to save our country ! 

Cato, Act iv. Sc. 4. ADDISON. 

The inextinguishable spark, which fires 
The soul of patriots. 



Evil Times. 
Resolved to ruin or to rule the state. 

Absalom and Achitophel, Part 11. DRYDEN. 

That bawl for freedom in their senseless mood, 
And still revolt when truth would set them free. 
License they mean, when they cry Libei'ty ; 

For who loves that must first be wise and good. 

Oji the Detraction which folloived upon my writing Certain 
Treatises, II. MILTON. 

The man that is not moved at what he reads, 
That takes not fire at their heroic deeds. 
Unworthy of the blessings of the brave, 
Is base in kind, and born to be a slave. 

Table Talk. COWPER. 

Content thyself to be obscurely good. 

When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway, 

The post of honor is a private station. 

Cato, Act iv. Sc. 4. ADDISON. 



The Tyrant's Plea. 

So spake the Fiend, and with necessity. 
The tyrant's plea, excused his devilish deeds. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON. 



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S01.DIEKS OF Freedom. 

It V't is not helm or feather, — 
¥ot ask yon despot, whether 

His plumed bandj 

Could Ltiug such hancL-j 
And hearts as ours together. 
Leave pomps to those who need 'em, — 
Give man but heart and freedom, 

And proud he braves 

The gaudiest slaver> 
That crawl where mouarchs lead 'em. 
The sword may pierce the beaver, 
Stone walls in time may sever; 

'T is mind alone, 

"Worth steel and stone, 
That keeps men free forever. 

O, the sight entratuitig. T. MOORE. 

When once more her hosts assemble, 
Let the tyrants only tremble ; 
Smile they at this idle threat ? 
Crimson tears will follow yet. 

Waterloo. BYRON. 

But William said, " He don't deserve 

The name of Faith's defender, 
Who would not venture life and limb 

To make a foe surrender. 

" Brave boys," he said, "be not dismayed, 

For the loss of one commander. 
For God will be our king this day. 

And I '11 be general under." 

From tlie Battle of the Boyne. OLD BALLAD. 

The Power that led his chosen, by pillared cloud 

and flame. 
Through parted sea and desert waste, that Power 

is still the same ; 
He fails not — He — the loyal hearts that firm on 

Him rely ; 
So put your trust in God, my boys, and keep 

your powder dry.* 

Oliver's Advice. COL. BLACKER. 



tL 



Humanity's Heroes. 

No common object to your sight displays. 
But what with pleasure Heaven itself surveys, 
A brave man struggling in the storms of fate. 
And greatly falling with a falling state. 
While Cato gives his little senate laws, 
What bosom beats not in his country's cause ? 
Who hears him groan, and does not wish to bleed ? 
Who sees him act, but envies every deed ? 

Prologue to Mr. Addison's Cato. POPE. 



* Cromwell, on a certain occasion, when his troops were about 
crossing- a river to attaclc the enemy, concluded an address with 
these words : " Put your trust in God ; but mind to keep your 
powder dry." 



But whether on the scaffold high 

Or in the battle's van. 
The fittest place where man can die 

Is where he dies for man ! 



M. J. BARRY. 



Freedom. 

I must have liberty 
Withal, as large a charter as the wind, 
To blow on whom I please. 

As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

Of old sat Freedom on the heights. 
The thunders breaking at her feet : 

Above her shook the starry lights : 
She heard the torrents meet. 

Her open eyes desire the truth. 

The wisdom of a thousand years 
Is in them. May perpetual youth 

Keep dry their light from tears ; 

That her fair form may stand and shine, 
Make bright our days and light our dreams. 

Turning to scorn with lips divine 
The falsehood of extremes ! 

0/ old sat Freedom oti the heights. TENNYSON. 

So Thought flung forward is the prophecy 
Of Truth's majestic march, and shows the way 
Where future time shall lead the proud array 

Of peace, of power, and love of liberty. 

Sir John Eowring. 

No. Freedom has a thousand charms to show. 
That slaves, howe'er contented, never know. 

Religion, virtue, truth, whate'er we call 
A blessing — Freedom is the pledge of all. 

Table Talk. COWPER. 



England. 

Daddy Neptune, one day, to Freedom did say, 

" If ever I lived upon dry land, 
The spot I should hit on would be little Britain ! " 
Says Freedom, "Why, that 's my own island !" 
0, it 's a snug little island ! 
A right little, tight little island ! 
Search the globe round, none can be found 
So happy as this little island. 

The Tight Little Island. T. DIBDIN. 

We must be free or die, who speak the tongue 
That Shakespeare spake ; the faith and morals 

hold 
Which Milton held. In everything we are sprung 
Of earth's first blood, have titles manifold. 

Poems dedicated to National Independence, Part I. Sonnet xvi, 

WORDSWORTH 



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This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle, 
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars, 
This other Eden, demi-paradise ; 
This fortress, built by Nature for herself, 
Against infection and the hand of war ; 
This happy breed of men, this little world, 
This precious stone set in the silver sea, 
"Which serves it in the office of a wall, 
Or as a moat defensive to a house. 
Against the envy of less happier ISnds ; 
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this 
England. 

King Richard II., Act ii. Sc. i . SHAKESPEARE. 



This England never did, nor never shall. 
Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror. 

Kins- John, Act v. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 



Fired at the sound, my genius spreads her 
wing, 
And flies where Britain courts the western spring ; 

Pride in their port, defiance in their eye, 
I see the lords of humankind pass by ; 
Intent on high designs, a thoughtful band, 
By forms unfashioned fresh from natui'e's hand, 
Fierce in their native hardiness of soul, 
True to imagined right, above control, — 
AVhile even the peasant boasts these rights to 

scan. 
And learns to venerate himself as man. 

Thine, Freedom, thine the blessings pictured 
here, 
Thine are those charms that dazzle and endear. 

The Traveller. GOLDSMITH. 



© 



A land of settled government, 
A land of just and old renown. 
Where freedom broadens slowly down, 

From precedent to precedent : 

Where faction seldom gathers head ; 
But, by degrees to fulness wrought. 
The strength of some diffusive thought 

Hath time and space to work and spread. 

The Land 0/ Lands. TENNYSON. 

God save our gracious king, 
Long live our noble king, 

God save the king. 
Send him victorious, 
Happy and glorious. 
Long to reign over us, 

God save the king. 

God save the King-. HENRY CAREY. 



Switzerland. 

Thus every good his native wilds impart. 
Imprints the patriot passion on his heart ; 
And e'en those ills, that round his mansion rise, 
Enhance the bliss his scanty fund supplies. 
Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms. 
And dear that hill which lifts him to the storms ; 
And as a child, when scaring sounds molest, 
Clings close and closer to the mother's breast. 
So the loud torrent and the whirlwind's roar 
But bind him to his native mountains more. 

Tlie Traveller. GOLDSMITH. 



America. 

Hail Columbia ! happy land ! 
Hail ye heroes, heaven-born band ! 
Who fought and bled in freedom's cause, 
Who fought and bled in freedom's cause, 
And when the storm of war was gone, 
Enjoyed the peace your valor won ! 
Let independence be our boast, 
Ever mindful what it cost ; 
Ever grateful for the prize, 
Let its altar reach the skies. 
Firm — united — let us be. 
Rallying round our liberty ; 
As a band of brothers joined, 
Peace and safety we shall find. 

Hail Columbia. JOSEPH HOPKINSON. 

They love their land because it is their own. 
And scorn to give aught other reason wh}"- ; 

Would shake hands with a king upon his throne. 
And think it kindness to his majesty. 

Connecticut. F. G. HALLECK. 



The Ballot-Box. 

Along the street 

The shadows meet 
Of Destiny, whose hands conceal 

The moulds of fate 

That shape the State, 
And make or mar the common weal. 

Around I see 

The powers that be ; 
I stand by Empire's primal springs ; 

And princes meet 

In every street. 
And hear the tread of uncrowned kings ! 

Not lightly fall 

Beyond recall 
The WTitten scrolls a breath can float ; 

The crowning fact 

The kingliest act 
Of Freedom is the freeman's vote ! 

The Eve 0/ Election. WhI' 



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A weapon that comes down as still 
As snow-flakes fall upon the sod ; 

But executes a freeman's will, 

As lightning does the will of God ; 

And from its force, nor doors nor locks 

Can shield you ; — 't is the hallot-box. 

A Word from a Petitioner. J. PIERPONT. 



" Centennial " Echoes. 

Sun of the stately Day, 
Let Asia into the shadow drift, 
Let Europe bask in thy ripened ray, 
And over the severing ocean lift 
A brow of broader splendor ! 
Give light to the eager eyes 
Of the Land that waits to behold thee rise : 
The gladness of morning lend her, 
"With the triumph of noon attend her. 
And the peace of the vesper skies ! 
For lo ! she cometh now 
With hope on the lip and pride on the brow, 
Stronger, and dearer, and fairer. 
To smile on the love we bear her, — 
To live, as we dreamed her and sought her, 

Liberty's latest daughter ! 
In the clefts of the rocks, in the secret places, 

We found her traces ; 
On the hills, in the crash of woods that fall, 
We heard her call ; 
When the lines of battle broke. 
We saw her face in the fiery smoke ; 
Through toil, and anguish, and desolation. 

We followed, and found her 
With the grace of a virgin Nation 
As a sacred zone around her ! 
Who shall rejoice 
With a righteous voice. 
Far-heard through the ages, if not she ? 
For the menace is dumb that defied her. 
The doubt is dead that denied her. 
And she stands acknowledged, and strong, and 
free ! 

The National Ode : read at the Celebration in Independence Hall, 
Philadelphia, July 4, 1876 BAYARD TAYLOR. 



Our fathers' God ! from out whose hand 
The centuries fall like grains of sand. 
We meet to-day, united, free. 
And loyal to our land and thee. 
To thank thee for the era done. 
And trust thee for the opening one. 

0, make thou us, through centuries long, 
In peace secure, in justice strong ; 
Around our gfft of freedom draw 
The safeguards of thy righteous law ; 
And, cast in some diviner mould, 
Let the new cycle shame the old ! 



CejitenJiial Hyjnn 
May 10, 1S76. 



Intertiational Exposition, Philadelphia, 

Whittier. 



Long as thine Art shall love true love, 
Long as thy Science truth shall know, 
Long as thine Eagle hanns no Dove, 
Long as thy Law by law shall grow, 
Long as thy God is God above. 
Thy brother every man below, — 
So long, dear Land of all my love. 
Thy name shall shine, thy fame shall glow ! 



Cente7uiial Meditation of Colu7nbia : 
Philadelphia, May 10, 1876. 



l?iter7iatio7ial Expositio7i, 
S. l.ANIER. 



Who cometh over the hills. 

Her garments with morning sweet, 

The dance of a thousand rills 

Making music before her feet ? 

Her presence freshens the air. 

Sunshine steals light from her face, 

The leaden footstep of Care 

Leaps to the tune of her pace, 

Fairness of all that is fair, 

Grace at the heart of all grace ! 

Sweetener of hut and of hall, 

Bringer of life out of naught. 

Freedom, 0, fairest of all 

The daughters of Time and Thought ! 

Ode to Fi-eedojn : Ce7ttennial An7iiversa7y of the Battle of Co7icord, 
April 19, 1875. J. R. Lowell. 



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POEMS OF THE SEA. 



THE SEA. 

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO IV. 

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, 
There is a rapture on the lonely shore, 
There is society where none intrudes 
By the deep sea, and music in its roar : 
I love not man the less, but nature more. 
From these our interviews, in which I steal 
From all I may be, or have been before. 
To mingle with the universe, and feel 
What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. 

Eoll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean, — roll! 
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain ; 
Man marks the earth with ruin, — ■ his control 
Stops with the shore ; — upon the watery plain 
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain 
A shadow of man's ravage, save his own, 
"When, for a moment, like a drop of rain, 
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan. 
Without a grave, unknelled, uncoffined, and un- 
known. 

His steps are not upon thy paths, — thy fields 
Are not a spoil for him, — thou dost arise 
And shake him from thee ; the vile strength 

he wields 
For earth's destruction thou dost all despise. 
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies. 
And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray 
And howling, to his gods, where haply lies 
His petty hope in some near port or bay. 
And dasliest him again to earth : — there let him 

lay. 

The armaments which thunderstrike the walls 
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake 
And monarchs tremble in their capitals, 
The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make 
Their clay creator the vain title take 
Of lord of thee and arbiter of war, — • 
These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake, 
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar 
Alike the Armada's pride or spoils of Trafalgar. 



Thy shores are empires, changed in all save 

thee ; 
Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are 

they? 
Thy waters wasted them while they were free. 
And many a tyrant since ; their shores obey 
The stranger, slave, or savage ; their decay 
Has dried up realms to deserts : not so thou ; 
Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play. 
Time writes no wrinkles on thine azure brow ; 
Such as ci'eation's dawn beheld, thourollest now. 

Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's 

form 
Glasses itself in tempests ; in all time. 
Calm or convulsed, — in breeze, or gale, or 

storm, 
Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime 
Dark -heaving ; boundless, endless, and sub- 
lime. 
The image of Eternity, — the throne 
Of the Invisible ! even from out thy slime 
The monsters of the deep are made ; each zone 
Obeys thee ; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, 
alone. 

And I have loved thee. Ocean ! and my joy 

Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be 

Borne, like thy bubbles, onward ; from a boy 

I wantoned with thy breakers, — they to me 

Were a delight ; and if the freshening sea 

Made them a terror, 't was a pleasing fear ; 

For I was as it were a child of thee. 

And trusted to thy billows far and near, 

And laid my hand upon thy mane, — as I do 

here. 

Lord Byron. 



THE SEA. 

Beautiful, sublime, and glorious ; 

Mild, majestic, foaming, free, — 
Over time itself victorious, 

Image of eternity ! 



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POEMS OF THE SEA. 



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Sun and moon and stars shine o'er thee, 

See thy surface ebb and flow, 
Yet attempt not to explore thee 

In thy soundless depths below. 

"Whether morning's splendors steep thee 
With the rainbow's glowing grace, 

Tempests rouse, or navies sweep rhee, 
'T is but for a moment's space. 

Earth, — her valleys and her mountains, 

Mortal man's behests obey ; 
The unfathomable fountains 

Scoff his search and scorn his sway. 

Such art thou, stupendous Ocean ! 

But, if overwhelmed by thee. 
Can we think, without emotion, 

What must thy Creator be ? 

BERNARD BARTON. 



h 



THE OCEAN. 

[Written at Scarborough, in the Summer of 1805.] 

All hail to the ruins, the rocks, and the shores ! 

Thou wide-rolling Ocean, all hail ! 

Now brilliant with sunbeams and dimpled with 

oars, 
Now dark with the fresh-blowing gale, 
While soft o'er thy bosom the cloud-shadows sail, 
And the silver-winged sea-fowl on high. 
Like meteors bespangle the sky, 
Or dive in the gulf, or triumphantly ride. 
Like foam on the surges, the swans of the tide. 

From the tumult and smoke of the city set free, 
With eager and awful delight, 
From the crest of the mountain I gaze upon thee, 
I gaze, — and am changed at the sight ; 
For mine eye is illumined, my genius takes flight. 
My soul, like the sun, with a glance 
Embraces the boundless expanse, 
And moves on thy waters, wherever they roll. 
From the day-darting zone to the night-shadowed 
pole. 

My spirit descends where the dayspring is born. 

Where the billows are rubies on lire. 

And the breezes that rock the light cradle of 

morn 
Are sweet as the Phoenix's pyre. 
regions of beauty, of love and desire ! 
gardens of Eden ! in vain 
Placed far on the fathomless main. 
Where Nature with Innocence dwelt in her 

youth. 
When pure was her heart and unbroken her 

truth. 



But now the fair rivers of Paradise wind 
Through countries and kingdoms o'erthrown ; 
Where the giant of tyranny crushes mankind. 
Where he reigns, — and will soon reign alone ; 
For wide and more wide, o'er the sun-beaming 

zone 
He stretches his hundred-fold arms. 
Despoiling, destroying its charms ; 
Beneath his broad footstep the Ganges is dry, 
And the mountains recoil from the flash of his 

eye. 

Thus the pestilent Upas, the demon of trees. 

Its boughs o'er the wilderness spreads. 

And with livid contagion polluting the breeze. 

Its mildewing influence sheds ; 

The birds on the wing, and the flowers in their 

beds. 
Are slain by its venomous breath. 
That darkens the noonday with death. 
And pale ghosts of travellers wander around. 
While their mouldering skeletons whiten the 

ground. 

Ah ! why hath Jehovah, in forming the world. 

With the waters divided the land, 

His ramparts of rocks round the continent 

hurled. 
And cradled the deep in his hand. 
If man may transgress his eternal command. 
And leap o'er the bounds of his birth, 
To ravage the uttermost earth, 
And violate nations and realms that should be 
Distinct as the billows, yet one as the sea ? 

There are, gloomy Ocean, a brotherless clan, 

Who traverse thy banishing waves, 

The poor disinherited outcasts of man, 

Whom Avarice coins into slaves. 

From the homes of their kindred, their fore- 
fathers' graves. 

Love, friendship, and conjugal bliss. 

They are dragged on the hoary abyss ; 

The shark hears their shrieks, and, ascending 
to-day, 

Demands of the spoiler his share of the prey. 

Then joy to the tempest that whelms them be- 
neath. 

And makes their destruction its sport ; 

But woe to the winds that propitiously breathe, 

And waft them in safety to port. 

Where the vultures and vampires of Mammon 
resort ; 

Where Europe exultingly drains 

The life-blood from Africa's veins ; 

Where man rules o'er man with a merciless rod,. 

And spurns at his footstool the image of God ! 



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The hour is approaching, — a temible hour ! 
And Vengeance is bending her bow ; 
Ah'eady the clouds of the hurricane lower, 
And the rock-rending whirlwinds blow ; 
Back rolls the huge Ocean, hell opens below ; 
The floods return headlong, • — they sweep 
The slave-cultured lands to the deep, 
In a moment entombed in the horrible void. 
By their Maker himself in his anger destroyed. 

Shall this be the fate of the cane-planted isles, 

More lovely than clouds in the west. 

When the sun o'er the ocean descending in smiles, 

Sinks softly and sweetly to rest ? 

No ! — Father of mercy ! befriend the opprest ; 

At the voice of thy gospel of peace 

May the sorrows of Africa cease ; 

And slave and his master devoutly unite 

To walk in thy freedom and dwell in thy light ! 

As homeward my weary-winged Fancy extends 

Her star-lighted course through the skies. 

High over the mighty Atlantic ascends. 

And turns upon Europe her eyes : 

Ah me ! what new prospects, new horrors, arfse ! 

I see the war-tempested flood 

All foaming, and panting with blood ; 

The panic-struck Ocean in agony roars, 

Eebounds from the battle, and flies to his shores. 

For Britannia is wielding the trident to-day, 

Consuming her foes in her ire, 

And hurling her thunder with absolute sway 

From her wave-ruling chariots of fire. 

She triumphs ; the winds and the waters conspire 

To spread her invincible name ; 

The universe rings with her fame ; 

But the cries of the fatherless mix with her 

praise, 
And the tears of the widow are shed on her baj^s. 

Britain, dear Britain ! the land of my birth ; 

Isle most enchantingly fair ! 

Thou Pearl of the Ocean ! thou Gem of the 

Earth ! 
my Mother, my Mother, beware, 
For wealth is a phantom, and empire a snare ! 
0, let not thy birthright be sold 
For reprobate glory and gold ! 
Thy distant dominions like wild graftings shoot, 
They weigh down thy trunk, they will tear up 

thy root, — 

The root of thine oak, my country ! that stands 

Eock-planted and flourishing free ; 

Its branches are stretched o'er the uttermost 

lands, 
And its shadow f^clipses the sea. 
The blood of our ancestors nourished the tree ; 



From their tombs, from their ashes, it sprung ; 

Its boughs with their trophies are hung ; 

Their spirit dwells in it, and — hark ! for it 

spoke, 
The voice of our fathers ascends from their oak : 

"Ye Britons, who dwell where we conquered of 

old. 
Who inherit our battle-field graves ; ' 

Though poor were your fathers, — gigantic and 

bold, 
AVe were not, we could not be, slaves ; 
But firm as our rocks, and as free as our waves, 
The spears of the Eomans we broke, 
We never stooped under their yoke. 
In the shipwreck of nations we stood up alone, — 
The world was great Csesar's, but Britain our 

own." 

JAMES MONTGOMERY. 



HAMPTON BEACH. 

The sunlight glitters keen and bright, 

Where, miles away. 
Lies sti'etching to my dazzled sight 
A luminous belt, a misty light. 
Beyond the dark pine blufls and wastes of sandy 
gray. 

The tremulous shadow of the Sea ! 

Against its ground 
Of silvery light, rock, hill, and tree, 
Still as a picture, clear and free. 
With varying outline mark the coast for miles 
around. 

On — on — we tread with loose-flung rein 

Our seaward way, 
Through dark-green fields and blossoming 

grain, 
Where the wild brier-rose skirts the lane, 
And bends above our heads the flowering locust 
spray. 

Ha ! like a kind hand on my brow 

Comes this fresh breeze, 
Cooling its dull and feverish glow. 
While through my being seems to flow 
The breath of a new life, — the healing of the 
seas ! 

Now rest we, where this grassy mound 

His feet hath set 
In the great waters, which have bound 
His granite ankles greenly round 
With long and tangled moss, and weeds with 
cool spray wet. 



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POEMS OF THE SEA. 



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Good-by to pain and care ! I take 

Mine ease to-day ; 
Here, where the sunny waters hreak, 
And ripples this keen breeze, I shake 
All burdens from the heart, all weary thoughts 
away, 

I draw a freer breath — I seem 
' Like all I see — 

Waves in the sun — the white-winged gleam 
Of sea-birds in the slanting beam — • 
And far-off sails which flit before the south-wind 
free. 

So when Time's veil shall fall asunder, 

The soul may know 
No fearful change, nor sudden wonder, 
Nor sink the weight of mystery under, 
But with the upward rise, and with the vastness 
grow. 

And all we shrink from now may seem 

No new revealing, — 
Familiar as our childhood's stream. 
Or pleasant memory of a dream. 
The loved and cherished Past upon the new life 
stealing. 

Serene and mild, the untried light 

May have its dawning ; 
And, as in summer's northern night 
The evening and the dawn unite, 
The sunset hues of Time blend with the soul's 
new morning. 

I sit alone ; in foam and spray 

Wave after wave 
Breaks on the rocks which, stern and gray. 
Shoulder the broken tide away. 
Or murmurs hoarse and strong through mossy 
cleft and cave. 

What heed I of the dusty land 

And noisy town ? 
I see the mighty deep expand 
From its white line of glimmering sand 
To where the blue of heaven on bluer waves 
shuts down ! 

In listless quietude of mind, 

I yield to all 
The change of cloud and wave and wind ; 
. And passive on the flood reclined, 
I wander with the waves, and with them rise 
and fall. 

But look, thou dreamer ! — wave and shore 

In shadow lie ; 
The night-wind warns me back once more 



To where, my native hill-tops o'er. 
Bends like an arch of fire the glowing sunset 
sky! 

So then, beach, bluff, and wave, farewell ! 

I bear with me 

No token stone nor glittering shell, 

But long and oft shall Memory tell 

Of this brief thoughtful hour of musing by the 

Sea. 

John Greenleaf whittier. 



TWILIGHT AT SEA. 

The twilight hours, like birds, flew by. 

As lightly and as free, 
Ten thousand stars were in the sky. 

Ten thousand on the sea ; 
For every wave, witli dimpled face. 

That leaped upon the air, 
Had caught a star in its embrace, 

And held it trembling there. 

AMELIA B. WELBY. 



OCEAN. 



FROM "THE COURSE OF TIME," BOOK I. 

Great Ocean ! strongest of creation's sons, 

Unconquerable, unreposed, untired. 

That rolled the wild, profound, eteriTal bass 

In natui'e's anthem, and made music such 

As pleased tlie ear of God ! original, 

Unmarred, unfaded work of Deity ! 

And un burlesqued by mortal's puny skill ; 

From age to age enduring, and unchanged, 

Majestical, inimitable, vast, 

Loud uttering satire, day and night, on each 

Succeeding race, and little pompous work 

Of man ; unfallen, religious,' holy sea ! 

Thou bowedst thy glorious head to none, fearedst 

none, 

Heardst none, to none didst honor, but to God 

Thy Maker, only worthy to receive 

Thy great obeisance. 

Robert pollok. 



THE SEA. 

Behold the Sea, 
The opaline, the plentiful and strong. 
Yet beautiful as is the rose in June, 
Fresh as the trickling rainbow of July : 
Sea full of food, the nourisher of kinds, 
Purger of earth, and medicine of men ; 
Creating a sweet climate by my breath, 
Washing out harms and griefs from memory. 
And, in my naathematic ebb and flow, 



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POEMS OF THE SEA. 



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Giving a hint of that which changes not. 
Rich are the sea-gods : — who gives gifts but they ? 
Theygropethesea for pearls, but more than pearls: 
They pluck Force thence, and give it to the wise. 
For every wave is wealth to Daedalus, 
"Wealth to the cunning artist who can work 
This matchless strength. Where shall he find, 

waves ! 
A load your Atlas shoulders cannot lift ? 
I with my hammer pounding evermore 
The rocky coast, smite Andes into dust. 
Strewing my bed, and, in another age. 
Rebuild a continent of better men. 
Then I unbar the doors : my paths lead out 
The exodus of nations : I disperse 
Men to all shores that front the hoary main. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



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THE DISAPPOINTED LOVER. 

FROM "THE TRIUMPH OF TIME." 

I WILL go back to the great sweet mother — 
Mother and lover of men, the Sea. 

1 will go down to her, I and none other, 
Close with her, kiss her, and mix her with me ; 

Cling to her, strive with her, hold her fast. 

fair white mother, in days long past 

•Born without sister, born without brother, 
Set free my soul as thy soul is free, 

fair green-girdled mother of mine. 

Sea, that art clothed with the sun and the rain. 
Thy sweet hard kisses are strong like wine. 

Thy large embraces are keen like pain. 
Save me and hide me with all thj-- waves, 
Find me one grave of thy thousand graves, 
Those pure cold populous graves of thine, — 

"Wrought without hand in a world without stain. 

1 shall sleep, and move with the moving ships, 
Change as the winds change, veer in the tide ; 

My lips will feast on the foam of thy lips, 

I shall rise with thy rising, with thee subside ; 
Sleep, and not know if she be, if she were, — 
Filled full with life to the eyes and hair. 
As a rose is full filled to the rose-leaf tips 
"W"ith splendid summer and perfume and pride. 

This woven raiment of nights and days. 

Were it once cast off and unwound from me, 

Naked and glad would I walk in thy ways, 
Alive and aware of thy waves and thee ; 

Clear of the whole world, hidden at home. 

Clothed with the green, and crowned with the 
foam, 

A pulse of the life of thy straits and bays, 
A vein in the heart of the streams of the Sea. 
ALGERNON Charles Swinburne. 



DOVER BEACH. 

The sea is calm to-night. 

The tide is full, the moon lies fair 

Upon the Straits ; — on the French coast, the light 

Gleams and is gone ; the cliffs of England stand, 

Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay. 

Come to the window ; sweet is the night air ! 

Only, from the long line of spray 

Where the ebb meets the moon-blanched sand, 

Listen ! you hear the grating roar 

Of pebbles which the waves suck back, and fling. 

At their return, up the high strand. 

Begin and cease, and then again begin. 

With tremulous cadence slow, and bring 

The eternal note of sadness in. 

Matthew Arnold. 



ADDRESS TO THE OCEAN. 

THOU vast Ocean ! ever-sounding Sea ! 
Thou symbol of a drear immensity ! 
Thou thing that windest round the solid world 
Like a huge animal, which, downward hurled 
From the black clouds, lies weltering and alone. 
Lashing and writhing till its strength be gone ! 
Thy voice is like the thunder, and thy sleep 
Is as a giant's slumber, loud and deep. 
Thou speakest in the east and in the west 
At once, and on thy heavily laden breast 
Fleets come and go, and shapes that have no life 
Or motion, yet are moved and meet in strife. 
The earth has naught of this : no chance or 

change 
Ruffles its surface, and no spirits dare 
Give answer to the tempest-wakened air ; 
But o'er its wastes the weakly tenants range 
At will, and wound its bosom as they go : 
Ever the same, it hath no ebb, no flow : 
But in their stated rounds the seasons come, 
And pass like visions to their wonted home ; 
And come again, and vanish ; the young Spring 
Looks ever bright with leaves and blossoming ; 
And Winter always winds his sullen horn. 
When the wild Autumn, with a look forlorn. 
Dies in his stormy manhood ; and the skies 
Weep, and flowers sicken, when the summer flies. 
0, wonderful thou art, great element, 
And fearful in thy spleeny humors bent, 
And lovely in repose ! thy summer form 
Is beautiful, and when thy silver waves 
Make music in earth's dark and winding caves, 
I love to wander on thy pebbled beach. 
Marking the sunlight at the evening hour. 
And hearken to the thoughts thy waters teach , — 
Eternity — Eternity — and Power. 

Bryan waller Procter (Barry Cornwall). 



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POEMS OF THE SEA. 



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ON" THE LOSS OF THE ROYAL GEORGE. 

WRITTEN WHEN THE NEWS ARRIVED ; 1782. 

Toll for the brave, — 

The brave that are no more ! 
All sunk beneath the wave, 

Fast by their native shore- 
Eight hundred of the brave, 

Whose courage well was tried, 
Had made the vessel heel. 

And laid her on her side. 

A land-breeze shook the shrouds, 

And she was overset ; 
Down went the Royal George, 

With all her crew comjalete. 

Toll for the brave ! 

Brave Kempenfelt is gone ; 
His last sea-fight is fought. 

His work of glory done. 

It was not in the battle ; 

No tempest gave the shock ; 
She sprang no fatal leak ; 

She ran upon no rock. 

His sword was in its sheath, 

His fingers held the pen. 
When Kempenfelt went down 

With twice four hundred men. 

Weigh the vessel up, 

Once dreaded by our foes ! 
And mingle with our cup 

The tear that England owes. 

Her timbers yet ai'e sound, 

And she may float again. 
Full charged with England's thunder, 

And plough the distant main. 

But Kempenfelt is gone ; 

His victories are o'er ; 
And he and his eight hundred 

Shall plough the wave no more. 

William Cowper. 



THE SHIPWRECK. 

In vain the cords and axes were prepared. 
For now the audacious seas insult the yard ; 
High o'er the ship they throw a horrid shade, 
And o'er her burst in terrible cascade. 
Uplifted on the surge, to heaven she flies. 
Her shattered top half buried in the skies. 



Then headlong plunging thunders on the ground ; 
Earth groans ! air trembles ! and the deeps re- 
sound ! 
Her giant-bulk the dread concussion feels, 
And quivering with the wound in torment reels. 
So reels, convulsed with agonizing throes, 
The bleeding bull beneath the murderer's blows. 
Again she plunges ! hark ! a second shock 
Tears her strong bottom on the marble rock : 
Down on the vale of death, with dismal cries. 
The fated victims, shuddering, roll their eyes 
In wild despair ; while yet another stroke, 
With deep convulsion, rends the solid oak ; 
Till like the mine, in whose infernal cell 
The lurking demons of destruction dwell. 
At length asunder torn her frame divides, 
And, crashing, spreads in ruin o'er the tides. 

0, were it mine with tuneful Maro's art 
To wake to sjanpathy the feeling heart ; 
Like him the smooth and mournful verse to dress 
In all the pomp of exquisite distress. 
Then too severely taught by cruel fate. 
To share in all the perils I relate. 
Then might I with unrivalled strains deplore 
The impervious horrors of a leeward shoi-e ! 

As o'er the surge the stooping mainmast hung, 
Still on the rigging thirty seamen clung ; 
Some, struggling, on a broken crag were cast. 
And there by oozy tangles grappled fast. 
Awhile they bore the o'erwhelming billows' rage. 
Unequal combat with their fate to wage ; 
Till, all benumbed and feeble, they forego 
Their slippery hold, and sink to shades below. 
Some, from the main-yard-arm impetuous thrown 
On marble ridges, die without a groan. 
Three with Palemon on their skill depend, 
And from the wreck on oars and rafts descend. 
Now on the mountain wave on high they lide. 
Then downward plunge beneath the involving 

tide, 
Till one, who seems in agony to strive. 
The whirling breakers heave on shore alive ; 
The rest a speedier end of anguish knew , 
And pressed the stony beach, a lifeless crew ! 

WILLIAM FALCONER. 



THE SEA FIGHT. 

AS TOLD BY AN ANCIENT MARINER. 

Ah, yes, — the fight ! Well, messmates, well, 
I served on board that Ninety-eight ; 

Yet what I saw I loathe to tell. 
To-night be sure a crushing weight 

Upon my sleeping breast, a hell 
Of dread, will sit. At any rate. 

Though land-locked here, a watch I '11 keep, — 

Grog cheers us still. Who cares for sleep ? 



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613 



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That Ninety-eight I sailed on board ; 

Along the Frenchman's coast we flew ; 
Right aft the rising tempest roared ; 

A noble first-rate hove in view ; 
And soon high in the gale there soared 

Her streanied-out bunting, — red, white, blue 
We cleared for fight, and landward bore, 
To get between the chase and shore. 

Masters, I cannot spin a yarn 

Twice laid with words of silken stuff, 

A fact 's a fact ; and ye may larn 

The rights o' this, though wild and rough 

My words may loom. 'T is your consarn. 
Not mine, to understand. Enough ; — 

We neared the Frenchman where he lay, 

And as we neared, he blazed away. 

We tacked, hove to ; we filled, we wore ; 

Did all that seamanship could do 
To rake him aft, or by the fore, — 

Now rounded off", and now broached to ; 
And now our starboard broadside bore, 

And showers of iron through and through 
His vast hull hissed ; our larboard then 
Swept from his threefold decks his men. 

As we, like a huge serpent, toiled, 

And wound about, through that wild sea. 

The Frenchman each manoeuvre foiled, — 
'Vantage to neither there could be. 

Whilst thus the waves between us boiled, 
We both resolved right manfully 

To fight it side by side ; — began 

Then the fierce strife of man to man. 

Gun bellows forth to gun, and pain 
Rings out her wild, delirious scream ! 

Redoubling thunders shake the main ; 
Loud crashing, falls the shot-rent beam. 

The timbers with the broadsides strain ; 
The slippery decks send up a steam 

From hot and living blood, and high 

And shrill is heard the death-pang cry. 

The shredded limb, the splintered bone. 
The unstiffened corpse, now block the way ! 

Who now can hear the dying groan ? 
The trumpet of the judgment-day, 

Had it pealed forth its mighty tone, 

We should not then have heard, — to say 

Would be rank sin ; but this I tell, 

That could alone our madness quell. 

Upon the forecastle I fought 

As captain of the for'ad gun. 
A scattering shot the carriage caught ! 

What mother then had known her son 



Of those who stood around ? — distraught. 
And smeared with gore, about they run. 
Then fall, and writhe, and howling die ! 
But one escaped, — that one was I ! 

Night darkened round, and the storm pealed : 

To windward of us lay the foe. 
As he-to leeward over keeled, 

He could not fight his guns below ; 
So just was going to strike, — when reeled 

Our vessel, as if some vast blow 
From an Almighty hand had rent 
The huge ship from her element. 

Then howled the thunder. Tumult then 
Had stunned herself to silence. Round 

Were scattered lightning-blasted men ! 

Our mainmast went. All stifled, drowned. 

Arose the Frenchman's shout. Again 
The bolt bui'st on us, and we found 

Our masts all gone, — our decks all riven : 

Man's war mocks faintly that of heaven ! 

Just then, — nay, messmates, laugh not now, - 

As I, amazed, one minute stood 
Amidst that rout, — I know not how, — 

'T was silence all, — the raving flood, 
The guns that pealed from stem to bow. 

And God's own thunder, — nothing could 
I then of all that tumult hear. 
Or see aught of that scene of fear, — 

My aged mother at her door 

Sat mildly o'er her humming wheel ; 

The cottage, orchard, and the moor, — 
I saw them plainly all. I '11 kneel. 

And swear I saw them ! 0, they wore 
A look all peace ! Could I but feel 

Again that bliss that then I felt. 

That made my heart, like childhood's, melt ! 

The blessed tear was on mj'- cheek. 

She smiled with that old smile I know : 

"Turn to me, mother, turn and speak," 
Was on my quivering lips, — when lo ! 

All vanished, and a dark, red streak 
Glared wild and vivid from the foe. 

That flaslied upon the blood-stained water, — 

For fore and aft the flames had caught her. 

She struck and hailed us. On us fast 
All burning, helplessly, she came, — 

Near, and more near ; and not a mast 
Had we to help us from that flame. 

'T was then the bravest stood aghast, — 
'T was then the wicked on the name 

(With danger and with guilt appalled) 

Of God, too long neglected, called. 



-^ 



t& 



614 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



The eddying flames with ravening tongue 
Now on our ship's dark bulwarks dash, — 

"We almost touched, — when ocean rung 
Down to its depths with one loud crash ! 

In heaven's top vault one instant hung 
The vast, intense, and blinding flash ! 

Then all was darkness, stillness, dread, — 

The wave moaned o'er the valiant dead. 

She 's gone ! blown up ! that gallant foe ! 

And though she left us in a plight, 
We floated still ; long were, I know. 

And hard, the labors of that night 
To clear the wreck. At length in tow 

A frigate took us, when 't was light ; 
And soon an English port we gained, — 
A hulk all battered and blood-stained. 

So many slain, — so many drowned ! 

I like not of that fight to tell. 
Come, let the cheerful grog go round ! 

Messmates, I 've done. A spell, ho ! spell, - 
Though a pressed man, I '11 still be found 

To do a seaman's duty well. 
I wish our brother landsmen knew 
One half we jolly tars go through. 

ANONYMOUS. 



^- 



CASABIANCA. 

[Youngf Casablanca, a boy about thirteen years old, son of the 
Admiral of the Orient, remained at his post (in the Battle of the Nile) 
after the ship had taken fire and all the guns had been abandoned, 
and perished in the explosion of the vessel, when the flames had 
reached the powder. J 

The boy stood on the burning deck. 

Whence all but him had fled ; 
The flame that lit the battle's wreck 

Shone round him o'er the dead. 

Yet beautiful and bright he stood. 

As born to rule the storm ; 
A creature of heroic blood, 

A proud though childlike form. 

The flames rolled on ; he would not go 

Without his fatlier's word ; 
That father, faint in death below, 

His voice no longer heard. 

He called aloud, ' ' Say, father, say. 

If yet my task be done ! " 
He knew not that the chieftain lay 

Unconscious of his son. 

" Speak, father ! " once again he cried, 

" If I may yet be gone ! " 
And but the booming shots replied, 

And fast the flames rolled on. 



Upon his brow he felt their breath. 

And in his waving hair. 
And looked from that lone post of death 

In still yet brave despair ; 

And shouted but once more aloud, 

" My father ! must I stay ?" 
While o'er him fast, through sail and shroud, 

The wreathing fires made way. 

They wrapt the ship in splendor wild, 

They caught the flag on high. 
And streamed above the gallant child. 

Like banners in the sky. 

There came a burst of thunder sound ; 

The boy, — Oh ! where was he 1 
Ask of the winds, that far around 

With fragments strewed the sea, — 

With shroud and mast and pennon fair, 
That well had borne their part, — 

But the noblest thing that perished there 
Was that young, faithful heart. 

FELICIA HEMANS. 



THE MARINER'S DREAM. 

In slumbers of midnight the sailor-boy lay ; 

His hammock swung loose at the sport of the 
wind ; 
But watch-worn and weary, his cares flew away. 

And visions of happiness danced o'er his mind. 

He dreamt of his home, of his dear native 
bowers, 
And pleasures that waited on life's merry 
morn ; 
While Memory stood sideways, half covered with 
flowers. 
And restored every rose, but secreted its thorn. 

Then Fancy her magical pinions spread wide. 
And bade the young dreamer in ecstasy rise ; 

Now far, far behind him the green waters glide. 
And the cot of his forefathers blesses his eyes. 

The jessamine clambers in flowers o'er the thatch, 
And the SAvallow chirps sweet from her nest in 
the wall ; 

All trembling with transport he raises the latch. 
And the voices of loved ones reply to his call. 

A father bends o'er him with looks of delight ; 
His cheek is impearled with a mother's warm 
tear ; 
And the lips of the boy in a love-kiss unite 
With the lips of the maid whom his bosom 
holds dear. 



fl- 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



615 



ft 



u- 



The heart of the sleeper beats high in his breast ; 
Joy quickens his pulse, all his hardships seem 
o'er ; 
And a murmur of happiness steals through his 
rest, — 
" God ! thou hast blest me, — I ask for no 
more." 

Ah ! whence is that flame which now bursts on 
his eye ? 
Ah ! what is that sound which now larums 
his ear ? 
'T is the lightning's red glare, painting hell on 
the sky ! 
'T is the crash of the thunder, the groan of the 
sphere ! 

He springs from his hammock, he flies to the 
deck ; 
Amazement confronts him with images dire ; 
Wild winds and mad waves drive the vessel a 
wreck ; 
The masts fly in splinters ; the shrouds are on 
fire. 

Like mcs.intains the billows tremendously swell ; 

In vain the lost wi'etch calls on mercy to save ; 
Unseen hands of spirits are ringing his knell, 

And the death-angel flaps his broad wing o'er 
the wave ! 

sailor-boy, woe to thy dream of delight ! 
In darkness dissolves the gay frost-work of 
bliss. 
Where now is the picture that Fancy touched 
bright, — 
Thy parents' fond pressure, and love's honeyed 
kiss? 

sailor-boy ! sailor-boy ! never again 

Shall home, love, or kindred th}'^ wishes repay ; 

Unblessed and unhonored, down deep in the 
main, 
Full many a fathom, thy frame shall decay. 

No tomb shall e'er plead to remembrance for 
thee. 
Or redeem form or fame from the merciless 
surge ; 
But the white foam of waves shall thy winding- 
sheet be. 
And winds in the midnight of winter thy 
dirge ! 

On a bed of green sea-flowers thy limbs shall be 
laid, — j_ 

Around thy white bones the red coral shall 
grow ; 



Of thy fair yellow locks threads of amber be 
made. 
And every part suit to thy mansion below. 

Days, months, years, and ages shall circle awaj^. 
And still the vast waters above thee shall roll ; 

Earth loses thy pattern forever and aye, — 
sailor-boy ! sailor-boy ! peace to thy soul ! 
William Dimond. 



POOR JACK. 

Go, patter to lubbers and swabs, do ye see, 

'Bout danger, and fear, and the like ; 
A tight-water boat and good sea-room give me, 

And it a'n't to a little I '11 strike. 
Though the tempest topgallant-masts smack 
smooth should smite, 

And shiver each splinter of wood, 
Clear the deck, stow the yards, and bouse every- 
thing tight. 

And under reefed foresail we '11 scud : 
Avast ! nor don't think me a milksop so soft 

To be taken for trifles aback; 
For they say there 's a Providence sits up aloft. 

To keep watch for the life of poor Jack ! 

I heard our good chaplain palaver one day 

About souls, heaven, mercy, and such ; 
And, my timbers ! what lingo he 'd coil and belay; 

Why, 't was just all as one as High Dutch ; 
For he said how a sparrow can't founder, d'ye see, 

Without orders that come down below ; 
And a many fine things that proved clearly to me 

That Providence takes us in tow : 
"For," says he, do you mind me, "let storms 
e'er so oft 

Take the topsails of sailors aback. 
There 's a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft. 

To keep watch for the life of poor Jack ! " 

I said to our Poll, — for, d' ye see, she would 
cry, — 

When last we weighed anchor for sea, 
"What argufies snivelling and piping your eye ? 

Why, what a blamed fool you must be ! 
Can't you see, the world's wide, and there's 
room for us all, 

Both for seamen and lubbers ashore ? 
And if to old Davy I should go, friend Poll, 

You never will hear of me more. 
What then ? All 's a hazard : come, don't be so 
soft : 

Perhaps I may laughing come back ; 
For, d' ye see, there 's a cherub sits smiling aloft, 

To keep watch for the life of poor Jack ! " 

■ — ^ 



a- 



616 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



-a 



D' ye mind me, a sailor should be every inch 

All as one as a piece of the ship, 
And with her brave the world, not offering to flinch 

From the moment the anchor 's a-trip. 
As for me, in all weathers, all times, sides, and 
ends, 

Naught 's a trouble from duty that springs. 
For my heart is my Poll's, and my rhino 's my 
friend's, 

And as for my will, 't is the king's. 
Even when my time comes, ne'er believe me so soft 

As for grief to be taken aback ; 
For the same little cherub that sits up aloft 

Will look out a good berth for poor Jack ! 

Charles Dibdin. 



U^ 



NAPOLEON AND THE BRITISH SAILOR. 

I LOVE contemplating — apart 

From all his homicidal glory — 
The traits that soften to our heart 
Napoleon's glory ! 

'T was when his banners at Boulogne 
Armed in our island every freeman. 
His navy chanced to capture one 
Poor British seaman. 

They suffered him — I know not how — 

Unprisoned on the shore to roam ; 
And aye was bent his longing brow 
On England's home. 

His eye, methinks ! pursued the flight 

Of birds to Britain half-way over ; 
"With envy they could reach the white 
Dear cliffs of Dover. 

A stormy midnight watch, he thought. 

Than this sojourn would have been dearer. 
If but the storm his vessel brought 
To England nearer. 

At last, when care had banished sleep, 

He saw one morning, dreaming, doting. 
An empty hogshead from the deep 
Come shoreward floating ; 

He hid it in a cave, and wrought 

The livelong day laborious ; lurking 
Until he launched a tiny boat 
By mighty working. 

Heaven help us ! 't was a thing beyond 
Description wretched ; such a wherry 
Perhaps ne'er ventured on a pond, 
Or crossed a ferry. 



For, ploughing in the salt-sea field. 

It would have made the boldest shudder ; 
Untarred, uncompassed, and unkeeled, — 
No sail, no I'udder. 

From neighboring woods he interlaced 

His sorry skiff with wattled willows ; 
And thus equipped he would have passed 
The foaming billows, — 

But Frenchmen caught him on the beach. 

His little Argo sorely jeering ; 
Till tidings of him chanced to reach 
Napoleon's hearing. 

"With folded arms Napoleon stood, 

Serene alike in peace and danger ; 
And, in his wonted attitude. 
Addressed the stranger : — 

" Rash man, that wouldst yon Channel pass 

On twigs and staves so rudely fashioned, 
Thy heart withsome sweet British lass 
Must be impassioned." 

" 1 have no sweetheart," said the lad ; 

" But — absent long from one another — 
Great was the longing that I had 
To see my mother." 

"And so thou shalt," Napoleon said, 
" Ye 've both my favor fairly Avon ; 
A noble mother must have bred 
So brave a son." 

He gave the tar a piece of gold. 

And , with a flag of truce, commanded 
He should be shipped to England Old, 
And safely landed. 

Our sailor oft could scarcely shift 

To find a dinner, plain and hearty, 
But never changed the coin and gift 

Of Bonaparte. 

THOMAS Campbell. 



HO"W'S MY BOY? 

" Ho, sailor of the sea ! 

How 's my boy — my boy ? " 

" "What 's your boy's name, good wife, 

And in what ship sailed he ? '' 

"My boy John — 
He that went to sea — 
"What care I for the ship, sailor ? 
My boy 's my boy to 3ne. 



-ff 



I 



\S- 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



617 



-a 



' ' You come back from sea, 

And not know my John ? 

I might as well have asked some landsman, 

Yonder down in the town. 

There 's not an ass in all the parish 

But he knows my John. 

" How 's my boy — my boy ? 

And unless you let me know, 

I '11 swear you are no sailor, 

Blue jacket or no, 

Brass buttons or no, sailor. 

Anchor and crown or no ! 

Sure his ship was the 'Jolly Briton'" — 

"Speak low, woman, speak low ! " 

" And why should I speak low, sailor. 
About my own boy John ? 
If I was loud as I am proud 
I 'd sing him over the town ! 
Why should I speak low, sailor ? " 
" That good ship went down." 

" How 's my boy — my boy ? 

AVhat care I for the ship, sailor ? 

I was never aboard her. 

Be she afloat or be she aground. 

Sinking or swimming, I '11 be bound 

Her owners can afford her ! 

I say, how 's my John ? " 

" Every man on board went down, 

Every man aboard her." ■ 

" How 's my boy — my boy ? 
What care I for the men, sailor ? 
I 'm not their mother — 
How 's my boy — my boy ? 
Tell me of him and no other ! 
How 's my boy — ■ my boy ? " 

Sydney Dobell. 



G 



HERVE EIEL. 

On the sea and at the Hogue, sixteen hundred 

ninety-two, 
Did the English fight the French, — woe to 

France ! 
And, the thirty-first of May, helter-skelter 

through the blue. 
Like a crowd of frightened jiorpoises a shoal of 

sharks pursue, 
Came crowding, ship on ship to St. Malo on 

the Ranee, 
With the English fleet in view. 



'T was the squadron that escaped, with the vic- 
tor in full chase. 
First and foremost of the drove, in his great 
ship, Damfreville ; 
Close on him fled, great and small, 
Twenty-two good ships in all ; 
And they signalled to the place, 
" Help the winners of a race ! 
Get us guidance, give us harbor, take us quick, 

— or, quicker still, 
Here 's the English can and will ! " 

Then the pilots of the place put out brisk and 
leaped on board. 
"Why, what hope or chance have ships like 
these to pass ? " laughed they ; 
" Rocks to starboard, rocks to port, all the pas- 
sage scarred and scored, 
Shall the Formidable here, with her twelve and 
eighty guns. 
Think to make the river-mouth by the single 
narrow way. 
Trust to enter where 't is ticklish for a craft of 
twenty tons, 
And with flow at full beside ? 
Now 't is slackest ebb of tide. 
Reach the mooring ? Rather say, 
While rock stands or water runs, 
Not a ship will leave the bay ! " 

Then was called a council straight ; 

Brief and bitter the debate : 

" Here 's the English at our heels ; would you 

have them take in tow 
All that 's left us of the fleet, linked together 

stern and bow. 
For a prize to Plymouth Sound ? 
Better run the ships aground ! " 

(Ended Damfreville his speech.) 
' ' Not a minute more to wait ! 
Let the captains all and each 
Shove ashore, then blow up, burn the vessels 
on the beach ! 
France must undergo her fate." 

" Give the word ! " But no such word 
Was ever spoke or heard ; 

For up stood, for out stepped, for in struck 
amid all these, 
A captain ? A lieutenant ? A mate, — first, 
second, third ? 
No such man of mark, and meet 
With his betters to compete ! 
But a simple Breton sailor pressed b}' Tour- 
ville for the fleet, — 
A poor coasting-pilot he, Herve Riel the Croi- 
sickese. 



-ff 



a-: 



618 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



-^a 



B- 



And " What mockery or malice have we here ? " 

cries Herve Kiel ; 
" Are you mad, you Malouins ? Are you cow- 
ards, fools, or rogues ? 
Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took the 

soundings, tell 
On my fingers every bank, every shallow, every 
swell 
'Twixt the offing here and Greve, where the 
river disembogues ? 
Are you bouglit by English gold ? Is it love the 
lying 's for ? 
Morn and eve, night and day, 
Have I piloted your bay, 
Entei'ed free and anchored fast at the foot of 
Solidor. 
Burn the fleet, and ruin France ? That were 
Avorse than fifty Hogues ! 
Sirs, they know I speak the truth ! Sirs, 
believe me, there 's a way ! 
Only let me lead the line. 

Have the biggest ship to steer, 
Get this Formidable clear. 
Make the others follow mine. 
And I lead them most and least by a passage I 
know well. 
Eight to Solidor, past Greve, 

And there lay them safe and sound ; 
And if one ship misbehave, ■ — 

Keel so much as grate the ground, — 
Why, I 've nothing but my life ; here 's my 
head ! " cries Herve Kiel. 

Not a minute more to wait. 

" Steer us in, then, small and great ! 

Take the helm, lead the line, save the squad- 
ron ! " cried its chief. 
Captains, give the sailor place ! 

He is Admiral, in brief. 
Still the north-wind, by God's grace. 
See the noble fellow's face 
As the big ship, with a bound, 
Clears the entry like a hound, 
Keeps the passage as its inch of way were the 
wide sea's profound ! 

See, safe through shoal and rock, 

How they follow in a flock. 
Not a ship that misbehaves, not a keel that 
grates the ground. 

Not a spar that comes to grief ! 
The peril, see, is past. 
All are harbored to the last ; 
And just as Herve Eiel halloos "Anchor ! " — 

s\ire as fate, 
Up the English come, too late. 

So the storm subsides to calin ; 
They see the green trees wave 
On the heights o'erlooking Greve : 



Hearts that bled are stanched with balm. 
" Just our rapture to enhance. 

Let tlie English rake the bay. 
Gnash their teeth and glare askance 

As they cannonade away ! 
'Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding on the 

Eance ! " 
How hoj^e succeeds despair on each captain's 

countenance ! 
Outburst all with one accord, 
" This is Paradise for Hell ! 
Let France, let France's King 
Thank the man that did the thing ! " 
What a shout, and all one word, 

" Herve Eiel," 
As he stepped in front once more, 
Not a symptom of surprise 
In the frank blue Breton eyes. 
Just the same man as before. 

Then said Damfreville, " My friend, 
I must speak out at the end. 

Though I find the speaking hard : 
Praise is deeper than the lips ; 
You have saved the king his ships. 

You must name your own reward. 
Faith, our sun was near eclipse ! 
Demand whate'er you will, 
France remains your debtor still. 
Ask to heart's content, and have ! or my name 's 
not Damfreville." 

Then a beam of fun outbroke 
On the bearded mouth that spoke, 
As the honest heart laughed through 
Those frank eyes of Breton blue : 
" Since I needs must say my say, 

Since on board the duty 's done. 

And fiom Malo Eoads to Croisic Point, what 
is it but a run ? 
Since 't is ask and have I may, — 

Since the others go ashore, — 
Come ! A good whole holiday ! 

Leave to go and see my wife, whom I call the 
Belle Aurore ! " 

That he asked, and that he got, — nothing more. 

Name and deed alike are lost ; 
Not a pillar nor a post 

In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it befell ; 
Not a head in white and black 
On a single fishing-smack 

In memory of the man but for whom had gone 
to wrack 

All that France saved from the fight whence 
England bore the bell. 
Go to Paris ; rank on rank 

Search the heroes flung pell-mell 



-d 



I 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



619 



--a 



On the Louvre, face and flank ; 

You shall look long enough ere you come to 

Herve Riel. 
So, for better and for worse, 
Herve Eiel, accept my verse ! 
In my verse, Herve Eiel, do thou once more 
Save the squadron, honor France, love thy wife 

the Belle Aurore. 

ROBERT BROWNING. 



TACKING SHIP OFF SHORE. 

The weather leach of the topsail shivers, 

The bowlines strain and the lee slirouds slacken. 

The braces are taut and the lithe boom quivers. 
And the waves with the coming squall-cloud 
blacken. 

Open one point on the weather bow 

Is the light-house tall on Fire Island Head ; 

There 's a shade of doubt on the captain's brow. 
And the pilot watches the heaving lead. 

I stand at the wheel and with eager eye 
To sea and to sky and to shore I gaze. 

Till the muttered order of " Full and by ! " 
Is suddenly changed to " Full for stats ! " 

The ship bends lower before the breeze. 

As her broadside fair to the blast she lays ; 

And she swifter spiings to the rising seas 
As the pilot calls, " Stand by for stays ! " 

It is silence all, as each in his place, 

With the gathered coils in his hardened hands. 
By tack and bowline, by sheet and brace. 

Waiting the watchword impatient stands. 

And the light on Fire Island Head draws near, 
As, trumpet-winged, the pilot's shout 

From his post on the bowsprit's heel I hear, 
AVith the welcome call of "Ready ! about ! " 

No time to spare ! it is touch and go, 
And the captain growls, "Down helm! hard 
down ! " 
As my weight on the whirling spokes I throw. 
While heaven grows black with the storm- 
cloud's frown. 

High o'er the knight-heads flies the spray, 
As we meet the shock of the plunging sea ; 

And my shoulder stiff' to the wheel I lay, — 
Asl answer, "Ay, ay, sir ! hard a lee ! " 

With the swerving leap of a startled steed 
The ship flies fast in the eye of the wind. 



The dangerous shoals on the lee r-ecede. 

And the headland white we have left behind. 

The topsails flutter, the jibs collapse 

And belly and tug at the groaning cleats ; 

The spanker slaps and the mainsail flaps. 
And thunders the order, " Tacks and sheets!" 

Mid the rattle of blocks and the tramp of the 
crew 
Hisses the rain of the rushing squall ; 
The sails are aback from clew to clew. 

And now is the moment for "Mainsail, 
HAUL ! " 

And the heavj' yards like a baby's toy 
By fifty strong arms are swiftly swung ; 

She holds her way, and I look with joy 

For the first white spray o'er the bulwarks 
flung. 

" Let go, and haul ! " 't is the last command, 
And the head-sails fill to the blast once more ; 

Astern and to leeward lies the land. 

With its breakers white on the shingly shore. 

What matters the reef, or the rain, or the squall ? 

I steady the helm for the open sea ; 
The first-mate clamors, " Belay there, all ! " 

And the captain's breath once more comes free. 

And so oft" shore let the good ship fly ; 

Little care I how the gusts may blow. 
In my fo" castle-bunk in a jacket dry, — 

Eight bells have struck, and my watch is below. 

WALTER F. Mitchell. 



THE TREASURES OF THE DEEP. 

What hid'st thou in thy treasure-caves and 
cells ? 
Thouhollow-soundingand mysterious main ! — 
Pale glistening pearls and rainbow-colored shells. 
Bright things which gleam unrecked of and in 
vain ! — 
Keep, keep thy riches, melancholy sea ! 
We ask not such from thee. 

Yet more, the depths have more ! — what wealth 
untold. 
Far down, and shining through their stillness 
lies ! 
Thou hast the starry gems, the burning gold. 
Won from ten thousand royal argosies ! — 
Sweep o'er thy spoils, thou wild and wrathful 
main ! 
Earth claims not these again. 



■^ 



[& 



620 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



^Q 



Yet more, the depths have more ! — thy waves 
have rolled 
Above the cities of a world gone by ! 
Sand hath filled up the palaces of old, 

Sea-weed o'ergrown the halls of revelry. 

Dash o'er them, Ocean, in thy scornful play ! 

Man yields them to decay. 

Yet more, the billows and the depths have more ! 
High hearts and brave are gathered to thy 
breast ! 
They hear not now the booming waters roar, 

The battle-thunders will not break their rest. — 
Keep thy red gold and gems, thou stormy grave ! 
Give back the,.*ue and brave ! 

Give back the lost and lovely ! — those for whom 
The place was kept at board and hearth so long ! 
The prayer went up through midnight's breath- 
less gloom, 
And the vain yearning woke midst festal song ! 
Hold fast thy buried isles, thy towers o'er- 
thrown, — • 
But all is not thine own. 

To thee the love of woman hath gone down, 

Dark flow thy tides o'er manhood's noble head, 
O'er youth's bright locks, and beauty's flowery 
crown ; 
Yet must thou hear a voice, — Restore the 
dead ! 
Earth shall reclaim her precious things from 
thee ! — 
Restore the dead, thou sea ! 

Felicia Hemans. 



t& 



"OLD IRONSIDES." 

[Written with reference to the proposed breaking up of the famous 
U. S. frigate " Constitution. "J 

Ay, tear her tattered ensign down ! 

Long has it waved on high. 
And many an eye has danced to see 

That banner in the sky ; 
Beneath it rung the battle-shout, 

And burst the cannon's roar : 
The meteor of the ocean air 

Shall sweep the clouds no more ! 

Her deck, once red with heroes' blood. 

Where knelt the vanquished foe. 
When winds were hurrying o'er the flood 

And waves were white below, 
No more shall feel the victor's tread, 

Or know the conquered knee : 
The harpies of the shore shall pluck 

The eagle of the sea ! 



better that her shattered hulk 

Should sink beneath the wave ! 
Her thunders shook the mighty deep. 

And there should be her grave : 
Nail to the mast her holy flag. 

Set every threadbare sail. 
And give her to the god of stormS, 

The lightning and the gale ! 

OLIVER Wendell Holmes. 



THE INCHCAPE ROCK. 

No stir in the air, no stir in tlie sea, — 
The ship was as still as she could be ; 
Her sails from heaven received no motion ; 
Her keel was steady in the ocean. 

Without either sign or sound of their shock. 
The waves flowed over the Inchcape rock ; 
So little they rose, so little they fell. 
They did not move the Inchcape bell. 

The holy Abbot of Aberbrothok 
Had placed that bell on the Inchcape rock ; 
On a buoy in the storm it floated and swung, 
And over the waves its warning rung. 

When the rock was hid by the surges' swell. 
The mariners heard the warning bell ; 
And then they knew the perilous rock. 
And blessed the Abbot of Aberbrothok. 

The sun in heaven was shining gay, — 

All things were joyful on that day ; 

The sea-birds screamed as they wheeled around, 

And there was joyance in their sound. 

The buoy of the Inchcape bell was seen, 
A darker speck on the ocean green ; 
Sir Ralph, the rover, walked his deck, 
And he fixed his eye on the darker speck. 

He felt "the cheering power of spring, — 
It made him whistle, it made him sing ; 
His heart was mirthful to excess ; 
But the rover's mirth was wickedness. 

His eye was on the bell and float : 
Quoth he, " My men, put out the boat ; 
And row me to the Inchcape rock, 
And I '11 plague the piiest of Aberbrothok." 



The boat is lowered, the boatmen row. 
And to the Inchcape rock they go ; 
Sir Ralph bent over from the boat, 
And cut the warning bell from the float. 



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POEMS OF THE SEA. 



621 



a 



Down sank the bell with a gurgling sound ; 

Tlie bubbles rose, and burst around. 

Quoth Sir Ralph, "The next who comes to the 

rock 
Will not bless the Abbot of Aberbrothok." 

Sir Ealph, the rover, sailed away, — 
He scoured the seas for many a day ; 
And now, grown rich with plundered store, 
He steers his course to Scotland's shore. 

So thick a haze o'erspreads the sky 
They cannot see the sun on high ; 
The wind hath blown a gale all day ; 
At evening it hath died away. 

On the deck the rover takes his stand ; 
So dark it is they see no land. 
Quoth Sir Ralph, " It will be lighter soon. 
For there is the dawn of the rising moon." 

"Canst hear," said one, "the breakers roar ? 
For yonder, methinks, should be the shore. 
Now where we are I cannot tell. 
But I wish we could hear the Inchcape bell." 

They hear no sound ; the swell is strong ; 
Though the wind hath fallen, they drift along ; 
Till the vessel strikes with a shivering shock, — 
Christ ! it is the Inclicape rock ! 

Sir Ralph, the rover, tore his hair ; 
He cursed himself in his despair. 
Tlie waves rush in on every side ; 
The ship is sinlving beneath the tide. 

But ever in liis dying fear 
One dreadful sound he seemed to hear, — 
A sound as if with the Inchcape bell 
The Devil below was ringing his knell. 

ROBERT SOUTHEY. 



f& 



THE THREE FISHERS. 

Three fishers went sailing out into the west, — 

Out into the west as the sun went down ; 
Each thought of the woman who loved him the 
best, 
And the children stood watching them out of 
the town ; 
For men nuist work, and women must weep ; 
And there 's little to earn, and many to keep, 
Tliough the harbor bar be moaning. 

Three wives sat up in the light-house tower. 

And trimmed the lamps as the sun Avent down ; 
And they looked at the squall, and they looked 
at the shower. 
And the rack it came rolling up, ragged and 
brown ; 



But men must work, and women must weep, 
Though storms be sudden, and waters deep, 
And the harbor bar be moaning. 

Three corpses lay out on the shining sands 

In the morning gleam as the tide went down, 
And the women are watching and wringing their 
hands, 
For those who will never come back to the 
town ; 
For men must work, and women must weep, ■ — 
And the sooner it 's over, the sooner to sleep, — 
And good-by to the bar and its moaning. 
Charles Kingslev. 



THE SANDS 0' DEE. 

" Mary, go and call the cattle home, 
And call the cattle home, 
And call the cattle home. 
Across the sands o' Dee ! " 
The western wind was wild and dank wi' foam, 
And all alone went she. 

The creeping tide came up along the sand. 
And o'er and o'er the sand. 
And round and round the sand. 
As far as eye could see ; 
The blinding mist came down and hid the land : 
And never home came she. 

"0, is it weed, or fish, or floating hair. — 
A tress o' golden hair, 
0' drowned maiden's hair, — 
Above the nets at sea ? 
Was never salmon yet that shone so fair, 
Among the stakes on Dee." 

They rowed her in across the rolling foam, - — 
The cruel, ciawling foam, 
The cruel, hungry foam, — 
To her grave beside the sea ; 
But still the boatmen hear her call the cattle home 
Across the sands o' Dee. 

Charles Kingsley. 



FLOTSAM AND JETSAM. 

The sea crashed over the grim gray rocks, 

It thundered beneath the height. 
It swept by reef and sandy dune, 
It glittered beneath the harvest moon, 
That bathed it in yellow light. 

Shell, and sea-weed, and sparkling stone, 

It flung on the golden sand. 
Strange relics torn from its deepest caves. 
Sad trophies of wild victorious waves. 

It scattered upon the strand. 



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622 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



-a 



Spars that had looked so strong and true, 

At many a gallant launch, 
Shattered and broken, flung to the shore, 
While the tide in its wild triumphant roar 

Kang a dirge for the vessel stanch. 

Petty trifles that lovers had brought 

From many a foreign clime. 
Snatched by the storm from the clinging clasp 
Of hands that the lonely will never grasp, 

While the world yet measures time. 

Back, back to its depths went the ebbing tide, 

Leaving its stores to I'est, 
Unsought and unseen in the silent bay. 
To be gathered again, ere close of day, 

To the ocean's mighty breast. 

Kinder than man art thou, sea ; 

Frankly we give our best, 
Truth, and hope, and love, and faith, 
Devotion that challenges time and death 

Its sterling worth to test. 

We fling them down at our darling's feet. 

Indifference leaves them there. 
The careless footstep turns aside. 
Weariness, changefulness, scorn, or pride, 

Bring little of thought or care. 

No tide of human feeling turns ; 

Once ebbed, love never flows ; 
The pitiful wreckage of time and strife, 
The flotsam and jetsam of human life. 

No saving reflux knows. 

ANONYMOUS. 



[0^ 



SEA WEED. 

When descends on the Atlantic 

The gigantic 
Storm-wind of the equinox, 
Landward in his wrath he scourges 

The toiling surges, 
Laden with sea-weed from the rocks : 

Fi'om Bermuda's reefs ; from edges 

Of sunken ledges. 
In some far-ofl", bright Azore ; 
From Bahama, and the dashing, 

Silver-flashing 
Surges of San Salvador ; 

From the tumbling surf, that buries 

The Orkneyan skerries, 
Answering the hoarse Hebrides ; 
And from wrecks of ships, and drifting 

Spars, uplifting 
On the desolate, rainy seas ; — ■ 



Evei' drifting, drifting, drifting 

On the shifting 
Currents of the restless main ; 
Till in sheltered coves, and reaches 

Of sandy beaches, 
All have found repose again. 

So when storms of wild emotion 

Strike the ocean 
Of the poet's soul, erelong, 
From each cave and rocky fastness , " 

In its vastness. 
Floats some fragment of a song : 

Fi'om the far-ofl' isles enchanted 

Heaven has planted 
With the golden fruit of Truth ; 
From the flashing surf, whose vision 

Gleams Elysian 
In the tropic cKme of Youth ; 

From the strong Will, and the Endeavor 

That forever 
Wrestles with the tides of Fate ; 
From the wreck of Hopes far-scattered, 

Tempest-shattered, 
Floating waste and desolate ; — 

Ever drifting, drifting, drifting 

On the shifting 
Currents of the restless heart ; 
Till at length in books recorded, 

They, like hoarded 
Household words, no more depart. 

Henry wadsworth Longfellow. 



GULF-WEED. 

A AVEAP.Y weed, tossed to and fro, 

Drearily drenched in the ocean brine. 
Soaring high and sinking low. 

Lashed along without will of mine ; 
Sport of the spume of the surging sea ; 

Flung on the foam, afar and anear, 
Mark my manifold mystery, — 

Growth and grace in their place appear. 

I bear round berries, gray and red, 

Piootless and rover though I be ; 
My spangled leaves, when nicely spread, 

Arboresce as a trunkless tree ; 
Coi"als curious coat me o'er, 

White and hard in apt array ; 
Mid the wild waves' rude uproar 

Gracefully grow I, night and day. 



^ 



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POEMS OF THE SEA. 



62^ 



*~Q} 



Hearts there are on the sounding shore, 

Something whispers soft to nie, 
Eestless and roaming forevermore, 

Like this weary weed of the sea ; 
Bear they yet on each beating breast 

The eternal type of the wondrous whole, 
Growth unfolding amidst unrest, 

Grace informing with silent soul. 

Cornelius George fenner. 



B- 



SEA LIFE. 

FROM "THE PELICAN ISLAND." 

Light as a flake of foam upon the wind 
Keel-upward from the deep emerged a shell, 
Shaped like the moon ere half her horn is filled; 
Fraught with young life, it righted as it rose. 
And moved at will along the yielding water. 
The native pilot of this little bark 
Put out a tie? of oars on either side. 
Spread to the wafting breeze a twofold sail, 
And mounted up and glided down the billow 
In happy freedom, ]ileased to feel the air, 
And wander iii the luxuiy of light. 
Worth all the dead creation, in that hour. 
To me appeared this lonely Nautilus, 
My fellow-being, like myself, alive. 
Entranced in contemplation, vague yet sweet, 
I watched its vagrant course and rippling wake. 
Till I forgot the sun amidst the heavens. 

It closed, sunk, dwindled to a point, then 
nothing ; 
AVhile tlie last bubble crowned the dimpling 

eddy, 
Through which mine eyes still giddily pursued it, 
A joyous creature vaulted through the air, — 
The aspiring fish that fain would be a bird. 
On long, light wings, that flung a diamond- 
shower 
Of dew-drops round its evanescent form, 
Sprang into light, and instantly descended. 
Ere I could greet the stranger as a friend, 
Or mourn his quick departure on the surge, 
A shoal of dolphins tumbling in wild glee. 
Glowed with such orient tints, they might have 

been 
The rainbow's offspring, when it met the ocean 
In that resplendent vision I had seen. 
Wliile yet in ecstasy I hung o'er these, 
With every motion pouring out fresh beauties, 
As though the conscious colors came and went 
At i)leasure, glorying in their subtle changes, — 
Enormous o'er the flood, Leviathan 
Looked forth, and from his roaring nostrils sent 
Two fountains to the sky, then plunged amain 
In headlong pastime through the closing gulf. 



These were but preludes to the revelry 
That reigned at sunset : then the deep let loose 
Its blithe adventurers to sport at large. 
As kindly instinct taught them ; buoyant shells. 
On stormless voyages, in fleets or single, 
Wherried their tiny mariners ; aloof. 
On wing-like fins, in bow-and-arrow figures. 
The flying-fishes darted to and fro ; 
While spouting whales projected watery col- 
umns. 
That turned to arches at their height, and seemed 
The skeletons of crystal palaces 
Built on the blue expanse, then perishing. 
Frail as the element which they wei'c made of ; 
Dolphins, in gambols, lent the lucid brine 
Hues richer than the canopy of eve. 
That overhung the scene with gorgeous clouds. 
Decaying into gloom more beautiful 
Than the sun's golden liveries which they lost : 
Till light that hides, and darkness that reveals 
The stars, — exchanging guard, like sentinels 
Of day and night, — transformed the face of 

nature : 
Above was wakefulness, silence around, 
Beneath, repose, — repose that reached even me. 
Power, will, sensation, memory, failed in turn ; 
My very essence seemed to pass away. 
Like a thin cloud that melts across the moon, 
Lost in the blue immensity of heaven. 

James montgomerv. 



THE CORAL INSECT. 

Toil on ! toil on ! ye ephemeral train. 
Who build in the tossing and treacherous main ; 
Toil on ! foi' the wisdom of man ye mock, 
With your sand-based structures and domes of 

rock. 
Your columns the fathomless fountains' cave. 
And your arches spring up to the crested wave ; 
Ye 're a puny race thus to boldly rear 
A fabric so vast in a realm so drear. 

Ye bind the deep with your secret zone, — 
The ocean is sealed, and the surge a stone ; 
Fresh wreaths from tlie coral pavement spring, 
Like the terraced pride of Assyria's king ; 
The turf looks green where the breakers rolled ; 
O'er the whirlpool ripens the rind of gold ; 
The sea-snatched isle is the home of men, 
And mountains exult where the wave hath been. 

But why do ye plant, 'neath the billows dark, 
The wrecking reef for the gallant bark ? 
There are snares enough on the tented field. 
Mid the blossomed sweets that the valleys yield ; 
There are serpents to coil ere the flowers are up. 
There 's a poison drop in man's purest cup. 



--C? 



[&-: 



624 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



■^ 



There are foes that watch for his cradle breath, 
And why need ye sow the floods with death ? 

With mouldering bones the deeps are white, 
From the ice-clad pole to the tropics bright ; 
The mermaid hath twisted her fingers cold 
With the mesh of the sea-boy's curls of gold. 
And the gods of the ocean have frowned to see 
The mariner's bed in their halls of glee ; 
Hath earth no graves, that ye thus must spread 
The boundless sea for the thronging dead ? 

Ye build — ye build — but ye enter not in, 
Like the tribes whom the desert devoured in 

their sin ; 
From the land of promise ye fade and die 
Ere its verdure gleams forth on your weary eye : 
As the kings of the cloud-crowned pyramid, 
Their noiseless bones in oblivion hid. 
Ye slumber unmarked mid the desolate main. 
While the wonder and pride of your works re- 
main. 

Lydia Huntley sigourney. 



fa 



THE CORAL REEF. 

FROM "THE PELICAN ISLAND." 

Every one, 
By instinct taught, performed its little task, — 
To build its dwelling and its sepulchre, 
From its own essence exquisitely modelled ; 
There breed, and die, and leave a progeny, 
Still multiplied beyond the reach of numbers. 
To frame new cells and tombs ; then breed and die 
As all their ancestors had done, — and rest, 
Hermetically sealed, each in its shrine, 
A statue in this temple of oblivion ! 
Millions of millions thus, from age to age, 
With simplest skill and toil unweariable. 
No moment and no movement unimproved. 
Laid line on line, on terrace terrace spread. 
To swell the heightening, brightening, gradual 

mound. 
By marvellous structure climbing towards the day. 

A point at first 
It peered above those waves ; a point so small 
I just perceived it, fixed where all was floating ; 
And when a bubble crossed it, the blue film 
Expanded like a sky above the speck ; 
That speck became a hand-breadth ; day and 

night 
It spread, accumulated, and erelong 
Presented to ray view a dazzling plain. 
White as the moon amid the sapphire sea ; 
Bare at low water, and as still as death. 
But when the tide came gurgling o'er the sm-face 
'T was like a resurrection of the dead : 



From graves innumerable, punctures fine 
In the close coral, capillary swarms 
Of reptiles, horrent as Medusa's snakes, 
Covered the bald -pate reef ; 

Erelong the reef o'ei'topt the spring-flood's height. 
And mocked the billows when they leapt upon it, 
L^nable to maintain their slippery hold, 
And falling down in foam-wreaths round its 

verge. 
Steep were the flanks, with precipices sharp. 
Descending to their base in ocean gloom. 
Chasms few and narrow and irregular 
Formed harbors, safe at once and perilous, — 
Safe for defence, but perilous to enter. 
A sea-lake shone amidst the fossil isle. 
Reflecting in a ring its cliff's and caverns, 
With heaven itself seen like a lake below. 

JAMES Montgomery. 



THE CORAL GROVE. 

Deep in the wave is a coral grove. 
Where the purple mullet and gold-fish rove ; 
Where the sea-flower spreads its leaves of blue 
That never are wet with falling dew, 
But in bright and changeful beauty shine 
Far down in the green and glassy brine. 
The floor is of sand, like the mountain drift, 
And the pearl-shells spangle the flinty snow ; 
From coral rocks the sea-plants lift 
Their boughs, where the tides and billows flow : 
The water is calm and still below, 
For the winds and waves are absent there, 
And the sands are bright as the stars that glow 
In the motionless fields of upper air. 
There, with its waving blade of green, 
The sea-flag streams through the silent water. 
And the crimson leaf of the dulse is seen 
To blush, like a banner bathed in slaughter. 
There, with a light and easy motion. 
The fan -coral sweeps through the clear deep sea; 
And the yellow and scarlet tufts of ocean 
Are bending like corn on the upland lea : 
And life, in rare and beautiful forms. 
Is sporting amid those bowers of stone. 
And is safe when the wrathful Spirit of storms 
Has made the top of the wave his own. 
And when the ship from his fury flies. 
Where the myriad voices of Ocean roar ; 
When the wind-god frowns in the murky skies. 
And demons are waiting the wreck on shore ; 
Then, far below, in the peaceful sea. 
The purple mullet and gold-fish rove. 
Where the waters murmur tranquilly. 
Through the bending twigs of the coral grove. 
James Gates Percival. 



S^ 



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POEMS OF THE SEA. 



625 



ra 



THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS. 

Th is is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign, 

Sails the unshadowed main, — 

The venturous bark that flings 
On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings 
In gulfs enchanted, where the Siren sings. 

And coral reefs lie bare, 
"Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their 
streaming hail". 

Its webs of living gauze no more unfurl ; 

Wrecked is the ship of pearl ! 

And every chambered cell. 
Where its dim dreaming life was wont to dwell, 
As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell. 

Before thee lies revealed, — 
Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed ! 

Year after year beheld the silent toil 

That spread his lustrous coil ; 

Still, as .the spiral grew. 
He left the past year's dwelling for the nsAV, 
Stole with soft step its shining archway through, 

Built up its idle door, 
Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the 
old no more. 

Thanks for the heavenly message brought by 
thee, 
Child of the wandering sea. 
Cast from her lap, forlorn ! 
From thy dead lips a clearer note is born 
Thau ever Triton blew from wreathed horn ! 

While on mine ear it rings. 
Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice 
that sings : — 

Build thee more stately mansions, my soul. 

As the swift seasons roll ! 

Leave thy low-vaulted past ! 
Let each new temple, nobler than the last. 
Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, 

Till thou at length art free, 

Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting 

sea ! 

Oliver Wendell Holmes. 



U 



THE SEA. 

The sea ! the sea ! the open sea ! 

The blue, the fresh, the ever free ! 

Without a mark, without a bound, 

It runneth the earth's M'ide regions round ; 

It plays with the clouds ; it mocks the skies 

Or like a cra<lled creature lies. 



I 'm on the sea ! I 'm on the sea ! 

I am where I would ever be ; 

With the blue above, and the blue below. 

And silence wheresoe'er I go ; 

If a storm should come and awake the deep, 

What matter ? / shall ride and sleep. 

I love, 0, hoio I love to ride 
On the fierce, foaming, bursting tide. 
When every mad wave drowns the moon. 
Or whistles aloft his tempest tune, 
And tells how goeth the world below, 
And why the sou'west blasts do blow. 

I never was on the dull, tame shore. 
But I loved the great sea more and more. 
And backwards flew to her billowy breast. 
Like a bird that seeketh its mother's nest ; 
And a mother she tvas, and is, to me ; 
For I was born on the open sea ! 

The waves were white, and red the morn, 
In the noisy hour when I was born ; 
And the whale it whistled, the porpoise rolled. 
And the dolphins bared their backs of gold ; 
And never was heard such an outcry wild 
As welcomed to life the ocean-child ! 

I 've lived since then, in calm and strife. 
Full fifty summers, a sailor's life. 
With wealth to spend and a power to range, 
But never have sought nor sighed for change ; 
And Death, whenever he comes to me. 
Shall come on the wild, unbounded sea I 

Bryan waller Procter {Barry Cornwall], 



SONG OF THE EMIGRANTS IN BERMUDA. 

Where the remote Bermudas ride 

In the ocean's bosom unespied. 

From a small boat that rowed along 

The listening winds received this song : 

' ' What should we do but sing His praise 

That led us through the watery maze 

Where he the huge sea monsters wracks, 

That lift the deep upon their backs. 

Unto an isle so long unknown. 

And yet far kinder than our own ? 

He lands us on a grassy stage. 

Safe from the storms, and prelate's rage ; 

He gave us this eternal spring 

Which here enamels everything, 

And sends the fowls to us in care 

On daily visits through the air. 

He hangs in shades the orange bright 

Like golden lamps in a green night. 



^ 



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626 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



n 



And does in the pomegranates close 
Jewels more rich than Ormus shows : 
He makes the figs our mouths to meet, 
And tlirovvs the melons at our feet ; 
But apples, plants of such a price, 
No tree could ever bear them twice. 
With cedars cliosen by his hand 
From Lebanon he stores the land ; 
And makes the hollow seas that roar 
Proclaim the ambergris on shore. 
He cast (of which we rather boast) 
The gospel's pearl upon our coast ; 
And in these rocks for lis did frame 
A temple where to sound his name. 
0, let our voice his praise exalt 
Till it arrive at heaven's vault, 
Which then perhaps rebounding may 
Echo beyond the Mexique bay ! " — 
Thus sung they in the English boat 
A holy and a cheerful note ; 
And all the way, to guide their chime, 
With falling oars they kept the time. 

Andrew Marvell. 



& 



A WET SHEET AND A FLOWING SEA. 

A WET sheet and a flowing sea, — 

A wind that follows fast, 
And fills the white and rustling sail, 

And bends the gallant mast, — 
And bends the gallant mast, my boys, 

While, like the eagle free. 
Away the good ship flies, and leaves 

Old England on the lee. 



for a soft and gentle wind ! 

I heard a fair one cry ; 
But give to me the snoring breeze 

And white waves heaving high, — • 
And white waves heaving high, my boys. 

The good ship tight and free ; 
The woi'ld of waters is our home. 

And merry men are we. 



There 's tempest in j^on horned moon, 

And lightning in yon cloud ; 
And hark the music, mariners ! 

The wind is piping loud, — 
The wind is pi])ing loud, my boys. 

The lightning flashing free ; 
While the hollow oak our palace is. 

Our heritage the sea. 

Allan Cunningham. 



SONG OF THE KOVER. 

FROM "THE CORSAIR," CANTO I. 

O'er the glad waters of the dark blue sea, 
Our thoughts as boundless and our souls as free, 
Far as the breeze can bear, the billows foam. 
Survey our empire, and behold our home ! 
These are our realms, no limits to their sway, — 
Our flag the sceptre all who meet obey. 
Ours the wild life in tumult still to range 
From toil to rest, and joy in every change. 
0, who can tell ? not thou, luxurious slave ! 
Whose soul would sicken o'er the heaving wave; 
Not thou, vain lord of wantonness and ease ! 
Whom slumber soothes not, • — pleasure cannot 

please. — 
0, who can tell save he whose heart liath tried. 
And danced in triumph o'er the waters wide. 
The exulting sense, the pulse's maddening play. 
That thrills the wanderer of that trackless way ? 
That for itself can woo the appi'oaching fight. 
And turn what some deem danger to delight ; 
That seeks what cravens shun with more than 

zeal. 
And where the feebler faint can only feel — 
Feel to the rising bosom's inmost core. 
Its hope awaken and its spirit soar ? 
No dread of death — if with us die our foes — 
Save that it seems even duller than repose : 
Come when it will — we snatch the life of life — 
When lost — what recks it — by disease or strife ? 
Let him who crawls enamored of decay. 
Cling to his couch and sicken j'ears awaj' ; 
Heave his thick breath, and shake his palsied 

head ; 
Ours — the fresh turf, and not the feverisli bed. 
While gasp by gasp he falters forth his sotiI, 
Ours with one pang — one bound — escapes con- 
trol. 
His corse may boast its urn and narrow cave, 
And the}^ who loathed his life may gild his grave: 
Ours ai-e the tears, though few, sincerely shed, 
When Ocean shrouds and sei:)ulchres our dead. 
For us, even banquets Ibnd regrets supply 
In the red cup that crowns our memory ; 
And the brief epitaph in danger's day, 
When those who win at length divide the prey. 
And cry, Eemembrance saddening o'er each brow, 
How had the brave who fell exulted now ! 

Lord Byron. 



MY BRIG AN TINE. 

FROM "THE WATER WITCH." 

Just in thy mould and beauteous in thy form. 
Gentle in roll and buoyant on the surge. 
Light as the sea-fowl rocking in the storm. 
In breeze and gale thy onward course we urge. 



^ 



iH- 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



^ 



My water-queen ! 

Lady of mine, 
More light and swift than thou none thread the 

sea 
With surer keel or steadier on its path. 
We brave each waste of ocean-mystery 
And laugh to hear the howling tempest's wrath, 

For we are thine. 

My brigantine ! 
Trust to the mystic power that points thy way, 
Trust to the eye that pierces from afar ; 
Trust the red meteors that around thee play, 
And, fearless, trust the Sea-Green Lady's star, 

Thou bark divine ! 

James Feni.more Cooper. 



THE HEAVING OF THE LEAD. 

For England when with favoring gale 
Our gallant ship up channel steered. 

And, scudding under easy sail, 

The high blue western land appeared ; 

To heave the lead the seaman sprung. 

And to the pilot cheerly sung, 

" By the deep — nine ! " 

And bearing up to gain the port, 

Some well-known object kept in view, — 

An abbej''-tower, a harbor-fort. 
Or beacon to the vessel true ; 

While oft the lead the seaman flung. 

And to the pilot cheerly sung, 

' ' By the mark — seven ! " 

And as the much-loved shore we near, 
With transport we behold the roof 

Where dwelt a friend or partner dear. 
Of faith and love a matchless proof. 

The lead once more the seaman flung. 

And to the watchful pilot sung, 

" Quarter less — five ! " 

Now to lier berth the ship draws nigh ; 

We shorten sail, — she feels the tide, — 
" Stand clear the cable " is the cr}', — 
The anchor 's gone ; we safely ride. 
The watch is set, and through the night 
We hear the seamen with delight 

Proclaim, - — "All 's well ! " 
Charles dibdin, 



4 



ALL 'S WELL. 

FROM "THE BRITISH FLEET."' 

Deserted by the waning moon. 

When skies proclaim night's cheerless noon. 

On tower, or fort, or tented ground 

The sentry walks his lonely round ; 



And should a footstep haply stray 
Where caution marks the guarded waj^, 
" Who goes there ? Stranger, quicklj' tell ! " 
" A friend ! " " The word ? " "Good-night ; 
all 's well. 

Or, sailing on the midnight deep. 
When weary messmates soundly sleep. 
The careful watch patrols the deck. 
To guard the ship from foes or wreck ; 
And while his thoughts oft homewards veer, 
Some friendly voice salutes his ear, — 
"What cheer ? Brother, quickly tell ; 
Above, — below." Good-night ; all 's Avell. 

Thomas Dibdin. 



THE TEMPEST. 

We were crowded in the cabin, 
Not a soul would dare to sleep, - — 

It was midnight on the waters 
And a storm was on the deep. 

'T is a fearful thing in winter 
To be shattered by the blast. 

And to hear the rattling trumpet 
Thunder, " Cut away the mast ! " 

So we shuddered there in silence, — 
For the stoutest held his breath. 

While the hungry sea was roaring, 
And the brealvcrs talked with Death. 

As thus Ave sat in darkness. 
Each one busy in his prayers, 

" We are lost ! " the captain shouted 
As he staggered down the stairs. 

But his little daughter whispered. 

As she took his icy hand, 
" Is n't God upon the ocean 

Just the same as on the land ? " 

Then we kissed the little maiden. 
And we spoke in better cheer. 

And we anchored safe in harbor 
When the morn was shining clear. 

James Thom.\s Fields 



THE MINUTE-GUN. 

WiiEX in the storm on Albion's coast, 
The night-watch guards his weary post, 

From thoughts of danger free. 
He marks some vessel's duskj' form. 
And hears, amid the howling storm. 

The minute-gun at sea. 



B^ 



fi 



628 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



a 



Swift on the shore a hardy few 

The life-boat man with a gallant crew 

And dare the dangerous wave ; 
Through the wild surf they cleave their way, 
Lost in the foam, nor know dismay, 

For they go the crew to save. 

But 0, what rapture fills each breast 

Of the hopeless crew of the ship distressed ! 

Then, landed safe, what joy to tell 

Of all the dangers that befell ! 

Then is heard no more. 

By the watch on shore, 

The minute-gun at sea. 

R. S- SHARPE. 



U^ 



THE BAY OF BISCAY. 

Loud roared the dreadful thunder, 

The rain a deluge shoAvers, 
The clouds were rent asunder 

By lightning's vivid powers ; 
The night both drear and dark. 
Our poor devoted bark, 
Till next day, there she lay, 
In the Bay of Biscay, ! 

Now dashed upon the billow. 

Her opening timbers creak. 
Each fears a watery pillow. 

None stops the dreadful leak ; 
To cling to slippery shrouds 
Each breathless seaman crowds, 
As she lay, till the day, 
In the Bay of Biscay, ! 

At length the wished-for morrow 
Broke through the hazy sky. 

Absorbed in silent sorrow. 
Each heaved a bitter sigh ; 

The dismal wreck to view 

Struck horror to the crew. 

As she lay, on that day. 

In the Bay of Biscay, ! 

Her yielding timbers sever, 

Her ])itchy seams are I'ent, 
When Heaven, all bounteous ever. 

Its boundless mercy sent, — 
A sail in sight appears ! 
We hail her with three cheers ; 
Now we sail, with the gale. 
From the Bay of Biscay, ! 

Andrew Cherry. 



THE STORM. 

Cease, rude Boreas, blustering railer ! 

List, ye landsmen all, to me ; 
Messmates, hear a brother sailor 

Sing the dangers of the sea ; 

From bounding billows, first in motion. 
When the distant whirlwinds rise. 

To the tempest-troubled ocean. 

Where the seas contend with skies. 

Hark ! the boatswain hoarsely bawling. 
By topsail-sheets and haulyards stand ! 

Down top-gallants quick be hauling ! 

Down your stay-sails, — hand, boys, hand ! 

Now it freshens, set the braces. 

Quick the topsail sheets let go ; 
Luff, boys, luff ! don't make wry faces, 

Up your topsails nimbly clew. 

Bound us roars the tempest louder. 
Think what I'ear our minds inthralls ! 

Harder yet it blows, still harder. 
Now again the boatswain calls. 

The topsail-yard point to the wind, boys. 
See all clear to reef each course ; 

Let the foresheet go, — don't mind, boys. 
Though the weather should be worse. 

Fore and aft the spritsail-yard get. 

Beef the mizzen, see all clear ; 
Hand up, each preventer-brace set ! 

Man the foreyards, — cheer, lads, cheer ! 

Now the dreadful thunder 's roaring. 

Peal on peal contending clash. 
On our heads fierce rain falls pouring. 

In our eyes blue lightnings flash. 

One wide water all around us. 

All above xis one black sky ; 
Different deaths at once surround us : 

Hark ! what means that dreadful cry ? 

The foremast's gone ! cries ever}' tongue out. 
O'er the lee twelve feet 'bove deck ; 

A leak beneatli the chest-tree 's sprung out. 
Call all hands to clear the wreck. 

Quick the lanyards cut to pieces ; 

Come, my hearts, be stout and bold ; 
Plumb the well, — the leak increases. 

Four feet water in the hold ! 



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POEMS OF THE SEA. 



629 



a 



While o'er the ship wild waves are beating, 
We our wives and children mourn ; 

Alas ! from hence there 's no retreating, 
Alas ! to them there 's no return ! 

Still the leak is gaining on us ! 

Both chain-pumps are choked below : 
Heaven have mercy here upon us ! 

For only that can save us now. 

O'er the lee-beam is the land, boys, 
Let the guns o'erboard be thrown ; 

To the pumps call every hand, boys, 
See ! our mizzen-mast is gone. 

The leak we 've found, it cannot pour fast ; 

We 've lightened her a foot or more ; 
Up and rig a jury foremast, ' 

She rights ! she rights, boys ! we're off shore. 
George Alexander Stevens. 




YE MAEINERS OF ENGLAND. 

Ye mariners of England ! 

That guard our native seas ; 

Whose flag has braved, a thousand years, 

The battle and the breeze ! 

Your glorious standard launch again 

To match another foe ! 

And sweep through the deep, 

While the stormy winds do blow ; 

While the battle rages loud and long. 

And the stormy winds do blow. 

The spirits of your fathers 

Shall start from every wave ! 

For the deck it was their field of fame, 
And ocean was their grave : 
Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell 
Your manly hearts shall glow. 
As ye sweep through the deep, 
While the stormy winds do*blow ; 
While the battle rages loud and long, 
And the stormy winds do blow. 

Britannia needs no bulwarks, 

No towers along the steep ; 

Her march is o'er the mountain-waves, 

Her home is on the deep. 

With thunders from her native oak, 

She quells the floods below, — 

As they roar on the shore, 

When the stormy winds do blow ; 

When the battle rages loud and long 

And the stormy winds do blow. 



The meteor flag of England 

Shall yet terrific burn ; 

Till danger's troubled night depart, 

And the star of peace return. 

Then, then, ye ocean warriors ! 

Our song and feast shall flow 

To the fame of your uan)e, 

When the storm has ceased to blow ; 

When the fiery fight is heard no more, 

And the storm has ceased to blow. 

Thomas Campbell. 



TOM BOWLING. 

Here, a sheer hulk, lies poor Tom Bowling, 

The darling of our crew ; 
No more he '11 hear the tempest howling. 

For death has broached him to. 
His form was of the manliest beauty, 

His heart was kind and soft ; 
Faithful, below, he did his duty ; 

But now he 's gone aloft. 

Tom never from his word departed, 

His virtues were so rare. 
His friends were many and true-hearted. 

His Poll was ki)id and fair : 
And then he 'd sing, so blithe and jolly, 

Ah, many 's the time and oft ! 
But mirth is turned to melancholj^, 

For Tom is gone aloft. 

Yet shall poor Tom find pleasant weather. 

When He who all commands 
Shall give, to call life's crew together, 

The word to "pipe all hands." 
Thus Death, who kings and tars despatches, 

Li vain Tom's life has doflud ; 
For though his body 's under hatches. 

His soul has gone aloft. 

Charles Dibdin. 



THE WHITE SQUALL. 

The sea was bright, and the bark rode well ; 
The breeze bore the tone of the vesper bell ; ' 
'T was a gallant bark with a crew as brave 
As ever launched on the heaving wave. 
She shone in the light of declining day. 
And each sail was set, and each heart was gay, 

I They neared the land where in beauty smiles 
The sunny shore of the Grecian Isles ; 
All thought of home, of that welcome dear 
Which soon should greet each wanderer's ear ; 
I And in fancy joined the social throng 
In the festive dance and the joyous song. 



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630 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



--a 



A white cloud glides through the azure sky, — 
What means that wild despairing cry '( 
Farewell the visioned scenes of home ! 
That cry is " Heli)," wliere no help can come ; 
For the White Squall rides on the surging wave, 
And the bark is 'gulfed in an ocean grave. 

Bryan waller Procter {Barry Cornwa.'l). 



OUR BOAT TO THE WAVES. 

Our boat to the waves go free, 

By the bending tide, where the curled wave 

breaks, 
Like the track of the wind on the white snow- 
flakes : 
Away, away 1 'T is a path o'er the sea. 

Blasts may rave, — spread the sail, 

For our spirits can wrest the power from the 
wind. 

And the gray clouds yield to the sunny mind. 
Fear not we the whirl of the gale. 

WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING. 



TO SEA! 

To sea ! to sea I the calm is o'er, 
The wanton water leaps in sport, 

And rattles down the pebbly shore. 

The dolphin wheels, the sea-cows snort, 

And unseen mermaid's pearly song 

Comes bubbling up, the weeds among. 

Fling broad the sail, dip deep the oar : 

To sea ! to sea ! the calm is o'er. 

To sea ! to sea ! our white-winged bark 
Shall billowing cleave its watery way. 

And with its shadow, fleet and dark. 
Break the caved Triton's azure day, 

T>ike mountain eagle soaring light 

O'er antelopes on Alpine height. 

The anchor heaves ! The ship swings free ! 

Our sails swell full ! To sea ! to sea ! 

Thomas I.ovell Beddoes. 



Vr 



THE SAILOR'S CONSOLATION. 

One night came on a hurricane. 

The sea was mountains rolling. 
When Barney Buntline turned his quid. 

And said to Billy Bowling : 
" A strong nor' wester 's blowing. Bill ; 

Hark ! don't ye hear it roar now ? 
Lord help 'em, how I pities them 

Unhappy folks on shore now ! 



" Foolhardy chaps who live in towns. 

What danger they are all in. 
And now lie quaking in their beds. 

For fear the roof shall fall in : 
Poor creatures ! how they envies us. 

And wishes, I 've a notion. 
For our good luck, in such a storm, 

To be upon the ocean ! 

" And as for them who 're out all day 

On business from their houses, 
And late at night are coming home. 

To cheer their babes and spouses, 7— 
While you and I, Bill, on the deck 

Are comfortably lying. 
My eyes ! what tiles and chimney-pots 

About their heads are flying ! 

" And very often have we heard 

How men are killed and \indone 
By overturns of carriages. 

By thieves and fires in London. 
We know what risks all landsmen run. 

From noblemen to tailors ; 
Then, Bill, let us thank Providence 

That you and I are sailors." 

William Pitt. 



A LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE. 

A LIFE on the ocean wave, 

A home on the rolling deep ; 
Where the scattered waters rave, 

And the winds their revels keep ! 
Like an eagle caged I pine 

On this dull, unchanging shore : 
0, give me the flashing brine. 

The spray and the tempest's roar ! 

Once more on the deck I stand. 

Of my own swift-gliding craft : 
Set sail ! farewell to the land ; 

The gale follows fair abaft. 
We shoot through the sparkling foam. 

Like an ocean-bird set free, — ■ 
Like the ocean-bird, our home 

We '11 find far out on the sea. 

The land is no longer in view, 

The clouds have begun to frown ; 
But with a stout vessel and crew. 

We '11 say. Let the storm come down ! 
And the song of our hearts shall be. 

While the winds and the waters rave, 
A home on the rolling sea ! 

A life on the ocean wave ! 

EPES SARGENT. 



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a- 



FRAGMENTS. 



631 



-a 



THE OCEAN. 

The Ocean at the bidding of the moon 
Forever changes witli his restless tide : 
Fhmg shoreward now, to be regathered soon 
"With kingl}^ pauses of reluctant jiride, 
And semblance of return. Anon from liome 
He issues forth anew, high ridged and free, — 
The gentlest murmur of his seething foam 
Like armies wliispering where great echoes be. 
0, leave me here upon this beach to rove. 
Mute listener to that sound so grand and lone ! 
A glorious sound, deep diawn, and strongly 

thrown. 
And reaching those on mountain heights above, 
To British ears (as who shall scorn to own ?) 
A tutelar fond voice, a savior tone of love. 

Charles turner. 



u 



TEAGMENTS. 

The Sea-Shore. 

I have seen 
A curious child, who dwelt upon a tract 
Of inland ground, applying to his ear 
The convolutions of a smooth-lipped shell ; 
To which, in silence hushed, his very soul 
Listened intensely ; and his countenance soon 
Brightened with joy ; for from within were heard 
Murmurings, whereby the monitor expressed 
Mysterious union with its native sea. 
Even such a shell the universe itself 
Is to the ear of Faith ; and there are times, 
I doubt not, when to you it doth impart 
Authentic tidings of invisible things ; 
Of ebb and flow, and ever-during power ; 
And central peace, subsisting at the heart 
Of endless agitation. 

T/ie J-xnu-sio)!, Book iv. WORDSWORTH. 

And there, where the smooth, wet pebbles be, 

The waters gurgle longingly. 

As if they fain would seek the shore, 

To be at rest from the ceaseless roar, 

To be at lest forevermore. 

The Sirens. J. R. LOWELL. 

I am as a weed, 
Fhuig from the rock, on Ocean's foam, to sail 
AVliere'er the surge may swee]), the tempest's 
breath prevail. 

Don Juan. Caul. iii. Byro.V. 

Peace on the Sea. 
Calm and unruflied as a summer sea, 
AVhen not a breath of wind flies o'er its surface. 

Cato. ADDISON. 



Winds and Waves. 

Watching the waves with all their white crests 

dancing 
Come, like thick-plumed squadrons, to the shore 
Gallantly bounding. 

Juiian. Sir A. HUNT. 

I have seen tempests when the scolding winds 
Have rived the knotty oaks ; and I have seen 
The ambitious ocean swell, and rage, and foam, 
To be exalted with the threat'ning clouds. 

JiiUus Ccesar, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

But chief at sea, whose every flexile wave 
Obeys the blast, the aerial tumult swells. 
In the dread Ocean undulating wide, 
Beneath the radiant line that girts the globe. 



The Seasons : Siijnjner. 



Thomson. 



Once more upon the waters ! yet once more ! 
And the waves bound beneath me as a steed 
That knows his rider. 

Don ynan, Cant. iii. BYRON. 

Strongly it bears us along in swelling and limit- 
less billows. 

Nothing before and Jiothing behind but the sky 
and the ocean. 

The Homeric Hexameter. Tr. <?/ COLERIDGE. SCHILLER. 



Ships. 

Build me straight, worthy Master ! 

Stanch and strong, a goodly vessel. 
That shall laugh at all disaster 

And with wave and whirlwind wrestle. 

The Biiildins: of the Ship. LONGFELLOW. 

Behold the threaden sails, 
Borne with the invisible and creeping wind. 
Draw the huge bottoms through the furrowed sea, 
Breasting the lofty surge. 

King Henry I'. Act m. Chorus. SHAKESPEARE. 

Sailing 
Like a stately ship 
Of Tarsus, bound for the isles 
Of .Javan or Gadire, 

With all her bravery on, and tackle trim. 
Sails filled, and streamers waving. 
Courted by all the winds that hold them play, 
An amber scent of odorous perfume 
Her harbinger. 

Samson Agonistes. MiLTON. 

Hearts of oifk are our ships, 
Hearts of oak are our men. 

Hearts of Oak. D. GARRICK. 



^ 



fl 



632 



POEMS OF THE SEA. 



^ 



Storms and Shipwreck. 
Ye gentlemen of England 

That live at home at ease, 
Ah ! little do you think upon 

The dangers of the seas. 

Ve Gentlci}i€}i of England^ M. PARKER. 

pilot ! 't is a fearful night, 
There 's danger on the deep. 

The Pilot. T. H. BAYLY. 

God moves in a mj'sterious way 

His wonders to perform ; 
He plants his footsteps in the sea 

And rides upon the storm. 

Light shiimig out of Darkness. COWPER. 



Rough with black winds, and storms 
Unwonted. 

Booiii. Oiies. Translation q/lAl'L.TOK. HORACE. 

Her deck is crowded with despairing souls, 
And in the hollow pauses of the storm 
We hear their piercing cries. 

Bertram. C. MaTURIN. 

Fierce o'er the wreck the whelming waters 
passed, 
The helpless crew sunk in the roaring main ! 

The Marijier. MRS. ANNE RadclIFFE. 

A solitary shriek, the bubbling cry 
Of some strong swimmer in his agony. 

Don yuan. Cant. ii. BYRON. 

Dangerous rocks, 
Which touching but my gentle vessel's side, 
Would scatter all her spices on the stream. 
Enrobe the roaring waters with my silks. 
And, in a word, but even now worth this, 
And now worth nothing. 

Merchant of Venice, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



As rich . . . 
As is the ooze and bottom of the sea 
With sunken wreck and sumless treasuries. 

King Henry V., Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

ISTo, here's to the pilot that weathered the storm. 

The Pilot that weathered the Storm. G. CANNING. 



The Low Countries. 

To men of other minds my fancy flies, 
Embosomed in the deep where Holland lies. 
Methinks her patient sons before me stand, 
Where the broad Ocean leans against the land, 
And, sedulous to stop the coming tide. 
Lift the tall rainpire's artificial pride. 
Onward methinks, and diligently slow. 
The firm connected bulwark seems to grow, 
Spreads its long arms amidst the watery i-oar, 
Scoops out an empire, and usurps the shore. 
While the pent Ocean, rising o'er the pile, 
Sees an amphibious world beneath him smile ; 
The slow canal, the yellow-blossomed vale. 
The willow-tufted bank, the gliding sail. 
The crowded mart, the cultivated plain, 
A new creation rescued from his reign. 

The Traveller. GOLDSMITH. 

As when the sea breaks o'er its bounds. 
And overflows the level grounds, 
Those banks and dams that like a screen 
Did keep it out, now keep it in. 

Hudibras. DR. S. BUTLER. 



England. 

Broad-based upon her people's will, 
And compassed by the inviolate sea. 

To tlie Queen. 



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fl- ^ 






'JVo^ ij^c^y^'-j^ y\^^^>^ Ci^-^o-ck, Xcvvo- ^ 

)4^^:^lt.^LyVtq/-D-hi 2 I. .^U^ Loir ^<Si;b 

^_._ -tf 



0-*- 



POEMS OF ADYENTUEE AND EUBAL SPOETS. 



ADVENTURE. 



CHEVY-CHASE. 

[Percy, Earl of Northumberland, had vowed to hunt for three 
days in the Scottish border, without condescendincj to ask leave 
from Earl Douj^las, who was either lord of the soil or lord warden 
of the Marches. This provoked the conflict which was celebrated 
in the old ballad of the " Hunting o' the Cheviot." The circum- 
stances of the battle of Otterbourne (A. D 1388) are woven into the 
ballad, and the affairs of the two events are confounded. The bal- 
lad preserved in the Percy Reliques is probably as old as 1574. 
The one followinc^ is a modernized form, of the time of James I.] 

God prosper long our noble king, 

Our lives and safeties all ; 
A woful hunting once there did 

In Chevy-Chase befall. 

To drive the deer with hound and horn 

Earl Percy took his way ; 
The child may rue that is unborn 

The hunting of that day. 

The stout Earl of Northumberland 

A vow to God did make, 
His pleasure in the Scottish woods 

Three summer days to take, — 

The chiefest harts in Chevy-Chase 

To kill and bear away. 
These tidings to Earl Douglas came, 

In Scotland where he lay ; 

Who sent Earl Percy present word 

He would prevent his sport. 
The English earl, not fearing that, 

Did to the woods resort, 

With fifteen hundred bowmen bold, 

All chosen men of might. 
Who knew full well in time of need 

To aim their shafts aright. 

The gallant greyhounds swiftly ran 

To chase the fallow deer ; 
On Monday they began to hunt, 

Wlien daylight did appear ; 



^ 



And long before high noon they had 

A hundred fat bucks slain ; 
Then, having dined, the drovers went 

To rouse the deer again. 

The bowmen mustered on the hills, 

Well able to endure ; 
And all their rear, with special care. 

That day was guarded sure. 

The hounds ran swiftly through the woods 

The nimble deer to take. 
That with their cries the hills and dales 

An echo shrill did make. 

Lord Percy to the quarry went. 
To view the slaughtered deer ; 

Quoth he, " Earl Douglas promiski 
This day to meet me here ; 

" But if I thought he would not come. 

No longer would I stay ; " 
With that a brave young gentleman 

Th us to the earl did say : — 

"Lo, yonder doth Earl Douglas come, — 

His men in armor bright ; 
Full twenty hundred Scottish spears 

All marching in our sight ; 

" All men of pleasant Teviotdale, 

Fast by the river Tweed ; " 
" Then cease your sport.s," Earl Percy said, 

' ' And take your bows with .speed ; 

" And now with me, my countrymen, 

Your courage forth advance ; 
For never was there chami)ion yet. 

In Scotland or in France, 

' ' That ever did on horseback come, 

But if my hap it were, 
I dur.st encounter man for man. 

With him to break a spear." 






cm: 



-a 



636 



POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS. 



Earl Douglas on his milk-white steed, 

Most like a baron bold, 
Rode foremost of his company, 

Whose armor shone like gold. 

" Show me," said he, " whose men you be, 

That hunt so boldly here. 
That, without my consent, do chase 

And kill my fallow-deer." 

The first man that did answer make, 

Was noble Percy, he — 
Who said, ' ' We list not to declare, 

Nor show whose men we be : 

" Yet will we spend our dearest blood 

Thy chiefest harts to slay." 
Then Douglas swore a solemn oath, 

And thus in rage did say : — 

" Ere thus I will out-braved be, 

One of us two shall die ; 
I know thee well, an earl thou art, — 

Lord Percy, so am I. 

" But trust me, Percy, pity it were. 

And great offence, to kill 
Any of these our guiltless men, 

For they have done no ill. 

" Let you and me the battle try. 

And set our men aside." 
" Accursed be he," Earl Percy said, 

" By whom this is denied." 

Then stepped a gallant squire forth, 

Witherington was his name. 
Who said, " I would not have it told 

To Henry, our king, for shame, 

" That e'er my captain fought on foot, 

And 1 stood looking on. 
You two be earls," said Witherington, 

" And I a squire alone ; 

"I '11 do the best that do I may. 
While I have power to stand ; 

While I have power to wield my sword 
1 '11 fight with heart and hand." 

Our English archers bent their bows, — 
Their hearts were good and true ; 

At the first flight of arrows sent. 
Full fourscore Scots they slew. 

Yet stays Earl Douglas on the bent, 
As chieftain stout and good ; 

As valiant ca2)tain, all unmoved, 
Tlie shock he finnlv stood. 



His host he parted had in three. 

As leader ware and tried ; 
And soon his spearmen on their foes 

Bore down on every side. 

Throughout the English archery 
They dealt full many a wound ; 

But still our valiant Englishmen 
All firmly kept their ground. 

And throwing straight their bows away, 
Tliey grasped their swords so bright ; 

And now sharp blows, a heavy shower. 
On shields and helmets light. 

They closed full fast on every side, — 
No slackness there was found ; 

And many a gallant gentleman 
Lay gasping on the ground. 

In truth, it was a grief to see 
How each one chose his spear, 

And how the blood out of their breasts 
Did gush like water clear. 

At last these two stout earls did meet ; 

Like captains of great might. 
Like lions wode, they laid ou lode. 

And made a cruel fight. 

They fought until they both did sweat, 
With swords of tempered steel. 

Until the blood, like drops of rain, 
Thej^ trickling down did feel. 

"Yield thee, Lord Percy," Douglas said, 

' ' In faith I will thee bring 
Where thou shalt high advanced be 

By James, our Scottish king. 

" Thy ransom I will freely give. 

And this report of thee, — 
Thou art the most courageous knight 

That ever I did see." 

" No, Douglas," saith Earl Percy then, 

' ' Thy profter I do scorn ; 
I will not yield to any Scot 

That ever yet was born." 

With that there came an arrow keen 

Out of an English bow, 
Which struck Earl Douglas to the heart, 

A deep and deadly blow ; 

^Vho never spake more woids than these 
" Fight on, my merrj' men all ; 

For why, my life is at an end ; 
Lord Percy sees my fall." 



U 



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©■ 



ADVENTURE. 



637 



n 



Then leaving life, Earl Percy took 

The dead man by the hand ; 
And said, " Earl Douglas, for tliy life 

Would I had lost my land. 

' ' In truth, my very heart doth bleed 

With sorrow for thy sake ; 
For sure a more redoubted knight 

ilischauce did never take." 

A knight amongst the Scots there was 

Who saw Earl Douglas die, 
Who straight in wrath did vow avenge 

Upon the Earl Percy. 

Sir Hugh Mountgomery was he called, 
Who, with a spear full bright, 

Well mounted on a gallant steed, 
Ran fiercely through the fight ; 

And past the English archers all, 

Without a dread or fear ; 
And through Earl Percy's body then 

He thrust his hateful spear. 

With such vehement force and might 

He did his body gore, 
The staff ran through the other side 

A large cloth-yard and more. 

So thus did both these nobles die, 
Whose courage none could stain. 

An English archer then perceived 
The noble earl was slain. 

He had a bow bent in his hand, 

Made of a trusty tree ; 
An arrow of a cloth-yard long 
, To the hard head haled he. 

Against Sir Hugh Moiintgomery 

So right the shaft he set. 
The gray goose wing that was thereon 

In his heart's blood was wet. 

This fight did last from break of day 

Till setting of the sun ; 
For when they rung the evening-bell 

The battle scarce was done. 

With stout Earl Percy there were slain 

Sir John of Egerton, 
Sir Robert Ratcliff, and Sir John, 

Sir James, that bold baron. 

And with Sir George and stout Sir James, 
Both knights of good account, 

Good Sir Ralph Raby there was slain, 
Whose prowess did surmount. 



For Witherington my heart is woe 

That ever he slain should be. 
For when his legs were hewn in two, 

He knelt and fought on his knee. 

And with Earl Douglas there were slain 

Sir Hugh Mountgomery, 
Sir Charles Murray, that from the field 

One foot would never flee ; 

Sir Charles Murray of Ratcliff, too, — 

His sister's son was he ; 
Sir David Lamb, so well esteemed, 

But saved he could not be. 

And the Lord Maxwell in like case 

Did with Earl Douglas die : 
Of twenty hundred Scottish spears, 

Scarce fifty-five did fly. 

Of fifteen hundred Englishmen, 

Went home but fifty-three ; 
The rest in Chevy-Chase were slain, 

Under the greenwood tree. 

jSText day did many widows come, 

Their husbands to bewail ; 
They washed their wounds in brinish tears 

But all would not prevail. 

Their bodies, bathed in purple blood, 

They bore with them away ; 
They kissed them dead a thousand times. 

Ere they were clad in clay. 

The news was brought to Edinburgh, 
Where Scotland's king did reign, 

That brave Earl Douglas suddenly 
Was with an arrow slain : 

" heavy news," King James did say ; 

" Scotland can witness be 
I have not any captain more 

Of such account as he." 

Lik(> tidings to King Henry came 

Within as short a space, 
That Percy of Northumberland 

Was slain in Chevy-Chase : 

" Now God be with him," said our King, 

" Since 't will no better be ; 
I trust I have within my realm 

Five hundred as good as he : 

" Yet shall not Scots or Scotland say 

But I will vengeance take ; 
I '11 be revenged on them all 

For brave Earl Percv's sake." 



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This vow full well the king performed 

After at Humbledown ; 
In one day fifty knights were slain 

"With lords of high renown ; 

And of the rest, of small account, 

Did many hundreds die : 
Thus endeth the hunting of Chevy-Chase, 

Made by the Earl Percy. 

God save the king, and bless this land. 

With plenty, joy, and peace ; 
And grant, henceforth, that foul debate 

'Twixt noblemen may cease. 

RICHARD SHEALE. 



LAMENT OF THE BOEDER WIDOW. 

[Sir Walter Scott says : " This ballad relates to the execution of 
Ccckburne of Henderland, a border freebooter, Iiansjed over the 
t;ate of his own tower by James V. in his famous expedition, in 1529, 
against the marauders of the border. In a deserted burial-place 
near the ruins of the castle, the monument of Cockburne and his 
!.-.dy is still show n. The following inscription is still legible, though 
dfj faced : — 

•'•HERE LYES PERVS OF COKBURNE AND HIS WYFE 
MARJORY.'") 

My love he built me a bonnie bower, 
And clad it a' wi' lily flower ; 
A brawer bower ye ne'er did see, 
Than my true-love he built for me. 

There came a man, by middle day, 
He spied his sport, and went away ; 
And brought the king that very night, 
Who brake my bower, and slew my knight. 

He slew my knight, to me sae dear ; 
He slew my knight, and poin'd his gear : 
My servants all for life did flee, 
And left me in cxtremitie. 

I sewed his sheet, making ray mane ; 
I watched the corpse mysell alane ; 
I watched his body night and day ; 
No living creature came that way. 

I took his body on my back, 

And whiles I gaed, and whiles I sat ; 

I digged a grave, and laid him in. 

And happed him with the sod sae green. 

But think nae ye my heart was sair, 
When I laid the moul' on his j'ellow hair ? 
0, think nae ye my heart was wae. 
When I turned about, away to gae ? 

Nae living man I '11 love again. 
Since that my lively knight is slain ; 
Wi' ae lock o' his yellow hair 
I '11 chain my heart forevermair. 



Anonv.mous. 



ROBIN HOOD AND ALLEN-A-DALE. 

[Of Robin Hood, the famous outlaw of Sherwood Forest, and 
his merry men, there are many ballads ; but the limits of this volume 
forbid our giving more than a single selection. 

Various periods, ranging from the time of Richard I. to the end 
of the reign of Edward II., have been assigned as the age in which 
Robin Hood lived. He is usually described as a yeoman, abiding 
in Sherwood Forest, in Nottinghamshire. His most noted follow- 
ers, generally mentioned in the ballads, are Little John, Friar Tuck, 
Ills chaplain, and his maid Marian. Nearly all the legends extol 
his courage, his generosity, his humanity, and his skill as an archer. 
He robbed the rich only, who could afford to lose, and gave freely 
to the poor. He protected the needy, was a champion of the fair 
sex, and took great delight in plundering prelates. The following 
ballad exhibits the outlaw in one of his most attractive aspects, — 
aflbrding assistance to a distressed lover.] 

Come, listen to me, you gallants so free. 
All you that love mirth for to hear, 

And I will tell you of a bold outlaw, 
That lived in Nottinghamshire. 



As Robin Hood in the forest stood, 

All under the greenwood tree, 
There he was aware of a brave young man, 

As fine as fine might be. 

The youngster was clad in scarlet red, 

In scarlet fine and gay ; 
And he did frisk it over the plain, • 

And chanted a roundelay. 

As Robin Hood next morning stood 

Amongst the leaves so gay, 
There did he espy the same young man 

Come drooping along the way. 

The scarlet he wore the day before 

It was clean cast away ; 
And at every ste]) he fetched a sigh, 

" Alack and well-a-day ! " 

Then stepped forth brave Little John, 

And Midge, the miller's son ; 
Which made the young man bend his bow, 

Whenas he see them come. 

"Stand off" ! stand off" ! " the young man said, 

"What is your will with me ? " 
" You must come before our master straight. 

Under yon greenwood tree." 

And when he came bold Robin before, 

Robin asked him courteously, 
" 0, lia.st thou any money to spare. 

For my merry men and me ? " 

" 1 have no money," the young man said, 

" But five shillings and a ring ; 
And that I have kept these seven long years, 

To have at my wedding. 



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' ' Yesterday I should have married a maid, 

But she was from me ta'en, 
And chosen to be an old knight's delight, 

Whereby my poor heart is slain." 

"What is thy name ?" then said Robin Hood, 

*' Come tell me without any fail." 
" By the faith of my body," then said the young 
man, 

" My name it is Allen-a-Dale." 

" What wilt thou give me," said Eobin Hood, 

" In ready gold or fee. 
To help thee to thy true-love again, 

And deliver her unto thee ? " 

" I have no money," then quoth the young man, 

" No ready gold nor fee, 
Bxit I will swear upon a book 

Thy true servant for to be." 

" How many miles is it to thy true-love ? 

Come tell me without guile." 
" By the faith of my body," then said the yoimg 
man, 

"•It is but five little mile." 

Then Robin he hasted over the plain. 

He did neither stint nor lin,* 
Until he came unto the church 

Where Allen should keep his wedding. 

! 
" What hast thou here ? " the bishop then said, 

" I prithee now tell unto me." 
"I am a bold harper," quoth Robin Hood, 

"And the best in the north country." 

" 0, welcome, 0, welcome," the bishop he said, 

" That music best pleaseth me." 
" You shall have no music," (juoth Robin Hood, 

"Till the bride and bridegroom I see." 

With that came in a wealthy knight. 

Which was both grave and old ; 
And after liiui a finikin lass, 

Did shine like the glistering gold. 

" This is not a fit match," quoth Robin Hood, 

" That you do seem to make here ; 
For since we are come into the chiu'ch, 

The bride shall chuse her own dear." 

Then Robin Hood put his horn to his mouth, 

And blew blasts two and three ; 
A¥lian four-and-twenty yeomen bold 

Came leaping over the lea. 

* Stop nor stay. 



And when they came into the churchyard. 

Marching all in a row. 
The very first man was Allen-a-Dale, 

To give bold Robin his bow. 

" This is thy true-love," Robin he said, 

" Young Allen, as I hear say; 
And you shall be married at this same time. 

Before we dej^art away." 

" That shall not be," the bishop he cried, 

"For thy word shall not stand ; 
They shall be three times asked in the church, 

As the law is of our land." 

Robin Hood pulled off' the bishop's coat. 

And put it upon Little John ; 
" By the faith of my body," then Robin said, 

"This cloth doth make thee a man." 

When Little John went into tlie quire. 

The people began to laugh ; 
He asked them seven times in the church 

Lest three times should not be enough. 

" Who gives me this maid ?" said Little John, 
Quoth Robin Hood, " That do 1 ; 

And he that takes her from Allen-a-Dale, 
Full dearly he shall her buy." 

And then, having ended this merry wedding, 

The bride looked like a queen ; 
And so they returned to the merry greenwood. 

Amongst the leaves so green. 

Anonymous. 



JOCK JOHNSTONE, THE TINKLER. 

I " 0, CAME ye ower by the Yoke-burn Ford, 
I Or down the King's Road of the clench ? * 
Or saw ye a knight and a lady bright, 
i Wha ha'e gane the gate they baith shall rue 

i "I saw a knight and a lady bright 
! Ride up the clench at the break of day ; 
The knight upon a coal-black steed. 
And the dame on one of a silver-gray. 

" And the lady's palfrey flew the first, 
AVith many a clang of silver bell : 

Swift as the raven's morning flight 
The two went scouring ower the fell. 

" By this time they are man and wife. 
And standing in St. Mary's fane ; 

And the lady in the grass-green silk 
A maid you will never see again." 



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POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS. 



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" But I can tell thee, saucy wight, — 
And tliat the runaway shall prove, — 

Revenge to a Douglas is as sweet 

As maiden charms or maiden's love." 

"Since thou say'st that, my Lord Douglas, 
Good faith some clinking there will be ; 

Beshrew my heart but and my sword, 
If I winna turn and ride with thee ! " 

They whipped out ower the Shepherd Clench, 
And doun the links o' the Corsecleueh Burn ; 

And aye the Douglas swore by his sword 
To win his love, or ne'er return. 

" First fight your rival, Lord Douglas, 

And then brag after, if you may ; 
For the Earl of Ross is as brave a lord 

As ever gave good weapon sway. 

"But I for ae poor siller merk, 
Or thirteen pennies and a bawbee,' 

Will tak in hand to fight you baith. 
Or beat the winner, whiche'er it be." 

The Douglas turned him on his steed. 
And I wat a loud laughter leuch he : 

" Of a' the fools I have ever met, 
Man, I ha'e never met ane like thee. 

"Art thou akin to lord or knight, 
Or courtly squire or warrior leal ? " 

"I am a tinkler," quo' the wight, 

" But 1 like croun-cracking unco week" 

When they came to St. Mary's kirk, 
The chaplain shook for very fear ; 

And aye he kissed the cross, and said, 

" What deevil has sent that Douglas here ! 

" He neither values book nor ban. 

But curses all without demur ; 
And cares nae mair for a holy man 

Than I do for a worthless cur." 

" Come here, thou liland and brittle priest. 

And tell to me without delay 
Where you have hid the lord of Ross 

And the lady that came at the break of day." 

" No knight or lady, good Lord Douglas, 
Have I beheld since break of morn ; 

And I never saw the lord of Ross 

Since the woful day that I was liorn." 

Lord Douglas turned him round about. 
And looked the Tinkler in the face ; 

AVhere he beheld a lurking smile. 
And a deevil of a dour grimace. 



" How 's this, how 's this, thou Tinkler loun ? 

Hast thou presumed to lie on me ?" 
" Faith that I have ! " the Tinkler said, 

" And a right good turn I have done to thee ; 

" For the lord of Ross and thy own true-love, 
The beauteous Harriet of Thirlestane, 

Rade west away, ere the break of day ; 

And you '11 never see the dear maid again ; 

" So I thought it best to bring you here. 
On a wrang scent, of my own accord ; 

For had you met the Johnstone clan, 
They wad ha'e made mince-meat of a lord." 

At this the Douglas was so wroth 

He wist not what to say or do ; 
But he strak the Tinkler o'er the croun, 

Till the blood came dreeping ower his brow. 

" Beshrew my heart," quo' the Tinkler lad. 

" Thou bear'st thee most ungallantlye ! 
If these are the manners of a lord. 

They are manners that winna gang doun wi' me. ' ' 

" Hold up thy hand," the Douglas cried, 
" And keep thy distance, Tinkler loun ! " ' 

" That will I not," the Tinkler said, 

"Though I and my mare should both go 
doun ! " 

" I have armor on," cried the Lord Douglas, 
" Cuirass and helm, as you may see." 

" The deil me care ! " quo' the Tinkler lad ; 
" I shall have a skelp at them and thee." 

" You are not horsed," quo' the Lord Douglas, 
"And no remorse this weapon brooks." 

"Mine's a right good yaud," quo' the Tinkler lad, 
' ' And a great deal better nor she looks. 

" So stand to thy weapons, thou haughty lord, 
Wliat I have taken I needs must give ; 

Thou shalt never strike a tinkler again, 
Foi- the langeat day thoiT hast to live." 

Then to it they fell, both sharp and snell. 
Till the fire from both their weapons flew ; 

But the very first shock tliat they met with, 
The Douglas his rashness 'gan to rue. 

For tliough he had on a sark of mail, 
A nd a cuirass on his breast wore he. 

With a good steel bonnet on his head. 
Yet the blood ran trickling to his knee. 

Tlie Douglas sat upright and firm, 

Aye as together their horses ran ; 
But the Tinkler laid on like a very deil, — 

Siccan strokes were never laid on by man. 



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" Hold up thy hand, thou Tinkler loun," 
Cried the poor priest, with whining din ; 

" If thou hurt the brave Lord James Douglas, 
A curse be on thee and all thy kin ! " 

"I care no more for Lord James Douglas 
Than Lord James Douglas cares for me ; 

But I want to let his proud heart know 
That a tinkler 's a man as well as he." 

So they fought on, and they fought on. 
Till good Lord Douglas' breath was gone ; 

And the Tinkler bore him to the ground, 
With rush, with rattle, and with gi-oan. 

" hon ! hon ! " cried the proud Douglas, 
" That I this day should have lived to see ! 

For sure my honor I have lost. 

And a leader again I can never be ! 

" Biit tell me of thy kith and kin, 
And where was bred thy weapon hand ? 

For thou art the wale of tinkler louns 
That ever was born in fair Scotland." 

" My name 's Jock Johnstone," quo' the wight 
" I winna keep in my name frae thee ; 

And here, tak thou thy sword again, 
And better friends Ave two shall be." 

But the Douglas swore a solemn oath. 
That was a debt he could never owe ; 

He would rather die at the back of the dike 
Than owe his sword to a man so low. 

" But if thou wilt ride under my banner, 
And bear my livery and ni}' name. 

My right-hand warrior thou shalt be 

And I "11 knight tliee on the field of fame." 

" Woe worth thy wit, gootl Lord Douglas, 
To think I 'd change my trade for thine ; 

Far better and wiser would you be, 
To live a journej^man of mine, 

" To mend a kettle or a casque, 

Or clout a goodwife's yettlin' pan, — 

Upon my life, good Lord Douglas, 
You 'd make a noble tinkler-man ! 

" I would give you a drammock twice a day. 

And sunkets on a Sunday morn. 
And you should be a rare adept 

In steel and copper, brass and horn ! 

" I '11 fight you every day you rise, 

Till you can act the hero's part ; 
Therefore, I pray you, think of this. 

And lay it seriously to heart." 



The Douglas writhed beneath the lash, 
Answering with an inward curse, — 

Like salmon wriggling on a spear. 

That makes his deadly wound the worse. 

But up there came two squires renowned ; 

In search of Lord Douglas they came ; 
And when they saw their master down, 

Their spirits mounted in a flame. 

And they flew upon the Tinkler wight, 

Like perfect tigers on their prey : 
But the Tinkler heaved his trusty sword. 

And made him ready for the fray. 

"Come one to one, ye coward knaves, — 
Come hand to hand, and steed to steed ; 

I would that ye were better men, 
For this is glorious work indeed ! " 

Before you could have counted twelve. 

The Tinkler's wondrous chivalrye 
Had both the squires upon the sward, 

And their horses galloping o'er the lea. 

The Tinkler tied them neck and heel, 

And mony a biting jest gave he : 
"0 fie, for shame ! " said the Tinkler lad ; 

" Siccan fighters I did never see ! " 

He slit one of their bridle reins, — 

0, what disgrace the conquered feels ! — 

And he skelpit the squires with that good tawse. 
Till the blood ran off at baith their heels. 

The Douglas he was forced to laugh 
Till down his cheek the salt tear ran : 

" I think the deevil be come here 
In the likeness of a tinkler man ! " 

Then he has to Lord Douglas gone, 

And he raised him kindly by the hand, 

And he set him on his gallant steed. 
And bore him away to Henderland : 

" Be not cast doM^n, my Lord Douglas, 
Nor writhe beneath a broken bane ; 

For the leech's art will mend the part. 
And your honor lost will spring again. 

'"Tis true, Jock Johnstone is my name ; 

I 'm a right good tinkler, as you see ; 
For I can crack a casque betimes. 

Or clout one, as my need may be. 

"Jock Johnstone is my name, 'tis true, - 
But noble hearts are allied to me ; 

For I am the lord of Annandale, 

And a knight and earl as well as thee." 



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Then Douglas strained the hero's hand, 

And took from it his sword again : 
"Since thou art the lord of Annandale, 

Thou hast eased my heart of meikle pain, 
e 
' ' I might have known thy noble form 

In that disguise thou 'rt pleased to wear ; 
All Scotland knows thy matchless arm, 

And England by experience dear. 

' ' We have been foes as well as friends, 
And jealous of each other's sway ; 

But little can I comprehend 

Thy motive for these pranks to-day." 

" Sooth, my good lord, the truth to tell, 
'T was I that stole your love away. 

And gave her to the lord of Ross 
An hour before the break of day ; 

" For the lord of Ross is my brother, 

By all the laws of chivalrye ; 
And I brought with me a thousand men 

To guard him to my ain countrye. 

" But I thought meet to stay behind, 
And try your lordship to waylay. 

Resolved to breed some noble sport, 
By leading you so far astray. 

" Judging it better some lives to spare, — 
Which fancy takes me now and then, — 

And settle our quarrel hand to hand. 
Than each with our ten thousand men. 

" God send you soon, my Lord Douglas, 
To Border foray sound and haill ! 

But never strike a tinkler again, 
If he be a Johnstone of Annandale." 

JAMES HOGG. 



MORT D'ARTHUR. 

So all day long the noise of battle rolled 
Among the mountains by the winter sea ; 
Until King Arthur's Table, man by man. 
Had fallen in Lyoness about their lord, 
King Arthur : then, because his wound was deep. 
The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him. 
Sir Bedivere, the last of all his Knights, 
And bore him to a chapel nigh the field, 
A broken chancel with a broken cross. 
That stood on a dark strait of barren land. 
On one side lay the Ocean, and on one 
Lay a great water, and the moon was full. 

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere : 
" The sequel of to-day unsolders all 



The goodliest fellowship of famous knights 
Whereof this world holds record. Such a sleep 
They sleep — the men I loved. I think that we 
Shall nevermore, at any future time. 
Delight our souls with talk of knightly deeds. 
Walking about the gardens and the halls 
Of Camelot, as in the days that were. 
I perish by this people which I made, — 
Though Merlin sware that I sliould come again 
To rule once more ; but let what will be, be. 
I am so deeply smitten through the helm 
That without help I cannot last till morn. 
Thou therefore take my brand Excalibur, 
Which was my pride : for thou rememberest 

how 
In those old days, one summer noon, an arm 
Rose up from oiit the bosom of the lake. 
Clothed in Mhite samite, mystic, wonderful. 
Holding the sword — and how I rowed across 
And took it, and have worn it, like a king ; 
And, wheresoever I am sung or told 
In after-time, this also shall be known : 
But now delay not : take Excalibur, 
And fling him far into the middle mere : 
Watch what thou seest, and lightly bring me 

word. 

To him replied the bold Sir Bedivere : 
" It is not m.eet. Sir King, to leave thee thus, 
Aidless, alone, and smitten through the helm. 
A little thing may harm a wounded man ; 
Yet I thy best will all perform at full. 
Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word." 

So saying, from the ruined shrine he stept 
And in the moon athwart the place of tombs, 
Where lay the mighty bones of ancient men. 
Old knights, and over them the sea-wind sang 
Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping 

down 
By zigzag paths, and juts of pointed rock. 
Came on the shining levels of the lake. 

There drew he forth the brand Excalibur, 
And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon. 
Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth 
And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt : 
For all the haft tAvinkled with diamond studs. 
Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work 
Of subtlest jewelry. He gazed so long 
That both his ej^es were dazzled as he stood, 
This way and that dividing the swift mind, 
In act to throw : but at the last it seemed 
Better to leave Excalibur concealed 
Thei-e in the many-knotted water-flags, 
That whistled stiff" and dry about theinaigc 
So strode he back slow to the wounded Kii;g. 



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Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere : 
'' Hast thou performed my mission which I 

gave ? 
AVhat is it thou hast seen ? or what hast heard ? " 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere : 
" I heard the ripple washing in the reeds, 
And the wild water lapping on the crag." 

To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale : 
" Thou hast betrayed thy nature a,nd thy name, 
Not rendering true answer, as beseemed 
Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight : 
For surer sign had followed, either hand, 
Or voice, or else a motion of the mere. 
This is a shameful thing for men to lie. 
Yet now, I chai-ge thee, ipiickly go again, 
As thou art lief and dear, and do the thing 
I bade thee, watch, and lightly bring me word." 

Then went Sir Bedivere the second time 
Across the ridge, and paced beside the mere, 
Counting the dewy pebbles, fixed in thought ; 
But when he saw the wonder of the hilt, 
How curiously and strangely chased, he smote 
His palms together, and he cried aloud : — 

" And if indeed I cast the bi-aiid away. 
Surely a precious thing, one worthy note, 
Should thus be lost forever from the earth. 
Which might have pleased the eyes of many men. 
What good should follow this, if this were done ? 
What harm, undone ? deep harm to disobey, 
Seeing obedience is the bond of rule. 
Were it well to obey then, if a king demand 
An act unprofitable, against himself ? 
The King is sick, and knows not what he docs. 
What record, or what relic of my lord 
Should be to after-time, but empty breath 
And rumors of a doubt ? but were this kept, 
Stored in some treasure-house of mighty kings, 
Some one might show it at a joust of arms. 
Saying, ' King Arthur's sword, Excalibui", 
Wrought by the lonely maiden of the Lake. 
Nine years she wrought it, sitting in the decjis 
Upon the hidden bases of the hills.' 
So might some old man speak in the after-time 
To all the people, winning reverence. 
But now much honor and much fame were lost." 

So spake he, clouded with his own conceit, 
And hid Excalibur the second time. 
And so strode back slow to the wounded King. 

Then spoke King Arthur, breatliing heavily : 
" What is it thou hastseen ? or what hast heard ? " 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere : 
" I heard the water lapping on the crag. 
And the long ripple wasliing in the reeds." 



To whom replied King Arthur, much in wrath : 
"Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue, 
Unknightly, traitor-hearted ! Woe is me ! 
Authority forgets a dying king, 
Laid widowed of the pov.'er in liis eye 
That bowed the will. I see thee what thou art. 
For thou, the latest-left of all my knights 
In whom should meet the offices of all, 
Thou wouldst betray me for the precious hilt ; 
Either from lust of gold, or like a girl 
Valuing the giddy pleasure of the eyes. 
Yet, for a man may fail in duty twice. 
And the third time may prosper, get thee hence : 
But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur, 
I will arise and slay thee with my hands." 

Then c[uickly rose Sir Bedivere, and ran. 
And, leaping down the ridges lightly, plunged 
Among the bulrush-beds, and clutched the sword. 
And .stroiigly wheeled and threw it. The great 

brand 
Made liglitnings in the splendor of the moon. 
And flashing round and round, and whirled in an 

arch, 
Shot like a streamer of the northern morn. 
Seen where the moving isles of winter shock 
By niglit, with noises of the northern sea. 
So flashed and fell the brand Excalibur : 
But ere he dipt the surface, rose an arm 
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful, 
And caught him by the hilt, and brandished him 
Three times, and drew him under in the mere. 
And lightly went the other to the King. 

Then spoke King Arthur, drawing thicker 
breath : 
" Now see I by thine eyes that this is done. 
Speak out : wliat is it thou hast heard, or seen ? " 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere : 
"Sir King, I closed mine eyelids, lest the gems 
Should blind my purpose, for I never saw. 
Nor shall see, here or elsewhere, till I die, 
Not though 1 live three lives of mortal men. 
So great a miracle as yonder hilt. 
Then with both hands I flung him, wheeling 

him ; 
But when I looked again, behold an arm. 
Clothed in white samite, mj^stic, wonderful, 
That caught him by the hilt, and brandished him 
Three times, and drew him under in the mere." 

And answer made King Arthur, breathing 
hard : 
" Mj' end draws nigh ; 't is time that I were gone. 
Make broad thy shoulders to receive my weight. 
And bear me to the margin ; yet I fear 
My wound hath taken cold, and I shall die." 



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So saying, from the pavement he half rose, 
Slowly, with pain, reclining on his arm, 
And looking wistfully with wide Hue eyes 
As in a picture. Him Sir Bedivere 
Remorsefully regarded through his tears, 
And would have spoken, but he found not words ; 
Then took with care, and kneeling on one knee, 
O'er both his shoulders drew the languid hands. 
And rising bore him through the place of tombs. 

But, as he walked, King Arthur panted hard, 
Like one that feels a nightmare on his bed 
When all the house is mute. So sighed the 

King, 
Muttering and murmuring at his ear "Quick, 

quick ! 
I fear it is too late, and I shall die." 
l)Ut the other swiftly strode from ridge to ridge. 
Clothed with his breath, and looking, as he 

walked, 
Lai-ger than human on the frozen hills. 
He heard the deep behind him, and a cry 
Jjefore. His own thought drove him like a goad. 
Dry clashed his harness in the icy caves 
And barren chasms, and all to left and right 
The bare black cliff clanged round him, as he 

based 
His feet on juts of slippery crag that rang 
Sharp-smitten with the dint of armed heels — 
And on a sudden, lo ! the level lake. 
And the long glories of the winter moon. 

Then saAV they how there hove a dusky barge. 
Dark as a funeral scarf from stem to stern. 
Beneath them ; and descending they were ware 
That all the decks were dense with stately forms, 
Black-stoled, black-hooded, like a dream, — by 

these 
Three Queens with crowns of gold, — and from 

them rose 
A cry that shivered to the tingling stars. 
And, as it were one voice, an agony 
Of lamentation, like a wind that shrills 
All night in a waste land, where no one comes, 
Or hath come, since the making of the world. 

Then murmured Arthur, " Place me in the 

barge ; " 
So to the barge they came. There those three 

Queens 
Put forth their hands, and took the King, and 

wept. 
But she that rose the tallest of them all, 
And fairest, laid his head upon her lap, 
And loosed the shattered cascjue, and chafed his 

hands, 
And called him by his name, complaining loiid^ 



And dropping bitter tears against his brow 
Striped with dark blood : for all his face was 

white 
And colorless, and like the withered moon 
Smote by the fresh beam of the springing east ; 
And all his greaves and cuisses dashed with drops 
Of onset ; and the light and lustrous curls — 
That made his forehead like a rising sun 
High from the dais-throne — were parched with 

dust ; 
Or, clotted into points and hanging loose, 
Mixed with the knightly growth that fringed his 

lips. 
So like a shattered column lay the King ; 
\ Not like that Ai'thur, who, with lance in rest, 
From spur to plume a star of tournament, 
Shot through the lists at Camelot, and charged 
Before the eyes of ladies and of kings. 

Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere : 
"Ah ! my Lord Arthur, whither shall I go ? 
Where shall I hide my forehead and my eyes ? 
For now I see the true old times are dead. 
When every morning brought a noble chance. 
And every chance brought out a noble knight. 
Such times have been not since the light that led 
The holy Elders with the gift of myrrh. 
But now the whole Round Table is dissolved 
Which was an image of the mighty world ; 
And I, the last, go forth companionless. 
And the days darken round me, and the years. 
Among new men, strange faces, other minds." 

And slowly answered Arthur from the barge : 
" The old order changeth, yielding place to new, 
And God fulfils himself in many ways. 
Lest one good custom should corrupt the world. 
Comfort thyself : what comfort is in me ? 
I have lived my life, and that which I have done 
May He within himself make pure ! but thou. 
If thou shouldst never see my face again. 
Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by 

prayer 
Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy 

voice 
Rise like a ibuntain for me night and day. 
For what are men better than sheep or goats 
That nourish a blind life within the brain. 
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer 
Both for themselves and those who call them 

friend ? 
For so the whole round earth is every way 
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God. 
But now farewell. 1 am going a long way 
With these thou seest, — if indeed I go 
(For all my mind is clouded with a doubt) — 
To the island-valley of Avilion ; 



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Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow, 
Nor ever wind blows loudly ; but it lies 
Deep-meadowed, happy, fair with orchard-lawns 
And bowery hollows crowned with summer sea, 
Where I will heal me of my grievous wound." 

So said he, and the barge with oar and sail 
Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted 

swan. 
That, fluting a wild carol ere her death, ; 

Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood I 
With swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere 
Revolving many memories, till the hull 
Looked one black dot against the verge of dawn, 
And on the mere the wailing died away. 

ALFRED TENNYSON. 



ALFRED THE HARPER. 

Dark fell the night, the watch was set, 
The host was idly spread, 
The Danes around their watclifires met, 
Caroused, and fiercely fed. 

The chiefs beneath a tent of leaves, 

And Guthrura, king of all, 

Devoured the flesh of England's beeves, 

And laughed at England's fall. 

Each warrior proud, each Danish earl. 

In mail and wolf-skin clad, 

Their bracelets white with plundered pearl, 

Their eyes with triumph mad. 

From Humber-land to Severn-land, 

And on to Tamar stream, 

Where Thames makes green the towery strand. 

Where Medway's waters gleam, — 

With hands of steel and mouths of flame 

They raged the kingdom through ; 

And where the Norseman sickle came, 

No crop but hunger grew. 

They loaded many an English hoi-se 

With wealth of cities fair ; 

They dragged from many a father's corse 

The daughter by her hair. 

And English slaves, and gems and gold, 

Were gathered round the feast ; 

Till midnight in their woodland hold, 

0, never that riot ceased. 

In stalked a warrior tall and rude 
Before the strong sea-kings ; 
" Ye Lords and Earls of Odin's brood, 
Without a Iiarper sings. 



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He seems a simple man and poor. 
But well he sounds the lay ; 
And well, ye Norseman chiefs, be sure, 
I Will ye the song repay." 

i In trod the bard with keen cold look, 
! And glanced along the boai'd. 

That with the shout and war-cry shook 

Of many a Danish lord. 

But thirty brows, inflamed and stern, 

Soon bent on him their gaze. 

While calm he gazed, as if to learn 

Who chief deserved his praise. 

Loud Guthrum spake, — " Nay, gaze not thus, 

Thou Harper weak and poor ! 

By Thor ! who bandy looks with us 

Must worse than looks endure. 

Sing high the praise of Denmark's host, 

High praise each dauntless Earl ; 

The brave who stun this English coast 

With war's unceasing whirl." 

The Harper slowly bent his head, 
And touched aloud the string ; 
Then raised his face, and boldly said, 
" Hear thou my lay, King ! 
High praise from every mouth of man 
To all who boldly strive, 
Who fall where first the fight began, 
And ne'er go back alive. 

"Fill high your cups, and swell the shout, 

At femous Regnar's name ! 

Who sank his host in bloody rout. 

When he to Humber came. 

His men were chased, his sons were slain, 

And he was left alone. 

They bound him in an iron chain 

Upon a dungeon stone. 

" With iron links they bound him fast ; 
With snakes they filled the hole. 
That made his flesh their long repast, 
And bit into his soul. 

" Great chiefs, why sink in gloom your eyes? 

Why champ your teeth in pain ? 

Still lives the song though Regnar dies ! 

Fill high your cups again ! 

Ye too, perchance, Norseman lords ! 

Who fought and swayed so long, 

Shall soon but live in minstrel words. 

And owe your names to song. 

" This land has graves by thousands more 
Than that where Regnar lies. 
When conquests fade, and rule is o'er, 
The sod must close your eyes. 



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How soon, who knows ? Not chief, nor bard ; 

And 3ret to me 't is given, 

To see your foreheads deeply scarred, 

And guess the doom of Heaven. 

" I may not read or when or how, 

But, Earls and Kings, be sure 

I see a blade o'er every brow, 

Where pride now sits secure. 

Fill high the cups, raise loud the strain ! 

When chief and monarch fall. 

Their names in song shall breathe again. 

And thrill the feastful hall." 

Grim sat the chiefs ; one heaved a groan. 

And one grew pale with dread, 

His iron mace was grasped by one. 

By one his wine was shed. 

And Guthrum cried, "Nay, bard, no more 

We hear thy boding lay ; 

Make drunk the song with spoil and gore ! 

Light up the joyous fray ! " 

" Quick throbs my brain," — so burst the song,- 

" To hear the strife once more. 

The mace, the axe, they rest too long ; 

Earth cries. My thirst is sore. 

More blithely twang the strings of bows 

Than strings of harps in glee ; 

Red wounds are lovelier than the rose 

Or I'osy lips to me. 

' ' 0, fairer than a field of flowers, 

When flowers in England grew, 

Would be the battle's marshalled powers, 

The plain of carnage new. 

With all its deaths before my soul 

The vision rises fair ; 

Raise loud the song, and drain the bowl ! 

I would that I were there ! " 

Loud rang the harp, the minstrel's eye 
Rolled fiercely round the throng ; 
It seemed two crashing hosts were nigh, 
Whose shock aroused the song. 
A golden cup King Guthrum gave 
To him who strongly played ; 
And said, " I won it from the slave 
Who once o'er England swayed." 

King Guthrum cried, " 'T was Alfred's own ; 

Thy song befits the brave : 

The King who cannot guard his throne 

Nor wine nor song shall have." 

The minstrel took the goblet bright, 

And said, ' ' I drink the wine 

To him who owns by justest right 

The cup thou bid'st be mine. 



" To him, your Lord, shout ye all ! 
His meed be deathless praise ! 
The King who dares not nobly fall, 
Dies basely all his days." 

"The praise thou speakest," Guthrum said, 

" With sweetness fills mine ear ; 

For Alfred swift before me fled, 

And left me monarch here. 

The royal coward never dared 

Beneath mine eye to stand. 

O, would that now this feast he shared, 

And saw me rule his land ! " 

Then stern the minstrel rose, and spake. 

And gazed upon the King, — 

"Not now the golden cup I take, 

Nor more to thee 1 sing. 

Another day, a happier hour. 

Shall bring me here again : 

The cup shall stay in Guthrum's power, 

Till I demand it then." 

The Harper turned and left the shed. 

Nor bent to Guthrum's crown ; 

And one who marked his visage said 

It wore a ghastly frown. 

The Danes ne'er saw that Harper more. 

For soon as morning rose. 

Upon their camp King Alfred bore. 

And slew ten thousand foes. 

John Sterli.n'G. 



THE EARL 0' QUARTERDECK. 

A NEW OLD BALLAD. 

The wind it blew, and the ship it flew ; 

And it was ' ' Hey for hame ! 
And ho for hame ! " But the skipper cried, 

" Hand her oot o'er the saut sea faem." 

Then up and spoke the King himsel' : 

" Hand on for Dumferline ! " 
Quo the skipper, " Ye 're king upo' the land — 

I 'm king upo' the brine." 

And he took the helm intil his hand. 

And he steered the ship sae free ; 
Wi' the wind astarn, he crowded sail, 

And stood right out to sea. 

Quo the king, " There 's treason in this, I vow ; 

This is something underhand ! 
'Bout ship ! " Quo the skipper, " Yer gi-ace for- 
gets 

Ye are king but o' the land ! " 



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Ami still he held to the open sea ; 

And the east-wind sank behind ; 
And the west had a bitter word to say, 

Wi' a white-sea roarin' wind. 

And he turned her head into the north. 

Said the king : " Gar fling him o'er." 
Quo the fearless skipper : " It's a' ye 're worth ! 

Ye 'II ne'er see Scotland more." 

The king crept down the cabin-stair, 

To drink the gude French wine. 
And up she came, his daughter fair. 

And luikit ower the brine. 

She turned her face to the drivin' hail, 

To the liail but and the weet ; 
Her snood it brak, and, as lang 's hersel', 

Hei' hair drave out i' the sleet. 

She turned her face frae the drivin' win' — 

" What 's that ahead ? " quo she. 
The skipper he threw himsel' ft-ae the win', 

And he drove the helm a-lee. 

" Put to yer hand, my lady fair ! 

Put to yer hand," quo he ; 
" Gin she dinna face the win' the mair, 

It's the waur for you and me." 

For the skipper kenned that strength is strength, 
Whether woman's or man's at last. 

To the tiller the lady she laid her han'. 
And the ship laid her cheek to the blast. 

For that slender hody was full o' soul. 

And the will is mair than shape ; 
As the skipper saw when they cleared the berg. 

And he heard her quarter scrape. 

Quo the skipper : "Ye are a lady fair, 

And a princess grand to see ; 
But ye are a woman, and a man wad sail 

To hell in yer company." 

She liftit a pale and queenly face ; 

Her een flashed, and syne they swim. 
" And what for no to heaven ? " she says, 

And she turned awa' frae him. 

But she took na her han' frae the good ship's helm, 

Until the day did daw ; 
And the skipper he spak, but what he said 

It was said atween them twa. 

And then the good ship she lay to. 

With the land far on the lee ; 
And up came the king upo' the deck, 

Wi' wan face and bluidshot ee. 



The skipper he louted to the king : 
*' Gae wa', gae w'a'," said the king. 

Said the king, like a prince, ' ' I was a' wrang. 
Put on this ruby ring." 

And the wind blew lowne, and the stars cam' oot. 
And the ship turned to the shore ; 

And, afore the sun was up again. 
They saw Scotland ance more. 

That day the ship hung at the pier-heid, 
And the king he stept on the land. 

" Skipper, kneel down," the king he said, 
" Hoo daur ye afore me stand ? " 

The skipper he louted on his knee, 

The king his blade he drew : 
Said the king, " How daured ye centre me ? 

1 'm aboard my ain ship noo. 

"I canna mak ye a king," said he, 
" For the Lord alone can do that ; 

And besides ye took it intil yer ain han' 
And crooned yersel' sae pat ! 

" But wi' what ye will I redeem my ring ; 

For ance I am at your beck. 
And first, as ye loutit Skipper o' Doon, 

Else up Yerl o' Quarterdeck." 

The skipper he rose and looked at the king 

In his een for all his croon ; 
Said the skipper, " Here is yer grace's ring. 

And yer daughter is my boon." 

The reid blude sprang into the king's face, — 

A wrathful man to see : 
" The rascal loon abuses our grace ; 

Gae hang him upon yon tree." 

But the skipper he sprang aboard his ship. 

And he drew his biting blade ; 
And he struck the chain that held her fast. 

But the iron was ower weel made. 

And the king he blew a whistle loud ; 

And tramp, tramp, down the pier. 
Cam' twenty riders on twenty steeds, 

Clankin' wi' spur and spear. 

"He saved your life ! " cried the lady fair ; 

" His life ye daurna spill ! " 
" Will ye come atween me and my hate ?" 

Quo the lady, "And that I will ! " 

And on cam' the knights wi' spur and spear. 

For they heard the iron ring. 
"Gin ye care na for yer father's grace, 

Mind ye that I am the king." 



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POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS. 



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" I kneel to my father for his grace, 

Right lowly on my knee ; 
But I stand and look the king in the face, 

For the skipper is king o' me." 

She tnrned and she sprang npo' the deck, 
And the cable splashed in the sea. 

The good ship spread her wings sae white. 
And away with the skipper goes she. 

Now was not this a king's daughter, 

And a brave lady beside ? 
And a woman with whom a man might sail 

Into the heaven wi' pride ? 

George macdonald. 



MARMION AND DOUGLAS. 

FROiM "MARMION," CANTO VI. 

Not far advanced was morning day, 
When Marmion did his troop array 

To Surrey's camp to ride ; 
He had safe-conduct for his band, 
Beneath the royal seal and hand, 

And Douglas gave a guide : 
The ancient Earl, with stately grace. 
Would Clara on her palfrey place. 
And whispered in an undertone, 
" Let the hawk stoop, his prey is flown." 
The train from out the castle drew. 
But Marmion stopped to bid adieu : — 
" Though something I might plain," he said, 
" Of cold respect to stranger guest. 
Sent hither by your king's behest. 

While in Tantallon's towers I stayed. 
Part we in friendship from your land, 
And, noble Earl, receive my hand."i — 
But Douglas round him drew his cloak, 
Folded his arms, and thus he spoke : — 
"My manors, halls, and bowers shall still 
Be open, at my sovereign's will. 
To each one whom he lists, howe'er 
Unmeet to be the owner's peer. 
My castles are my king's alone. 
From turret to foundation-stone, — 
The hand of Douglas is his own ; 
And never shall in friendly grasp 
The hand of such as Marmion clasp." — 

Burned Marmion's swarthy cheek like fire, 
And shook his very frame for ire. 

And — " This to me ! " he said, — 
" An 't were not for thy hoaiy beai'd. 
Such hand as Marmion's had not spared 

To cleave the Douglas' head ! 
And, first, I tell thee, haughty Peer, 
He who does England's message here. 
Although the meanest in her state. 



May well, proud Angus, be thy mate : 
And, Douglas, more I tell thee here. 

Even in thy pitch of pride, 
Here in thy hold, thy vassals near, 
(Nay, never look upon your lord. 
And lay your hands upon your sword,) 

I tell thee, thou 'rt defied ! 
And if thou said'st I am not peer 
To any lord in Scotland here, 
Lowland or Highland, far or near, 

Lord Angus, thou hast lied ! " — 
On the Earl's cheek the flush of rage 
O'ercame the ashen hue of age : 
Fierce he broke forth, — " And dar'st thou then 
To beard the lion in his den. 

The Douglas in his hall ? 
And hop'st thou hence unscathed to go ? 
No, by St. Bride of Bothwell, no ! 
Up drawbridge, grooms, — what. Warder, ho ! 

Let the portcullis fall." — 
Lord Marmion turned, — well was his need ! — 
And dashed the rowels in his steed ; 
Like arrow through the archway sprung ; 
The ponderous grate behind him rung : 
To pass there was such scanty room, 
The bars, descending, razed his plume. 

The steed along the drawbridge flies, 

Just as it trembled on the rise ; 

Not lighter does the swallow skim 

Along the smooth lake's level brim ; 

And when Lord Marmion reached his band. 

He halts, and turns with clenched hand, 

And shout of loud defiance pours. 

Ami shook his gauntlet at the towers. 

"Horse! hoi^se ! " the Douglas cried, "and 

chase ! " 
But soon he reined his fury's pace : 
" A royal messenger he came. 
Though most unworthy of the name. 

St. Mary, mend my fierj'^ mood ! 
Old age ne'er cools the Douglas blood, 
I thought to slay him wdiere he stood. 
'T is pity of him too," he cried ; 
" Bold can he speak, and fairly ride : 
I warrant him a warrior tried." 
With this his mandate he recalls, 
And slowly seeks his castle halls. 

Sir Walter Scoti. 



JAMES FITZ-JAMES AND ELLEN. 

FROM " THE LADY OF THE LAKE," CANTO VI. 

A FOOTSTEP struck her ear. 

And Snowdoun's graceful Knight was near. 

She turned the hastier, lest again 

The prisoner should renew his strain. 



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" welcome, brave Fitz- James ! " she said ; 

" How may an almost orphan maid 

Pay tlie deep debt " — "0, say not so ! 

To me no gratitude you owe. 

Not mine, alas ! the boon to give, 

And bid thy noble father live ; 

I can but be thy guide, sweet maid, 

With Scotland's King thy suit to aid. 

No tyrant he, though ire and pride 

May lead his better mood aside. 

Come, Ellen, come ; 'tis more than time, 

He holds his court at morning prune." 

"With beating heart and bosom wrung, 

As to a brother's arm she clung. 

Gently he dried the falling tear, 

And gently whispered hope and cheer ; 

Her faltering steps half led, half stayed, 

Through gallery fair and high arcade, 

Till, at his touch, its wings of pride 

A portal arch unfolded wide. 

Within 't was brilliant all and light, 

A thronging scene of figures bright ; 

It glowed on Ellen's dazzled sight. 

As when the setting sun has given 

Ten thousand lines to summer even. 

And from their tissue fancy frames 

Aerial knights and fairy dames. 

Still by Fitz -James her footing stayed ; 

A few faint steps she forward made, 

Then slow her drooping head she raised, 

And fearful round the presence gazed : 

For him she sought who owned this state. 

The dreaded prince whose will was fate ! 

She gazed on many a princely port 

Might well have ruled a royal court ; 

On many a splendid garb she gazed, — 

Then turned bewildered and amazed, 

For all stood bare ; and in the room 

Fitz-James alone wore cap and plume. 

To him each lady's look was lent. 

On him each courtier's eye was bent. 

Midst furs and silks and jewels sheen 

He stood, in simple Lincoln green. 

The centre of the glittering ring, — • 

And Snowdoun's Knight is Scotland's King ! 

As wreath of snow, on mountain breast, 
Slides from the rock that gave it rest, 
Poor Ellen glided from her stay. 
And at the Monarch's feet she lay ; 
Noword her choking voice commands : 
She showed the ring, she clasped her hands. 
0, not a moment could he brook. 
The generous prince, that suppliant look ! 
Gently lie raised her, and the while 
Checked with a glance the circle's smile ; 
Graceful, but grave, her brow he kissed, 



And bade her terrors be dismissed : — 

" Yes, fair ; the wandering poor Fitz-James 

The fealty of Scotland claims. 

To him thy woes, thy wishes bring ; 

He will redeem his signet-ring. 

Ask naught for Douglas ; yester even 

His prince and he have much forgiven : 

Wrong hath he had from slanderous tongue, 

I, from his rebel kinsmen, wrong. 

We would not to the vulgar crowd 

Yield what they craved with clamor loud ; 

Calmly we heard and judged his cause. 

Our council aided and our laws. 

I stanched thy father's death-feud stern. 

With stout De Vaux and gray Glencairn ; 

And Botliwell's Lord henceforth we own 

The friend and bulwark of our Throne. 

But, lovely infidel, how now ? 

What clouds thy misbelieving brow ? 

Lord James of Douglas, lend thine aid ; 

Thou must confirm this doubting maid.." 

Then forth the noble Douglas sprung. 

And on his neck his daughter hung. 

The Monarch drank, that happy hour. 

The sweetest, holiest draught of Power, — 

When it can say, the godlike voice, 

Arise, sad Virtue, and rejoice ! 

Yet would not James the general eye 

On nature's raptures long should piy : 

He stepped between — "Nay, Douglas, nay, 

Steal not my proselyte away ! 

The riddle 't is my right to read, 

That brought this happy chance to speed. 

Yes, Ellen, when disguised I stray 

In life's more low but happier way, 

'T is under name which veils my power,. 

Nor falsely veils, — for Stirling's tower 

Of yore the name of Snowdoun claims. 

And Normans call me James Fitz-James. 

Thus watch I o'er insulted laws, 

Thus learn to right the injured cause." 

Then, in a tone apart and low, 

" Ah, little trait'ress ! none must know 

What idle dream, what lighter thought, 

What vanity full dearly bought. 

Joined to thine eye's dark witchcraft, drew 

My spell-bound steps to Benvenue, 

In dangerous hour, and all but gave 

Thy Monarch's life to mountain glaive ! " 

Aloud he spoke, — " Thou still dost hold 

That little talisman of gold, 

Pledge of my faith, Fitz-James's ring ; 

What seeks fair Ellen of the King ? " 

Full well the conscious maiden guessed, 
He probed the weakness of her breast ; 



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But with tliat consciousness there came 

A lightening of her fears for Gr.Bme, 

And more she deemed the monarch's ire 

Kindled 'gainst him, who, for her sire, 

Rebellious broadsword boldly drew ; 

And, to her generous feeling true, 

She craved the grace of Roderick Dhu. 

" Forbear thy suit ; the King of kings 

Alone can stay life's parting wings. 

I know his heart, I know his hand, 

Have shared his cheer, and proved his brand. 

My fairest earldom would I give 

To bid Clan-Alpine's Chieftain live ! — 

Hast thou no other boon to crave ? 

No other captive friend to save ?" 

Blushing, she turned her from the King, 

And to the Douglas gave the ring. 

As if she ■^^•ished her sire to speak 

The suit that stained her glowing cheek. 

" Nay, then, my pledge has lost its force, 

And stubborn justice holds her course. 

Malcolm, come forth ! " — And, at the word, 

Down knelt the Graeme to Scotland's Lord. 

"For thee, rash youth, no suppliant sues. 

From thee may Vengeance claim her dues, 

Who, nurtured underneath our smile, 

Hast paid our care by treacherous wile, 

And sought, amid thy faithful clan, 

A refuge for an outlawed man. 

Dishonoring thus thy loyal name,— 

Fetters and warder for the Grteme ! " 

His chain of gold the King unstrung. 

The links o'er Malcolm's neck he flung, 

Then gently drew the glittering band, 

And laid the clasp on Ellen's hand. 

Sir Walter Scott. 



NORVAL. 

FROM THE TRAGEDY OF " DOUGLAS," ACT II. SC. I. 

Lady Randolph. How fares my lord ? 

Loud Ramdoi,ph. That it fares well, thanks 
to this gallant youth, 
"Whose valor saved me from a wretched death. 
As down the winding dale I walked alone. 
At the cross way four armed men attacked me. 
Rovers, I judge, from the licentious camp. 
Who would have quickly laid Lord Randolph low, 
Had not this brave and generous stranger come. 
Like my good angel, in the hour of fate, 
And, mocking danger, made my foes his own. 
They turned upon him: but his active arm 
Struck to the ground, from whence they rose no 

more, 
The fiercest two ; the others fled amain. 
And left him master of the bloody field. 
Speak, Lady Randolph ; upon beauty's tongue 



Dwell accents pleasing to the brave and bold, 
Speak, noble dame, and thank him for thy lord. 
Lady Ran. My lord, I cannot speak what 

now I feel. 
My heart o'erflows with gratitude to Heaven, 
And to this noble youth, who, all unknown 
To you and yours, deliberated not, 
Nor paused at peril, but, humanely brave. 
Fought on )'-our side against such fearful odds. 
Have you yet learnt of him whom we should 

thank, 
Whom call the savior of Lord Randolph's life ? 
Lord Ran. I asked that question, and he 

answered not ; 
But I must know who my deliverer is. (To the 

Stranger. ) 
NoiivAL. A low-born man, of parentage ob- 
scure. 
Who naught can boast but his desire to be 
A soldier, and to gain a name in arms. 

Lord Ran. Whoe'er thou art, thy spirit is 

ennobled 
By the great King of kings : thou art ordained 
And stamped a hero by the sovereign hand 
Of nature ! Blush not, flower of modesty 
As well as valor, to declare thy birth. 

NoRV. My name is Norval : on the Grampian 

hills 
My father feeds his flocks, — a frugal swain, 
Whose constant cares were to increase his store. 
And keep his only son, myself, at home. 
For I had heard of battles, and I longed 
To follow to the field some warlike lord : 
And Heaven soon granted what my sire denied. 
This moon which rose last night, round as my 

shield. 
Had not yet filled her horns, wnen, by her light, 
A band of fierce barbarians frona the hills 
Rushed like a torrent down upon the vale. 
Sweeping our flocks and herds. The shepherds 

fled 
For safety and for succor. I alone. 
With bended bow, and quiver full of arrows. 
Hovered about the enemy, and marked 
The road he took ; then hasted to my friends. 
Whom, with a troop of fifty chosen men, 
I met advancing. The pursuit I led. 
Till we o'ertook the spoil-encumbered foe. 
We fought and conquered. Ere a sword was 

drawn 
An arrow from my bow had pierced their chief, 
Who wore that day the arms which now I wear. 
Returning home in triumph, I disdained 
The shepherd's slothful life ; and having heard 
That our good king had sunnrioned his bold j'eers 
To lead their warriors to the Carron sifle, 
I left my father's house, and took with ir^D 



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A chosen servant to conduct my steps, — 
Yon trembling coward, who forsook his master. 
Journeying with this intent, I passed these 

towers. 
And, Heaven-directed, came this day to do 
The happy deed that gikis my humble name. 
Lord Ran. He is as wise as brave : was ever 
tale 
"With such a gallant modesty rehearsed ? 
My brave deliverer ! thou shalt enter now 
A nobler list ; and, in a monarch's sight. 
Contend with princes for the prize of fame. 
I will present tliee to our Scottish king, 
Whose valiant spirit ever valor loved. 
Ha ! my Matilda ! wherefore starts that tear ? 
Lady Ran. I cannot say ; for various affec- 
tions. 
And strangely mingled, in my bosom swell : 
Yet each of them may well command a tear. 
I joy that thou art safe ; and I admire 
Him and his fortunes, who hath wrought thy 

safety ; 
Yea, as my mind predicts, with thijie his own. 
Obscure and friendless, he the army sought ; 
Bent upon peril, in the range of death 
Resolved to hunt for fame, and with his sword 
To gain distinction which his birth denied. 
In this attempt unknown he might have perished. 
And gained witli all his valor but oblivion. 
Now graced by thee, his virtue serves no more 
Beneath despair. The soldier now of hope, 
He stands conspicuous : fame and great renown 
Are brought within the compass of his sword. 
On this my mind reflected, whilst you spoke. 
And blessed the wonder-working hand of Heaven. 
LojiD Ran. Pious and grateful ever are thy 
thoughts ! 
My deeds shall follow where thou point'st the way. 
Next to myself, and equal to Glenalvon, 
In honor and command shall Xorval be. 

NoRV. I know not how to thank you : rude 
I am 
In speech and manners ; never till this hour 
Stood I in such a presence ; j^et, my lord, 
There 's something in my breast which makes 

me bold 
To say that Nerval ne'er will shame thy favor. 

John Home. 



JORASSE. 



FROM " ITALY. 



Jorasse was in his three-and-twentieth year 
Graceful and active as a stag just roused ; 
Gentle withal, and pleasant in his speech. 
Yet seldom seen to smile. He had grown up 
Among the liuuters of the Higher Alps ; 



Had caught their starts and fits of thoughtful- 

ness, 
Their haggard looks, and strange soliloquies. 
Arising (so say they that dwell below) 
From frequent dealings with the Mountain- 
Spirits. 
But other ways had taught him better things ; 
And now he numbered, marching by my side, 
The great, the learned, that with him had crossed 
The frozen tract, ■ — with him familiarly 
Through the rough day and rougher night eon- 
versed 
In many a chalet round the Peak of TeiTor, 
Round Tacul, Tour, Well-horn, and Rosenlau, 
And her whose throne is inaccessible. 
Who sits, withdrawn in virgin majesty, 
Nor oft unveils. Anon an avalanche 
Rolled its long thunder ; and a sudden crash, 
Sharp and metallic, to the startled ear 
Told that far down a continent of ice 
Had burst in twain. But he had now begun ; 
And with what transport he recalled the hour 
When, to deserve, to win his blooming bride, 
Madelaine of Annecy, to his feet he bound 
The iron crampons, and, ascending, trod 
The upper realms of frost ; then, by a cord 
Let half-way down, entered a grot star-bright, 
And gathered from above, below, around. 
The pointed crystals ! — Once, nor long before 
(Thus did his tongue run on, fast as his feet. 
And with an eloquence that Nature gives 
To all her children, — breaking ofi' by staits 
Into the harsh and rude, oft as the mule 
Drew his displeasure), — once, nor long before, 
Alone at daybreak on the Mettenberg, 
He slipped, he fell ; and, through a fearful cleft 
Gliding from ledge to ledge, from deep to deeper, 
Went to the under-world ! Long while he lay 
Upon his rugged bed, — then waked like one 
Wishing to sleep again and sleep forever ! 
For, looking round, he saw, or thought he saw, 
Innumerable branches of a cave. 
Winding beneath that solid crust of ice ; 
With here and there a rent that showed the stars ! 
M'"hat then, alas ! was left him but to die ? 
What else in those immeasurable chambers, 
Strewn with the bones of miserable men. 
Lost like himself ? Yet must he wander on, 
Till cold and hunger set his spirit free ! 
And, rising, he began his dreary round ; 
AVhen hark ! the noise as of some mighty river 
Working its wa}' to light ! Back he withdrew, 
But soon returned, and, fearless from despair. 
Dashed down the dismal channel ; and all day, 
If day could be where utter darkness was. 
Travelled incessantly ; the craggy roof 
Just overhead, and the impetuous waves, 



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Nor broad nor deep, yet with' a giant's strength, 
Lashing him on. At last, as in a pool. 
The water slept ; a pool sullen, piolound, 
Where if a Ivillow chanced to heave and swell 
It broke not ; and the roof, that long 
Had threatened, suddenly descending, lay 
Flat on the surface. Statiiedike he stood, 
His journey ended, when a ray divine 
Shot through his soul. Breathing a prayer to her 
Whose ears are never shut, the Blessed Virgin, 
He plunged, he swam, — and in an instant rose, 
The barrier passed, in sunshine ! Through a vale, 
Sucli as in Arcady, where many a thatch 
Gleams through the trees, half seen and half 

embowered. 
Glittering the river ran ; and on the bank 
The young were dancing ('twas a festival-day) 
All in their best attire. There first he saw 
His Madelaine. In the crowd she stood to hear, 
When all drew round, inquiring ; and her face, 
Seen behind all, and varying, as he spoke. 
With hope and fear and generous sympathy. 
Subdued him. From that very hour he loved. 

Samuel Rogers. 



THE GLOVE AND THE LIONS. 

King Francis was a hearty king, and loved a 
royal sport, 

And one day, as his lions fought, sat looking on 
the court. 

The nobles filled the benches, with the ladies in 
their pride. 

And 'mongst them sat the Count de Lorge, with 
one for whom he sighed : 

And truly 'twas a gallant thing to see that crown- 
ing show. 

Valor and love, and a king above, and the royal 
beasts below. 

Ramped and roared the lions, with horrid laugh- 
ing jaws ; 

They bit, they glared, gave blows like beams, a 
wind went with their paws ; 

With wallowing miglit and stilled roar they rolled 
on one another, 

Till all the pit with sand and mane was in a 
thunderous smother ; 

The bloody foam above the bars came whisking 
through the air ; 

Said Francis then, "Faith, gentlemen, we're 
better here than there." 

De' Lorge's love o'erheard the King, a beauteous 

lively dame, 
With smiling lips and sliarp bright eyes, which 

always seemed the same ; 



She thought, the Count, my lover, is brave as 

brave can be ; 
He surely wonld do wondrous things to show his 

love of me ; 
King, ladies, lovers, all look on ; the occasion is 

divine ; 
I '11 drop my glove, to prove his love ; great glory 

will be mine. 

She dropped her glove, to prove his love, then 

look'.^d at him and smiled ; 
He bowed, and in a moment leaped among the 

lions wild ; 
The leap was quick, return was quick, he has 

regained his place, 
Then threw the glove, but not with love, right 

in the lady's face. 
"By Heaven," said Francis, "rightly done!" 

and he rose from where he sat ; 

"No love," quoth he, "but vanity, sets love a 

task like that." 

Leigh hunt. 



PRINCE ADEB. 

In Sana, 0, in Sana, God, the Lord, 
Was very kind and merciful to me ! 
Forth from the Desert in my I'ags I came, 
Weary and sore of foot. I saw the spires 
And swelling bubbles of the golden domes 
Rise througli the trees of Sana, and my heart 
Grew great within me with the strength of God ; 
And I cried out, "' Now shall I right myself, — 
I, Adeb the despised, — for God is just ! " 
There he who wronged my father dwelt in peace, — 
Mj' warlike i'ather, who, when gray hairs crept 
Around his forehead, as on Lebanon 
The whitening snows of winter, was betrayed 
To the sly Imam, and his tented wealth 
Swept from him, 'twixt the roosting of the cock 
And Ills fii'st crowing, — in a single night : 
And I, poor Adeb, sole of all my race. 
Smeared with myfather'sandmy kinsmen's blood, 
Fled through the Desert, till one day a tribe 
Of hungiy Bedouins found me in the sand. 
Half mad with famine, and they took me up. 
And made a slave of me, — of me, a prince ! 
All was fulfilled at last. I fled from them, 
In rngs and sorrow. Nothing but my heart. 
Like a strong swimmer, bore me up against 
The howling sea of my adversity. 
At length o'er Sana, in the act to swoop, 
I stood like a young eagle, on a crag. 
The traveller passed me with suspicious fear : 
I asked for nothing ; I was not a thief. 
The lean dogs snuHed around me : my lank bones. 
Fed on the berries and the crusted pools, 



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Were a scant morsel. Once a brown-skinned girl 
Called me a little from the common path, 
And gave me iigs and barley in a bag. 
I paid her with a kiss, with nothing more, 
And slie looked glad ; for I was beautiful, 
And virgin as a fountain, and as cold. 
I stretched her bounty, pecking like a bird 
Her tigs and barley, till my strength returned. 
So when rich Sana lay beneath my eyes, 
M}' foot was as the leopard's, and my hand 
As heavy as the lion's brandished paw ; 
And underneath my burnished skin tlie veins 
And stretching muscles played, at every step, 
In wondrous motion. I was very strong. 
I looked upon my body, as a bird 
That bills his feathers ere he takes to flight, — • 
I, watching over Sana. TJien I prayed ; 
And on a soft stone, wetted in the brook, 
Ground my long knife ; and then I prayed again. 
God heard my voice, preparing all for me, 
As, softly stepping down the hills, I saw 
The Imam's summer-palace all ablaze 
In the last flash of sunset. Every fount 
"Was spouting Are, and all the orange-trees 
Bore blazing coals, and from the marble walls 
Andgildeds[)ires and columns, strangely wrought, 
Glared the red light, until my eyes were pained 
With the fierce splendor. Till the night grew 

thick, 
I lay within the bushes, next the door, 
Still as a serpent, as invisible. 
The guard hung round the portal. Man by man 
They dropped away, save one lone sentinel. 
And on his eyes God's finger lightly fell ; 
He slept half standing. Like a summer wind 
That threads the grove, yet never turns a leaf, 
I stole from shadow unto shadow forth ; 
Crossed all the marble court-yard, swung the door, 
Lilce a soft gust, a little way ajai', — • 
My body's narrow width, no more, — and stood 
Beneath the cresset in the painted hall. 
I marvelled at the riches of my foe ; 
I marvelled at God's ways with wicked men. 
Then I reached forth, and took God's waiting 

hand : 
And so he led me over mossy floors. 
Flowered with the silken summei' of Shiraz, 
Straight to the Imam's chamber. At the door 
Stretched a brawn eunuch, blacker than my eyes: 
His woolly head lay like the Kaba-stone 
In Mecca's mos(iue, as silent and as huge. 
I stepped across it, with my pointed knife 
Just missing a lull vein along his neck. 
And, pushing by tlie curtains, there I was, — 
I, Adeb the despised, — upon the spot 
That, next to heaven, I longed for most of all. 
I could have shouted for the joy in me. 



Fierce pangs and flashes of bewildering light 
Leaped through my brain and danced before my 

eyes. 
So loud my heart beat, that I feared its sound 
Would wake the sleeper ; and the bubbling blood 
Choked in my throat till, weaker than a child, 
I reeled against a column, and there hung 
In a blind stupor. Then I prayed again : 
And, sense by sense, I was made whole once more. 
I touched myself ; I was the same ; I knew 
Myself to be lone Adeb, young and strong, 
With nothing but a stride of empty air 
Between me and God's justice. In a slaep, 
Thick with the fumes of the accursed grape, 
Sjjrawled tlie false Imam. On his shaggy breast. 
Like a wliite lily heaving on the tide 
Of some foul stream, the fairest woman slept 
These roving eyes have ever looked upon. 
Almost a child, her bosom barely showed 
The change beyond her girlhood. All her charms 
Were budding, but half opened ; for I saw 
Not only beauty wondrous in itself, 
But possibility of more to be 
In the full process of her blooming days. 
I gazed upon her, and my heart grew soft. 
As a parched pasture with the dew of heaven. 
While thus I gazed she .snnled, and slowly raised 
The long curve of her lashes ; and we looked 
Each n;ion each in wonder, not alarm, — 
Not eye to eye, but soul to soul, we held 
Each other for a moment. All her life 
Seemed centred in the circle of her eyes. 
She stirred no limb ; her long-drawn, equal breath 
Swelled out and ebbed away beneath her breast. 
In calnr unbroken. Not a sign of fear 
Touched the faint color on her oval cheek, 
Or pinclied tlie arches of her tender mouth. 
She took me for a vision, and slie lay 
With her sleep's smile unaltered, as in doubt 
Whether real life had stolen into her dreams. 
Or dreaming stretched into her outer life. 
I was not graceless to a woman's eyes. 
The girls of Damar paused to see me pass, 
I walking in my rags, yet beautiful. 
One maiden said, "He has a prince's air ! " 
I am a prince ; the air was all my own. 
So thought the lily on the Imam's breast ; 
And lightly as a summer mist, that lifts 
Before the morning, so she floated up, 
Without a sound or rustle of a robe. 
From her coarse pillow, and before me stood 
With asking eyes. The Imam never moved. 
A stride and blow were all my need, and they 
Were wholly in my power. I took her hand, 
I held a warning linger to my li[)s, 
And whispered in her small, expectant ear, 
"Adeb, the son of Akem ! " She replied 



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In a low murmur whose bewildering sound 
Almost lulled wakeful me to sleep, and sealed 
The sleeper's lids in tenfold slumber, " Prince, 
Lord of the Lnam's life and of my heart, 
Take all thou seest, — it is thy right, I know, — 
But spare the Imam for thy own soul's sake ! " 
Then I arrayed me in a robe of state, 
Shining with gold and jewels ; and I bound 
In my long turban gems that might have bought 
The lands 'twixt Babelmandeb and Sahan. 
I girt about me, with a blazing belt, 
A scimitar o'er which the sweating smiths 
In far Damascus hammered for long years. 
Whose hilt and scabbard shot a trembling light 
From diamonds and rubies. And she smiled, 
As piece by piece I put the treasures on. 
To see me look so fair, — in pride she smiled. 
I hung long purses at my side. I scooped, 
From off a table, figs and dates and rice, 
And bound them to my girdle in a sack. 
Then over all I flung a snowy cloak, 
And beckoned to the maiden. So she stole 
Forth like my shadow, past the sleeping wolf 
Who wronged my fatlier, o'er the woolly head 
Of the swart eunuch, down the painted court, 
And by the sentinel who standing slept. 
Strongly against the portal, througli my rags, — 
My old base rags, — and through the maiden's veil, 
I pressed my knife, — upon the wooden hilt 
Was " Adeb, son of Akem," carved by me 
In my long slavehood, — as a passing sign 
To wait the Imam's waking. Shadows cast 
From two high-sailing clouds upon the sand 
Passed not more noiseless than we two, as one, 
Glided beneath the moonlight, till I smelt 
The fragrance of the stables. As I slid 
The wide doors open, with a sudden bound 
Uprose the startled horses : but they stood 
Still as the man who in a foreign land 
Hears his strange language, when my Desei't call. 
As low and plaintive as the nested dove's, 
Fell on their listening ears. From stall to stall. 
Feeling the horses with my groping hands, 
I crept in darkness ; and at length I came 
Upon two sister mares whose rounded sides. 
Fine muzzles, and small heads, and pointed ears, 
And foreheads spreading'twixt their eyelids wide, 
Long slender tails, thin manes, and coats of silk. 
Told me, that, of the hundred steeds there stalled. 
My hand was on the treasures. O'er and o'er 
I felt their bony joints, and down their legs 
To the cool hoofs ; — no blemish anywhere : 
These I led forth and saddled. Upon one 
I set the lily, gathered now for me, — 
My own, henceforth, forever. So we rode 
Across the grass, beside the stony path, 
Until we gained the highway that is lost, 



Leading from Sana, in the eastern sands : 
When, with a cry that both the desert -born 
Knew without hint from whip or goading spur, 
We dashed into a gallop. Far behind 
In sparks and smoke the dusty highway rose ; 
And ever on the maiden's face I saw. 
When the moon flashed upon it, the strange smile 
It wore on waking. Once I kissed her mouth. 
When she grew weary, and her strength returned. 
All through the night we scoured between the hills : 
The moon went down behind us, and the stars 
Dropped after her ; but long before I saw 
A planet blazing straight against our eyes. 
The road had softened, and the shadowy hills 
Had flattened out, and I could hear the hiss 
Of sand spurned backward by the flying mares. 
Glory to God ! I was at home again ! 
The sun rose on us ; far and near I saw 
The level Desert ; sky met sand all round. 
We paused at midday by a palm-crowned well, 
And ate and slumbered. Somewhat, too, was said : 
The words have slipped my memory. That 

same eve 
We rode sedately through a Hamoum camp, — 
I, Adeb, prince amongst them, and my bride. 
And ever since amongst them I have ridden, 
A head and shoulders taller than the best ; 
And ever since my days have been of gold, 
My nights have been of silver, — ■ God is just ! 
George Henry Boker. 



HELVELLYN. 

[In the spring of 1805, a young gentleman of talents, and of a 
most amiable disposition, perislied by losing his way on the moun- 
tain Helvellyn. His remains were not discovered tiil three montlis 
afterwards, when they were found guarded by a faitiiful terrier, his 
constant attendant during frequent solitary rambles through the 
wilds of Cumberland and Westmoreland.] 

I CLIMBED the dark brow of the mighty Hel- 
vellyn, 
Lakes and mountains beneath me gleamed 
misty and wide : 
All was still, save, by fits, when the eagle was 
yelling. 
And starting around me the echoes replied. 
On the right, Striden Edge round the Red Tarn 

was bending. 
And Catchedicam its left verge was defending. 
One huge nameless rock in the front was ascend- 
ing. 
When I marked the sad spot where the wan- 
derer had died. 

Dark green was that spot mid the brown moun- 
tain heather, 
Where the Pilgrim of Nature lay stretched in 
decay, 



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Like the corpse of an outcast abandoned to 
weather, 
Till the mountain winds wasted the tenantless 
clay ; 
Not yet quite deserted, though lonely extended, 
For, faithful in death, liis mute favorite attended, 
The much-loved remains of her master defended, 
And chased the hill-fox and the raven away. 

How long didst thou think that his silence was 

slumber ? 
When the wind waved his garment, how oft 

didst thou start ? 
How many long days and long nights didst thou 

number 
Ere he faded before thee, the friend of thy 

heart ? 
And, 0, was it meet that — -no retiuiem read o'er 

him, 
No mother to weep, and no friend to deplore him. 
And thou, little guardian, alone stretched before 

him — 
Unhonored the Pilgrim from life should de- 
part ? 

"When a prince to the fate of the peasant has 
yielded. 
The tapestry waves dark round the dim- 
lighted hall. 
With 'scutcheons of silver the coffin is shielded, 
And pages stand mute by the canopied pall : 
Through the courts, at deep midnight, the 

torches are gleaming ; 
In the proudly arched chapel the banners are 

beaming ; 
Far adown the long aisle sacred music is stream- 
ing, 
Lamenting a Chief of the People should fall. 

But meeter for thee, gentle lover of nature. 
To lay down thy head like the meek mountain 
lamb. 
When, wildered, he drops from some cliff huge 
in stature, 
And draws his last sob by the side of his dam. 
And more stately thy couch by this desert lake 

lying, 
Thy ob.sequies sung by the gray plover flying, 
With one faithful friend but to witness thy dying. 
In the arms of Helvellyn and Catchedicam. 

Sir Walter Scott. 

« 

FITZ-JAMES AND RODERICK DHU. 

FROM "THE LADY OF THE LAKE," CANTO V. 

"I AM by promise tied 
To match me with this man of pride : 
Twice have I sought Clan-Alpine's glen 
In peace ; but when I come again, 



I come with banner, brand, and bow, 

As leader seeks his mortal foe. 

For lovelorn swain, in lady's bower, 

Ne'er panted for the appointed hour. 

As I, until before me stand 

This rebel Chieftain and his band." 

" Have, then, thy wish ! " — He whistled slirill, 

And he was answered from the hill ; 

Wild as the scream of the curlew, 

From crag to crag the signal flew. 

Instant, through copse and heath, arose 

Bonnets and spears and bended bows ; 

On right, on left, above, below. 

Sprung up at once the lurking foe ; 

From shingles gray their lances start. 

The bracken bush sends forth the dart, 

The rushes and the willow-wand 

Are bristling into axe and brand. 

And every tuft of broom gives life 

To plaided warrior ai'med for strife. 

That whistle garrisoned the glen 

At once with full five hundred men. 

As if the yawning hill to heaven 

A subterranean host had given. 

Watching their leader's beck and will, 

All silent there they stood, and still. 

Like the loose crags whose threatening mass 

Lay tottering o'er the hollow pass. 

As if an infant's touch could urge 

Their headlong passage down the verge. 

With step and weapon forward flung. 

Upon the mountain-side they hung. 

The Mountaineer cast glance of pride 

Along Benledi's living side, 

Then fixed his eye and sable brow 

Full on Fitz- James : " How say'st thou now ? 

These are Clan-Alpine's warriors true ; 

And, Saxon, — I am Roderick Dhu ! " 

Fitz -James was brave ; — though to liis heart 

The life-blood thrilled with sudden start. 

He manned himself with dauntless air, 

Returned the Chief his haughty stare, 

His back against a rock he bore, 

And firmly placed his foot before : — 

"Come one, come all ! tins rock shall fly 

From its firm base as soon as I." 

Sir Roderick marked, — and in his eyes 

Respect was miugled with surprise, 

And the stern joy which warriors feel 

In foemen worthy of their steel. 

Short space he stood, — then waved his hand : 

Down sunk the disappearing band ; 

Each warrior vanished where he stood, 

In broom or bracken, heath or wood : 

Sunk brand and spear, and bended bow, 

In osiers pale and copses low : 



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It seemed as if their mother Earth 

Had swallowed up her warlike birth. 

The wind's last breath had tossed in air 

Pennon and plaid and plumage fair, — 

The next but swept a lone hillside, 

Where heath and fern \v'ere waving wide ; 

The sun's last glance was glinted back. 

From spear and glaive, from targe and jack, — 

The next, all unrefiected, shone 

On bracken green, and cold gray stone. 

Fitz-James looked round, — yet scarce believed 

The witness that his sight received ; 

Such apparition well might seem 

Delusion of a dreadful dream. 

Sir Roderick in suspense he eyed. 

And to his look the Chief replied : 

" Fear naught — nay, that I need not say — 

But — doubt not aught from mine array. 

Thou art my guest ; — I pledged my word 

As far as Coilantogle ford : 

Nor would I call a clansman's brand 

For aid against one valiant hand. 

Though on our strife lay every vale 

Rent by the Saxon from the Gael. 

So move we on ; — 1 only meant 

To show the reed on which you leant, 

Deeming this path you might pursue 

Without a pass from Roderick Dim." 

They moved ; — I said Fitz-James was brave, 

As ever knight that belted glaive ; 

Yet dare not say that now his blood 

Kept on its wont and tempered Hood, 

As, following Roderick's stride, he drew 

That seeming lonesome pathway through. 

Which yet, by fearful pi-oof, was rife 

With lances, that, to take his life, 

Waited but signal from a guide, 

So late dishonored and defied. 

Ever, by stealth, his eye sought round 

The vanished guardians of the ground, 

And still, from copse and heather deep, 

Fancy saw spear and broadsword peep, 

And in the plover's shrilly strain 

The signal whistle heard again. 

ISTor breathed he free till far behind 

The pass was left ; for then they wind 

Along a wide and level green, 

Where neither tree nor tuft was seen, 

Nor rush nor bush of broom was near, 

To hide a bonnet or a spear. 

The Chief in silence strode before, 

And reached that torrent's sounding shore, 

Which, daughter of three miglity lakes. 

From Vennachar in silver breaks, 

Sweeps through the jjlain, and ceaseless mines 

On Bochastle the mouldering lines, 



Where Rome, the Empress of the world. 

Of yore her eagle wings unfurled. 

And here his course the Chieftain stayed, 

Threw down his target and his jdaid, 

And to the Lowland warrior said : 

" Bold Saxon ! to his promise I'ust, 

Vich-Alpine has discharged his trust. 

This murderous Chief, this ruthless man, 

This head of a rebellious clan. 

Hath led thee safe through watch and ward, 

Far past Clan- Alpine's outmost guard. 

Now, man to man, and steel to steel, 

A Chieftain's vengeance thou shalt feel. 

See, here, all vantageless 1 stand. 

Armed, like thyself, with single brand ; 

For this is Coilantogle ford, 

And thou must keep thee with thy sword." 

The Saxon paused : "I ne'er delayed. 

When foeman bade me draw my blade ; 

Nay more, brave Chief, I vowed thy death : 

Yet sure thy fair and generous faith, 

And my deep debt for life preserved, 

A better meed have well deserved : 

Can naught but blood our feud atone ? 

Are there no means 'i " " No, Stranger, none 

And hear, — to fire thy flagging zeal, — 

The Saxon cause rests on thy steel ; 

For thus spoke Fate, by prophet bred 

Between the living and the dead : 

' Who spills the foremost foeman's life, 

His party conquers in the strife.' " 

" Then, by my woi'd,"' the Saxon said, 

" The riddle is already read. 

Seek yonder brake beneath the cliff, — ■ 

There lies Red Murdoch, stark and stiff. 

Thus Fate hatli solved her prophecy, 

Then yield to Fate, and not to me. 

To James, at Stirling, let us go. 

When, if thou wilt be still his foe, 

Or if the King shall not agree 

To grant thee grace and favor free, 

I plight mine honoi', oath, and word, 

That, to thy native strengths restored. 

With each advantage shalt thou stand, 

That aids thee now to guard thy land." 

Dark lightning flashed from Roderick's eye : 
" Soars thy presumi)tion, then, so high, 
Because a wretched kern ye slew. 
Homage to name to Roderick Dhu ? 
He yields not, he, to man nor fate ! 
Thou add'st but fuel to my hate : — 
My clansman's blood demands revenge. 
Not yet prepared ? — By Heaven, I change 
My tliought, and hold thy valor light 
As that of some vain carpet knight, 



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Who ill deserved my courteous care, 

And whose best boast is but to wear 

A braid of his fair lady's hair." 

"I thank thee, Eoderi<;k, for the woi'd ! 

It nerves my heart, it steels my sword ; 

For I have sworn this braid to stain 

In the best blood that warms thy vein. 

Now, truce, farewell ! and ruth, begone ! — 

Yet thhdc not that by thee alone. 

Proud Chief ! can courtesy be shown ; 

Thonp;h not from copse, or heath, or cairn, 

Start at my whistle clansmen stern. 

Of this small horn one feeble blast 

Would fearful odds against thee cast. 

But fear not — doubt not — which thou wilt — 

We try this quarrel hilt to hilt." 

Then each at once his falchion drew. 

Each on the ground his scabbard threw. 

Each looked to sun and stream and plain, 

As what they ne'er might see again ; 

Then, foot and point and eye opposed. 

In dubious strife they dai'kly closed. 

Ill fared it then with Roderick Dhu, 

Tliat on the field his targe he threw. 

Whose brazen studs and tough bull-hide 

Had death so often dashed aside ; 

For, trained abroad his arras to wield, 

Fitz-James's blade was sword and shield. 

He practised every pass and ward. 

To thrust, to strike, to feint, to guard ; 

Wliile less expert, though stronger far. 

The Gael maintained unequal war. 

Three times in closing strife they stood, 

And thrice the Saxon blade drank blood : 

No stinted draught, no scanty tide, 

Tlie gushing Hoods the tartans dyed. 

Fierce Roderick felt the fatal drain, 

And showered his blows like wintry rain ; 

And, as firm rock or castle-roof 

Against the winter shoAver is proof, 

Tiie foe, invulnerable still. 

Foiled liis wild rage by steady skill ; 

Till, at advantage ta'en, his brand 

Forced Roderick's weapon from his hand, 

And, backwards boi'ue upon the lea. 

Brought the jiroud Chieltain to his knee. 

"Now yield thee, or, by Him who nuule 

The world, thy heart's blood dyes my blade ! " 

" Thy threats, thy mercy, I defy ! 

Let recreant yield, who fears to die." 

Like adder darting from his coil, 

Like wolf that dashes through the toil, 

Like mountain-cat who guards her young, 

Full at Fitz-James's throat he sprung ; 

Received, but recked not of a wound, 

And locked his arms his foeman round. 

Now, gallant Saxon, hold thine own ! 



No maiden's hand is round thee thrown ! 
That desperate grasp thy frame might feel 
Through bars of brass and triple steel ! 
They tug, they strain ! down, down they go. 
The Gael above, Fitz-James below. 
The chieftain's gripe his throat compressed. 
His knee was planted in his breast ; 
His clotted locks he backward threw, 
Across his brow his hand he drew. 
From blood and mist to clear his sight, 
Then gleamed aloft his dagger bright ! 
But hate and fury ill supplied 
The stream of life's exhausted tide. 
And all too late the advantage came, 
To turn the odds of deadly game ; 
For, while the dagger gleamed on high, 
Reeled soul and sense, reeled brain and eye. 
Down came the blow ! but in the heath 
The erring blade found bloodless sheath. 
The struggling foe may now unclasp 
The fainting Chief's relaxing grasp ; 
Unwounded from the dreadful close. 
But breathless all, Fitz-James arose. 

He faltered thanks to Heaven for life. 

Redeemed, unhoped, from desperate strife; 

Next on his foe his look he cast. 

Whose every gasp appeared liis last ; 

In Roderick's gore he dipped the braid, — 

"Poor Blanche ! thy wrongs are dearl}' paid : 

Yet witJi thy foe must die, or live. 

The praise that faith and valor give." 

With that he blew a bugle note, 

Undid the collar from his throat, 

Unbonneted, and by the wave 

Sat down his brow and hands to lave. 

Then faint afar are heard the feet 

Of rushing steeds in gallop Heet ; 

The sounds increase, and now are seen 

Four mounted S'^uires in Lincoln green ; 

"Two who bear lance, and two who lead, 

By loosened rein, a saddled steed ; 

Each onward held his headlong course. 

And by Fitz-James reined up his hfirse, — 

AVith wonder viewed the bloody spot, — 

" Exclaim not, gallants ! question not, — 

You, Herbert and Lutfness, alight, 

And bind the wounds of yonder knight ; 

Let the gray palfrey bear his weight. 

We destined for a fairer freight. 

And bring him on to Stirling straight ; 

I will before at better speed. 

To seek fresii horse and fitting weed. 

Tiie sun rides high ; — I must be boune 

To see the ai'cher-game at noon ; 

But lightly Bayard clears the lea. 

De Vuux and Herries, follow nie." 

SiK WALTER Scott. 



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WAKEN, LORDS AND LADIES GAY. 

Waken, lords and ladies gay. 
On the mountain dawns the daj' ; 

All the jolly chase is here. 

With hawk and horse and hunting-spear ! 
Hounds are in their couples yelling. 
Hawks are whistling, horns are knelling, 

Merrily, merrily mingle they, 

"Waken, lords and ladies gay." 

Waken, lords and ladies gay. 
The mist has left the mountain gray, 
Springlets in the dawn are steaming. 
Diamonds on the brake are gleaming, 
And foresters have busy been 
To track the buck in thicket green ; 
Now we come to chant our lay, 
"Waken, lords and ladies gay." 

Waken, lords and ladies gay, 
To the greenwood haste away ; 

We can show you where he lies, 

Fleet of foot and tall of size ; 
We can show the marlcs he made 
AVhen 'gainst the oak his antlers frayed ; 

You shall see him brought to bay ; 

Waken, lords and ladies gay. 

Louder, louder chant the lay. 
Waken, lords and ladies gay ! 

Tell them, youth and mirth and glee 

Run a course as well as we ; 
Time, stern huntsman, who can balk, 
Stanch as hound and ileet as hawk ? 

Think of this, and rise with day, 

Gentle lords and ladies gay ! 

SIR WALTER SCOTT. 



THE STAG HUNT. 

FROM "THE LADY OF THE LAKE," CANTO I. 

The stag at eve had drunk his fdl, 

AVhere danced the moon on Monan's rill, 

And dee]) his midnight lair had made 

In lone Glenartney's hazel shade ; 

But, when the sun his beacon red 

Had kindled on Benvoirlich's head. 

The deep-mouthed bloodhound's heavy bay 

Resounded up the rocky way. 

And faint, from farther distance borne. 

Were heard the clanging hoof and horn. 



As Chief who hears his warder call, 

" To arms ! the foemen storm the wall," 

The an tiered monarch of the waste 

Sprung from his heathery couch in haste. 

But, ere his ileet career he took. 

The dew-drops from his flanks he shook ; 

Like crested leader proud and high 

Tossed his beamed frontlet to the sky ; 

A moment gazed adown the dale, 

A moment snuffed the tainted gale, 

A moment listened to the cry, 

That thickened as the chase drew nigh ; 

Then, as the headmost foes appeared. 

With one brave bound the copse he cleared, 

And, stretching forward free and far, 

Sought the wild heaths of Uam-Var. 

Yelled on the view the opening pack ; 
Rock, glen, and cavern paid them back ; 
To many a mingled sound at once 
The awakened mountain gave response. 
A hundred dogs bayed deep and strong, 
Clattered a hundred steeds along. 
Their peal the merry horns rung out, 
A hundred voices joined the shout ; 
With hark and whoop and wild lialloo, 
No rest Benvoirlich's echoes knew. 
Far from the tumult fled the roe ; 
Close in her covert cowered the doe ; 
The falcon, from her cairn on high, 
Cast on the rout a wondering eye, 
Till far beyond her piercing ken 
The hurricane had swept the glen. 
Faint, and more faint, its failing din 
Retui'ned from cavern, clifl', and linn, 
And silence settled, wide and still. 
On the lone wood and mighty hill. 

'T were long to tell what steeds gave o'er. 
As swept the hunt through Cambus-more ; 
What reins were tightened in despair. 
When rose Benledi's ridge in air ; 
Who flagged upon Bochastle's heath, 
Who shunned to stem the flooded Teith, — 
For twice that day, from shore to shore, 
The gallant stag swam stoutly o'er. 
Few were the stragglers, following far 
That reached the lake of Vennachar ; 
And when the Brigg of Turk was won, 
The headmost horseman rode alone. 
Alone, but with unbated zeal. 
That horseman plied the scourge and steel 



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For, jaded now, and spent with toil, 

Embossed with foam, and dark with soil, 

While every gasp with sobs he drew. 

The laboring stag strained fall in view. 

Two dogs of black St. Hubert's breed, 

Unmatched for courage, breath, and speed, 

Fast on his flying traces came. 

And all but won that desperate game ; 

For, scarce a spear's length from his haunch, 

Vindictive toiled the bloodhounds stanch ; 

Nor nearer might the dogs attain, 

Nor farther might the quarrjr strain. 

Thus up the margin of the lake. 

Between the precipice and brake. 

O'er stock and rock their race they take. 

The hunter marked that mountain high, 
The lone lake's western boundary. 
And deemed the stag must turn to bay, 
Where that huge rampart barred the way ; 
Already glorying in the jirize. 
Measured his antlers with his eyes ; 
For the death-wound and dealh-halloo 
Mustered his breath, his whinyard drew ; 
But thundering as he came prepared. 
With ready arm and weapon bared, 
The wily quarry shunned the shock. 
And turned him from the opposing rock ; 
Then, dashing down a darksome glen, 
Soon lost to hound and hunter's ken, 
In the deep Trosachs' wildest nook 
His solitary refuge took. 
There while, close couclied, the thicket shed 
Cold dews and wild-flowers on his head, 
He heard the baffled dogs in vain 
Eave through the hollow pass amain. 
Chiding the rocks that yelled again. 

Close on the hounds the hunter came. 
To cheer them on the vanished game ; 
But, stumbling in the rugged dell, 
The gallant horse exhausted fell. 
The impatient rider strove in vain 
To rouse him with the spur and rein. 
For the good steed, his labors o'er. 
Stretched his stiff limbs, to rise no more ; 
Then, touched with pity and remorse. 
He sorrowed o'er the expiring horse : 
"I little thought, when first thy reiu 
I slacked upon the banks of Seine, 
That Highland eagle e'er should feed 
On thy fleet limbs, my matchless steed ! 
Woe worth the chase, woe worth the day. 
That costs thy life, my gallant gray ! " 

Then through the dell his horn resounds, 
From vain pursuit to call the hounds. 



Back limped, with slow and crippled pace. 
The sulky leaders of tlie chase ; 
Close to their master's side they pressed, 
With drooping tail and humbled crest ; 
But still the dingle's hollow throat 
Prolonged the swelling bugle-note. 
The owlets started from their dream. 
The eagles answered with their scream, 
Round and around the sounds were cast. 
Till echo seemed an answering blast ; 
And on tlie hunter hied his way, 
To join some comrades of the day ; 
Yet often paused, so strange the road. 
So wondrous were the scenes it showed. 

Sir walier. Scott. 



MY HEART'S IN THE HIGHLANDS. 

My heart 's in the Highlands, my heart is not 

here ; 
My heart 's in the Highlands a-chasing the deer ; 
Chasing the wild deer, and following the roe. 
My heart 's in the Highlands wherever I go. 
Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to the North, 
The birthplace of valor, the country of worth ; 
Wherever I wander, wherever I rove, 
The hills of the Highlands forever I love. 

Farewell to the mountains high covered with 

snow ; 
Farewell to the straths and green valleys below ; 
Farewell to the forests and Vvild-hanging woods ; 
Farewell to the torrents and loud-pouring Hoods. 
My heart 's in the Highlands, my heart is not 

here ; 
My heart 's in the Highlands a-chasiug the deer 
Chasing the wild deer, and following the roe. 
My heart 's in the Highlands wherever I go. 

Robert Burns. 



THE STAG HUNT. 

FROM "THE SEASONS: AUTU.MN." 

The stag too, singled from the herd where long 
He ranged, the branching monarch of the shades. 
Before the tempest drives. At first, in speed 
He, sprightly, puts his faith ; and, roused by 

fear, 
Gives all his swift aerial soul to flight. 
Against the breeze he darts, that way the more 
To leave the lessening murderous cry behind : 
Deception short ! though fleeter than the winds 
Blown o'er the keen-aired mountain by the north, 
He bursts the thickets, glances through the 

glades. 
And plunges deep into the wildest wood, — 



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If slow, yet sure, adhesive to the track 
Hot-steaming, up behind him come again 
The inhuman rout, and from the sliady depth 
Expel him, circling through his every shift. 
?le sweeps the forest oft ; and sobbing sees 
The glades, mild opening to the golden day, 
Where, in kind contest, with his butting friends 
He wont to struggle, or his loves enjoj'. 
Oft in the full-descending flood he tries 
To lose the scent, and lave his burning sides ; 
Oft seeks the herd ; the watchful herd, alarmed, 
"With selfish care avoid a brother's woe. 
What shall he do ? His once so vivid nerves. 
So fall of buoyant spirit, now no more 
Ius[iire the course ; but fainting breathless toil. 
Sick, seizes on his heart : he stands at bay ; 
And puts his last weak refuge in des]iair. 
The big round tears run down his dappled face ; 
He groans in anguish ; whih^ the gi'owling pack. 
Blood-happy, hang at his fair jutting chest. 
And mark his beauteous checkered sides with gore. 

JA.MES THOMSON'. 



PIART-LEA? WELL. 

" Hart-T^enp Well is a small sprinaf of water about five miles 
from RichninncI in Yorkshire, and n;ar tiie side of tlie road that 
leads from Richmond to Askric;i^. Its name is dLrived from a 
remarkable chase, the memory of which is preserved by the monu- 
ments spoken of in the second part of the foUowinij poem, which 
monuments do now exist fiSoo] as I have there described them." — 
THE AUTHOK. 

PATIT FIItST. 

The knight had ridden down from Wensley 

jMoor, 
With the slow motion of a summer's cloud ; 
And now, as he approached a vassal's door, 
" Bring forth another horse ! " ho cried aloud. 

"Another horse ! " — That shout the vassal heard, 
And saddled his best steed, a comely gray ; 
Sir Walter mounted him ; he was the third 
Which he had mounted on that glorious day. 

Joy sparkled in the jirancing courser's eyes ; 
The hoisc and hors?man are a happy pair ; 
lint, though Sir Walter like a falcon Hies, 
There is a doleful silence in the air. 

A rout this morning left Sir Walter's hall. 
That as they galloped made the echoes roar ; 
But horse and man are vanislied, one and all ; 
Such race, I think, was never seen before. 

Sir Walter, restless as the veering wind, 
Calls to the few tired dogs that yet remain : 
Blanche, Swift, and Music, noblest of their kind. 
Follow, and up the weary mountain strain. 



The knight hallooed, he cheered and chid them on 
With suppliant gestures and upbraidings stern ; 
But breatii and eyesight fail ; and, one by one, 
The dogs are stretched among the mountain fern. 

Where is the throng, the tumult of the race ? 
The bugles that so joyfully were blown ? 
— This chase it looks not like an earthly chase ; 
Sir Walter and the hart are left alone. 

The poor hart toils along the mountain-side ; 
I will not stop to tell how far he fled, 
Nor will I mention by what death he died ; 
But now the knight beholds him lying dead. 

Dismounting, then, he leaned against a thorn ; 
He had no follower, dog, nor man, nor boy : 
He neither cracked his whip, nor blew his horn, 
But gazed upon the spoil with silent joy. 

Close to the thorn on which Sir Walter leaned 
Stood his dumb partner in this glorious feat ; 
Weak as a lamb the hour that it is yeaned. 
And white with foam as if with cleaving sleet. 

Upon his side the hart was lying stretched : 
His nostril touched a spring beneath a hill. 
And with the last deep groan his breath had 

fetched 
The waters of the spring were trembling still. 

And now, too hap]iy for repose or rest, 

(Never had living man such joyful lot !) 

Sir Walter walked all round, north, south, and 

west. 
And gazed and gazed upon that darling spot. 

And climbing up the hill (it was at least 
Four roods of sheer ascent), Sir Walter found 
Three several hoof-marks which the hunted beast 
Had left imprinted on the grassy ground. 

Sir Walter wiped his fiice, and cried, "Till now 
Such sight was never seen by human eyes : 
Three leaps have borne him fi'om this lolty brow, 
Down to the very fountain where he lies. 

"I '11 build a pleasure-house upon this spot, 
And a small arbor, made ibr rural joy ; 
'T will be the traveller's shed, the pilgrim's cot, 
A place of love for damsels that are coy. 

" A cunning artist will I have to frame 

A basin for that fountain in the dell ! 

And they who do make mention of the same. 

From this day forth, shall call it Hart-Leap AVcll. 

"And, gallant stag ! to make thy praises known, 
Another monument shall here be raised ; 



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Three several pillars, each a rough-hewn stone, 
And planted where thy hoofs the turf have grazed. 

"And in the summer-time, when days are long, 
I will come hither with my paramour ; 
And with the dancers and the minstrel's song 
We will make merry in that pleasant bower. 

"Till the foundations of the mountains fail 
My mansion with its arbor shall endure ; — 
The joy of them who till the fields of Swale, 
And them who dwell among the woods of Ure ! " 

Then home he went, and left the hart, stone-dead. 
With breathless nostrils stretched above the 

spring. 
— Soon did the knight perform what he had said. 
And far and wide the fame thereof did ring. 

Ere thrice the moon into her port had steered, 
A cup of stone received the living well ; 
Three pillars of rude stone Sir Walter reared, 
And built a house of pleasure in the dell. 

And near the fountain, flowers of stature tall 
With trailing plants and trees were intertwined, — 
Which soon composed a little sylvan hall, 
A leafy shelter from the sun and wind. 

And thither, when the summer days were long, 
Sir Walter led his wondering paramour ; 
And with the dancers and the minstrel's song 
Made merriment within that pleasant bower. 

The Icnight, Sir Walter, died in course of time, 
And his bones lie in his paternal vale. — 
But there is matter for a second rhyme, 
And I to this would add another tale. 



PART SECOND. 

The moving accident is not my trndc ; 
To freeze the blood I have no ready arts : • 
'T is my delight, alone in summer shade, 
To pipe a simple song for thinking hearts. 

As I from Hawes to Richmond did repair, 
It chanced that I saw standing in a dell 
Three aspens at thi'ee corners of a square ; 
And one, not four yards distant, near a well. 

What this imported I could ill divine : 
And, ])ulling now the rein my horse to stop, 
1 saw three pillars standing in a line, — • 
The last stone pillar on a dark hill-top. 

The trees were gray, with neitiier arms nor head 
Half wasted the square mound of tawny green ; 
So that you just might say, as then I said, 
" Here in old time the hand of man hath been." 



I looked upon the hill both far and near, — 
More doleful place did never eye survey ; 
It seemed as if the spring-time came not here, 
And nature here were willing to decay, 

I stood in various thoughts and fancies lost. 
When one, who was in shepherd's garb attired, 
Came up the hollow ; — him did I accost. 
And what this place might be I then ijiquired. 

The shepherd stopped, and that same story told 
Which in my former rhyme I have rehearsed. 
" A jolly place," said he, "in times of old ! 
But sometiiing ails it now ; the spot is curst. 

"You see these lifeless stumps of aspen- wood, — 
Some say that they are beeches, others elms, — 
These were the bower ; and here a mansion stood. 
The hnest palace of a hundred realms ! 

"The arbor does its own condition tell ; 
You see the stones, the fountain, and the stream ; 
But as to the great lodge ! you might as well 
Hunt half a day for a forgotten dream. 

" There 's neither dog nor heifer, horse nor sheep. 
Will wet his lips within that cup of stone ; 
And oftentimes, when all are fast asleeji, 
This water doth send forth a dolorous groan. 

" Some say that here a murder has been done, 
And blood cries out for blood ; Imt, for my part, 
1 've guessed, when I 've been sitting in the sun. 
That it was all for that unhappy hart. 

" What thoughts must through the creature's 

brain have past ! 
Even from the topmost stone, upon the steep, 
Are but three bounds, — and look, sir, at this last ! 
master ! it has been a cruel leap. 

" For thirteen hours he ran a desperate race ; 
And in my simple mind we cannot tell 
What cause the hart might have to love this place. 
And come and make his death-bed near the well. 

" Here on the grass perhnps aslee[) he sank, 
Lirlled by the fountain in the summer-tide ; 
This water was perhajjs the fii'st he di'ank 
When he had wandered from his mother's side. 

" In April here beneath the flowering thorn 
He lieard the birds their morning caiols sing ; 
And he, perhaps, for aught we know, was born 
Not half a furlong from that self-same spring. 

" Now, here is neither gi-ass nor ])leasnnt shade : 
The sun on drearier hollow never shone ; 
So will it be, as I have often said, 
I Till trees, and stones, and fountain, all arc gone." 



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*' Gray-headed shepherd, thou hast spoken well ; 
Small difference lies between thy creed and mine : 
This beast not unobserved by nature fell ; 
His death was mourned by sympathy divine. 

" The Being, that is in the clouds and air, 
That is in the green leaves among the groves, 
Maintains a deep and reverential care 
For tlie unottending creatures whom he loves. 

"The pleasure-house is dust : — behind, before, 
This is no common waste, no common gloom ; 
But Nature, in due course of time, once moi'O 
Shall here put on her beauty and her bloom. 

"She leaves these objects to a slow decay. 
That what we are, and have been, may be known ; 
But at the coming of tlie milder day 
These monuments shall all be overgrown. 

" One lesson, shepherd, let us two divide, 
Taught both by what she shows and what con- 
ceals ; 
Never to blend our pleasure or our pride 
With sorrow of the meanest thing that feels." 

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. 



BETH GfiLERT. 

TiiE spearmen heard the bugle sound. 
And cheerily smiled the morn ; 

And many a brach, and many a hound, 
Obeyed Llewellyn's horn. 

And still he blew a louder blast. 

And gave a lustier cheer, 
"Come, Gelert, come, wert never last 

Llewellyn's horn to hear. 

"0, where does faithful Gelert roam, 

The flower of all his race ; 
So true, so brave, — a lamb at home, 

A lion in the chase ? " 

In sooth, he was a peerless hound, 

The gift of royal John ; 
But now no Gelert could be found, 

And all the chase rode on. 

That day Llewellyn little loved 
The chase of hart and hare ; 

And scant and small the booty proved, 
For Gelert was not there. 

Unpleased, Llewellyn homeward hied, 
When, near the portal seat, 

His truant Gelert he espied. 
Bounding his lord to greet. 



But, when he gained his castle-door, 

Aghast the chieftain stood ; 
The hound all o'er was smeared with gore ; 

His lips, his fangs, ran blood. 

Llewellyn gazed with fierce surprise ; 

Unused sucli looks to meet. 
His favorite checked his joyful guise, 

And crouched, and licked his feet. 

Onward, in haste, Llewellyn passed, 

And on went Gelert too ; 
And still, where'er his eyes he cast. 

Fresh blood-gouts shocked his view. 

O'erturned his infant's bed he found. 
With blood-stained covert rent ; 

And all around the walls and ground 
With recent blood besprent. 

He called his child, ■ — no voice replied, — 

He searched with terror wild ; 
Blood, blood he found on every side. 

But nowhere found his child. 

"Hell-hound ! ray child 's by thee devoured, 

The frantic father cried ; 
And to the hilt his vengeful sword 

He plunged in Gelert's side. 

Aroused by Gelert's dying yell. 
Some slumberer wakened nigh : 

What words the parent's joy could tell 
To hear his infant's cry ! 

Concealed beneath a tumbled heap 

His hurried search had missed, 
All glowing from his I'osy sleep. 

The cherub boy he kissed. 

Nor scathe had he, nor harm, nor dread, 

But, the same couch beneath, 
Laj^ gaunt wolf, all torn and dead, 

Tremendous still in death. 

Ah, what was then Llewellyn's pain ! 

For now the truth was clear ; 
His gallant hound the wolf had slain 

To save Llewellyn's heir. ^ 

William Robert Spencer. 



A HUNTING WE WILL GO. 

The dusky night rides down the sky, 

And ushers in the morn : 
The hounds all join in glorious cry, 

The huntsman winds his horn, 

And a hunting we will so. 



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The wife around her husband throws 

Her arms to make him stay ; 
"My dear, it rains, it hails, it blows ; 

You cannot hunt to-day." 

Yet a hunting we will go. 

Away they fly to 'scape the rout, 
Their steeds they soundly switch ; 

Some are thrown in, and some thrown out, 
And some thrown in the ditch. 

Yet a hunting we will go. 

Sly Reynard now like lightning flies, 

And sweeps across the vale ; 
And when the hounds too near he spies, 

He drops his bushy tail. 

Then a hunting we will go. 

Fond Echo seems to like the sport. 

And join the jovial cry ; 
The woods, the hills, the sound retort. 

And music iills the sk}'. 

When a hunting we do go. 

At last his strength to faintness worn. 

Poor Reynard ceases flight ; 
Then hungrj'^, homeward we return. 

To feast away the night, 

And a drinking we do go. 

Ye jovial hunters, in the morn 

Prepare then for the chase ; 
Rise at the sounding of the liorn 

And health with sport embrace, 

"When a hunting we do go. 

■ HENRY FIELDING. 



LIFE IN THE AUTUMN WOODS. 

[VIRGINIA.) 

Summer, has gone. 
And fruitful Autumn has advanced so far 
That there is warmth, not heat, in the broad sun, 
And you may look, with naked eye, upon 

The ardors of his car ; 
The stealthy frosts, whom his spent looks em- 
bolden. 

Are making the green leaves golden. 

What a brave splendor 
Is in the October air ! how rich, and clear. 
And bracing, and all-joyous ! We must render 
Love to the Spring-time, with its sproutings 
tender. 

As to a child quite dear ; 
But Autunm is a thing of perfect glory, 

A manhood not yet hoary. 



I love the woods. 
In this good season of the liberal year ; 
I love to seek their leafy solitudes. 
And give myself to melancholy moods, 

With no intruder near. 
And find strange lessons, as I sit and ponder. 

In every natural wonder. 

But not alone. 
As Shakespeare's melancholy courtier loved 

Ardennes, 
Love I the browning forest ; and I own 
I would not oft have mused, as he, but flown 

To hunt with Amiens — 
And little thought, as np the bold deer bounded, 

Of the sad creature wounded. 

A brave and good. 
But world-Avorn knight — soul-wearied with his 

part 
In this vexed life — gave man for solitude. 
And built a lodge, and lived in Wantley wood. 

To hear the belling hart. 
It was a gentle taste, but its sweet sadness 

Yields to the Imnter's madness. 

What passionate 
And keen delight is in the proud swift chase ! 
Go out what time the lark at heaven s red gate 
Soars joyously singing — quite infuriate 

With the high pride of his place ; 
What time the unrisen sun arrays the pjorning 

In its first bright adorning. 

Hark ! the quick horn — 
As sweet to hear as any clarion — 
Piercing with silver call the ear of morn ; 
And mark the steeds, stout Curtal and Topthorne, 

And Greysteil and the Don — ■ 
Each one of them his fiery mood displaying 

With pawing and with neighing. 

Urge your swift horse 
After the crying hounds in this fresh hour ; 
Vanquish high hills, stem perilous streams per- 
force, 
On the free plain give free wings to your course, 

And you will know the power 
Of the brave chase, — and how of griefs the sorest 

A cure is in the forest. 

Or stalk the deer ; 
The same red lip of dawn has kissed the hills, 
Tlie gladdest sounds are crowding on your ear, 
There is a life in all the atmosphere : — 

Your very nature fills 
With the fresh hour, as up the hills aspiring 

You climb with limbs untirimx. 



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POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS. 



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It is a fair 
And goodly sight to see the antlered stag 
Witli the long sweep of his swift walk repair 
To join his brothers ; or the plethoric bear 

Lying in some high crag, 
With pinky eyes half closed, but broad head 
shaking, 

As gadHies keep him waking. 

And these you see, 
And, seeing them, you travel to their death 
With a slow, stealthy step, from tree to tree, 
Noting the wind, however faint it be. 

The hunter draws a breath 
In times Tike these, which, he will say, repays him 

Eor all care that waylays him. 

A strong joy fills 
(A joy beyond the tongue's cxxDressive power) 
My heart in Autumn weather — tills and thrills! 
And I would rather stalk the breezy hills 

Descending to my bower 
Nightly, by the sweet spirit of Peace attended, 

Thau pine where life is splendid. 

PHILIP PENDLETON COOKE. 



THE ARAB TO HIS FAVOPJTE STEED. 

My beautiful ! my beautiful ! that standest 

meekly by, 
With thy proudly arched and glossy neck, and 

dark and tiery eye. 
Fret not to roam the desert now, with all thy 

winged speed ; 
I may not mount on thee again, — thou 'rt sold, 

my Arab steed ! 
Fret not with that impatient hoof, — snuff not 

the breezy wind, — 
The farther that thou lliest now, so far am I be- 
hind ; 
The stranger hath thy bridle-rein, — thy master 

hath his gold, — 
Fleet-linibed and beautiful, farewell ; thou'rt 

sold, my steed, thou 'rt sold. 

Farewell ! those free, untired limbs full many a 
mile must roam. 

To reach the chill and wintry sky which clouds 
the stranger's home ; 

Some other hand, less fond, must now thy corn 
and bed prepare. 

Thy silky mane, I braided once, must be another's 
care ! 

The moining sun shall dawn again, but never- 
more with thee 



Shall I gallop through the desert paths, where 

we were wont to be ; 
Evening shall darken on the earth, and o'er the 

sandy plain 
Some other steed, with slower step, shall bear me 

home again. 

Yes, thou must go ! the M'ild, free breeze, the 
brilliant sun and sky, 

Thy master's house, — from all of these my 
exiled one must fly ; 

Thy proud dark eye will grow less proud, thy 
step become less fleet, 

And vainly shalt thou arch thy neck, thy mas- 
ter's hand to meet. 

Only in sleep shall I behold that dark eye, glan- 
cing bright ; — • 

Only in sleep shall hear again that step so firm 
and light ; 

And when I raise my dreaming arm to check or 
cheer thy speed, 

Then must I, starting, wake to feel, — thou'rt 
sold, my Arab steed ! 

Ah ! rudely then, unseen by me, some cruel hand 

may chide. 
Till foam-wreaths lie, like crested waves, along 

thj'^ panting side : 
And the rich blood that 's in thee sw^ells, in thy 

indignant pain, 
Till careless eyes, which rest on thee, may count 

each starting vein. 
JVill they ill-use thee ? If I thought — but no, 

it cannot be, — 
Thou art so swift, yet easy curbed ; so gentle, 

yet so free : 
And yet, if haply, when thou 'rt gone, my lonely 

heart should yearn, — 
Can the hand which casts thee from it now com- 
mand thee to return ? 

Ecturn ! alas ! my Arab steed ! what shall thy 

nraster do. 
When thou, who wast his all of joy, hast vanished 

from his view ? 
When the dim distance cheats mine eye, and 

through the gathering tears 
Thy bright form, for a moment, like the false 

mirage appears ; 
Slow and unmounted shall I roam, with weary 

step alone. 
Where, with fleet step and joyo\is bound, thou 

oft hast borne me on ; 
And sitting down by that green well, I '11 pause 

and sadly think, 
" It was here he bowed his glossy neck when last 

I saw him drink 1 " 



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JVhen last Isaiv thee drink ! — Away ! the fevered 

dream is o'er, — 
I could not live a day, and know that we should 

meet no more ! 
They tempted me, my beautiful ! — for hunger's 

power is strong, — 
They tempted me, my beautiful ! but I have 

loved too long. 
Who said that I had given thee itp ? who said 

that thou wast sold ? 
'T is false, — 't is fiilse, my Arab steed ! I fling 

them back their gold ! 
Thus, tlius, I leap upon thy back, and scour the 

distant plains ; 
Away ! who overtakes us now shall claim thee 

for his pains ! 

Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton. 



THE HORSEBACK RIDE. 

When troubled in spirit, when weary of life, 
When I faint 'neath its burdens, and shrink from 

its strife, 
When its fruits, turned to ashes, are mocking my 

taste. 
And its fairest scene seems but a desolate waste, 
Then come ye not near me, my sad heart to 

cheer 
With friendship's soft accents or sympathy's tear. 
No pity I ask, and no counsel I need. 
But bring me, 0, bring me niy gallant young 

.steed, 
With his high arched neck, and his nostril spread 

wide. 
His eye full of fire, and his step full of pride ! 
As I spring to his back, as I seize the strong 

rein. 
The strength to my spirit returneth again ! 
Tlie bonds are all broken that fettered my mind. 
And my cares borne away on the wings of the 

wind ; 
My pride lifts its head, for a season bowed down. 
And the queen in my nature now puts on her 

crown ! 

Now we 're off — lilce tlie winds to the plains 

whence tliey came ; 
And the rapture of motion is thrilling my frame ! 
On, on speeds my courser, scarce printing the sod, 
Scarce crushing a daisy to mark where he trod ! 
On, on like a deer, when the hound's early bay 
Awakes the wild eclioes, away, and away ! 
Still faster, still further, he leaps at my cheer. 
Till the rush of the startled air whirs in my ear ! 
Now 'long a clear rivulet lieth his track, — 
See his glancing hoofs tossing the white pebbles 

back! 



Now a glen dark as midnight — what matter ? — 

we '11 down. 
Though shadows are round us, and rocks o'er us 

frown ; 
The thick branches shake as we 're hurrying 

through, 
And deck us with spangles of silvery dew ! 

What a wild thought of triumph, that this girlisli 

hand 
Such a steed in the might of his strength may 

command ! 
What a glorious creature I Ah ! glance at him 

now. 
As I check him a while on this green hillock's 

brow ; 
How he tosses his mane, with a shrill joj'ous 

neigh, 
And paws the firm earth in his proud, stately 

play ! 
Hurrah ! off again, dashing on as in ire. 
Till the long, flinty pathway is flashing with fire ! 
Ho ! a ditch ! — Shall we pause ? No ; the bold 

leap we dare. 
Like a swift- winged arrow we rush through tli e air I 
0, not all the pleasures that poets may praise, 
Not the 'wildering waltz in the ball-room's blaze, 
Nor the chivalrous joust, nor the daring race, 
Nor the swift regatta, nor merry chase. 
Nor the sail, high heaving waters o'er. 
Nor the rural dance on the moonlight shore, 
Can the wild and thrilling joy exceed 
Of a fearless leap on a fiery steed ! 

Sara Jane LipPINCOTT {Grace Green-wood). 



A CANADIAN BOAT-SONG. 

Faintly as tolls the evening chime, 

Our voices keep tune, and our oars keep time. 

Soon as the woods on shore look dim, 

We '11 sing at St. Ann's our parting hymn. 

Row, brothers, row ! the stream runs fast, 

The rapids are near, and the daylight's past I 

Why should we yet our sail unfurl ? — 
There is not a breath the blue wave to curl. 
But when the wind blows off the shore, 
0, sweetly we '11 rest our weary oar ! 
Blow, breezes, blow ! the stream runs fast. 
The rapids are near, and the daylight 's past ! 

Utawa's tide ! this trembling moon 
Shall see us float over tliy surges soon. 
Saint of this green isle, hear our prayers, — 
0, grant us cool lieavens and favoring airs ! 
Blow, breezes, blow ! the stream runs fast. 
The rapids are near, and the daylight 's past ! 

Thomas Moore. 



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POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS. 



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THE SNOWS.* 

Over the Snows 

Buoyantly goes 
The lumberers' bark canoe : 

Lightly they sweep, 

Wilder each leap, 
Rending the white-caps through. 

Away ! Away ! 
With the speed of a startled deer, 

While the steersman true 

And his laughing creW 
Sing of their wild career : 

" Mariners glide 

Far o'er the tide 
In ships that are stanch and strong : 

Safely as they 

Speed we away. 
Waking the woods with song." 

Away ! Away ! 
With the speed of a startled deer, 

While the laughing crew 

Of the swift canoe 
Sing of the raftsmen's cheer : 

"Through forest and brake, 

O'er rapid and lake. 
We 're sport for the sun and rain ; 

Free as the child 

Of the Arab wild, 
Hardened to toil and pain. 

Away ! Away ! 
With the speed of a startled deer, 

While our buoj^ant flight 

And the rapid's might 
Heighten our swift career." 

Over the Snows 

Buoyantly goes 
The lumberers' bark canoe : 

Lightly they sweep, 

Wilder each leap. 
Tearing the white-caps through. 

Away ! Away ! 
With the speed of a startled deer. 

There 's a fearless crew 

In each light canoe 
To sing of the raftsmen's cheer. 

CHARLES SANGSTER. 



THE PLEASURE-BOAT. 

Come, hoist the sail, the fast let go ! 

They 're seated side by side ; 
Wave chases wave in pleasant flow ; 

The bay is fair and wide. 

* The name given to a foaming rapid on the Upper Ottawa River, 
in Canada. 



The ripples lightly tap the boat ; 

Loose ! Give her to the wind ! 
She shoots ahead ; they 're all afloat ; 

The strand is far behind. 

No danger reach so fair a crew ! 

Thou goddess of the foam, 
I '11 ever pay thee worship due, 

If thou wilt bring them home. 

Fair ladies, fairer than the spray 

The prow is dashing wide. 
Soft breezes take you on your way, 

Soft flow the blessed tide. 

0, might I like those breezes be, 

And touch that arching brow, 
I 'd dwell forever on the sea 

Where ye are floating now. 

The boat goes tilting on the waves ; 

The waves go tilting by ; 
There dips the duck, — her back she laves ; 

O'erhead the sea-gulls fly. 

Now, like the gulls that dart for prey, 

The little vessel stoops ; 
Now, rising, shoots along her way, 

Like them, in easy swoops. 

The sunlight falling on her sheet. 

It glitters like the drift, 
Sparkling, in scorn of summer's heat, 

High up some mountain rift. 

The winds are fresh ; she 's dri\^ing fast 

Upon the bending tide ; 
The crinkling sail, and crinkling mast, 

Go with her side by side. 

Why dies the breeze away so soon ? 

Why hangs the pennant down ? 
The sea is glass ; the sun at noon. — 

Nay, lady, do not frown ; 

For, see, the -winged fisher's plume 

Is painted on the sea ; 
Below, a cheek of lovely bloom. 

Whose eyes look up to thee ? 

She smiles ; thou need'st must smile on her. 

And see, beside her face, 
A rich, white cloud that doth not stir : 

What beauty, and what grace ! 

And pictured beach of yellow sand. 

And peaked rock and hill. 
Change the smooth sea to fairy-land ; 

How lovely and how still ! 



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From that ftir isle the thresher's flail 

Strikes close upon the ear ; 
The leaping fish, the swinging sail 

Of yonder sloop, sound near. 

The parting sun sends out a glow 

Across the placid bay. 
Touching with glory all the show. — 

A breeze ! Up helm ! Away ! 

Careening to the wind, they reach. 
With laugh and call, the shore. 

They 've left their footprints on the beach, 
But them I hear no more. 

Richard Henry Dana. 



THE ANGLER'S TRYSTING-TREE. 

SiNC, sweet thrushes, forth and sing ! 

Meet the morn upon the lea ; 
Are the emeralds of the spring 

On the angler's trysting-tree ? 

Tell, sweet thrushes, tell to me ! 

Are there buds on our willow-tree ? 

Buds and birds on our trysting-ti'ee ? 

Sing, sweet thrushes, forth and sing ! 

Have you met the honey-bee, 
Circling upon rapid wing. 

Round the angler's trysting-tree ? 

Up, sweet thrushes, up and see ! 

Are there bees at our willow-tree ? 

Birds and bees at the trysting-tree ? 

Sing, sweet thrushes, forth and sing ! 

Are the fountains gushing free ? 
Is the south-wind wandering 

Through the angler's trysting-tree ? 

Up, sweet thrushes, tell to me ! 

Is there wind up our willow-tree ? 

Wind or calm at our trysting-tree ? 

Sing, sweet thrushes, forth and sing ! 

Wile us with a merry glee 
To the flowery haunts of spring, — 

To the angler's trysting-tree. 

Tell, sweet thrushes, tell to me ! 

Are there flowers 'neath our willow-tree . 

Sjmng and flowers at the trysting-tree ? 

Thomas Tod Stoddaf.d. 



IN PRAISE OF ANGLING. 

Quivering fears, heart-tearing cares. 
Anxious sighs, untimely tears, 

Fly, fly to courts, 

Fly to fond worldlings' sports, 



Where strained sardonic smiles are glozing still, 
And grief is forced to laugh against her will. 

Where mirth 's but mummery, 

And sorrows only real be. 

Fly from our country pastimes, fly, 
Sad troops of human misery ; 

Come, serene looks. 

Clear as the crystal brooks. 
Or the pure azured heaven that smiles to see 
The rich attendance on our poverty ; 

Peace and a secure mind, 

Which all men seek, we only find. 

Abused mortals ! did you know 

Where joy, heart's ease, and comforts grow, 
You 'd scorn proud towers 
And seek them in these bowers. 

Where winds, sometimes, our woods perhaps may 
shake. 

But blustering care could never tempest make ; 
Nor murmurs e'er come nigh us. 
Saving of fountains that glide by us. 

Here 's no fantastic mask or dance. 
But of our kids that frisk and prance ; 
Nor wars are seen, 
Unless upon the green 
Two harmless lambs are butting one the other, 
Which done, both bleating run, each tohismother; 
And wounds are never found. 
Save what the ploughshare gives the ground. 

Here are no entrapping baits 
To hasten to, too hasty fates ; 

Unless it be 

The fond credulity 
Of silly fish, which (worldling like) still look 
Upon the bait, but never on the hook ; 

Nor envy, 'less among 

The birds, for price of their sweet song. 

Go, let the diving negro seek 

For gems, hid in some forlorn creek : 

We all pearls scorn 

Save what the dewy morn 
Congeals upon each little spire of grass, 
Which careless shepherds beat down as they 
pass ; 

And gold ne'er here appears, 

Save what the yellow Ceres bears. 

Blest silent groves, 0, may you be. 
Forever, mirth's best nursery ! 

May pure contents 

Forever intch their tents 



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Upon these downs, these meads, these rocks, 

these mountains ! 
And peace still slumber by these purling foun- 
tains, 
Which we may erery year 
Meet, when we come a-fishing here. 

SIR HliNRY WOTTON. 



THE ANGLER. 

THE gallant fisher's life, 

It is the best of any ! 
'T is full of pleasure, void of strife, 
And 't is beloved by many ; 
Other joys 
Are but toys ; 
Only this 
Lawful is ; 
For our skill 
Breeds no ill. 
But content and pleasure. 

In a morning, up we rise. 
Ere Aurora's peeping ; 
Drink a cup to wash our eyes. 
Leave the sluggard sleeping ; 

Then we go 

To and fro. 

With our knacks 

At our backs, 

To such streams 

As the Thames, 
If we have the leisure. 

When we please to walk abroad 

For our recreation. 
In the fields is our abode, 
Full of delectation. 

Where, in a brook, 

With a hook, — 

Or a lake, — 

Fish we take ; 

There we sit. 

For a bit. 
Till we fish entangle. 

We have gentles in a horn. 

We have paste and woruis too ; 
We can watch both night and morn, 
Sulfer rain and storms too j 
None do here 
Use to swear : 
Oaths do fray 
Fish away ; 
We sit still, 
AVatch our (juill : 
Fishers must not wransrle. 



If the sun's excessive heat 
Make our bodies swelter. 
To an osier hedge we get. 
For a friendly shelter ; 

Where, in a dike, 

Perch or pike, 

Roach or dace, 

We do chase. 

Bleak or gudgeon. 

Without grudging ; 
We are still contented. 

Or we sometimes pass an hour 

Under a green willow. 
That defends us from a shower, 
Making eartli our pillow ; 

Where we may 

Think and pray, 

Before death 

Stops our breath ; 

Other joys 

Are but toys. 
And to be lamented. 

JOHN CHALKHILL 



THE ANGLER'S WISH. 

I IN these flowery meads would be. 

These crystal streams should solace me ; 

To whose harmonious bubbling noise 

I, with my angle, would rejoice. 

Sit here, and see the turtle-dove 
Court his chaste mate to acts of love ; 

Or, on that bank, feel the west-wind 
Breathe health and plenty ; please my mind. 
To see sweet dew-drops kiss these flowers. 
And then washed off' by April showers ; 
Here, hear my Kenna* sing a song : 
There, see a blackbird feed her young. 

Or a laverock build her nest; 

Here, give my weary spirits rest, 

And raise my low-pitclied thoughts above 

Earth, or what poor mortals love. 

Thus, free from lawsuits, and the noise 
Of princes' courts, 1 would rejoice ; 

Or, with my Bryan and a book, 

Loiter long days near Shawford brook ; 

There sit by him, and eat my meat ; 

There see the sun both rise and set ; 

There bid good morning to next day ; 

There meditate mj"- time away ; 

And angle on ; and beg to have 

A quiet passage to a welcome grave. 

IZAAK WALTON. 

• " Kenna." the name of his supposed mistress, seems \o havf 
been fovsned from the name of his wife, wliich was Ken. 



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ANGLING. 

FROM "THE SEASONS : SPRING." 

Just in the dubious point, where with the pool 
Is mixed the trembling stream, or where it boils 
Around tlie stone, or from the hollow ed bank 
Reverted plays in undulating flow, 
There throw, nice-judging, the delusive fly ; 
And, as you lead it round in artful curve. 
With eye attentive mark the springing game. 
Straight as above the surface of the flood 
They wanton rise, or urged by hunger leap. 
Then fix, with gentle twitch, the barbed hook ; 
Some lightly tossing to the grassy bank. 
And to the shelving shore slow dragging some, 
With various hand proportioned to their force. 
If yet too young, and easily deceived, 
A worthless prey scarce bends your pliant rod, 
Him, piteous of his youth, and the short space 
He has enjoyed the vital light of heaven. 
Soft disengage, and back into the stream 
The speckled infant throw. But should you lure 
From his dark haunt, beneath the tangled roots 
Of pendent trees, the monarch of the brook. 
Behooves you then to ply your finest art. 
Long time he, following cautious, scans the fly ; 
And oft attempts to seize it, but as oft 
The dimpled water speaks his jealous fear. 
At last, wliile haply o'er the shaded sun 
Passes a cloud, he desperate takes the death. 
With sullen plunge. At once he darts along, 
Deep-struck, and runs out all the lengthened line ; 
Then seeks the farthest ooze, the sheltering weed. 
The caverned bank, his old secure abode ; 
And flies aloft, and flounces round the pool. 
Indignant of the guile. With yielding hand. 
That feels him still, yet to his furious course 
Gives way, you, now retiring, following now 
Across the stream, exhaust his idle rage ; 
Till, floating broad upon his breathless side, 
And to his fate abandoned, to the shore 
You gayly drag your unresisting prize. 

JAMES THOMSON. 



THE ANGLER. 

But look ! o'er the fall see the angler stand, 
Swinging his rod with skilful hand ; 
The fly at the end of his gossamer line 

Swims through the sun like a summer moth, 
Till, dropt with a careful precision fine. 

It touches the pool beyond the froth. 
A-sudden, the speckled hawk of the brook 
Darts from liis covert and seizes the hook. 
Swift spins the reel ; with easy slip 
The line pays out, and the rod, lilce a whip, 



Lithe and arrowy, taperiug, slim, 
Is bent to a bow o'er the brooklet's brim, 
Till the trout leaps up in tlie sun, and flings 
The sprajj^ from the flash of iiis finny wings ; 
Then falls on his side, and, diuuken with friglit. 
Is towed to the shore like a staggering barge. 
Till beached at last on the sandy marge. 
Where he dies with the hues of the morning light, 
While liis sides with a cluster of stars are bright. 
The angler in his basket lays 
The constellation, and goes his ways. 

THOMAS Buchanan Read. 



SWIMMING. 



FROM "THE TWO FOSCARI.' 



How many a time have I 
Cloven, with arm still lustier, bi-east more daiing, 
The wave all roughened ; with a swimmer's sti'oke 
Flinging the billows back from my drenched hair, 
And laughing from my lip the audacious brine, 
Which kissed it like a wine-cup, rising o'er 
The waves as they arose, and prouder still 
The loftier they uplifted me ; and oft. 
In wantonness of spirit, plunging down 
Into their green and glassy gulfs, and making 
My way to shells and sea-weed, all unseen 
By those above, till they waxed fearful ; then 
Returning with my grasp full of such tokens 
As showed that I had searched the deep ; exult- 
ing, 
With a far-dashing stroke, and drawing deep 
The long-suspended breath, again I spurned 
The foam which broke around me, and pursued 
My track like a sea-bird. — I was a boy then. 

Lord Byron. 



BATHING. 

FROM "THE SEASONS: SUMMER." 

The sprightly youth 
Speeds to the well-known pool, whose crystal 

depth 
A sandy bottom shows. A while he stands 
Gazing th' inverted landscape, half afraid 
To meditate the blue profound below ; 
Then plunges headlong down the circling flood. 
His ebon tresses and his rosy cheek 
Instant emerge ; and through the obedient wave, 
At each short breathing by his lip repelled. 
With arms and legs according well, he makes, 
As liumor leads, an easy-winding path ; 
Wliile from his polished sides a dewy light 
EHiises on the jileased spectators round. 



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Tliis is the purest exercise of health. 

The kind refresher of the summer-heats ; 

Nor, when cold winter keens the brightening 

flood, 
Would I weak-shivering linger on the brink. 
Thus life redoubles, and is oft preserved, 
By the bold swimmer, in the swift elapse 
Of accident disastrous. Hence the limbs 
Knit into force ; and the same Roman arm, 
That rose victorious o'er the conquered earth, 
First learned, while tender, to subdue the wave. 
Even from the body's purity, the mind 
Receives a secret sympathetic aid. 

JAMES THOMSON. 



OUR SKATER BELLE. 

Along the frozen lake she comes 
In linking crescents, light and fleet ; 

The ice-imprisoned Undine hums 
A welcome to her little feet. 

I see the jaunty hat, the jilunie 

Swerve birdlike in the joyous gale, — 

The cheeks lit up to burning bloom, 

The young eyes sparkling through the veil. 

The (j^uick breath parts her laughing lips, 

The white neck shines through tossing curls ; 

Her vesture gently sways and dips, 
As on she speeds in shell-like whirls. 

Men stop and smile to see her go ; 

They gaze, they smile in pleased surprise ; 
They ask her name ; they long to show 

Some silent friendship in their eyes. 

She glances not ; she passes on ; 

Her steely footfall quicker rings ; 
She guesses not the benison 

Which follows her on noiseless wings. 

Smooth be her ways, secure her tread 

Along the devious lines of life. 
From grace to grace successive led, — 

A noble maiden, nobler wife ! 

ANONYMOUS. 



SLEIGH SONG. 

Jingle, jingle, clear the way, 
'T is the merry, merry sleigh ! 
As it swiftly scuds along, 
Hear the bui-st of hap[)y song ; 
See the gleam of glances bright, 
Flashing o'er the pathway white ! 
.lingle, jingle, past it flies, 
Sending shafts from hooded eyes, 



Roguish archers, I '11 be bound, 
Little heeding whom they wound ; 
See them, with cai)ricious pranks. 
Ploughing now the drifted banks ; 
Jingle, jingle, mid the glee 
Who among them cares for me ? 
Jingle, jingle, on they go. 
Capes and bonnets white with snow, 
Not a single robe they fold 
To protect them from the cold ; 
Jingle, jingle, mid the storm, 
Fun and frolic keep them warm ; 
Jingle, jingle, down the hills. 
O'er the meadows, past the mills, 
Now 'tis slow, and now 'tis fast ; 
Winter will not always last. 
Jingle, jingle, clear the way ! 
'T is the merry, merry sleigh. 

G. VV. PETTEE. 



FEAGMENTS. 

The Soul of Adventure. 

Fierce warres, and faithfull loves shall moralize 
my song. 

Faeyie Qnecne^ Book i,, Proem, SPENSER. 

Send danger from the east unto the west, 
So honor cross it fi'om the north to south, 
And let them grapple : ! the blood more stirs 
To rouse a lion than to start a hare ! 

By Heaven, methinks, it were an easy leap, 

To pluck bright honor from the pale-faced moon, 

Or dive into the bottom of the deep, 

Where fathom-line could never touch the ground, 

And pluck up drowned honor by the locks. 

King Henry jr., Part I. Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



Adventurous Daring. 

On his bold visage middle age 

Had slightly pressed his signet sage. 

Yet had not (pienched the open truth, 

And fiery vehemence of youth ; 

Forward and frolic glee was there. 

The will to do, the soul to dare, 

The sparkling glance, soon blown to fire 

Of hasty love or headlong ire. 

The Lady o/lhe Lake, Cant. i. SCOTT. 

Dar'st thou, Cassius, now 
Leap in with me into this angry Hood, 
And swim to yonder point ? — Upon the word, 
Accoutred as I was, I plunged in. 
And bade him follow. 

Julius Ctesur, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE . 



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Through thick aud thin, both over bank and bush, 
In hope her to attain by hook or crook. 

Faerie Qiteeiie, Book iii. Cant. i. SPENSER. 

The intent and not tlie deed 

Is in our power ; and therefore who dares greatly 

Does greatly. 

BarUarossa. J. BROWN. 

Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, 

safety. 

King Henry ly. Part I. Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

" You fool ! I tell you no one means you haruL" 
"So much the better," Juan said, "for them." 

Don yuan. BYRON. 



Horsemanship. 

I saw young Harry, with his beaver on. 

His cuisses on his thighs, gallantly armed, 

Rise from the ground like feathered Mercury, 

And vaulted with such ease into his seat, 

As if an angel dropped down from the clouds. 

To turn and wind a fiery Pegasus, 

And witch the world with noble horsemanship. 



King Henry IV., Part I. Act iv. Sc. 



Shakespeare. 



" Stand, Bayard, stand ! " The steed obeyed. 

With arching neck and bended head, 

And glancing eye, and quivering ear, 

As if he loved his lord to hear. 

No foot Fitz-James in stirrup staid, 

No grasp upon the saddle laid. 

But wreathed his left hand in the mane, 

And lightly bounded from the plain. 

Turned on the horse his armed heel, 

And stirred his courage with the steel. 

Bounded the fiery steed in air. 

The rider sate erect and fair, 

Then, like a bolt from steel cross-bow 

Forth launched, along the plain they go. 

The Lady of the Lake, Cant. v. SCOTT. 

After many strains and heaves, 
He got up to the saddle eaves, 
From whence he vaulted into th' seat 
With so much vigor, strength, and heat. 
That he had almost tumbled over 
With his own weight, but did recover, 
By laying hold of tail and mane. 
Which oft he used instead of rein. 

Hudibras. DR. S. BUTLER. 

Hunting. 

Better to hunt in fields for health unbought, 
Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught. 
The wise for cure on exercise depend ; 
God never made his work for man to mend. 

Cynion and Iphigenia, DRYIJRN. 



Hunting is the noblest exercise, 
Makes men laborious, active, wise, 
Brings health, and doth the spirits delight. 
It helps the hearing and the sight ; 
It teacheth arts that never slip 
The memory, good horsemanship. 
Search, sharpness, courage and defence. 
And ehaseth all ill habits hence. 

Masques. £ji-;n JonSON. 

My hoarse-sounding horu 
Invites thee to the chase, the sport of Ww^ ; 
Image of war without its guilt. 

The Chase. W. SOMERVILLE. 

Contusion hazarding of neck or spine, 
Which rural gentlemen call sport divine. 

Needless Alarm. -COW'PER. 

My hawk is tired of perch and hood, 
My idle greyhound loathes his food, 
My horse is weary of his stall. 
And I am sick of captive thrall. 
I wish I were as I have been 
Hunting the hart in forests green, 
With bended bow and bloodhound free, 
For that 's the life is meet fo)' nie ! 

Lay 0/ the Imfrisoned Huiilsinaii. : The Lady 0/ the Lake, 
Cant. vi. SCOIT. 

The healthy huntsman, with a cheerful horn. 
Summons the dogs and greets the dappled moru. 

Rural sports. J. GAY. 

Why, let the strucken deer go weep, 

The hart ungalled play ; 
For some must watch, while some must sleep ; 

Thus runs the world away. 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Shooting. 

See from the brake the whirring pheasant springs. 
And mounts exulting on triumphant wings ; 
Short is his joy ; he feels the fiery wound, 
Flutters in blood, and panting beats the ground. 

Wi)uisor Forest. . I'OPE. 

But as some muskets so contrive it, 
As oft to miss the mark they drive at, 
And though well aimed at duck or plover. 
Bear wide, and kick their owners over. 

McFingal, Cant. i. J. Tru.MUULL. 



Swimming. 

The torrent roared ; and we did buffet it 

With lusty sinews, throwing it aside, 

And stennuing it with hearts of controversy. 

Juliits Ccesar, Act'x. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



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I saw him beat the surges under him, 
And ride upon their bpcks ; he trod the water, 
Whose enmity he fiunj aside, and breasted 
The surge most swoln that met him. 

The Tempest, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Angling. 

All 's fish they get 
That Cometh to net. 

Five Hundred Points of Coed Husbandry. T. TUSSER. 

In genial spring, beneath the quivering shade, 
AVhere cooling vapors breathe along the mead. 
The patient fishev takes his silent stand, 
, Intent, his angle trembling in his hand ; 
With looks unmoved, he hopes the scaly breed. 
And eyes the dancing cork, and bending reed. 

IVindior Forest. POPE. 

Now is the time. 
While yet the dark-brown water aids the guile, 
To tempt the trout. The well-dissembled fly. 
The rod fine tapering with elastic spring. 
Snatched from the hoary steed the floating line, 
And all thy slender wat'ry stores prepare. 

The Seasons : SpHng. THOMSON. 

His angle-rod made of a sturdy oak ; 
His line a cable which in storms ne'er broke ; 
His hook he baited with a dragon's tail. 
And sat upon a rock, and bobbed for whale. 

upon a Giant's Angling. W. KING. 



Skating. 

All shod with steel, 
We hissed along the polished ice, in games 
Confederate, imitative of the chase 
And woodland pleasures, — the resounding horn, 
The pack loud-chiming, and the hunted hare. 
So through the darkness and the cold we flew, 
And not a voice was idle ; with the din 
Smitten, the precipices rang aloud ; 
The leafless trees and every icy crag 
Tinkled like iron. 

Influence of Natural Objects. WORDSWORTH. 



RuiiAL Life. 

Rustic mirth goes round ; 
The simple joke that takes the shepherd's heart, 
Easily pleased ; the long loud laugh sincere ; 
The kiss snatched hasty from the sidelong maid, 
On purpose guardless, or pretending sleep ; 
The leap, the slap, the haul ; and, shook to notes 
Of native music, the respondent dance. 
Thus jocund fleets with them the winter night. 

The Seasons: IVinter. THOMSON- 

God made the country, and man made the town ; 
What wonder then, that health and virtue, gifts 
That can alone make sweet the bitter draught 
That life holds out to all, should most abound 
And least be threatened in the fields and groves. 

The Task, Book i. : The Sofa. COWPER. 



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A THING OF BEAUTY IS A JOY 
FOREVER. 

FROM '• ENDYMION," BOOK I. 

A THING of beauty is a joy forever : 

Its loveliness increases ; it will never 

Pass into nothingness ; but still will keep 

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep 

Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet 

breathing. 
Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing 
A flowery band to bind us to the earth, 
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth 
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days, 
Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkened ways 
Made for our searching : yes, in spite of all. 
Some shape of beauty moves away the pall 
From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon, 
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon 
For simple sheep ; and such are daffodils 
With the green world they live in ; and clear rills 
That for themselves a cooling covert make 
'Gainst the hot season ; the mid-forest brake. 
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk -rose blooms : 
And such too is the grandeur of the dooms 
We have imagined for the' mighty dead ; 
All lovely tales that we have heard or read : 
An endless fountain of immortal drink. 
Pouring unto us from the heaven's brink. 

JOHN Keats. 



MELROSE ABBEY. 

FROM "THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL," CANTO U. 

If thou wouldst view fair Melrose aright, 
Go visit it by the pale moonlight ; 
For the gay beams of lightsome day 
Gild, but to flout, the ruins gray. 
When the broken arches are black in night. 
And each shafted oriel glimmers white ; 
When the cold light's uncertain shower 
Streams on the ruined central tower ; 
When buttress and buttress, alternately. 
Seem framed of ebon and ivory ; 



When silver edges tlie imageiy, 

And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die ; 

When distant Tweed is heard to rave. 

And the owlet to hoot o'er the dead man's grave, 

Then go, — but go alone the while, — 

Then view St. David's ruined pile ; 

And, home returning, soothly swear, 

Was never scene so sad and fair ! 

The pillared arches were over their head. 

And beneath their feet were the bones of the dead. 

Spreading herbs and flowerets bright 
Glistened with the dew of night ; 
Nor herb nor floweret glistened there. 
But was carved in the cloister-arches as fair. 
The monk gazed long on the lovely moon, 

Then into the night he looked forth ; 
And red and bright the streamers light 

Were dancing in the glowing north. 
So had he seen, in fair Castile, 

The youth in glittering squadrons start, 
Sudden the flying jennet wheel. 
And hurl the unexjiected dart. 
He knew, by the streamers that shot so bright. 
That spirits were riding the northern light. 

By a steel-clenched postern door. 

They entered now the chancel tall ; 
The darkened roof lose high aloof 

On pillars lofty and light and small ; 
The keystone, that locked each ribbed aisle, 
Was a fleur-de-lys, or a quatre-feuille : 
The corbells.were carved grotesque and grim ; 
And the pillars, with clustered shafts so trim. 
With base and with capital flourished around. 
Seemed bundles of lances which garlands had 
bound. 

Full many a scutcheon and banner, riven. 
Shook to the cold night-wind of heaven, 

Around the screened altar's pale ; 
And there the Jying lamps did burn, 
Before thy low and lonely urn, 
gallant Chief of Otterburne ! 

And thine, dark Knight of Liddesdale ! 



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fading honors of the dead ! 
high amtition, lowly laid ! 

The moon on the east oriel shone 
Through slender shafts of shapely stone, 

By foliaged tracery combined ; 
Thou wouldst have thought some fairy's hand 
'Twixt poplars stiaight the osier wand 

In many a freakish knot had twined ; 
Then framed a sj)ell, when the work was done, 
And changed the willow wreaths to stone. 
The silver light, so pale and faint. 
Showed many a prophet, and many a saint, 

Whose image on the glass was dyed ; 
Full in the midst, his Cross of Red 
Triumphant Michael brandished. 

And trampled the Apostate's pride. 
The moonbeam kissed the holy pane, 
And threw on the pavement a bloody stain. 

Sir Walter scott. 



NORHAM CASTLE. 



FROM "MARMION," CANTO I. 

[The ruinous castle of Norham (anciently called Ubbanford) is 
situated on the southern bank of the Tweed, about six miles above 
Berwick, and where that river is still the boundary between Eng- 
land and Scotland. The extent of its ruins, as well as its historical 
importance, shows it to have been a place of magnificence as well 
as strength. Edward I. resided there when he was created umpire 
of the dispute concerning the Scottish succession. It was repeat- 
edly taken and retaken during- the wars between England and 
Scotland, and, indeed, scarce any happened in which it had not 
a principal share. Norham Castle is situated on a steep bank 
which overhangs the river. The ruins of the castle are at present 
considerable, as well as picturesque. They consist of a large 
shattered tower, with many vaults, and fragments of other edifices 
enclosed within an outward wall of great circuit.] 



Day set on Norham's castled steep, 
And Tweed's fair river, broad and deep, 

And Cheviot's mountains lone : 
The battled towers, the donjon keep, 
The loop-hole grates where captives weep, 
The flanking walls that round it sweep, 

In yellow lustre shone. 
The warriors on the turrets high. 
Moving athwart the evening sky, 

Seemed forms of giant height ; 
Their armor, as it caught the rays. 
Flashed back again the western blaze 

In lines of dazzling light. 

St. George's banner, broad and gay, 

Now faded, as the fading ray- 
Less bright, and less, was flung ; 

The evening gale had scarce the power 

To wave it on the donjon tower, 
So heavily it hung. 



The scouts had parted on their search, 

The castle gates were barred ; 
Above the gloomy portiil arch, 
Timing his footsteps to a march, 

The warder kept his guard ; 
Low humming, as he paced along, 
Some ancient Border-gathering song. 

A distant trampling sound he hears ; 
He looks abroad, and soon appears, 
O'er Horncliff' hill, a plump of spears, 

Beneath a pennon gay ; 
A horseman, darting from the crowd. 
Like lightning from a summer cloud, 
Spurs on his mettled courser proud 

Before the dark array. 
Beneath the sable palisade, 
That closed the castle barricade. 

His bugle-horn he blew ; 
The warder hasted from the wall. 
And warned the captain in the hall, 

For well the blast he knew ; 
And joyfully that knight did call 
To sewer, squire, and seneschal. 

" Now broach ye a pipe of Malvoisie, 

Bring pasties of the doe. 
And quickly make the entrance free. 
And bid my hei'alds ready be, 
And every minstrel sound his glee. 

And all our trumpets blow ; 
And, from the platform, spare ye not 
To fire a noble salvo-shot : 

Lord Marmion waits below." 
Then to the castle's lower ward 

Sped forty yeomen tall, 
The iron-studded gates unbarred, 
Raised the portcullis' ponderous guard. 
The lofty palisade unsparred, 

And let the drawbridge fall. 

Along the bridge Lord Marmion rode, 
Proudly his red-roan charger trode, 
His helm hung at the saddle-bow ; 
Well by his visage you might know 
He was a stalworth knight, and keen, 
And had in many a battle been. 
The scar on his brown cheek revealed 
A token true of Bosworth field ; 
His eyebrow dark, and eye of fire. 
Showed spirit proud, and prompt to ire ; 
Yet lines of thought upon his cheek 
Did deep design and counsel speak. 
His forehead, by his casque worn bare, 
His thick mustache, and curly hair, 
Coal-black, and grizzled here and there, 
But more through toil than age ; 



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THE CONVENT. 



" Her hopes, her fears, her joys, -were all 
Bounded withtn the cloister wall- 



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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS. 



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His square-turned joints, and strength of limb, 
Showed him no carpet-kniglit so trim. 
But in close fight a champion grim, 
In camps a leader sage. 

Well was he armed from head to lieol, 

In mail and plate of Milan steel ; 

But his strong helm, of mighty cost, . 

Was all with burnished gold embossed ; 

Annid the plumage of the crest, 

A falcon hovered on her nest, 

With wings outspread, and forward breast ; 

E'en such a falcon, on his shield, 

Soared sable in an azure field : 

The golden legend bore aright, 

S2Si)0 cfjccfts at mc to ti£atf) is tiisbt. 

Blue was the charger's broidered rein ; 

Blue ribbons decked his arching mane ; 

The kniglitly housing's ample fold 

Was velvet blue, and trapped with gold. 

Behind him rode two gallant si;iuires 
Of noble name and knightly sires ; 
They burned the gilded spurs to claim ; 
For well could each a war-horse tame, 
Could draw the bow, the sword could sway, 
And lightly bear the ring away ; 
Nor less with courteous precepts stored, 
Could dance in hall, and carve at board, 
And frame love-ditties passing rare. 
And sing them to a lady fair. 

Four men-at-arms came at their backs, 
AVith halbert, bill, and battle-axe ; 
They bore Lord Marniion's lance so strong. 
And led his sumpter-mules along, 
And ambling pnlfrey, when at need 
Him listed ease his battle-steed. 
The last and trustiest of the four 
On high his forky pennon bore ; 
Like swallow's tail, in shape and hue, 
Fluttered the streamer glossy blue, 
Where, blazoned sable, as before, 
The towering falcon seenjed to soar. " 
Last, twenty yeomen, two and two, 
In hosen black, and jerkius blue, 
With falcons broidered OTi eSch breast. 
Attended on their lord's ''behest : 
Each, chosen for an arcKer good, 
Knew hunting-craft by lake or wood ; 
Each one a six-foot bow could bend, 
And far a cloth-yard shaft could send ; 
Each held a boar-spear tough and strong, 
And at their belts their quivers rung. 
Their dusty palfreys and array 
Showed they had marched a weary way. 

Sir Walter Scott. 



ALNWICK CASTLE. 

Home of the Percy's high-born race, .^ 

Home of their beautiful and brave, 
Alike their birth and burial place. 

Their cradle and their grave ! 
Still sternly o'er the castle gate ■' 
Their house's Lion stands in state, -i^ 

As in his proud departed hours ; -^ 
And warriors frown in stone on high, ? 
And feudal banners " flout the sky " j. 

Above his princely towers. 

A gentle hill its side inclines, 
1 Lovely in England's fadeless green, 
To meet the quiet stream which winds 

Through this romantic scene 
As silently and sweetly still 
As when, at evening, on that hill. 

While summer's wind blew soft and low", 
Seated by gallant Hotspur's side. 
His Katherine was a happy bride, 

A thousand years ago. 

I wandered through the lofty halls 

Trod by the Percys of old fame, 
And traced upon the chapel walls 

Each high, heroic name, 
From him who once his standard set 
Where now, o'er mosque and minaret, 

Glitter the Sultan's crescent moons. 
To him who, when a younger son, 
Fought for King George at Lexington, 

A major of dragoons. 

That last half-stanza, — it has dashed 

From my warm lip the sparkling cup ; 
The light that o'er my eyebeam flashed. 

The power that bore my spirit up 
Above this bank-note world, is gone ; 
And Alnwick 's but a market town. 
And this, alas ! its market day, 
And beasts and borderers throng the wa}- ; 
Oxen and bleating lambs in lots, 
Northumbrian boors and plaided Scots, 

Men in the coal and cattle line ; 
From Teviot's bard and hero land, 
From royal Berwick's beach of sand. 
From Wooller, Mori)eth, Hexham, and 

Newcastle-upon-Tyne. 

These are not the romantic times 
So beautiful in Spenser's rhymes. 

So dazzling to the dreaming boy ; 
Ours are the days of fact, not fable. 
Of knights, but not of the round table, 

Of Bailie Jarvie, not Rob Roy ; 
'Tis what "Our President," Monroe, 



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Has called " tlie era of good feeling ; " 
The Highlander, the bitterest foe 
To modern laws, has felt their blow, 
Consented to be taxed, and vote, 
And put on pantaloons and coat, 

And leave off cattle-stealing : 
Lord Stafford mines for coal and salt, 
The Duke of Norfolk deals in malt, 

The Douglas in red herrings ; 
And noble name and cultured land, 
Palace, and park, and vassal band. 
Are powerless to the notes of hand 

Of Rothschild or the Barings. 

The age of bargaining, said Burke, 
Has come : to-day the turbaned Turk 
( Sleep, Richard of the lion heart ! 
Sleep on, nor from your cerements start) 

Is England's friend and fast ally ; 
The Moslem tramples on the Greek, 

And on the Cross and altar-stone, 

And Christendom looks tamely on, 
And hears the Christian maiden shriek, 

And sees the Christian father die ; 
And not a sabre-blow is given 
For Greece and fame, for faith and heaven, 

By Europe's craven chivalry. 

You '11 ask if yet the Percy lives 

In the armed pomp of feudal state. 
The present representatives 

Of Hotspur and his "gentle Kate," 
Are some half-dozen serving-men 
In the drab coat of William Penn ; 

A chambermaid, whose lip and eye, 
And cheek, and brown hair, bright and curling. 

Spoke nature's aristocracy ; 
And one, half groom, half seneschal. 
Who bowed me through court, bower, and hall. 
From donjon keep to turret wall. 

For ten-and-sixpence sterling. 

FiTZ-GREENE HALLECK. 



SONNET. 

COMPOSED UPON WESTMINSTER BRIDGE, LONDON, l8o2. 

Earth has not anything to show more fair ; 
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by 
A sight so touching in its majesty : 
This city now doth, like a garment, M'ear 
The beauty of the morning ; silent, bare. 
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie 
Open unto the fields, and to the sky. 
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air. 
Never did sun more beautifully steep 
In his first splendor valley, rock, or hill ; 



Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep ! 
The river glideth at his own sweet will : 
Dear God ! the very houses seem asleep ; 
And all that mighty heart is lying still ! 

William Woroswortii. 



NUREMBERG. 

In the valley of the Pegnitz, where across broad 

meadow-lauds 
Rise the blue Franconian mountains, Nuremberg, 

the ancient, stands. 

Quaint old town of toil and traffic, quaint old 

town of art and song, 
Memories haunt thy pointed gables like the rooks 

that round them throng : 

Memories of the Middle Ages, when the em- 
perors rough and bold 

Had their dwellings in thy castle, time-defying, 
centuries old ; 

And thy brave and thrifty burghers boasted, in 

their uncouth rhyme. 
That their great, imperial city stretched its hand 

to every clime. 

In the court-yard of the castle, bound with many 

an iron band, 
Stands the mighty linden planted by Queen 

Cunigunde's hand ; 

On the square, the oriel window, where in old 
heroic days 

Sat the poet Melchior, singing Kaiser Maximil- 
ian's praise. 

Everywhere I see around me rise the wondrous 
world of art ; 

Fountains wrought with richest sculpture stand- 
ing in the common mart ; 

Anfl above catliedral doorways saints and bishops 

cai'ved in stone, 
Bj a former age commissioned as apostles to our 

own. 

In the church of sainted Sebald sleeps enshrined 

his holy dust, 
And in bronze the Twelve Apostles guard from 

age to age their trust : 

In the church of sainted Lawrence stands a pix 

of sculpture rare, 
Like the foamy sheaf of fountains, rising through 

the painted air. 



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Here, when art was still religion, with a simple 
reverent heart, 

Lived and labored Albrecht Diirer, the Evan- 
gelist of Art ; 

Hence in silence and in sorrow, toiling still with 

busy hand. 
Like an emigi'ant he wandered, seeking for the 

Better Land. 

Emigravit is the inscription on the tombstone 

where he lies, 
Dead he is not — but departed — for the artist 

never dies : 

Fairer seems the ancient city, and the sunshine 

seems more fair 
That he once has trod its pavement, that he once 

has breathed its air. 

Through these streets so broad and stately, these 

obscure and dismal lanes. 
Walked of yore the Mastersingers, chanting rude, 

poetic strains ; 

From remote and sunless suburbs came they to 

the friendly guild. 
Building nests in Fame's great temple, as in 

spouts the swallows build. 

As the weaver plied the shuttle, wove he too the 

mystic rhyme, 
And tlie smith his iron measures hammered to 

the anvil's chime. 

Thanking God, whose boundless wisdom makes 

the flowers of poesy bloom 
In the forge's dust and cinders, in the tissues of 

the loom. 

Here Hans Sachs, the cobbler-poet, laureate of 

the gentle craft. 
Wisest of the Twelve Wise Masters, in huge 

folios sang and laughed. 

But his house is now an alehouse, with a nicely 

sanded floor. 
And a garland in the window, and his face above 

the door. 

Painted by some humble artist, as in Adam. 

Puschman's song, 
As the old man gray and dovelike, with his 

gi'eat beard white and long. 

And at night the swart mechanic comes to drown 
his cark and care. 

Quaffing ale from pewter tankards, in the mas- 
ter's antique chair. 



Vanished is the ancient splendor, and before my 

dreamy eye 
Wave these mingling shapes and figures, like a 

faded tapestry. 

Not thy Councils, not thy Kaisers, win for thee 

the world's regard. 
But thy painter, Albrecht Diirer, and Hans Sachs, 

thy cobbler- bard. 

Thus, Nuremberg, a wanderer from a region 

far away. 
As he paced thy streets and court-yards, sang in 

thought his careless lay ; 

Gathering from the pavement's crevice, as a 

floweret of the soil. 
The nobility of labor, — the long pedigree of toil. 
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 



ITALY. 

FROM •■ ITALY." 

Italy, how beautiful thou art ! 
Yet I could weep, — for thou art lying, alas ! 
Low in the dust ; and they who come admire 

thee 
As we admire the beautiful in death. 
Thine was a dangerous gift, the gift of beauty. 
Would thou hadst less, or wert as once thou wast. 
Inspiring awe in those who now enslave thee ! 
But why despair ? Twice hast thou lived already. 
Twice shone among the nations of the world. 
As the sun shines among the lesser lights 
Of heaven ; and shalt again. The hour shall 

come. 
When they who think to bind the ethereal spirit, 
Who, like the eagle cowering o'er his prey. 
Watch with quick eye, and strike and strike again 
If but a sinew vibrate, shall confess 
Their wisdom folly. 

SAMUEL ROGERS. 



VENICE. 



FROM " ITALY." 



There is a glorious City in the Sea. 
The Sea is in the broad, the narrow streets, 
Ebbing and flowing ; and the salt sea-weed 
Clings to the marble of her palaces. 
No track of men, no footsteps to and fro. 
Lead to her gates. The path lies o'er the Sea, 
Invisible ; and from the land we went. 
As to a floating City, — steering in. 
And gliding up her streets as in a dream. 
So smoothly, silently, — by many a dome 



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Mosque-like, and many a stately portico, 

The statues ranged along an azure sky ; 

By many a pile in more than Eastern splendor, 

Of old the residence of merchant kings ; 

The fronts of some, though Time had shattered 

them, 
Still glowing with the richest hues of art, 
As though the wealth within them had run o'er. 

A few in fear. 
Flying away from him whose boast it was 
That the grass grew not where his horse had 

trod. 
Gave birth to Venice. Like the wateifowl, 
They built their nests among the ocean waves ; 
And where the sands were shifting, as the wind 
Blew from the north, the south ; where they that 

came 
Had to make sure the ground they stood upon, 
Rose, like an exhalation, from the deep, 
A vast Metropolis, with glittering spires. 
With theatres, basilicas adorned ; 
A scene of light and glory, a dominion. 
That has endui'ed the longest among men. 

And whence the talisman by which she rose 
Towering ? 'T was found there in the barren sea. 
Want led to Enterprise ; and, far or near, 
Who met not the Venetian ? — now in Cairo ; 
Ere yet the Califa came, listening to hear 
Its bells approaching from the Red Sea coast ; 
Now on the Euxine, on the Sea of Azoph, 
In converse with the Persian, with the Russ, 
The Tartar ; on his lowly deck receiving 
Pearls from the gulf of Ormus, gems from Bagdad, 
Eyes brighter yet, that shed the light of love 
From Georgia, from'Circassia. Wandering round. 
When in the rich bazaar he saw, displayed. 
Treasures from unknown climes, away he went, 
And, travelling slowly upward, drew erelong 
From the well-head supplying all below ; 
Making the Imperial City of the East 
Herself his tributary. 

Thus did Venice rise. 
Thus flourish, till the unwelcome tidings came. 
That in the Tagus had arrived a fleet 
From India, from the region of the Sun, 
Fragrant with spices, — that a way was found, 
A channel opened, and the golden stream 
Turned to enrich another. Then she felt 
Her strength departing, and at last she fell. 
Fell in an instant, blotted out and razed ; 
She who had stood yet longer than the longest 
Of the Four Kingdoms, — who, as in an Ark, 
Had floated down amid a thousand wrecks, 
Uninjured, from the Old World to the New 

Samuel Rogers. 



ROME. 



FROM " ITALY." 



I AM in Rome ! Oft as the morning ray 
Visits these eyes, waking at once I cry. 
Whence this excess of joy ? AVhat has befallen 

me ? 
And from within a thrilling voice replies, 
Thou art in Rome ! A thousand busy thoughts 
Rush on my mind, a thousand images ; 
And I spring up as girt to run a race ! 

Thou art in Rome ! the City that so long 
Reigned absolute, the mistress of the world ; 
The mighty vision that the prophets saw. 
And trembled ; that from nothing, from the 

least, . 

The lowliest village (what but here and there 
A reed-roofed cabin by a river-side ?) 
Grew into everything ; and, year by year, 
Patiently, fearlessly working her way 
O'er brook and field, o'er continent and sea, • 
Not like the merchant with his merchandise, 
Or traveller with staff and scrip exploring. 
But hand to hand and foot to foot through hosts. 
Through nations numberless in battle array. 
Each behind each, each, when the other fell, 
Up and in arms, at length subdued them all. 

Samuel Rogers. 



COLISEUM BY MOONLIGHT. 

FROM " MA.N'FRED," ACT lU. SC. 4. 

The stars are forth, the moon above the tops 
Of the snow-shining mountains. — Beautiful ! 
1 linger yet with Nature, for the night 
Hath been to me a more familiar face 
Than that of man ; and in her starry shade 
Of dim and solitary loveliness 
I learned the language of another world. 
I do remember. me, that in my youth. 
When I was wandering, — upon such a night 
I stood within the Coliseum's wall, 
Midst the (-hief relics of almighty Rome. 
The trees which grew along the broken arches 
Waved dark in the blue midnight, and the stars 
Shone through the rents of ruin ; from afar 
The watch -dog bayed beyond the Tiber ; and 
'More near, from out the Csesars' palace came 
The owl's long cry, and, interruptedly. 
Of distant sentinels the fitful song 
Beguir and died upon the gentle wind. 
Some cypresses beyond the time-worn breach 
Appeared to skirt the horizon, yet they stood 
Within a bowshot, — where the Caesars dwelt, 
And dwell the tuneless birds of night, amidst 



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A grove which springs through levelled battle- 
ments, 
And twines its roots with the imperial hearths. 
Ivy usurps the laurel's place of growth ; — 
But the gladiators' bloody Circus stands, 
A noble wreck in ruinous perfection. 
While CiDesar's chambers and the Augustan halls 
Grovel on earth in indistinct decay. — 
And thou didst shine, thou rolling moon, upon 
All this, and cast a wide and tender light, 
Which softened down the hoar austerity 
Of rugged desolation, and filled up, 
As 't were anew, the gaps of centuries, 
Leaving that beautiful which still was so, 
And making that which was not, till the place 
Became religion, and the heart ran o'er 
With silent worship of the great of old ! — 
The dead, but sceptred sovereigns, who still rule 
Our spirits from their urns. 

LORD BYRON. 



THE COLISEUM. 

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO IV. 

Arches on arches ! as it were that Eome, 
Collecting the chief trophies of her line, 
Would build up all her triumphs in one dome, 
Her Coliseum stands ; the moonbeams shine 
As 't were its natural torches, for divine 
Should be the light which streams here, to 

illume 
This long-explored, but still exhaustless, mine 
Of contemplation ; and the azure gloom 
Of an Italian night, where the deep skies assume 

Hues which have words, and speak to ye of 

heaven, 
Floats o'er this vast and wondrous monument, 
And shadows forth its glory. There is given 
Unto the things of earth, which Time hath bent, 
A spirit's feeling, and where he hath leant 
His hand, but broke his scythe, there is a power 
And magic in the ruined battlement, 
For wliich the palace of the present hour 
Must yield its j)omp, and wait till ages are its 

dower. 

And here the buzz of eager nations ran, 
In murmured pity, or loud-roared applause. 
As man was slaughtered by his fellow-iuan. 
And wherefore slaughtered ? wherefore, but 

because 
Such were the bloody Circus' genial laws. 
And the imperial pleasure. — Wherefore not ? 
What matters where we fall to fill the maws 
Of worms, — on battle-plains or listed spot ? 
Both are but theatres where the chief actors rot. 



I see before me the Gladiator lie ; 
He leans upon his hand, — his manly brow 
Consents to death, but conquers agony. 
And his drooped head sinks gradually low, — 
And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow 
From the I'ed gash, fall heavy, one by one. 
Like the first of a thunder-shower ; and now 
The arena swims around him, — he is gone. 
Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hailed the 
wretch who won. 

He heard it, but he heeded not, — his eyes 
Were with his heart, and that was far away. 
He recked not of the life he lost nor prize. 
But where his rude hut by the Danube lay, 
There were his young barbarians all at play. 
There was their Dacian mother, — he, their sire. 
Butchered to make a Roman holiday ! — 
All this rushed with his blood. — Shall he 

expire. 
And unavenged ? Arise, ye Goths, and glut your 

ire ! 

But here, where Murder breathed her bloody 

steam, 
And here, where buzzing nations choked the 

ways. 
And roared or murmured like a mountain stream 
Dashing or winding as its torrent strays ; 
Here, where the Roman millions' blame or praise 
Was death or life, the playthings of a crowd, 
My voice sounds much, — and fall the stars' 

faint rays 
On the arena void, seats crushed, walls bowed, 
And galleries, where my steps seem echoes strange- 
ly loud. 

A ruin, — yet what ruin ! from its mass 
Walls, palaces, half-cities, have been reared ; 
Yet oft the enormous skeleton ye pass, 
And marvel wh ere the spoil could have appeared. 
Hath it indeed been plundered, or but cleared ? 
Alas ! developed, opens the decay. 
When the colossal fabric's form is neared ; 
It will not bear the brightness of the day, 
Which streams too much on all years, man, have 
reft away. 

But when the rising moon begins to climb 
Its topmost arch, and gently jjauses there ; 
When the stars twinkle through the loops of 

time, 
And the low night-breeze waves along the air 
The garland-forest, which the gray walls wear, 
Like laurels on the bald first Caesar's head ; 
When the light shines serene, but doth not 

glare, — • 
Then in this magic circle raise the dead ; 
Heroes have trod this spot, — 't is on their dust 

ye tread. 



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" While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand; 

When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ; 

And when Rome falls — the World." From 

our own land 

Thus sjiake the pilgrims o'er this mighty wall 

In Saxon times, which we are wont to call 

Ancient ; and these three mortal things are still 

On their foundations, and unaltered all ; 

Rome and her Ruin past Redemption's skill, 

The World, the same wide den — of thieves, or 

what ye will. 

Lord Byron. 



THE PANTHEON. 

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO IV. 

Simple, erect, severe, austere, sablime, — 
Shrine of all saints and temple of all gods, 
From Jove to Jesus, • — spared and blest by time ; 
Looking tranquillity, while falls or nods 
Arch, empire, each tiling round thee, and man 

plods 
His way through thorns to ashes, — glorious 

dome ! 
Shalt thou not last ? Time's scythe and tyrants' 

rods 
Shiver upon thee, — sanctuary and home 
Of art and piety, — Pantheon ! — pride of Rome ! 

Relic of nobler days and noblest arts ! 

Despoiled yet perfect, with thy circle spreads 

A holiness appealing to all hearts. 

To art a model ; and to him who treads 

Rome for the sake of ages, Glory sheds 

Her light through thy sole aperture ; to those 

Who worship, here are altars for their beads ; 

And they who feel for genius may repose 

Their eyes on honored forms, whose busts around 

them close. 

Lord Byron. 



A DAY IN THE PAMFILI DORIA, 

NEAR ROME. 

Though the hills are cold and snowy, 
And the wind drives chill to-day, 

My heart goes back to a spring-time, 
Far, far in the past away. 

And I see a quaint old city, 

Weary and woi'n and brown, 
Where the spring and the birds are so early. 

And the sun in such light goes down. 

I remember that old-time villa 
Where our afternoons went by, 

Where the suns of March flushed warmly, 
And spring was in earth and sky. 



Out of the mouldering city, — 
Mouldering, old, and gray, — 

We sped, with a lightsome heart-thrill, 
For a sunny, gladsome day, — 

For a revel of fresh spring verdure, 
For a race mid springing flowers, 

For a vision of plashing fountains. 
Of birds and blossoming bowers. 

Tliere were violet banks in the shadows, 

Violets white and blue ; 
And a world of bright anemones, 

That over the terrace grew, — 

Blue and orange and purple, 

Rosy and yellow and white, 
Rising in rainbow bubbles. 

Streaking the lawns with light. 

And down from the old stone-pine trees. 

Those iar-off islands of air, 
The birds are flinging the tidings 

Of a joyful revel up there. 

And now for the grand old fountains, 

Tossing their silvery spray ; 
Those fountains, so quaint and .so manj', 

That are leaping and singing all day ; 

Those fountains of strange weird sculpture, 
With lichens and moss o'ergrown, — 

Are they marble greening in moss-wreaths, 
Or moss- wreaths whitening to stone ? 

Down many a wild, dim pathway 
We ramble from morning till noon ; 

We linger, unheeding the hours. 
Till evening comes all too soon. 

And from out the ilex alleys. 

Where lengthening shadows play, 

We look on the dreamy Campagna, 
All glowing with setting day, — 

All melting in bands of purple. 
In swathings and foldings of gold, 

In ribbons of azure and lilac, 
Like a princely banner unrolled. 

And the smoke of each distant cottage, 
And the flash of each villa white, 

Shines out with an opal glimmer, 
Like gems in a casket of light. 

And the dome of old St. Peter's 
With a strange translucence glows. 

Like a mighty bubble of amethyst 
Floating in waves of rose. 



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In a trance of dreamy vagueness, 
We, gazing and yearning, behold 

That city beheld by the prophet, 
Whose walls were transparent gold. 

And, dropping all solemn and slowly. 

To hallow the softening spell. 
There falls on the dying twilight 

The Ave Maria bell. 

With a mournful, motherly softness, 

With a weird and weary care. 
That strange and ancient city 

Seems calling the nations to prayer. 

And the words that of old the angel 
To the mother of Jesus brought 

Rise like a new evangel, 

To hallow the trance of our thought. 

With the smoke of the evening incense 
Our thoughts are ascending then 

To Mary, the mother of Jesus, 
To Jesus, the Master of men. 

city of prophets and martyrs ! 

shrines of the sainted dead ! 
When, when shall the living day-spring 

Once more on your towers be spread ? 

When He who is meek and lowly 

Shall rule in those lordly halls. 
And shall »tand and feed as a shepherd 

The flock which his mercy calls, — • 

0, then to those noble churches. 

To picture and statue and gem, 
To the pageant of solemn worship, 

Shall the meaning come back again. 

And this strange and ancient city, 
In that reign of his truth and love. 

Shall be what it seems in the twilight, 
The type of that City above. 

Harriet Beecher Stowe. 



A VIEW ACROSS THE ROMANS' 
CAMPAGNA. 



Over the dumb campagna-sea, 

Out in the ofSng through mist and rain, 
St. Peter's Church heaves silently 

Like a mighty ship in pain, 

Facing the tempest with struggle and strain. 

Motionless waifs of i-uined towers. 
Soundless breakers of desolate land ! 



The sullen surf of the mist devours 

That mountain-range upon either hand. 
Eaten away from its outline grand. 

And over the dumb campagna-sea 

Where the ship of the Church heaves on to 
wreck. 

Alone and silent as God must be 

The Christ walks ! — Ay, but Peter's neck 
Is stiff to turn on the foundering deck. 

Peter, Peter, if such be thy name, 
Now leave the ship for another to steer. 

And proving thy faith evermore the same 

Come forth, tread out through the dark and 

drear. 
Since He who walks on the sea is here ! 

Peter, Peter ! — he does not speak, — 
He is not as rash as in old Galilee. 

Safer a ship, though it toss and leak, 
Than a reeling foot on a rolling sea ! 
— And he 's got to be round in the girth, 
thinks he. 

Peter, Peter ! — he does not stir, — 
His nets are heavy with silver fish : 

He reckons his gains, and is keen to infer, 
" The broil on the shore, if the Lord should 

wish, — 
But the sturgeon goes to the Caesar's dish." 

Peter, Peter, thou fisher of men, 

Fisher of fish wouldst thou live instead, — 

Haggling for pence with the other Ten, 
Cheating the market at so much a head, 
Griping the bag of the traitor dead ? 

At the triple crow of the Gallic cock 

Thou weep'st not, thou, though thine eyes be 
dazed : 
What bird comes next in the tempest shock ? 
Vultures ! See, — as when Romulus gazed. 
To inaugurate Rome for a world amazed ! 

Elizabeth Barrett browning. 



NAPLES. 



FROM "ITALY.' 



This region, surely, is not of the earth. 
Was it not dropt from heaven ? Not a grove. 
Citron or pine er cedar, not a grot 
Sea-worn and mantled with the gadding vine. 
But breathes enchantment. Not a cliff but flings 
On the clear wave some image of delight. 
Some cabin -roof glowing with crimson flowers. 
Some ruined temple or fallen monument, 



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To muse on as the bark is gliding by, 
And be it mine to muse there, mine to glide. 
From daybreak, when the mountain pales his fire 
Yet more and more, and from the mountain-top. 
Till then invisible, a smoke ascends. 
Solemn and slow, as erst from Ararat, 
When he, the Patriarch, who escaped the Flood, 
Was with his household sacrificing there, — 
From daybreak to that hour, the last and best. 
When, one by one, the fishing-boats come forth. 
Each with its glimmering lantern at the prow. 
And, when the nets are thrown, the evening hymn 
Steals o'er the trembling waters. 

Everywhere 
Fable and Truth have shed, in rivalry. 
Each her peculiar influence. Fable came, 
And laughed and sung, arraying Truth in flowers. 
Like a young child her grandam. Fable came ; 
Earth, sea, and sky reflecting, as she flew, 
A thousand, thousand colors not their own: 
And at her bidding, lo ! a dark descent 
To Tartarus, and those thrice happy fields, 
Those fields with ether pure and jjurple light 
Ever invested, scenes by him described 
Who here was wont to wander and record 
What they revealed, and on the western shore 
Sleeps in a silent grove, o'erlooking thee. 
Beloved Partheuope. 

Yet here, methinks. 
Truth wants no ornament, in her own shape 
Filling the' mind by turns with awe and love, 
By turns inclining to wild ecstasy 
And soberest meditation. 

SAMUEL ROGERS. 



DPJFTING, 

My soul to-day 

Is far away, 
Sailing the Vesuvian Bay ; 

My winged boat, 

A bird afloat. 
Swims round the purple peaks remote 

Round purple peaks 

It sails, and seeks 
Blue inlets and their crystal creeks. 

Where high rocks throw, 

Through deeps below, 
A duplicated golden glow. 

Far, vague, and dim 

The mountains swim ; 
While, on Vesuvius' misty brim, 

With outstretched hands. 

The gray smoke stands 
O'erlookinc; the volcanic lands. 



Here Ischia smiles 

O'er liquid miles ; 
And yonder, bluest of the isles, 

Calm Capri waits. 

Her sapjjhire gates 
Beguiling to her bright estates. 

I heed not, if 

My rijjpling skiff 
Float swift or slow from cliff to cliff ; — 

With dreamful eyes 

My spirit lies 
Under the walls of Paradise. 

Under the walls 

Where swells and falls 
The Bay's deep breast at intervals, 

At peace I lie. 

Blown softly by, 
A cloud upon this li(iuid sky. 

The da}^, so mild. 

Is Heaven's own child, 
With Earth and Ocean reconciled ; — 

The airs I feel 

Around me steal 
Are murmuring to the murmuring keel. 

Over the rail 

My hand I trail 
Within the shadow of the sail ; 

A joy intense. 

The cooling sense 
Glides down my drowsy indolence. 

• With dreamful eyes 

My spirit lies 
Where Summer sings and never dies, — 

O'-erveiled with vines. 

She glows and shines 
Among her future oil and wines. 

Her children, hid 

The cliffs amid. 
Are gambolling with the gambolling kid 

Or down the walls, 

With tipsy calls. 
Laugh on the rocks like waterfalls. 

The fisher's child, 

With tresses wild. 
Unto the smooth, bright sand beguiled. 

With glowing lips 

Sings as she skips. 
Or gazes at the far-off ships. 

Yon deep bark goes 
Where Traffic bloAvs, 
From lands of sun to lands of snows ; — 



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This happier one, 
Its course is run 
From lands of snow to lands of sun. 

happy sliip, 

To rise and dip, 
With the blue crystal at your lip ! 

happy crew, 

My heart with you 
Sails, and sails, and sings anew ! 

No more, no more 

The worldly shore 
Upbraids me with its loud uproar ! 

With dreamful eyes 

My spirit lies 
Under the walls of Paradise ! 

In lofty lines, 

Mid palms and pines. 
And olives, aloes, elms, and vines, 

Sorrento swings 

On sunset wings. 
Where Tasso's spirit soars and sings.* 

Thomas Buchanan Read. 



WEEHAWKEN AND THE NEW YORK 
BAY. 

FROM "FANNY." 

Weeiiawkex ! In thy mountain scenery yet. 
All we adore of Nature in her wild 

And frolic hour of infancy is met ; 

And never has a summer's morning smiled 

Upon a lovelier scene than the full eye 

Of the enthusiast revels on, — when high 

Amid thy forest solitudes he climbs 

O'er crags that proudly tower above the deep. 
And knows that sense of danger which sublimes 

The breathless moment, — when his daring 
step 
Is on the verge of the cliff, and he can hear 
The low dash of the wave with startled ear. 

Like the death-music of his coming doom. 
And clings to the green turf with desperate 
force, 

As the heart clings to life ; and when resume 
The currents in his veins their wonted course. 

There lingers a deep feeling, — like the moan 

Of wearied ocean when the storm is gone. 



• The last stanza was written just before the author's death, and 
published shortly after in the Cincuttuiti Gazette, 



In such an hour he turns, and on his view 
Ocean and earth and heaven burst before him ; 

Clouds slumbering at his feet, and the clear blue 
Of summer's sky in beauty bending o'er him, — 

The city bright below ; and far away. 

Sparkling in golden light, his own romantic bay. 

Tall spire, and glittering roof, and battlement. 
And banners lioating in the sunny air ; 

And white sails o'er the calm blue waters bent. 
Green isle, and circling shore, are blended 
there 

In wild reality. When life is old, 

And many a scene forgot, the heart will hold 

Its memory of this ; nor lives there one 

Whose infant breath was drawn, or boyhood's 
days 

Of happiness were passed beneath that sun. 
That in his manhood's prime can calmly gaze 

Upon that bay, or on that mountain stand. 

Nor feel the prouder of his native land. 

FiTZ-GREENE HALLECK. 



CALM AND STORM ON LAKE LEMAN. 

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO III. 

Clear, placid Leman ! thy contrasted lake, 
With the wild world I dwelt in, is a thing 
Which warns me, with its stillness, to forsake 
Earth's troubled waters for a purer spring. 
Tliis (|uiet sail is as a noiseless wing 
To waft me from distraction ; once I loved 
Torn ocean's roar, but thy soft murmuring 
Sounds sweet as if a sister's voice reproved. 
That I with stern delights should e'er have been 
so moved. 

It is the hush of night, and all between 

Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet 

clear. 
Mellowed and mingling, yet distinctlj'- seen. 
Save darkened Jura, whose capt heights appear 
Precipitously steep ; and drawing near. 
There breathes a living fragrance from tlie 

shore. 
Of flowers yet fresh with childhood ; on the ear 
Drops the light drip of the suspended oar, 
Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol 

more : 

He is an evening reveller, who makes 
His life an infancy, and sings his fill ; 
At intervals, some bird from out the brakes 
Starts into voice a moment, tlien is still. 



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There seems a floating whisper on the hill, 
But that is fancy ; for the starlight dews 
All silently their tears of love instil, 
"Weeping themselves away, till they infuse 
Deep into Nature's hi-east the spirit of her hues. 

The sky is changed ! — and such a change ! 

0' night, 
And storm, and darkness, ye are wondrous 

strong, 
Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light 
Of a dark eye in woman ! Far along, 
From peak to peak, the rattling ci-ags among 
Leaps the live thunder ! Not from one lone 

cloud, 
But every mountain now hath found a tongiie, 
And Jura answers, through her misty shroud, 
Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud ! 

And this is in the night : — most glorious 

night ! 
Thou wert not sent for slumber ! let me be 
A sharer in thy fierce and f\ir delight, — 
A portion of the tempest and of thee ! 
How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric sea. 
And the big rain comes dancing to the earth ! 
And now again 't is black, — and now, the glee 
Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain- 
mirth, 
As if they did rejoice o'er a young earthquake's 
birth. 

LORD BYRON. 



THE HURPJCANE. 

Lord of the winds ! I feel thee nigh, 
I know thy breath in the burning sky ! 
And I wait, with a thrill in every vein, 
For the coming of the hurricane ! 

And lo ! on the wing of the heavy gales. 
Through the boundless arch of heaven he sails. 
Silent and slow, and terribly strong, 
The mighty shadow is borne along, 
Like the dark eternity to come ; 
"While the world below, dismayed and dumb. 
Through the calm of the thick hot atmosphere 
Looks up at its gloomy folds with fear. 

They darken fast ; and the golden blaze 
Of the sun is quenched in the lurid haze, 
And he sends through the shade a funeral ray - 
A glare that is neither night nor day, 
A beam that touches, with hues of death. 
The clouds above and the earth beneath. 
To its covert glides the silent bird, 
"While the hurricane's distant voice is heard 
Uplifted among the mountains round, 
And the forests hear and answer the sound. 



He is come ! he is come ! do ye not behold 
His ample robes on the wind unrolled ? 
Giant of air ! we bid thee hail ! — 
How his gray skirts toss in the whirling gale ; 
How his huge and writhing arms are bent 
To clasp tlie zone of the firmament. 
And fold at length, in their dark embrace. 
From mountain to mountain the visible space ! 

Darker, — still darker ! the whirlwinds bear 
The dust of the plains to the middle air ; 
And hark to the crashing, long and loud, 
Of the chariot of God in the thunder-cloud ! 
You may trace its path by the flashes that start 
From the rapid wheels where'er they dart. 
As the fire-bolts leap to the world below, 
And flood the skies with a lurid glow. 

"What roar is that ? • — 't is the rain that breaks 
In torrents away from the airy lakes. 
Heavily poured on the shuddering ground, 
And shedding a nameless horror round. 
Ah! well-known woods, and mountains, and skies, 
"With the verj' clouds ! — ye are lost to my eyes. 
I seek ye vainlj^, and see in your place 
Tlie shadowy tempest that sweeps through space, 
A whirling ocean that fills the wall 
Of the crystal heaven, and buries all. 
And I, cut off from the world, remain 
Alone with the terrible hurricane. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



THE DESERTED VILLAGE. 

Sweet Auburn ! loveliest village of the plain, 
"Where health and plenty cheered the laboring 

swain, 
"Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid, 
And parting summer's lingering blooms delayed. 
Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease. 
Seats of my youth, when every sport could please, 
How often have I loitered o'er thy green, 
"Where humble happiness endeared each scene ! 
How often have I paused on every charm, 
The sheltered cot, the cultivated farm, 
The never-failing brook, the busy mill, 
The decent church that topped the neighboring 

hill, 
The hawthorn-bush, Avith seats beneath 

shade. 
For talking age and whispering lovers made ! 
How often have I blessed the coming day, 
"When toil remitting lent its turn to play, 
And all the village train, from labor free. 
Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree, 
"Wliile many a pastime circled in the shade. 
The young contending as the old surveyed ; 



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And many a gambol frolicked o'er the ground, 
And sleights of art and feats of strength went 

round ; 
And still, as each repeated pleasure tired, 
Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspired ; 
The dancing pair that simply sought renown, 
By holding out, to tire each other down ; 
The swain mistrustless of his smutted face. 
While secret laughter tittered round the place ; 
The bashful virgin's sidelong looks of love, 
The matron's glance that would those looks re- 
prove, — 
These were thy charms, sweet village ! sports like 

these, 
"With sweet succession, taught e'en toil to please ; 
These round thy bowers their cheerful inHuence 

shed, 
These were thy charms, ■ — but all these charms 
are fled ! 

Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn. 
Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms with- 
drawn ; 
Amidst tliy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen. 
And desolation saddens all thy green ; 
One only master grasps the whole domain. 
And half a tillage stints thy smiling plain ; 
No more thy glassy brook reflects the day. 
But, choked with sedges, works its weedy way ; 
Along thy glades, a solitary guest. 
The hollow-sounding bittern guards its nest ; 
Amidst thy desert walks the lapwing flies. 
And tires their echoes with unvaried cries. 
Sunk are thy bowers in shapeless ruin all. 
And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall, 
And, trembling, shrinking from the spoiler's hand, 
Far, far away thy children leave the land. 

■. Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey. 
Where wealth accumulates and men decay : 
Princes and lords maj'' flourish, or may iade ; 
A breath can make them, as a breath has made ; 
But a bold peasantry, their countrj''s pride. 
When once destroyed, can never be supplied. 

A time there was, ere England's griefs began, 
AVhen every rood of ground maintained its man ; 
For liim light Labor spread her wholesome stoi'e. 
Just gave what life required, but gave no more ; 
His best companions, innocence and health ; 
And his best riches, ignorance of wealth. 

But times are altered ; trade's unfeeling train 
Usurp the land and dispossess the swain ; 
Along the lawn, where scattered hamlets rose, 
Unwieldy wealth and cumbrous pomp repose. 
And every want to luxury allied, 
And every pang that folly pays to pride. 



Those gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom. 
Those calm desires that asked but little room. 
Those healthful sports that graced the peaceful 

scene, 
Lived in each look, and brightened all the 

green, — 
These, far departing, seek a kinder shore. 
And rural mirth and manners are no more. 

Sweet Auburn ! parent of the blissful hour. 
Thy glades forlorn confess the tyrant's power. 
Here, as I take my solitary rounds, 
Amidst thy tangling walks and ruined grounds, 
And, many a year elapsed, return to view 
Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew, 
Eemembrance wakes, with all her busy train, 
Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain. 

In all my wanderings round this world of care. 
In all my griefs — and God has given my share — 
I still had hopes my latest hours to crown, 
Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down ; 
To husband out life's taper at the close. 
And keep the flame from wasting by repose ; 
1 still had hopes — for pride attends us still — 
Amidst the swains to show my book-learned skill. 
Around my fire an evening group to draw. 
And tell of all I felt and all I saw ; 
And, as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue, 
Pants to the place from whence at first she flew, 
I still had hopes, my long vexations past. 
Here to return, — and die at home at last. 

blest retirement ! friend to life's decline. 
Retreats from care, that never must be mine. 
How blest is he who crowns in shades like these 
A youth of labor with an age of ease ; 
Who quits a world where strong temptations try. 
And, since 't is hari to combat, learns to fly ! 
For him no wretches, born to work and weep. 
Explore the mine, or tempt the dangerous deep ; 
No surly porter stands in guilty state. 
To spurn imploring famine from the gate : 
But on he moves to meet his latter end, 
Angels around befriending virtue's friend ; 
Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay. 
While resignation gently slopes the way ; 
And, all his prospects brightening to the last. 
His heaven commences ere the world be past. 

Sweet was the sound, when oft, at evening's 
close. 
Up yonder hill the village murmur rose ; 
There, as I passed with careless steps and sIoav, 
The mingling notes came softened from below ; 
The swain responsive as the milkmaid sung, 
The sober herd that lowed to meet their young ; 



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The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool, 
The playful children just let loose from school ; 
The watch-dog's voice that bayed the whispering 

wind, 
And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind, — 
These all in sweet confusion sought the shade, 
And filled each pause the nightingale had made. 
But now the sounds of population fail, 
No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale, 
No busy steps the grass-grown foot-way tread, 
But all the bloomy flush of life is fled. 
All but yon widowed, solitary thing, 
That feebly bends beside the plashy spring ; 
She, wretched matron, forced in age, for bread. 
To strip the brook with mantling cresses spread. 
To pick her wintry fagot from the thorn, 
To seek her nightly shed, and weep till morn ; 
She only left of all the harmless train, 
The sad historian of the pensive plain. 

Near yonder copse, where once the garden 
smiled. 
And still where many a garden-flower grows wild; 
There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose. 
The village preacher's modest mansion rose. 
A man he was to all the country dear, 
And passing rich with forty pounds a year ; 
Remote from towns he ran his godly race. 
Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change, his 

place ; 
Unskilful he to fawn, or seek for power. 
By doctrines fashioned to the varying hour ; 
Far other aims his heart had learned to prize, 
More bent to raise the wretched than to rise. 
His house was known to all the vagrant train. 
He chid their wanderings, but ndieved their pain ; 
The long-remembered beggar was his guest. 
Whose beard descending swept his aged breast. 
The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud. 
Claimed kindred there, and had his claims al- 
lowed ; 
The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay, 
Sate by his fire, and talked the night away ; 
Wept o'er his wounds, or tales of sorrow done, 
Shouldered his crutch, and showed how fields 

were won. 
Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to 

glow, 
And quite forgot their vices in their woe ; 
Careless their merits or their faults to scan, 
His pit}' gave ere charity began. 

Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride, 
And e'en his failings leaned to Virtue's side ; 
But in his duty prompt at every call. 
He watched and wept, he prayed and felt for all ; 
And, as a bird each fond endearment tries. 
To tempt its new-fledged off'spring to the' skies. 



He tried each art, reproved each dull delay. 
Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way. 

Beside the bed where parting life was laid. 
And sorrow, guilt, and pain by turns dismayed, 
The reverend champion stood. At his control, 
Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul ; 
Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise. 
And his last faltering accents whispered praise. 

At chui'ch, with meek and unaffected grace. 
His looks adorned the venerable place ; 
Truth from his li[)s prevailed with double sway. 
And fools, who came to scoff", remained to pray. 
The service past, around the pious man, 
With steady zeal, each honest rustic ran ; 
E'en children followed with endearing wile. 
And plucked his gown, to share the good man's 

smile. 
His ready smile a parent's warmth expressed. 
Their welfare pleased him, and their cares dis- 
tressed ; 
To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given, 
But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven. 
As some tall cliff, that lifts its awful form. 
Swells from the vale, and niidwajfleaves tlie storm, 
Though round its breast the rolling clouds are 

spread, 
Eternal sunshine settles on its head. 

Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way. 
With blossomed furze unprofitably gay. 
There, in his noisy mansion, skilled to rule, 
The village master taught his little school ; 
A man severe he was, and stei'n to view, 
I knew him well, and every truant knew ; 
Well had the boding tremblers learned to trace 
The dajr's disasters in his morning face ; 
Full well they laughed with counterfeited glee 
At all his jokes, for many a joke had he ; 
Full well the busy whisper circling round 
Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned ; 
Yet he was kind, or, if severe in aught. 
The love he bore to learning was in fault. 
The village all declared how much he knew, 
'T was certain he could write, and cipher too ; 
Lands he could measure, times and tides presage. 
And e'en the story ran that he could gauge ; 
In arguing too, the parson owned his skill. 
For, e'en though vanquished, he could argue still, 
While words of learned length and thundering 

sound 
Amazed the gazing rustics ranged around ; 
And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew 
That one small head could carry all he kuew^ 



But past is all his fame. The very spot 
Where many a time he triumphed is forgot. 



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Near yonder thorn, that lifts its head on high, 
Where once the sign-post caught the passing eye, 
Low lies that house where nut-brown draughts 

inspired. 
Where graybeard mirth and smiling toil retired, 
Where village statesmen talked with looks pro- 
found. 
And news much older than their ale went round. 
Imagination fondly stoops to trace 
The parlor splendors of that festive place, — 
The wliitewashed wall ; the nicely sanded floor ; 
The varnished clock that ticked behind the door ; 
The chest, contrived a double debt to pay, 
A bed by night, a cliest of drawers by day ; 
The pictures placed for ornament and use ; 
The twelve good rules ; the royal game of goose ; 
The hearth, except when winter chilled the day, 
With aspen boughs and flowers and fennel gay ; 
While bi'oken teacups, wisely kept for show, 
Eanged o'er the chimney, glistened in a row. 

Vain, transitory splendor ! could not all 
Eepi-ieve the tottering mansion from its fall ? 
Obscure it sinks, nor shall it more impart 
An hour's importance to the jioor man's heart ; 
Thither no more the peasant shall repair 
To sweet oblivion of his daily care ; 
No more the farmer's news, the barber's tale. 
No more the woodman's ballad shall prevail '; 
No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear. 
Relax his ponderous strengtli, and lean to hear ; 
The host himself no longer shall be found 
Careful to see the mantling bliss go round ; 
Nor the coy maid, half willing to be prest,' 
Shall kiss the cup to pass it to the rest. 



Yes ! let the rich deride, the proud disdain, 
These simple blessings of the lowly train ; 
To me more dear, congenial to my heart. 
One native charm, than all the gloss of art. 
Spontaneous joys, where nature has its play, 
The soul adopts, and owns their lirst-born sway ; 
Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mind, 
Unenvied, unmolested, unconfined : 
But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade, 
With all the freaks of wanton wealth arrayed, — 
In these, ere triflers half their wish obtain. 
The toiling [)leasure sickens into pain ; 
And, e'en while fashion's brightest arts decoy. 
The heart, distrusting, asks if this be joy. 

Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen, who survey 
The rich man's joys increase, the poor's decay, 
'T is yours to judge, how wide the limits stand 
Between a splendid and a happy land. 
Proud swells the tide with loads of freighted ore. 
And shouting Folly hails them from her shore ;' 



Hoards e'en beyond the miser's wish abound. 
And rich men flock from all the world around. 
Yet count our gains. This wealth is but a name 
That leaves our useful products still the same. 
Not so the loss. The man of wealth and pride 
Takes up a space that many poor supplied ; 
Space for his lake, his i>ark's extended bounds. 
Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds : 
The robe that wraps his limbs in silken sloth 
Has robbed the neighboring fields of half their 

growth ; 
His seat, where solitary sports are seen. 
Indignant spurns the cottage from the green ; 
Around the world each needful product flies, 
For all the luxuries the world supplies : 
While thus the land, adorned for pleasure all. 
In barren splendor feebly waits the fall. 

As some fair female unadorned and plain. 
Secure to jilease while youth confirms her reign. 
Slights every borrowed charm that dress supplies. 
Nor shares with art the triumph of her eyes, 
But when those charms are past, — for charms 

are frail, — 
When time advances, and when lovers fail. 
She then shines forth, solicitous to bless, 
In all the glaring impotence of dress ; 
Thus fares the land by luxury betrayed. 
In nature's simplest charms at first arrayed, 
But verging to decline, its splendors rise. 
Its vistas strike, its palaces surprise ; 
While, scourged by famine from the smiling land, 
The mournful peasant leads his humble band ; 
And while he sinks, without one arm to save, 
The country blooms, — a garden and a grave. 



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Where then, ah ! where shall poverty reside, 
To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride ? 
If to some common's fenceless limits strayed 
Ho drives his flock to pick the scanty blade. 
Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide. 
And e'en the bare- worn common is denied. 
If to the city sped, —what waits him there ? 
To see profusion that he must not share ; 
To see ten thousand baneful arts combined 
To pamper luxury and thin mankind'; 
To see each joy the sons of pleasure know 
Extorted from his fellow-creature's woe. 
Here while the courtier glitters in brocade. 
There the pale artist plies the sickly trade ; 
Here while the proud their long-drawn pomps 

display. 
There the black gibbet glooms beside the way. 
The dome where Pleasure holds her midnight 

reign. 
Here, richly decked, admits the gorgeous train ; 
Tumultuous grandeur crowds the blazing square. 
The rattling chariots clash, the torches glare. 



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Sure scenes like tlieso no troubles e'er annoy ! 

Sure these denote one imiversal joy ! 

Are these thy serious thoughts ? — Ah, turn 

thine eyes 
Where the poor houseless shivering female lies. 
She once, perhaps, in village plenty blest. 
Has wept at tales of innocence distrest ; 
Her modest looks the cottage might adorn. 
Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn ; 
Now lost to all : her friends, her virtue fled, 
Near her betrayer's door she lays her head, 
And, pinched with cold, and shrinking from the 

shower, 
With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour, 
When idly first, ambitious of the town. 
She left her wheel and robes of country brown. 

Do thine, swe'et Auburn, thine, the loveliest 
train, 
Do thy fair tribes participate her pain ? 
E'en now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led, 
At proud men's doors they ask a little bread ! 

Ah, no ! To distant climes, a dreary scene. 
Where half the convex world intrudes between, 
Through torrid tracks with fainting steps they go. 
Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe. 
Far different there from all that charmed before. 
The various terrors of that horrid shore, — 
Those blazing suns that dart a downward ray, 
And fiercely shed intolerable day ; 
Those matted woods where birds forget to sing, 
But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling ; 
Those poisonous fields with rank luxuriance 

crowned. 
Where the dark scorpion gathers death around ; 
Where at each step the stranger fears to wake 
The rattling terrors of the vengeful snake ; 
Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey, 
And savage men more murderous still than they ; 
While oft in whirls the mad tornado flies, 
Mingling the ravaged landscape with the skies. 
Far different these from every former scene. 
The cooling brook, the grassy vested green. 
The breezy covert of the warbling grove. 
That only sheltered thefts of harmless love. 

Good Heaven ! what sorrows gloomed that 
parting day 
That called them from their native walks away ; 
When the poor exiles, every pleasure past. 
Hung round the bowers, and fondly looked their 

last, 
And took a long farewell, and wished in vain 
For seats like these beyond the western main ; 
And shuddering still to face the distant deep. 
Returned and wept, and still returned to weep. 



The good old sire the first prepared to go 
To new-found worlds, and wept for others' woe ; 
But for himself in conscious virtue brave. 
He only wished for worlds beyond the grave. 
His lovely daughter, lovelier in her tears. 
The fond companion of his helpless years. 
Silent went next, neglectful of her charms, 
And left a lover's for her father's arms. 
With louder plaints the mother spoke her woes. 
And blessed the cot where every pleasure rose ; 
And kissed her thoughtless babes with many a tear. 
And clasped them close, in soitow doubly dear ; 
Whilst her fond husband strove to lend relief 
In all the silent manliness of grief. 

Luxury ! thou curst by Heaven's decree, 
How ill exchanged are things like these for thee ! 
How do thy potions, with insidious joy, 
Diff'use their pleasures only to destroy ! 
Kingdoms by thee, to sickly greatness grown. 
Boast of a florid vigoi' not their own. 
At every draught more large and large they grow, 
A bloated mass of rank, unwieldy woe ; 
Till, sapped their strength, and every part un- 
sound, 
Down, down they sink, and spread a ruin round. 

Even now the devastation is begun. 
And half the business of destruction done ; 
Even now, methinks, as pondering here I stand, 
I see the rural virtues leave the land. 
Down where j^on anchoring vessel spreads the sail 
That idl}'' waiting flaps with every gale, 
Downward they move, a melancholy band, 
Pass from the shore, and darken all the strand. 
Contented toil, and hospitable care. 
And kind connubial tenderness, are there ; 
And piety with wishes placed above. 
And steady loyalty, and faithful love. 
And thou, sweet Poetry, thou loveliest maid, 
Still first to fly where sensual joys invade ; 
Unfit, in these degenerate times of shame. 
To catch the heart, or strike for honest fame ; 
Dear charming nymph, neglected and decried, 
My shame in crowds, my solitary piide ; 
Thou source of all my bliss and all my woe, 
That found'st me poor at first, and keep'st me so ; 
Thou guide, by which the nobler arts excel, 
Thou nurse of every virtue, fare thee well ! 
Farewell ; and 0, where'er thy voice be tried, 
On Torno's cliffs, or Pambamarca's side. 
Whether where equinoctial fervors glow. 
Or winter wraps the polar world in snow, 
Still let thy voice, prevailing over time. 
Redress the rigors of the inclement clime ; 
Aid slighted truth with thy persuasive strain ; 
Teach erring man to spurn the rage of gain ; 



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" We sftt by the fisher' s cottage 
A nd looked at the stormy tide 



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Teach him, that states of native strength possest, 
Though very poor, may still be very blest ; 
That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay, 
As ocean sweeps the labored mole away ; 
While self-dependent power can time defj', 
As rocks resist the billows and the sky. 

OLIVER Goldsmith. 



THE FISHER'S COTTAGE. 

We sat by the fisher's cottage, 

And looked at the stormy tide ; 
The evening mist came rising, 

And floating far and wide. 

One by one in the light-house 

The lamps shone out on high ; 
And far on the dim horizon 

A ship went sailing by. 

We spoke of storm and shipwreck, — 

Of sailors, and how they live ; 
Of journeys 'twixt sky and water. 

And the sorrows and joys they give. 

We spoke of distant countries, 

In regions strange and fair. 
And of the wondrous beings 

And curious customs there ; 

Of perfumed lamps on the Ganges, 
Which are launched in the twilight hour ; 

And the dark and silent Brahmins, 
Who worship the lotos flower. 

Of the wretched dwarfs of Lapland, — 

Broad-headed, wide-mouthed, and small, — 

Who crouch round their oil-fires, cooking. 
And chatter and scream and bawl. 

And the maidens earnestly listened. 

Till at last we spoke no more ;■ 
The ship like a shadow had vanished, 

And darkness fell deep on the shore. 

From the German of Heinrich HEINE. Translation 
of Charles G. Leland, 



THE ISLAND. 

from "the buccaneer." 

The island lies nine leagues away. 

Along its solitary shore. 
Of craggy rock and sandy bay, 
No sound but ocean's roar, 
Save where the bold, wild sea-bird makes her 

home, 
Her shrill cry coming through the sparkling foam. 



But when the light winds lie at rest. 

And on th^ glassy, heaving sea 
The black duck, with her glossy breast, 
Sits swinging silently, 
How beautiful ! no ripples break the reach. 
And silvery waves go noiseless up the beach. 

And inland rests the green, warm dell ; 

The brook comes tinkling down its side ; 
From out the trees the Sabbath bell 
Rings cheerful, far and wide, 
Mingling its sound with bleatings of the flocks. 
That feed about the vale among the rocks. 

Nor holy bell, nor pastoral bleat, 
In former days within the vale ; 
Flapped in the bay the pirate's sheet ; 
Curses were on the gale ; 
Rich goods lay on the sand, and murdered men ; 
Pirate and wrecker kept their revels then. 

But calm, low voices, words of grace, 

Now slowly fall upon the eai' ; 
A quiet look is in each face. 
Subdued and holy fear : 
Eacli motion 'g gentle ; all is kindly done ; — 
Come, listen how from crime this isle was won. 
Richard Henry Dana. 



SMOKE. 



LiGHT-wiNGfeD Smoke ! Icarian bird. 
Melting thy pinions in thy upward flight ; 
Lark without song, and messenger of dawn, 
Circling above the hamlets as thy nest ; 
Or else, departing dream, and shadowy form 
Of midnight vision, gathering up thy skirts ; 

By night star-veiling, and by day 
Darkening the light and blotting out the sun ; 
Go thou, my incense, upward from this hearth, 
And ask the gods to pardon this clear flame. 

Henry David Thoreau. 



MIST. 



Low-anchored cloud, 
Newfoundland air. 
Fountain-head and source of rivers, 
Dew-cloth, dream-drapery. 
And napkin spread by fays ; 
Drifting meadow of the air, 
Where bloom the daisied banks and violets, 
And in whose fenny labyrinth 
The bittern booms and heron wades ; 
Spirit of lakes and seas and rivers, — 
Bear only perfumes and the scent 
Of healing herbs to just men's fields. 

Henry David Thoreau. 



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THE EVENING CLOUD. 

A CLOUD lay cradled near the setting sun, 

A gleain of crimson tinged its braided snow ; 
Long had I watched the glory moving on 

O'er the still radiance of the lake below. 
Tranquil its spirit seemed, and floated slow ! 

Even in its very motion there was rest ; 
While every breath of eve that chanced to blow 

Wafted the traveller to the beauteous west. 
Emblem, methought, of the departed soul ! 

To whose white robe the gleam of bliss is given, 
And by the breath of mercy made to roll 

Right onwards to the golden gates of heaven, 
Where to the eye of faith it peaceful lies, 
And tells to man his glorious destinies. 

John Wilson ^^Christopher North). 



NEWPORT BEACH. 

Wave after wave successively rolls on 

And dies along the shore, until more loud 

One billow with concentrate force is heard 

To swell prophetic, and exultant rears 

A lucent form above its pioneers. 

And rushes past them to the farthest goal. 

Thus our unuttered feelings rise and fall. 

And thought will follow thought in equal waves, 

Until reflection nerves design to will. 

Or sentiment o'er chance emotion reigns. 

And all its wayward undulations blends 

In one o'erwhelming surge ! 

Henry Theodore Tuckerman. 



A STILL DAY IN AUTUMN. 

I LOVE to wander through the woodlands hoary 
In the soft light of an autumnal day. 

When Summer gathers up her robes of glory, 
And like a dream of beauty glides away. 

How through each loved, familiar path she lingers, 
Serenely smiling through the golden mist. 

Tinting the wild grape with her dewy fingers 
Till the cool emerald turns to amethyst ; 

Kindling the faint stars of the hazel, shining 
To light the gloom of Autumn's mouldering 
halls. 

With hoary plumes the clematis entwining 
Where o'er the rock her withered garland falls. 

Warm lights are on the sleepy uplands waning 
Beneath soft clouds along the horizon rolled. 

Till the slant sunbeams through their fringes 
raining 
Bathe all the hills in melancholy gold. 



The moist winds breathe of crisped leaves and 
flowers 

In the damp hollows of the woodland sown. 
Mingling the freshness of autumnal showers 

With spic}' airs from cedarn alleys blown. 

Beside the brook and on the umbered meadow. 
Where yellow fern-tufts fleck the faded ground. 

With folded lids beneath their palmy shadow 
The gentian nods, in dewy slumbers bound. 

Upon those soft, fringed lids the bee sits brooding. 
Like a fond lover loath to say farewell. 

Or with shut wings, through silken folds in- 
truding. 
Creeps near her heart his drowsy tale to tell. 

The little birds upon the hillside lonely 
Flit noiselessly along from spray to spray. 

Silent as a sweet wandering thought that only 
Shows its bright wings and softly glides away. 

SARAH HELEN WHITMAN. 



THE BIRCH STREAM. 

At noon, within the dusty town. 
Where tlie wild river rushes down. 

And thunders hoarsely all day long, 
I think of thee, my hermit stream, 
Low singing in thy summer dream 

Thine idle, sweet, old, tranquil song. 

Northward, Katahdin's chasmed pile 
Looms through thy low, long, leafy aisle 

Eastward, Olamon's summit shines ; 
And I upon thy grassy shore, 
The dreamful, happy child of yore, 

Worship before mine olden shrines. 

Again the sultry noontide hush 
Is sweetly broken by the thrush. 

Whose clear bell rings and dies away 
Beside thy banks, in coverts deeji. 
Where nodding buds of orchis sleej) 

In dusk, and dream not it is day. 

Again the wild cow-lily floats 
Her golden-freighted, tented boats 

In thy cool coves of softened gloom, 
O'ershadowed by the whispering reed, 
And purple plumes of pickerel- weed, 

And meadow-sweet in tangled bloom. 

The startled minnows dart in flocks 
Beneath thy glimmering amber rocks, 

If but a zephyr stirs the brake ; 
The silent swallow swoops, a Hash 
Of light, and leaves, with dainty plash, 

A ring of ripples in her wake. 



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Without, the land is hot and dim ; 
The level fields in languor swim, 

Their stubble-grasses brown as dust ; 
And all along the upland lanes, 
"Where shadeless noon oppressive reigns. 

Dead roses wear their crowns of rust. 

Within, is neither blight nor death ; 
The fierce sun wooes with ardent breath, 

But cannot win thy sylvan heai't. 
Only the child who loves thee long, 
With faithful worship pure and strong, 

Can know how dear and sweet thou art. 

So loved I thee in days gone by. 

So love I yet, though leagues may lie 

Between us, and the years divide ; 
A breath of coolness, dawn, and dew, 
A joy forever fresh and true. 

Thy memory doth with me abide. 

Anna boynton Averill. 



THE BLACKBIRD. 

How sweet the harmonies of afternoon ! 

The Blackbird sings along the sunny breeze 
His ancient song of leaves, and summer boon ; 

Rich breath of hayfields streams through whis- 
pering trees ; 
And birds of morning trim their bustling wings, 
And listen fondly — while the Blackbird sings. 

How soft the lovelight of the west reposes 
On this green valley's cheer}' solitude, 

On the trim cottage with its screen of roses. 
On the gray belfry with its ivj' hood. 

And murmuring mill-race, and the wheel that 
flings 

Its bubbling freshness — 'while the Blackbird 



The very dial on the village church 

Seems as 't were dreaming in a dozy rest ; 

The scribbled benches underneath the porch 
Bask in the kindly welcome of the west : 

But the broad casements of the old Three Kings 

Blaze like a furnace — while the Blackbird sings. 

And there beneath the immemorial elm 
Three rosy revellers round a table sit. 
And through gray clouds give laws unto the 
realm, 
Curse good and gi'eat, but worship their own wit, 
And roar of fights, and fairs, and junketings. 
Corn, colts, and curs — the while the Blackbird 
sings. 



Before her home, in her accustomed seat. 
The tidy grandam spins beneath the shade 

Of the old honeysuckle, at her feet 

The dreaming pug and purring tabby laid ; 

To her low chair a little maiden clings. 

And spells in silence — while the Blackbird sings. 

Sometimes the shadow of a lazy cloud 

Breathes o'er the hamlet with its gardens green, 

While the far fields with sunlight overflowed 
Like golden shores of Fairyland are seen ; 

Again the sunshine on the shadow springs. 

And fires the thicket — where the Blackbird 
sings. 

The woods, the lawn, the peaked manor-house. 
With its peach-covered walls, and rookery loud. 

The trim, quaint garden-alleys, screened with 
boughs, 
The lion-headed gates, so grim and proud. 

The mossy fountain with its murmurings. 

Lie in warm sunshine — while the Blackbird 



The ring of silver voices, and the sheen 
Of festal garments, — and my lady streams 

With her gay court across the garden green ; 
Some lauglx and dance, some whisper their 
love-dreams ; 

And one calls for a little page : he strings 

Her lute beside her — • while the Blackbird sings. 

A little while, — and lo ! the charm is heard : 
A youth, whose life has been all summer, steals 

Forth from the noisy guests around the board, 
Creeps by her softly, at her footstool kneels. 

And, when she pauses, murmurs tender things 

Into her fond ear — while the Blackbird sings. 

The smoke-wreaths from the chimneys curl up 
higher, 
And dizzy things of eve begin to float 
Upon the light ; the breeze begins to tire. 
Half-way to sunset with a drowsy note 
The ancient clock from out the valley swings ; 
The grandam nods — and still the Blackbird 
sings. 

Far shouts and laughter from the farm-stead peal. 
Where the great stack is piling in the sun ; 

Through narrow gates o'erladen wagons reel. 
And barking curs into the tumult run ; 

While the inconstant wind bears ott', and brings 

The merry tempest — and the Blackbird sings. 

On the high wold the last look of the sun 
Burns, like a beacon, over dale and stream ; 

The shouts have ceased, the laughter and the fun ; 
The grandam sleeps, and peaceful be her dream ; 



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Only a hammer on an anvil rings ; 

The day is dying — still the Blackbird sings. 

Now the good vicar passes from his gate, 
Serene, with long white hair ; and in his eye 

Burns the clear spirit that hath conquered Fate, 
And felt the wings of immortality ; 

His heart is thronged with great imaginings 

And tender mercies — while the Blackbird sings. 

Down by the brook he bends his steps, and 
through 
A lowly wicket ; and at last he stands 
Awful beside the bed of one vvho grew 

From boyhood with him, — who with lifted 
hands 
And eyes seems listening to far welcomings 
And sweeter music — than the Blackbird sings. 

Two golden stars, like tokens from the blest, 

Strike on his dim orbs from the setting sun ; 
His sinking hands seem pointing to the west ; 
He smiles as though he said, " Thy will be 
done ! " 
His eyes they see not those illuminings ; 
His ears they hear not — what the Blackbird sings. 
Frederick Tennyson. 



THE PHILOSOPHER TOAD. 

Down deep in a hollow, so damp and so cold. 

Where oaks are by ivy o'ergrown. 
The gray moss and lichen creep over the mould, 

Lying loose on a ponderous stone. 
Now within this huge stone, like a king on 

his throne, 
A toad has been sitting more years than is 

known ; 
And, strange as it seems, yet he constantly 

deems 
The world standing still while he 's dreaming 

his dreams, — 
Does this wonderful toad, in his cheerful abode 
In the innermost heart of that flinty old stone. 
By the gray-haired moss and the lichen o'ergrown. 

Down deep in the hollow, from morning till 
night, 
Dun shadows glide over the ground. 
Where a watercourse once, as it sparkled with 
light. 
Turned a ruined old mill-wheel around : 
Long years have passed by since its bed became 

dry, 
And the trees grow so close, scarce a glimpse 
of the sky 



Is seen in the hollow, so dark and so damp. 
Where the glow-worm at noonday is trimming 

his lamp, 
And hardly a sound from the thicket around, 
Where the rabbit and squirrel leap over the 

ground. 
Is heard by the toad in his spacious abode 
In the innermost heart of that ponderous stone. 
By the gray-haired moss and the lichen o'ergrown. 

Down deep in that hollow the bees never come. 

The shade is too black for a flower ; 
And jewel-winged birds, with their musical 
hum. 
Never flash in the night of that bower ; 
But the cold-blooded snake, in the edge of the 

brake. 
Lies amid the rank grass, half asleep, half 

awake ; 
And the ashen-white snail, with the slime in 

its trail, 
Moves weaiily on like a life's tedious tale. 
Yet disturbs not the toad in his spacious abode. 
In the innermost heart of that flinty old stone. 
By the gray-haired moss and the lichen o'ergrown. 

Down deep in a hollow some wiseacres sit, 

Like a toad in his cell in the stone ; 
Around them in daylight the blind owlets flit. 
And their creeds are with ivy o'ergrown ; — 
Their streams may go dry, and the wheels 

cease to ply. 
And their glimpses be few of the sun and the 

sky. 
Still they hug to their breast every time- 
honored guest. 
And slumber and doze in inglorious rest ; 
For no progress they find in the wide sphere 

of mind, 
And the world 's standing still with all of their 

kind ; 
Contented to dwell deep down in the well. 
Or move like the snail in the crust of his shell. 
Or live like the toad in his narrow abode, 
With their souls closely wedged in a thick wall 

of stone. 
By the gray weeds of prejudice rankly o'ergrown. 
REBECCA S. Nichols. 



THE MUSICAL DUEL. 

FROM "THE LOVER'S MELANCHOLY." 

Menaphon. Passing from Italy to Greece the 
tales 
Which poets of an elder time have feigned 
To glorify their Tempe, bred in mo 
Desire of visiting that paradise. 



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To Thessaly I came ; and, living private, 
Without acquaintance of more sweet companions 
Than the old inmates to my love, my thoughts, 
I day by day frequented silent groves 
And solitary walks. One morning early 
This accident encountered me : I heard 
The sweetest and most ravishing contention 
That art and nature ever were at strife in. 

Amethus. I cannot yet conceive what you 
infer 
By art and nature. 

Men. I shall soon resolve you. 

A sound of music touched mine ears, or rather. 
Indeed, entranced my soul. As I stole nearer. 
Invited by the melancholy, I saw 
This youth, this fair-faced youth, upon his lute, 
"With strains of strange variety and harmony, 
Proclaiming, as it seemed, so bold a challenge 
To the clear choristers of the woods, the birds, 
That, as they flocked about him, all stood silent, 
"Wondering at what they heard. I wondered too. 

Am. And so do I ; good ! — On ! 

Mex. a nightingale, 

Nature's best skilled musician, undertakes 
The challenge, and, for every several strain 
The well-shaped youth could touch, she sung her 

own ; 
He could not run division with more art 
Upon his quaking instrument than she, 
The nightingale, did with her various notes 
Reply to ; for a voice, and for a soimd, 
Amethus, 't is much easier to believe 
That such they were than hope to hear again. 

Am. How did the rivals part ? 

Men. You term them rightly ; 

For they were rivals, and their mistress. Har- 
mony. — 
Some time thus spent, the young man grew at last 
Into a pretty anger, that a bird 
"Whom art had never taught clefs, moods, or 

notes. 
Should vie with him for mastery, whose study 
Had busied many hours to perfect practice : 
To end the controversy, in a I'apture 
Upon his instrument he plays so swiftly. 
So many voluntaries, and so quick. 
That there was curiosity and cunning, 
(.^oncord in discord, lines of differing method 
ileeting in one full centre of delight. 

Am. Now for the bird. 

Men. The bird, ordahied to be 

Jlusic's first mart3'r, strove to imitate 
These several sounds ; which, when her warbling 

throat 
Failed in, for grief, down dropped she on his lute. 
And broke her heart ! It was the cpiaintest sad- 
ness 



To see the conqueror upon her hearse 

To weep a funeral elegy of teai-s ; 

That, trust me, my Amethus, I could chide 

Mine own unmanly weakness, that made me 

A fellow-mourner with him. 

Am. I believe thee. 

Men. He looked upon the trophies of his art. 
Then sighed, then wiped his eyes, then sighetl, 

and cried, 
" Alas, poor creature ! I v;ill soon revenge 
This cruelty upon the author of it ; 
Henceforth this lute, guilty of innocent blood, 
Shall nevermore betray a harmless peace 
To an untimely end ;" and in that sorrow, 
As he was pashing it against a tree, 
I suddenly stept in. 

JOHN FORD. 



THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS. 

FROM "THE CANTERBURY TALES: PROLOGUE."* 

"Whan that Aprille with hise shoures soote ^ 
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote. 
And bathed every veyne in swich 2 licour, 
Of which vertue engendred is the flour ; 
"Whan Zephirus eek with his swete breeth 
Inspired hath in every holt ^ and heeth 
The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne 
Hath in the Ram his halffe cours y-ronne, 
And smale foweles maken melodye 
That slepen al the nyght with open eye, — 
So priketh hem nature in hir corages,* — 
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages, 
And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes, 
To fcrne halwes,^ kowthe'' in sondry londes ; 
And specially, from every shires ende 
Of Engelond, to Caunterbury they wende 
The liooly blisful martir^ for to seke. 
That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke. 

Bifil that, in that seson on a day. 
In Southwerk at the Tabard as I lay, 
Redy to wenden on my pilgrymage 
To Caunterbury witli ful devout corage, 
At n3'ght were come in-to that hostelrye 
Wei nyue-and-twenty in a compaiguye. 



J sweet. 


2 such. 


3 wood. 


4 their hearts 


5 ancient saints. 


6 renowned. 


7 Thomas h Becket. 







* The following passages from the Prologue to The Canterbury 
Talcs give excellent specimens of Chaucer's close observation of 
nature, men, and manners, and of his clear, graphic, descriptive 
style. The text followed is that of the "Riverside Edition," edited 
by Mr. Arthur Oilman, which is based chiefly on that of the manu- 
script in possession of Lord EUesmere, published by the Chaucer 
Society of London. That edition, however, is not responsible for 
the explanatory notes, nor for the addition of the grave accent, used 
to indicate syllables which the rhythm requires to be pronounced, in 
order to simplify the reading for those unaccustomed to the old-time 
irregularities of spelling. 



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Of sondry folk, by aventure y-falle 

In felaweshipe, and pilgrymes were thei alle, 

That toward Caunterbury wolden ryde. 

A Knyght ther was, and that a wortliy man. 
That fro the tyme that he lirst bigan 
To riden out, he loved chivalrie, 
Trouthe and honour, fredom and curteisie. 
Ful worthy was he in his lordes werre, 
And therto hadde he riden, noman ferre,i 
As wel in cristendom as in hethenesse. 
And evere honoured for his worthynesse. 

And though that he were worthy, he was wys, 
And of his port as meeke as is a mayde. 
He nevere yet no vileynye ^ ne sayde 
In al his lyf unto no maner wight. 
He was a verray parfit, gentil knyght. 

With hym ther was his sone, a yong Squier, 
A lovyere and a lusty bacheler, 
With lokkes crulle^ as they were leyd in presse. 
Of twenty yeer of age he was I gesse. 
Of his stature he was of evene lengthe. 
And wonderly delyvere,* and of greet strengthe. 
And he hadde ben somtyme in chyvachie,^ 
In Flaundres, in Artoys, and Pycardie, 
And born hym weel, as of so litel space. 
In hope to stonden in his lady grace. 
Enibrouded ^ was he, as it were a meede 
Al ful of fresshe floures whyte and reede. 
Syngynge he was, or floytynge,'' al the day ; 
He was as fressh as is the monthe of May. 
Short was his gowne, with sieves longe and wyde. 
Wel oowde he sitte on hors, and faire ryde. 
He koude songes make and wel endite, 
Juste and eek dannce, and weel purtreye^ and 

write. 
So hoote he lovede, that by nyghtertale ^ 
He sleep nomore than dooth a nyghtyngale ; 
Cartels he was, lowely and servysable. 
And carf i° biforn his fader at the table. 

Ther was also a Nonne, a Prioresse, 
That of hire smylyng was ful symple and coy ; 
Hire gretteste ooth ne was but by seint Loy ; ^^ 
And she was cleped madame Eglentyne. 
Ful weel she soonge the service dyvyne, 
Eutuned in hir nose ful semeely ; 
And Frenssh she spak ful faire and fetisly.^"^ 
After the scole of Stratford-atte-Bowe, 
For Frenssh of Parys was to hire unknowe. 



I farther. 
3 curled. 

5 a military expedition. 
7 playinji on a flute. 
9 niglit-tiine. 
II probably St. Louis. 



E nothing unmannerly. 

4 active. 

6 embroidered. 

8 portray — draw, 
ic carved. 
12 featly — neatly. 



At mete ^ wel ytaught was she with alle, 
She leet no morsel from hir lippes falle, 
Ne wette hire fyngres in hire sauce deepe. 
Wel koude she carie a morsel and wel kepe, 
That no drope ne fille irp-on hire breste ; 
In curtei.sie was set ful muchel hir leste.- 
Hire over-lippe wyped she so clene, 
That in hir coppe ther was no ferthyng ^ sene 
Of grece, whan she dronken hadde hir draughte. 
Ful semely after hir mete she raughte,* 
And sikerly ^ she was of greet disport. 
And ful ^ilesaunt, and amyable of port, 
And peyned hir ^ to countrefete cheere 
Of Court, and to ben estatlich of manere, 
And to ben holden digne of reverence ; 
But for to speken of hire conscience. 
She was so charitable and so pitous, 
She wolde wepe if that she saugh a mous 
Kaught in a trappe, if it were deed or bledde. 
Of smale honndes hadde .she, that she fedde 
With rosted fiessh, or mylk and wastel-breed ; '' 
But soore wepte she if any of hem were deed. 
Or if m^en smoot it with a yerde ^ sinerte : 
And al was conscience and tendre herte. 

Ful semely hire wympul pynched was ; 
Hire nose tretys,^ hire even greye as glas, 
Hir mouth ful smal, and ther to softe and reed. 
But sikerly she hadde a fair forheed ; 
1 1 was almoost a spanne brood, I trowe, 
For hardily she was nat undergrowe. 
Ful fetys was hir cloke, as I was war ; 
Of smal coral aboute hire arm she bar 
A peire of bedes gauded ^'^ al with grene ; 
And ther-on heng a broch of gold ful schene, 
On which ther was first write a crowned A, 
And after. Amor vincit omnia. 

Another Nonne with hire hadde she, 
That was hire Chapeleyne, and Preestes tbre. 

A Clerk ther was of Oxenford also 
That un-to logyk hadde longe ygo. 
And leene was his hors as is a rake, 
And he nas nat right fat, I underjake, 
But looked holwe, and ther to sobrely ; 
Ful thredbare was his overeste courtepy,ii 
For he hadde geten hym yet no benefice, 
Ne M'as so worldly to have office ; 
For hym was levere have at his beddes heed 
Twenty bo'okes, clad in blak or reed, 
Of Aristotle and his philosophic, 
Than robes riche, or fithele,!'^ or gay sautrie.i^ 
But al be that he was a philosox)hre, 
Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre ; 

I meat— table. 2 pleasure. 

3 niorbel. 4 reached. 

5 surely. 6 took pains. 

7 cake (tjasteau) bread. 8 rod. 

9 straii;lit. lo The ir'i'«^2"were the larger beads. 

II uppermost short cloak. 12 fiddle. 13 psaltery. 



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But al that he niighte of his freendes hente,i 
On bookes and his lernynge he it spente, 
And bisily gan for the soules preye 
Of hem that gaf him wher with to scoleye,^ 
Of studie took he moost cure and moost heede, 
Noght word spak he moore than was neede, 
And that was seyd in forme and reverence 
And short and qnyk and ful of hy sentence. 
Sownynge in ^ moral vertu was his speclre 
And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche. 

A Sergeant of the Lawe, war * and wys, 
That often hadde ben at the Parvys,^ 
Ther was also ful riche of excellence. 
Discreet he was and of greet reverence ; 
He semed swich, hise wordes weren so wise. 
Justice he was ful often in Assise, 
By patente, and by pleyn commissioun, 
For his science and for his heigh renoun. 
Of fees and robes hadde he many oon ; 
So gret a purchasour^ was nowher noon. 
Al was fee symple to hym in effect, 
His purchasyng myghte nat ben infect.'^ 
Nowher so bisy a man as he ther nas,^ 
And yet he semed bisier than he was. 

A good man was ther of religioun, 
And was a Povki: Persoun ' of a Toun ; 
But riche he was of hooly thoght and werk ; 
He was also a lerned man, a clerk 
That Cristes Gospel trewely wolde preche, 
Hise parisshens devoutly wolde he teche. 
Benygne he was, and wonder diligent. 
And in adversitee ful pacient ; 
And such he was y-preved ofte sithes.^'' 
Ful looth were hym to curse for his tythes, 
But rather wolde he geven,^! out of doute, 
Un-to his povre parisshens aboute. 
Of his offryng and eek of his siibstaunce. 
He koude in litel thjmg have sufiisaunce. 
Wyd was his parisshe, and houses fer a-sonder, 
But he ne lafte ^^ nat for reyn ne thonder, 
In siknesse nor in meschief to visite 
The ferreste ^^ in his parisshe niuche and lite ^* 
Up-on his feet, and in his hand a staf. 
This noble ensample to his sheepe he gaf,!'^ 
That firste he wroghte, and afterward he taughte. 

A bettre preest, I trowe, that nowher noon is • 
He waiteth after no pompe and reverence, 
N"e maked him a spiced conscience, 



1 get. 2 study. 

3 tending- toward. 4 wary — prudent. 

5 portico of St. PauKs, wliere lawyers met. 

6 prosecutor. 7 tainted. 

8 ne was= was not. 9 Poor Parson. 

10 times. ]i give. 

12 ceased. 13 farthest. 

14 great and small. 15 gave. 



But Cristes loore, and his Apo.stles twelve. 
He taughte, but first he folwed it hym selve. 

Now have I toold yoir shortly in a clause 
The staat, tharray, the nombre, and eek the causQ 
Why that assembled was this compaignye 
In Southwerk at this gentil hostelrye. 
That highte the Tabard, faste by the Belle. 
But now is tyme to yow for to telle 
How that we baren us that ilke ' n3'ght. 
Whan we were in that hostelrie alyght, 
And after wol I telle of our viage. 
And al the remenaunt of oure pilgrimage. 

But first, I pray yow of your curteisj'e. 
That ye narette it nat my vileinye,'-^ 
Thogh that I pleynly.speke in this mateere. 
To teWh yow hir wordes and hir cheere ; 
Ne thogh I speke hir wordes proprely. 
For this ye knowen al so wel as I, 
Whoso shal telle a tale after a man, 
He moote reherce, as nj' as evere he kan 
Everich a word, if it be in his charge, 
Al speke he never so rudeliche ^ or large ; * 
Or ellis he moot telle his tale untrewe, 
Or feyne thyng, or fynde wordes newe. 
He may nat spare al thogh he were his brother, 
He moot as wel seye o word as another. 
Crist spak hym self ful brode in hooly writ 
And wel ye woot no vileynye is it. 
Eek Plato seith, who so can hym rede, 
"The wordes moote be cosyn^ to the dede." 

Also I prey yow to forgeve it me, 
Al have I nat set folk in hir degree 
Heere in this tale, as that they scholde stonde ; 
My wit is short, ye may wel understonde. 

Greet chierfe made oure host us everichon. 
And to the soper sette he us anon 
And served us with vitaille at the beste. 
Strong was the wyn and Avel to drynke us leste.^ 

A semely man Oure Hoost he was withalle 
For to han been a marchal in an halle ; 
A large man he was with eyen stepe, 
A fairer burgeys was ther noon in Chepe : 
Boold of his speche, and wys and wel ytaught. 
And of manhod hym lakkedfe right naught. 
Eek therto he was right a niyrie ^ man. 
And after soper pleyen he bj^gan, 
And spak of myrthe amonges othere thinges. 
Whan that we hadde inaad our rekenj-nges ; 
And seyde thus : " Lo, lordynges, trewely 
Ye ben to me right welcome hertely : 
For by iny trouthe, if that I shal nat lye, 
I saugh nat this yeer so myrie a compaignye 
Atones in this herberwe^ as is now. 



1 sane, 2 that ye ascribe it not to my ill-breedii 

3 rudely. 4 free. 

5 germane. 6 pleased. 7 merry. S liarbo -age — 



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Fayn wolde I doon ^ yow myrthe, wiste I how. 
And of a mjn'the I am right now bythoght, 
To doon you ese, and it shal coste noght. 

Ye goon to Canterbury, God you speede, 
The blisful martir quite yow youre meede ! ^ 
And wel I woot as ye goon by the weye 
Ye shapen yow ^ to talen * and to pleye ; 
For trewely confort ne myrthe is noon 
To ride by the weye doumb as the stoon ; 
And therefore wol I maken you disport, 
As I seyde erst, and doon you som confort. 

That ech of yow to shorte with oure weye. 

In this viage shal telle tales tweye,^ — ■ 

To Caunterburyward, I mean it so. 

And homward he shal tellen othere two, — 

Of aventures that whilom han bifalle. 

And which of yow that bereth hym best of alle, 

That is to seyn, that telleth in this caas 

Tal^s of best sentence,^ and most solaas,'' 

Shal have a soper at oure aller cost, 

Heere in this place, syttynge by this post, 

Whan that we come agayn fro Caunterbury. 

And, for to make you the moore murj^, 

I wol my-selfe gladly with yow ryde. 

Eight at myn owene cost, and be youre gyde. 

And who so wole my juggement withseye ^ 

Shal paye al that we spenden by the weye. 

And if ye vouche-sauf that it be so, 

Tel me anon, with-outen wordes mo, 

And I Avol erly shape ^ me therfore." 

This thyng was graunted, and oure othes swore 
"With ful glad herte, and preyden hym also 
That he would vouche-sauf for to do so. 
And that he wolde been oure governour. 
And of oure tales juge and reportour. 
And sette a soper at a certeyn pris 
And we wol reuled been ^° at his devj^s 
In heigh and lough ; and thus by oon assent 
"We been acorded to his juggement. 
And ther-up-on the wyn was fet anon ; 
"We dronken and to reste wente echon 
"With-outen any lenger taryynge. 

Geoffrey Chaucer. 



CHRISTMAS IN THE OLDEN TIME. 

FROM "MARMION," INTROD TO CANTO VI. 

Heap on more wood ! — the wind is chill ; 
But, let it whistle as it will, 
"We '11 keep our Christmas merry still. 
Each age has deemed the new-born year 



I make. 




2 reward. 


3 purpose. 




4 tell tales. 


5 two. 




6 sense. 


7 solace — mirth. 




8 gainsay. 


9 shape my affairs - 


-prepare. 


10 be ruled. 



The fittest time for festal cheer : 

Even, heathen yet, the savage Dane 

At lol more deep the mead did drain ; 

High on the beach his galleys drew, 

And feasted all his pirate crew ; 

Then in his low and pine-built hall, 

"Where shields and axes decked the wall, 

Thej'' gorged iipon the half-dressed steer ; 

Caroused in seas of sable beer ; 

"While round, in brutal jest, were thrown 

The half-gnawed rib and marrow-bone ; 

Or listened all, in grim delight, 

"While scalds yelled out the joys of fight. 

Then forth in frenzj'' would they hie, 

"While wildly loose their red locks fly ; 

And, dancing round the blazing pile. 

They make such barbarous mirth the while, 

As best might to the mind recall 

The boisterous joys of Odin's hall. 

And well our Christian sires of old 
Loved when the year its course had rolled 
And brought blithe Christmas back again 
"V\'ith all his hospitable train. 
Domestic and religious rite 
Gave honor to the holy night : 
On Christmas eve the bells were rung ; 
On Christmas eve the mass was sung ; 
That only night, in all the year. 
Saw the stoled priest the chalice rear. 
The damsel donned her kirtle sheen ; 
The hall Avas dressed with ho]]j green ; 
Forth to the wood did merry-men go, 
To gather in the mistletoe. 
Then opened wide the baron's hall 
To vassal, tenant, serf, and all ; 
Power laid his rod of rule aside, 
And Ceremony doffed her pride. 
The heir, with roses in his shoes. 
That night might village partner choose ;, 
The lord, underogating, share 
The vulgar game of "post and pair." 
All hailed, with uncontrolled delight, 
And general voice, the happy night 
That to the cottage, as the crown, 
Brought tidings of salvation down. 

The fire, Avith well-dried logs supplied, 
"Went roaring up the chimney wide ; 
The huge hall-table's oaken face, 
Scrubbed till it shone, the day to grace, 
Bore then upon its massive board 
No mark to part the squire and lord. 
Then was brought in the lusty brawn. 
By old blue-coated serving-man ; 
Then the grim boar's-head frowned on high 
Crested with baj's and I'osemary. 
"Well can the green-garbed ranger tell 
How, when, and where the monster fell ; 



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What dogs before his death he tore, 

And all the baiting of the boar. 

The wassail round, in good brown bowls, 

Garnished with ribbons, blithely trowls. 

There the Imge sirloin reeked ; hard by 

Plum-porridge stood, and Christmas pie ; 

jSTor failed old Scotland to produce, 

At such high-tide, her savory goose. 

Then came the merry maskers in. 

And carols roared with blithesome din ; 

If unmelodious was the song. 

It was a hearty note, and strong. 

Who lists may in their mumming see 

Traces of ancient mystery ; 

White skirts supplied the masquerade. 

And smutted cheeks the visors made : 

But, 0, what maskers richly dight 

Can boast of bosoms half so light ! 

England was merry England, when 

Old Christmas brought his sports again. 

'T was Christmas broached the mightiest ale ; 

'T was Christmas told the merriest tale ; 

A Christmas gambol oft could cheer 

The poor man's heart through half the year. 

Sir Walter Scott. 



0, THE PLEASANT DAYS OF OLD! 

0, THE pleasant days of old, which so often people 

praise ! 
True, they wanted all the luxuries that grace our 

modern days : 
Bare floors were strewed with rushes, the walls 

let in the cold ; 
0, how they must have shivered in those pleasant 

days of old ! 

0, those ancient lords of old, how magnificent 

they were ! 
They threw down and imprisoned kings, — to 

thwart them who might dare ? 
They ruled their serfs right sternly ; they took 

fronr Jews their gold, — 
Above both law and equity were those great lords 

of old ! 



0, the gallant knights of old, for their valor so 

renowned ! 
With sword and lance and armor strong they 

scoured the country round ; 
And whenever aught to tempt them they met by 

wood or wold, 
By right of sword they seized the prize, — those 

gallant knights of old ! 



0, the gentle dames of old ! who, quite free from 

fear or pain, 
Could gaze on joust and tournament, and see 

their champions slain ; 
They lived on good beefsteaks and ale, which 

made them strong and bold, — 
0, more like men than women were those gentle 

dames of old ! 

0, those mighty towers of old ! with their turrets, 

moat, and keep. 
Their battlements and bastions, their dungeons 

dark and deep. 
Full many a baron held his court within the 

castle hold ; 
And many a captive languished there, in those 

strong towers of old. 

0, the troubadours of old ! with the gentle min- 
strelsie 

Of hope and joy, or deep despair, whiche'er their 
lot might be ; 

For years they served their ladye-loves ere they 
their passions told, — 

0, wondrous patience must have had those trou- 
badours of old ! 

0, those blessed times of old, with their chivalry 

and state ! 
I love to read their chronicles, which such brave 

deeds relate ; 
I love to sing their ancient rhymes, to hear their 

legends told, — 

But, Heaven be thanked ! I live not in those 

blessed times of old ! 

Frances brown. 



THE TRUMPETS OF DOOLKARNEIN. 

[In Eastern history are two Iskanders, or Alexanders, who are 
sometimes confounded, and both of whom are called Doolkarnein, 
or the Two-Horned, in allusion to their subjugation of East and 
West, horns being an Oriental symbol of power. 

One of these heroes is Alexander of Macedon ; the other a con- 
queror of more ancient times, who built the marvellous series of 
ramparts on Mount Caucasus, known in fable as the wall of Gog 
and Magog, that is to say, of the people of the North. It reached 
from the Euxine Sea to the Caspian, where its flanks originated the 
subsequent appellation of the Caspian Gates.] 

With awful walls, far glooming, that possessed 
The passes 'twixt the snow-fed Caspian foun- 
tains, 
Doolkarnein, the dread lord of East and West, 
Shut up the northern nations in their moun- 
tains ; 
And ui)on platforms where the oak-trees grew. 
Trumpets he set, huge beyond dreams of 
wonder, 



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Craftily purposed, when his arms withdrew, 
To make him thought still housed there, like 
the thunder: 
And it so fell ; for when the winds blew right, 
They woke these trumpets to their calls of might. 

Unseen, but heard, their calls the trumpets blew, 
Kinging the granite rocks, their only bearers, 
Till the long fear into religion grew, 
And nevermore those heights had human 
darers. 
Dreadful Doolkarnein was an earthly god ; 
His walls but shadowed forth his mightier 
frowning ; 
Armies of giants at his bidding trod 

From realm to realm, king after king dis- 
crowning. 
When thunder spoke, or when the earthquake 

stirred, 
Then, nuittering in accord, his host was heard. 

But when the winters marred the mountain 
shelves. 
And softer changes can^e with vernal mornings. 
Something had touched the trumpets' lofty selves. 
And less and less rang forth their sovereign 
warnings ; 
Fewer and feebler ; as when silence spreads 
In plague-struck tents, where haughty chiefs, 
left dying. 
Fail by degrees upon their angry beds. 

Till, one by one, ceases the last stern sighing. 
One by one, thus, their breath the trumpets drew, 
Till now no more the imperious music blew. 

Is he then dead ? Can great Doolkarnein die ? 

Or can his endless hosts elsewhere be needed ? 
Were the great breaths that blew his minstrelsy 

Phantoms, that faded as himself receded ? 
Or is he angered ? Surely he still comes ; 

This silence ushers the dread visitation ; 
Sudden will burst the torrent of his drums. 

And then will follow bloody desolation. 
So did fear dream ; though now, with not a sound 
To scare good hope, summer had twice crept 
round. 

Then gathered in a band, with lifted eyes. 

The neighbors, and those silent heights as- 
cended. 
Giant, nor aught blasting their bold emprise. 
They met, though twice they halted, breath 
suspended : 
Once, at a coming like a god's in rage 

AVith thunderous leaps, — but 't was the piled 
snow, falling ; 
And once, when in the woods an oak, for age. 
Fell dead, the silence with its groan appalling. 



At last they came where still, in dread array, 
As though they still might speak, the trumpets 
lay. 

Unhurt they lay, like caverns above ground," 
The rifted rocks, for hands, about them cling- 
ing. 
Their tubes as straight, their mighty mouths as 
round 
And lirm as when the rocks were ilrst set 
ringing. 
Fresh froni their unimaginable mould 

They might have seemed, save that tlie storms 
had stained them 
With a rich rust, that now, with gloomy gold 
In the bright sunshine, beauteously ingrained 
them, 
l^reathlcss the gazers looked, nigh faint for awe, 
Then leaped, then laughed. What was it now 
they saw 1 

Myriads of birds. Myriads of birds, that filled 
The trumpets all with nests and nestling 
voices ! 
The great, huge, stormy music had been stilled 
By the soft needs that imrsed those small, 
sweet noises ! 
thou Doolkarnein, where is now thy wall ? 

Where now thy voice divine and all thy forces ? 
Great was thy cunning, but its wit was small 
Compared with nature's least and gentlest 
courses. 
Fears and false creeds may fright the realms 

awhile ; 
But heaven and earth abide their time, and smile. 

Leigh Hunt. 



MAHMOUD. 

TiiERK came a man, making his hasty moan 
Before the Sultan Mahmoud on his throne, 
And crying out, " My sorrow is my I'ight, 
And I will see the Sultan, and to-night." 
" Sorrow," said Mahmond, " is a reverend thing : 
I recognize its right, as king with king ; 
Speak on." " A fiend has got into my house," 
Exclaimed the staring man, "and tortures us, — 
One of thine officers ; he conies, the abhorred. 
And takes possession of my hou.se, my board. 
My bed ; — I have two daughters and a wife, 
And the wild villain comes and makes me mad 

with life." 
" Is he there now ? " said Mahmoud. " No ; he 

left 
The Tiouse when I did, of my wits bereft. 
And laughed me down the street, because I vowed 
1 'd bring the prince himself to lay him in his 

shroud. 



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I 'm mad with wiiut, I 'ra mad with misery, 
And, thou Sultan Mahmoud, God cries out for 
thee ! " 

Tlie Sultan comforted the man, and said, 
" G» home, and I will send tliee wine and bread" 
(For ho was poor) "and other comforts. Go ; 
And should the wretch return, let Sultan Mah- 
moud know." 

In three days' time, with haggard eyes and heard, 

And shaken voice, the suitor reappeared, 

And said, "He's come." Mahmoud said not a 

word, 
But rose and took four slaves, each with a sword. 
And went with the vexed man. Tliey reach the 

place, 
And hear a voice, and see a woman's face, 
That to the window lluttered in affright : 
"Go in," said Mahmoud, " and put out the light ; 
But tell the females first to leave the room ; 
And when the drunkard follows tlunii, we come." 

The man went in. There was a cry, and hark ! 
A table falls, the window is struck dark : 
Forth rush the breathless women, and behind 
"With curses comes the fiend in desperate mind. 
In vain : the siibres soon cut short the strife, 
And chop the shrieking wretch, and drink his 
bloody life. 

"Now Krjld the light," the Sultan cried aloud : 
'T was done : he took it in his hand and bowed 
Over the corpse, and looked upon the face ; 
Then turned and knelt, and to the throne of grace 
Put uf) a prayer, and from his lips there crept 
Some gentle words of pleasure, and he wept. 
In reverent silence the beholders wait. 
Then briiig him at his call both wine and incut ; 
And when he had refreshed his noble heart. 
He bade his host be blest, and rose up to de2)ait. 

The man amazed, all mildness now and tears. 
Fell at the Sultan's feet with many prayers. 
And begged him to vouchsafe to tell his slave 
Tlie reason fii'st of that command ho gave 
About the light ; then, when he saw the face, 
"Why he knelt down ; and lastly, how it was 
That fare so poor as his detained him in the place. 

The Sultan said, with a benignant eye, 

" Since fii'st I saw thee come, anil heard thy cry, 

I could not rid me of a dread, that one 

By whom such daring villanies were done, 

Must be some lord of mine, — ay, e'en perhaps a 

son. 
For this I had the light put out : but when 
I saw the face, and found a stranger slain. 



I knelt and thanked the sovereign Arbiter, 

Whose work I had performed through pain and 

fear ; 

And then I rose and was refreshed with food, 

The first time since thy voice had marred my 

solitude." 

Leigh Hunt. 



THE LEPER. 

' ' Room for the leper ! room ! " And as he came 
The cry passed on, — " Room for the leper ! room ! " 

And aside they stood. 
Matron, and child, and pitiless manhood, — all 
Who met him on his way, — ^and let him pass. 
And onward through the open gate he came 
A leper with the ashes on his brow. 
Sackcloth about his loins, and on his lip 
A covering, stepping painfully and slow. 
And with a difficult utterance, like one 
Whose heart is with an iron nerve put down, 
Crying, " Unclean ! unclean ! " 

Day wa« breaking 
When at the altar of the temple stood 
The holy priest of God. The incense-lamp 
Burned with a struggling light, and a low chant 
Swelled through the hollow arches of the roof. 
Like an articulate wail, and there, alone, 
Wasted to ghastly thinness, Helon knelt. 
The echoes of the melancholy strain 
Died in the distant aisles, and he rose up. 
Struggling with weakness, and bowed down liis 

heafl 
Unto the sprinkled ashes, and put off 
His costly I'aiment for the leper's garb, 
And with the sackcloth round him, and his lip 
Hid in a loathsome covering, stood still, 
Waiting to hear his doom : — 

" Depart ! depart, child 
Of Israel, from the temple of thy God, 
For he has smote thee with his chastening rod. 

And to the desert wild 
From all thou lov'.st away thy feet must flee. 
That from thy plague his people may be free. 

" Depart ! and come not near 
The busy maii;, the crowded city, more ; 
Nor set thy foot a human threshold o'er ; 

And stay tliou not to hear 
Voices that call thee in the way ; and fly 
From all who in the wilderness pass by. 

" Wet not thy burning lip 
In .streams that to a human dwelling glide ; 
Nor rest thee where the covert fountains hide. 

Nor kneel thee down to dip 



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The water where the pilgrim bends to drink, 
By desert well, or river's grassy brink. 

' ' And pass not thou between 
The weary traveller and the cooling breeze, 
And lie not down to sleep beneath the trees 

Where human tracks are seen ; 
Nor milk the goat that browseth on the plain, 
ISTor pluck the standing corn or yellow grain. 

" And now depart ! and when 
Thy heart is heavy, and thine eyes are dim, 
Lift up thy prayer beseechingly to Him 

Who, from the tribes of men, 
Selected thee to feel his chastening rod. 
Depart ! leper ! and forget not God ! " 

And he went forth — alone ! not one of all 
The many whom he loved, nor she whose name 
Was woven in the fibres of the heart 
Breaking within him now, to come and speak 
Comfort unto him. Yea, he went his way, 
Sick and heart-broken and alone, — to die ! 
For God had cursed the leper ! 

It was noon, 
And Helen knelt beside a stagnant pool 
In the lone wilderness, and bathed his brow, 
Hot with the burning leprosy, and touched 
The loathsome water to his fevered lips. 
Praying that he might be so blest, — to die ! 
Footsteps approached, and with no strength to 

flee. 
He drew the covering closer on his lip, 
Crjdng, " Unclean ! unclean ! " and in the folds 
Of the coarse sackcloth shrouding up his face. 
He fell upon the earth till they should pass. 
Nearer the stranger came, and, bending o'er 
The leper's prostrate form, pronounced his name. 
— " Helon ! " — the voice was like the master- 
tone 
Of a rich instrument, — most strangely sweet ; 
And the dull pulses of disease awoke, 
And for a moment beat beneath the hot 
And leprous scales with a restoring thrill. 
" Helon ! arise ! " and he forgot his curse, 
And rose and stood before him. 

Love and awe 
Mingled in the regard of Helon's eye 
As he beheld the stranger. He was not 
In costly raiment clad, nor on his brow 
The symbol of a princely lineage wore ; 
No followers at his back, nor in his hand 
Buckler or sword or spear, — yet in his mien 
Command sat throned serene, and if he smiled, 
A kingly condescension graced his lips 
The lion would have crouched to in his lair. 
His garb was simple, and his sandals worn ; 



His stature modelled with a perfect grace ; 
His countenance, the impress of a God, 
Touched with the open innocence of a child ; 
His eye was blue and calm, as is the sky 
In the serenest noon ; his hair unshorn 
Fell to his shoulders ; and his curling beard 
The fulness of perfected manhood bore. 
He looked on Helon earnestly awhile, 
As if his heart was moved, and, stooping down. 
He took a little water in his hand 
And laid it on his brow, and said, " Be clean ! " 
And lo ! the scales fell from him, and his blood 
Coursed with delicious coolness through his veins, 
And his dry palms grew moist, and on his brow 
The dewy softness of an infant's stole. 
His leprosy was cleansed, and he fell down 
Prostrate at Jesus' feet, and worshipped him. 
Nathaniel Parker Willis. 



GODIVA. 

Not only we, the latest seed of Time, 

New men, that in the flying of a wheel 

Cry down the past ; not only we, that prate 

Of rights and wrongs, have loved the people well, 

And loathed to see them overtaxed ; but she 

Did more, and underwent, and overcame, 

The woman of a thousand summers back, 

Godiva, wife to that grim Earl who ruled 

In Coventry : for when he laid a tax 

Upon his town, and all the mothers brought 

Their children, clamoring, " If we pay, we 

starve ! " 
She sought her lord, and found him, where he 

strode 
About the hall, among his dogs, alone, 
His beard a foot before him, and his hair 
A yard behind. She told him of their tears, 
And prayed him, " If they pay this tax, they 

starve." 
Whereat he stared, replying, half amazed, 
" You would not let your little finger ache 
For such as these ?" " But I would die, " said she. 
He laughed, and swore by Peter and by Paul : 
Then filliped at the diamond in her ear ; 
" 0, ay, ay, ay, you talk ! " " Alas ! " she said, 
" But prove me what it is I would not do." 
And from a heart as rough as Esau's hand. 
He answered, " Kide you naked through the town. 
And I repeal it ; " and nodding, as in scorn, 
He parted, with great strides among his dogs. 

So left alone, the passions of her mind, 
As winds from all the compass shift and blow, 
Made war upon each other for an hour. 
Till pity won. She sent a herald forth, 

And bade him cry, with sound of trumpet, all 
The hard condition ; but that she would loose 



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Tlie people : therefore, as they loved her well, 
From then till noon no foot should pace the street, 
No eye look down, she passhig ; but that all 
Should keep within, door shut and window barred. 

Then fled she to her inmost bower, and there 
Unclasped the wedded eagles of her belt, 
The grim Earl's gift ; but ever at a breath 
She lingered, looking like a summer moon 
Half dipt in cloud : anon she shook her head. 
And showered the rippled ringlets to her knee ; 
Unclad herself in haste ; adown the stair 
Stole on ; and, like a creeping sunbeam, slid 
From pillar unto pillar, until she reached 
The gateway ; there she found her palfrey trapt 
In purple blazoned with armorial gold. 

Then she rode forth, clothed on with chastity : 
The deep air listened round her as she rode, 
And all the low wind hardly breathed for fear. 
The little wide-mouthed heads upon the spout 
Had cunning eyes to see : the barking cur 
Made her cheek flame : her palfrey's footfall shot 
Light horrors through her pulses : the blind walls 
Were full of chinks and holes ; and overhead 
Fantastic gables, crowding, stared : but she 
Not less through all bore up, till, last, she saw 
The white-flowered elder-thicket from the field 
Gleam through the Gothic archways in the wall. 

Then she rode back, clothed on with chastity : 
And one low churl, compact of thankless earth, 
The fatal byword of all years to come, 
Boring a little auger-hole in fear. 
Peeped — but his eyes, before they had tlieir will, 
"Were shrivelled into darkness in his head, 
And dropt before him. So the Powers, who wait 
On noble deeds, cancelled a sense misused ; 
And she, that knew not, passed : and all at once, 
With twelve great shocks of sound, the shameless 

noon 
Was clashedandhammered from a hundred towers. 
One after one : but even then she gained 
Her bower ; whence reissuing, robed and crowned. 
To meet her lord, she took the tax away. 
And built herself an everlasting name. 

Alfred Tennyson. 



THE PRISONER OF CHILLON. 

Eternal spirit of the chainless mind ! 
Brightest in dungeons, Liberty ! thou art, 
For there thy habitation is the heart, — 
The heart which love of thee alone can bind ; 
And when thy sons to fetters are consigned, — 
To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom, — 
Their country conquers with their martjTdom, 
And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind. 
Chillon ! thy prison is a holy place. 
And thy sad floor an altar, — for 't was trod. 



Until his very steps have left a trace 
Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod, 
By Bonnivard ! — May none those marks efiace 
For they appeal from tyranny to God. 



My hair is gi'ay, but not with years, 
Nor grew it white 
In a single night, 
As men's have grown from sudden fears : 
My limbs are bowed, though not with toil, 

But rusted with a vile repose. 
For they have been a dungeon's spoil, 

And mine has been the fate of those 
To whom the goodly earth and air 
Are banned, and barred, — forbidden fare ; 
But this was for my father's faith 
I suff'ered chains and courted death ; 
That father perished at the stake 
For tenets he would not forsake ; 
And for the same his lineal race 
In darkness found a dwelling-place ; 
We were seven, — who now are one. 

Six in youth, and one in age. 
Finished as they had begun. 

Proud of Persecution's rage ; 
One in fire, and two in field, 
Their belief with blood have sealed ! 
Dying as their father died. 
For the God their foes denied ; 
Three were in a dungeon cast, 
Of whom this wreck is left the last. 

There are seven pillars of Gothic mould 
In Chillon's dungeons deep and old. 
There are seven columns, massy and gray. 
Dim with a dull imprisoned ray, — 
A sunbeam which hath lost its way. 
And through the crevice and the cleft 
Of the thick wall is fallen and left. 
Creeping o'er the floor so damp. 
Like a marsh's meteor lamp, — 
And in each pillar there is a ring. 

And in each ring there is a chain ; 
That iron is a cankering thing. 

For in these limbs its teeth remain 
With marks that will not Avear away, 
Till I have done with this new day. 
Which now is painful to these eyes. 
Which have not seen the sun to rise 
For years, — I cannot count them o'er, 
I lost their long and heavj' score 
When my last brother drooped and died. 
And I lay living by his side. 

They chained us each to a column stone. 
And we were three, yet each alone ; 
We could not move a single pace. 



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"VVe could not see each other's face, 
But with that pale and livid light 
That made us strangers in our sight ; 
And thus together, yet apart, 
Fettered in hand, but pined in heart ; 
T was still some solace, in the dearth 
Of the pure elements of earth, 
To hearken to each other's speech, 
And each turn comforter to each 
With some new hope, or legend old, 
Or song heroically bold ; 
But even these at length grew cold. 
Our voices took a dreary tone. 
An echo of the dungeon-stone, 

A grating sound, — not full and free 
As they of yore were wont to be ; 
It might be fancy, — but to me 
They never sounded like our own. 

I was the eldest of the three. 

And to uphold and cheer the rest 
I ought to do — and did — my best, 
And each did well in his degree. 

The youngest, whom my father loved, 
Because our mother's brow was given 
To him, with eyes as blue as heaven, — 
For him my soul was sorely moved ; 
And truly might it be distrest 
To see such bird in such a nest ; 
For he was beautiful as day 
(When day was beautiful to me 
As to young eagles, being free), — 
A polar day, which will not see 
A sunset till its summer 's gone, 

Its sleepless summer of long light, 
The snow-clad offspring of the sun ; 

And thus he was as pure and bright, 
And in his natural spirit gay, 
With tears for naught but others' ills. 
And then they flowed like mountain rills, 
Unless he could assuage the woe 
Which he abhorred to view below. 

The other was as pure of mind, 
But formed to combat with his kind ; 
Strong in his frame, and of a mood 
Which 'gainst the world in war had stood, 
And perished in the foremost rank 

With joy ; — but not in chains to pine ; 
His spirit withered with their clank, 

I saw it silently decline, ■ — 

And so perchance in sooth did mine ; 
But yet I forced it on to cheer 
Those relics of a home so dear. 
He was a hunter of the hills, 

Had followed there the deer and wolf ; 

To liim this dungeon was a gulf 
And fettered feet the worst of ills. 



Lake Leman lies by Chillon's walls : 
A thousand feet in depth below 
Its massy waters meet and flow ; 
Thus much the fathom-line was sent 
From Chillon's snow-white battlement, 

Which round about the wave inthralls ; 
A double dungeon wall and wave 
Have made, — and like a living grave. 
Below the surface of the lake 
The dark vault lies wherein we lay, 
We heard it ripple night and day ; 

Sounding o'er our heads it knocked ; 
And I have felt the winter's spray 
Wash through the bars when winds were high 
And wanton in the happy sky ; 

And then the very rock hath rocked. 

And I have felt it shake, unshocked. 
Because I could have smiled to see 
The death that would have set me free. 

I said my nearer brother pined, 
I said his mighty heart declined. 
He loathed and put away his food ; 
It was not that 't was coarse and rude, 
For we were used to hunter's fare. 
And for the like had little care ; 
The milk drawn from the mountain goat 
Was changed for water from the moat. 
Our bread was such as captives' tears 
Have moistened many a thousand years, 
Since man first pent his fellow-men 
Like brutes within an iron den ; 
But what were these to us or him ? 
These wasted not his heart or limb ; 
My brother's soul was of that mould 
Which in a palace had grown cold. 
Had his free breathing been denied 
The range of the steep mountain's side ; 
But why delay the truth ? — he died. 
I saw, and could not hold his head, 
Nor reach his dying hand, — nor dead, — 
Though hard I strove, but strove in vain, 
To rend and gnash my bonds in twain. 
He died, — and they unlocked his chain, 
And scooped for him a shallow grave 
Even from the cold earth of our cave. 
I begged them, as a boon, to lay 
His corse in dust whereon the day 
Might shine, — it was a foolish thought, 
But then within my brain it wrought, 
That even in death his free-born breast 
In such a dungeon could not rest. 
I might have spared my idle prayer, — 
They coldly laughed, and laid him there. 
The flat and turfless earth above 
The being we so much did love ; 
His empty chain above it leant, 
Such murder's fitting monument ! 



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a 



But he, the favorite and the flower, 
Most cherished since his natal hour, 
His mother's image in fair face, 
The infant love of all his race, 
His martyred father's dearest thought. 
My latest care, for whom I sought 
To hoard my life, that his might be 
Less wretched now, and one day free ; 
He, too, who yet had held untired 
A spirit natural or inspired, — 
He, too, was struck, and day by day 
Was withered on the stalk away. 

God ! it is a fearful thing 

To see the human soul take wing 
In any shape, in any mood : — 

1 've seen it rushing forth in blood, 
I 've seen it on the breaking ocean 
Strive with a swoln convulsive motion, 
I 've seen the sick and ghastly bed 

Of Sin delirious with its dread : 

But these were horrors, — this was woe 

Unmixed with such, — but sure and slow : 

He faded, and so calm and meek, 

So softl}'' worn, so sweetly weak, 

So tearless, yet so tender, — kind, 

And grieved for those he left behind ; 

With all the while a cheek whose bloom 

Was as a mockery of the tomb. 

Whose tints as gently sunk away 

As a departing rainbow's raj', — 

An eye of most transparent light. 

That almost made the dungeon bright, 

And not a word of murmur, — not 

A groan o'er his untimely lot, — ■ 

A little talk of better days, 

A little hope my own to raise. 

For I was sunk in silence, — lost 

In this last loss, of all the most ; 

And then the sighs he would suppress 

Of fainting nature's feebleness, 

More slowly drawn, grew less and less : 

I listened, but I could not hear, — 

I called, for I was wild with fear ; 

I knew 't was hopeless, but my dread 

Would not be thus admonished ; 

I called, and thought I heard a sound, — 

I burst my chain with one strong bound. 

And rushed to him : — I found him not, 

/ only stirred in this black spot, 

I only lived, — I only drew 

The accursed breath of dungeon-dew ; 

The last — the sole — the dearest link 

Between me and the eternal brink. 

Which bound me to my failing race, 

Was broken in this fatal place. 

One on the earth, and one beneath, — 

My brothers — both had ceased to breathe. 



I took that hand which lay so still, 
Alas ! my own was full as chill ; 
I had not strength to stir or strive. 
But felt that I was still alive, — 
A frantic feeling when we know 
That what we love shall ne'er be so. 

I know not why 

I could not die, 
I had no earthly hope — but faith. 
And that forbade a selfish death. 

What next befell me then and there 
I know not well ■ — I never knew. 

First came the loss of light and air, 
And then of darkness too ; 

I had no thought, no feeling — none : 

Among the stones 1 stood a stone. 

And was, scarce conscious what I wist, 

As shrubless crags within the mist ; 

For all was blank and bleak and gray ; 

It was not night, — it was not day ; 

It was not even the dungeon -light. 

So hateful to my heavy sight ; 

But vacancy absorbing space. 

And fixedness, without a place : 

There were no stars — no earth — no time — 

No check — no change — no good — no crime 

But silence, and a stir! ess breath 

Which neither was of life nor death : — 

A sea of stagnant idleness. 

Blind, boundless, mute, and motionless ! 

A light broke in upon my brain, — 

It was the carol of a bird ; 
It ceased, and then it came again, — 

TJie sweetest song ear ever heard. 
And mine was thankful till my eyes 
Ran over with the glad surprise, 
And they that moment could not see 
I was the mate of misery ; 
But then by dull degrees came back 
My senses to their wonted track, 
I saw the dungeon walls and floor 
Close slowly round me as before, 
I saw the glimmer of the sun 
Creeping as it before had done. 
But through the crevice where it came 
That bird was perched, as fond and tame. 

And tamer than rrpon the tree ; 
A lovely bird, Avitli azure wings. 
And song that said a thousand things. 

And seemed to say them all for me ; 
I never saw its like before, 
I ne'er shall see its likeness more. 
It seemed, like me, to want a mate, 
But was not half so desolate, 
And it was come to love me when 



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None lived to love me so again, 
And cheering from my dungeon's brink, 
Had brought me back to feel and think. 
I know not if it late were free, 

Or broke its cage to perch on mine, 
But knowing well captivity, 

Sweet bird ! I could not wish for thine ! 
Or if it were, in winged guise, 
A visitant from Paradise : 
For — Heaven forgive that thought ! the while 
Which made me both to weep and smile — 
I sometimes deemed that it might be 
My brother's soul cotne down to me ; 
But then at last away it flew. 
And then 't was mortal, — well I knew, 
For he would never thus have flown. 
And left me twice so doubly lone, — 
Lone — as the corse within its shroud, 
Lone — as a solitary cloud, 

A single cloud on a sunny day. 
While all the rest of heaven is clear, 
A frown upon the atmosphere. 
That hath no business to appear 

When skies are blue and earth is gay. 

A kind of change came in my fate, 
My keepers grew compassionate ; 
I know not what had made them so. 
They were inured to sights of woe, 
But so it was : — my broken chain 
With links unfastened did remain, 
And it was liberty to stride 
Along my cell from side to side. 
And up and down, and then athwart, 
And tread it over every pai't ; 
And round the pillars one by one, 
Eeturning where my walk begun. 
Avoiding only, as I trod, 
My brothers' graves without a sod ; 
For if I thought with heedless tread 
My step profaned their lowly bed, 
My breath came gaspingly and thick. 
And my crushed heart fell blind and sick. 

I made a footing in the wall. 

It was not therefrom to escape, 
For I had buried one and all 

Who loved me in a human shape : 
And the whole earth would henceforth be 
A wider prison unto me : 
No child, — no sire, — • no kin had I, 
No partner in my misery ; 
I thought of this and I was glad. 
For thought of them had made me mad ; 
But I was curious to ascend 
To my barred windows, and to bend 
Once more, upon the mountains high, 
The quiet of a loving eye. 



I saw them, — and they were the same, 
They were not changed like me in frame ; 
I saw their thousand years of snow 
On high, — their wide long lake below, 
And the blue Rhone in fullest flow ; 
I heard the torrents leap and gush 
O'er channelled rock and broken bush ; 
I saw the white-walled distant town. 
And whiter sails go skimming down ; 
And then there was a little isle. 
Which in my very face did smile. 

The only one in view ; 
A small green isle, it seemed no more, 
Scarce broader than my dungeon floor. 
But in it there were three tall trees. 
And o'er it blew the mountain breeze, 
And by it there were waters flowing, 
And on it there were young flowers growing, 

Of gentle breath and hue. 
The fish swam by the castle wall. 
And they seemed joyous each and all ; 
The eagle rode the rising blast, 
Methought he never flew so fast 
As then to me he seemed to fly, 
And then new tears came in my eye. 
And I felt troubled, — and would fain 
I had not left my recent chain ; 
And when I did descend again. 
The darkness of my dim abode 
Fell on me as a heavy load ; 
It was as in a new-dug grave 
Closing o'er one we sought to save. 
And yet my glance, too much oppressed, 
Had almost need of such a rest. 

It might be months, or years, or days, 

I kept no count, — I took no note, 
I had no hope my eyes to raise. 

And clear them of their dreary mote ; 
At last men came to set me free, 

I asked not why and recked not where, 
It was at length the same to me. 
Fettered or fetterless to be, 

I learned to love despair. 
And thus when they appeared at last, 
And all my bonds aside were cast, 
These heavy walls to me had grown 
A hermitage, and all my own ! 
And half I felt as they were come 
To tear me from a second home ; 
With spiders I had friendship made, 
And watched them in their sullen trade, 
Had seen the mice by moonlight play, 
And why should I feel less than they ? 
We were all inmates of one place. 
And I, the monarch of each race. 
Had power to kill, — yet, strange to tell ! 
In quiet we had learned to dwell, — 



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707 



ra 



My very chains and I grew friends, 
So much a long communion tends 
To make us what we are : — even I 
Regained my freedom with a sigh. 

LORD BYRGiN. 



DIVINA COMMEDIA. 

Oft have I seen, at some cathedral door, 
A laborer, pausing in the dust and heat, 
Lay down his burden, and with reverent feet 
Enter, and cross himself, and on the floor 

Kneel to repeat his paternoster o'er ; 
Ear off the noises of the world retreat ; 
The loud vociferations of the street 
Become an undistinguishable roar. 

So, as I enter here from day to day. 

And leave my burden at this minster gate, 
Kneeling in prayer, and not ashamed to pray, 

The tumult of the time disconsolate 
To inarticulate murmurs dies away, 
While the eternal ages watch and wait. 

How strange the sculptures that adorn these 
towers ! 
This crowd of statues, in whose folded sleeves 
Birds build their nests ; while canopied with 

leaves 
Parvis and portal bloom like trellised bowers. 
And the vast minster seems a cross of flowers ! 
But fiends and dragons on the gargoyled eaves 
Watch the dead Christ between the living 

thieves. 
And, underneath, the traitor Judas lowers ! 
Ah ! from what agonies of heart and brain. 
What exultations trampling on despair, 
What tenderness, what tears, what hate of 
wrong. 
What passionate outcry of a soul in pain, 
Uprose this poem of the earth and aii;. 
This mediseval miracle of song ! 

I enter, and I see thee in the gloom 
Of the long aisles, poet saturnine ! 
And strive to make my steps keep pace with 

thine. 
The air is filled with some unknown perfume ; 

The congregation of the dead make room 
For thee to pass ; the votive tapers shine ; 
Like rooks that haunt Ravenna's groves of pine 
The hovering echoes fly from tomb to tomb. 

From the confessionals I hear arise 
Reheai'sals of forgotten tragedies, 
And lamentations from the crypts below ; 

And then a voice celestial, that begins 

With the pathetic words, "Although your sins 
As scarlet be," and ends with "as the snow." 



With snow-white veil and garments as of flame. 
She stands before thee, who so long ago 
Filled thy young heart with passion and the woe 
From which thy song and all its splendors came ; 

And while with stern rebuke she speaks thy name. 
The ice about thy heart melts as the snow 
On mountain heights, and in swift overflow 
Comes gushing from thy lips in sobs of shame. 

Thou makest full confession ; and a gleam. 
As if the dawn on some dark forest cast. 
Seems on thy lifted forehead to increase ; 

Lethe and Eunoe — the remembered dream 
And the forgotten sorrow — bring at last 
That perfect pardon which is perfect peace. 

I lift mine eyes, and all the windows blaze 
With forms of saints and holy men who died, 
Here martyred and hereafter glorified ; 
And the great Rose upon its leaves displays 

Christ's Triumph, and the angelic roundelays. 
With splendor upon splendor multiplied ; 
And Beatrice again at Dante's side 
ISTo more rebukes, but smiles her words of praise. 

And then the organ sounds, and unseen choirs 
Sing the old Latin hymns of peace and love, 
And benedictions of the Holy Ghost ; 

And the melodious bells among the spires 

O'er all the house-tops and through heaven 

above 
Proclaim the elevation of the Host ! 

star of morning and of liberty ! 

bringer of the light, whose spleirdor shines 
Above the darkness of the Apennines, 
Forerunner of the day that is to be ! 

The voices of the city and the sea. 

The voices of the mountains and the pines, 
Repeat thy song, till the familiar lines 
Are footpaths for the thought of Italy ! 

Thy fame is blown abroad from all the heights. 
Through all the nations, and a sound is heard, 
As of a mighty wind, and men devout. 

Strangers of Rome, and the new proselytes, 
In their own language hear thy wondrous word. 
And many are amazed and many doubt. 

Henry wadsworth Longfellow. 



THE VILLAGE SCHOOLMISTRESS. 

FROM "THE SCHOOLMISTRESS." 

In every village marked with little spire. 
Embowered in trees, and hardly known to fame, 
There dwells, in lowly shed and mean attire, 
A matron old, whom we Schoolmistress name ; 
Who boasts unruly brats with birch to tame : 
They grieven sore, in piteous durance pent. 
Awed by the power of this relentless dame ; 



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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS. 



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And ofttimes, on vagaries idly bent, 
For unkempt hair, or task unconned, are sorely 
shent. 

Her cap, far whiter than the driven snow, 
Emblem right meet of decency does yield : 
Her apron dyed in grain, as blue, I trowe, 
As is the harebell that adorns the held : 
And in her hand, for sceptre, she does wield 
Tway birchen sprays ; with anxious fear en- 
twined, 
With dark distrust, and sad repentance hlled ; 
And steadfast hate, and sharp affliction joined. 
And fury uncontrolled, and chastisement unkind. 

A russet stole was o'er her shoulders thrown ; 
A russet kirtle fenced the nipping air : 
'T was simple russet, but it was her own ; 
'T was her own country bred the flock so fair, 
'T was her own labor did the fleece prepare ; 
And, sooth to say, her pupils, ranged around, 
Through pious awe, did term it passing rare ; 
For they in gaping wonderment abound, 
And think, no doubt, she been the greatest wight 
on ground. 

Albeit ne flattery did corrupt her truth, 
Ne pompous title did debauch her ear ; 
Goody, good-woman, gossip, n'aunt forsooth. 
Or dame, the sole additions she did hear ; 
Yet these she challenged, these she held right 

dear : 
Ne would esteem him act as mought behove, 
Who should not honor eld with these revere ; 
For never title yet so mean could prove. 
But there was eke a mind which did that title love. 

In elbow-chair (like that of Scottish stem. 
By the sharp tooth of cankering eld defaced. 
In which, when he receives his diadem. 
Our sovereign prince and liefest liege is placed) 
The matron sat ; and some with rank she graced, 
(The source of children's andof courtiers' pride!) 
Redressed affronts, — for vile affronts there 

passed ; 
And warned them not the fretful to deride. 
But love each other dear, whatever them betide. 

Right well she knew each temper to descry. 
To thwart the proud, and the submiss to raise ; 
Some with vile copper-prize exalt on high, 
And some entice with pittance small of praise ; 
And other some with baleful sprig she 'frays : 
Even absent, she the reins of power doth hold. 
While with quaint arts the giddy crowd she 

swajj-s ; 
Forewarned, if little bird their pranks behold, 
'Twill whisper in her ear, and all the scene unfold. 



Lo ! now with state she utters her command ; 
Eftsoons the urchins to their tasks repair. 
Their books of stature small they take in hand, 
Which with pellucid horn secured are, 
To save from finger wet the letters fair : 
The work so gay, that on their back is seen, 
St. George's high achievements does declare ; 
On which thilk wight that has y-gazing been. 
Kens the forthcoming rod, — unpleasing sight, I 
ween ! 

But now Dan Phoebus gains the middle sky, 
And Liberty unbars her prison door ; 
And like a rushing torrent out they fly ; 
And now the grassy cirque han covered o'er 
With boisterous revel rout and wild uproar ; 
A thousand ways in wanton rings they run. 
Heaven shield their short-lived pastimes, I im- 
plore ; 
For well may freedom erst so dearly won 
Appear to Biitish elf more gladsome than the sun. 
William Shenstone. 



THE JOLLY OLD PEDAGOGUE. 

'T WAS a jolly old pedagogue, long ago. 

Tall and slender, and sallow and diy ; 
His form was bent and his gait was slow, 
His long thin hair was as white as snow, 

But a wonderful twinkle shone in his eye ; 
And he sang every night as he went to bed, 

" I^et us be happy down here below ; 
The living should live, though the dead be dead," 

Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago. 

He taught his scholars the rule of three. 

Writing, and reading, and history too ; 
He took the little ones up on his knee. 
For a kind old heart in his breast had he. 

And the ■wants of the littlest child he knew : 
" Learn while you 're yoimg," he often said, 

"There 's much to enjoy down here below; 
Life for the living and rest for tlie dead ! " 

Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago. 

With the stupidest boys he was kind and cool, 

Speaking only in gentlest tones ; 
The rod was hardly known in his school, — 
Whipping, to him, was a barbarous rule. 

And too hard work for his poor old bones ; 
" Besides, it is painful," he sometimes said ; 

' ' We should make life pleasant down here 
below, 
The living need charity more than the dead," 

Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago. 



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He lived in the house by the hawthorn lane, 

With roses and woodbine over the door ; 
His rooms were quiet and neat and plain, 
But a spirit of comfort there held reign, 

And made him forget he was old and poor ; 
"I need so little," he often said ; 

" And my friends and relatives here below 
Won't litigate over me when I am dead," 

Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago. 

But the pleasantest times that he had, of all. 

Were the sociable hours he used to pass. 
With his chair tipped back to a neighbor's wall. 
Making an unceremonious call, 

Over a pipe and friendly glass : 
This was the finest pleasure, he said, 

Of the many he tasted here below ; 
" Who has no cronies had better be dead," 

Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago. 

Then the jolly old pedagogue's wrinkled face 

Melted all over in sunshiny smiles ; 
He stirred his glass with an old-school grace, 
Chuckled, and sipped, and prattled apace, 

Till the house grew merry, from cellar to tiles. 
"I 'm a pretty old man," he gently said, 

" I have lingered a long while here below ; 
But my heart is fresh, if my youth is fled," 

Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago. 

He smoked his pipe in the balmy air 

Every night when the sun went down, 
While the soft wind played in his silvery hair, 
Leaving his tenderest kisses there, 

On the jolly old pedagogue's jolly old crown ; 
And feeling the kisses, he smiled, and said, 

'T was a gloiious world, down here below ; 
" Why wait for happiness till we are dead ? " 

Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago. 

He sat at his door, one midsummer night. 

After the sun had sunk in the west, 
And the lingering beams of golden light 
Made his kindly old face look warm and bright, 

While the odorous night-wind whispered, 
"Rest!" 
Gently, gently, he bowed his head, — 

There were angels waiting for him, I know ; 
He was sure of happiness, living or dead, — 

This jolly old pedagogue, long ago ! 

George Arnold. 



THE SETTLER. 

His echoing axe the settler swung 

Amid the sea-like solitude, 
And, rushing, thundering, down were flung 

The Titans of the wood ; 



Loud shrieked the eagle, as he dashed 
From out his mossj' nest, which crashed 

With its supporting bough, 
And the first sunlight, leaping, flashed 

On the wolf's haunt below. 

Rude was the garb and strong the frame 

Of him who plied his ceaseless toil : 
To form that garb the wildwood game 

Contributed their spoil ; 
The soul that warmed that frame disdained 
The tinsel, gaud, and glare that reigned 

Where men their crowds collect ; 
The simple fur, untrimmed, unstained, 

This forest-tamer decked. 

The paths which wound mid gorgeous trees, 

The stream whose bright lips kissed their 
flowers. 
The winds that swelled their harmonies 

Through those sun-hiding bowers, 
The temple vast, the green arcade, 
The nestling vale, the grassy glade. 

Dark cave, and swampy lair ; 
These scenes and sounds majestic made 

His world, his pleasures, there. 

His roof adorned a pleasant spot ; 

Mid the black logs green glowed the grain, 
And herbs and plants the woods knew not 

Throve in the sun and rain. 
The smoke-wreath curling o'er the dell. 
The low, the bleat, the tinkling bell, 

All made a landscape strange, 
Which was the living chronicle 

Of deeds that wrought the change. 

The violet sprang at spring's first tinge, 

The rose of summer spread its glow. 
The maize hung out its autumn fringe, 

Rude winter brought his snow ; 
And still the lone one labored there. 
His shout and whistle broke the air, 

As cheerily he plied 
His garden-spade, or drove his share 

Along the hillock's side. 

He marked the fire-storm's blazing flood 

Roaring and crackling on its path, 
And scorching earth, and melting wood. 

Beneath its greedy wrath ; 
He marked the rapid whirlwind shoot, 
Trampling the pine-tree with its foot. 

And darkening thick the day 
With streaming bough and severed root. 

Hurled whizzing on its way. 



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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS. 



His gaunt hound yelled, his riile flashed, 

The grim bear hushed his savage growl ; 
In blood and foam the panther gnashed 

His fangs, with dying howl ; 
The fleet deer ceased its flying bound, 
Its snarling wolf-foe bit the ground, 

And, with its moaning cry, 
The beaver sank beneath the wound 

Its pond-built Venice by. 

Humble the lot, yet his the race. 

When Liberty sent forth her cry, 
Who thronged in conflict's deadliest place. 

To fight, — to bleed, — to die ! 
Who cumbered Bunker's height of red, 
By hope through weary years were led, 

And witnessed Yorktown's sun 
Blaze on a nation's banner spread, 

A nation's freedom won. 

Alfred B. Street. 



THE CLOSING SCENE. 

Within the sober realm of leafless trees, 
The russet year inhaled the dreamy air ; 

Like some tanned reaper, in his hour of ease. 
When aU the fields are lying brown and bare. 

The gray barns looking from their hazy hills, 
O'er the dun waters widening in the vales. 

Sent down the air a greeting to the mills 
On the dull thunder of alternate flails. 

All sights were mellowed and all sounds subdued, 
The hills seemed further and the stream sang 
low, 

As in a dream the distant woodman hew^ed 
His winter log with many a muffled blow. 

The embattled forests, erewhile armed with gold. 
Their banners bright with every martial hue, 

Now stood like some sad, beaten host of old, 
Withdrawn afar in Time's remotest blue. 

On slumb'rous wings the vulture held his flight ; 
The dove scarce heard its sighing mate's com- 
plaint ; 
And, like a star slow drowning in the light. 
The village church-vane seemed to pale and 
faint. 

The sentinel-cock upon the hillside crew, — 
Crew thrice, — and all was stiller than before ; 

Silent, till some replying warden blew 

His alien horn, and then was heard no more. 



Where erst the jay, within the elm's tall crest, 
Made garrulous trouble round her unfledged 
young ; 

And where the oriole hung her swaying nest, 
By every light wind like a censer swung ; — 

Where sang the noisy martens of the eaves. 
The busy swallows circling ever near, — 

Foreboding, as the rustic mind believes. 
An early harvest and a plenteous year ; — 

Where every bird which charmed the vernal feast 
Shook the sweet slumber from its wings at 
morn, 

To warn the reaper of the rosy east : — 
All now was sunless, empty, and forlorn. 

Alone from out the stubble piped the quail. 
And croaked the crow through all the dreamy 
gloom ; 

Alone the pheasant, drumming in the vale. 
Made echo to the distant cottage-loom. 

There was no bud, no bloom upon the bowers ; 
The spiders moved their thin shrouds night by 
night. 
The thistle-down, the only ghost of flowers. 
Sailed slowly by, — passed noiseless oiit of 
sight. 

Amid all this — in this most cheerless air, 

And where the woodbine shed upon the porch 

Its crimson leaves, as if the Year stood there 
Firing the floor with his inverted torch, — 

Amid all this, the centre of the scene. 

The white-haired matron with monotonous 
tread 

Plied the swift wheel, and with her joyless mien 
Sat, like a fate, and w^atched the flying thread. 

She had known Sorrow, — he had walked with 
her. 

Oft supped, and broke the bitter ashen crust ; 
And in the dead leaves still she heard the stir 

Of his black mantle trailing in the dust. 

While yet her cheek was bright with summer 
bloom. 

Her country summoned and she gave her all ; 
And twice War bowed to her his sable plume, — 

Re-gave the swords to rust upon the wall. 

Re-gave the swords, but not the hand that drew 
And struck for Liberty the dying blow ; 

Nor him who, to his sire and country true, 
Fell mid the ranks of the invading foe. 



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Long, but not loud, the droning wheel went on, 
Like the low murmur of a hive at noon ; 

Long, but not loud, the memory of the gone 
Breathed through her lips a sad and tremulous 
tune. 

At last the thread was snapped ; her head was 
bowed ; 
Life dropt the distaff through his hands se- 
rene ; 
And loving neighbors smoothed her careful 
shroud, 
While Death and Winter closed the autumn 

scene. 

Thomas Buchanan Read. 



SEVEN AGES OF MAN. 

FROM "AS YOU LIKE IT," ACT II. SC. 7. 

All the world 's a stage, 
And all the men and women merely players : 
They have their exits and their entrances ; 
And one man in his time plays manj^ parts, 
His Acts being seven ages. At first the Infant, 
Mewling and puking in the nurse's anns. 
Then .the whining School- boy, with his satchel 
And shining morning face, creeping like snail 
Unwillingly to school. And then the Lover, 
Sighing like furnace, with a woful ballad 
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a Soldier, 
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard ; 
Jealous in honor, sudden and guick in quarrel, 
Seeking the bubble reputation 
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the 

Justice, 
In fair round belly with good capon lined, 
With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut, 
Full of wise saws and modern instances, — 
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts 
Into the lean and slippered Pantaloon, 
With spectacles on nose, and pouch on side ; 
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide 
For his shrunk shank ; and his big manly voice, 
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes 
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all, 
That ends this strange eventful histoiy, 
Is second childishness, and mere oblivion, — 
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



GIRLHOOD. 

An exquisite incompleteness, blossom fore- 
shadowing fruit ; 
A sketch faint in its beauty, with promise of 
future worth ; 



A plant with some leaves unfolded, and the rest 
asleep at its root, 
To deck with their future sweetness the fairest 
thing on the earth. 

Womanhood, wifehood, motherhood — each a 
possible thing. 
Dimly seen through the silence that lies be- 
tween then and now ; 
Something of each and all has woven a magic 
ring. 
Linking the three together in glory on girl- 
hood's brow. 

Anonymous. 



SONG. 



How near to good is what is fair, 

Which we no sooner see, 
But with the lines and outward air 

Our senses taken be. 
We wish to see it still, and prove 

What ways we may deserve ; 

We court, we praise, we more than love, 

We are not grieved to serve. 

Ben Jonson. 



ADAM AND EVE. 

FROM " PARADISE LOST," BOOK IV. 

Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall, 
Godlike erect, with native honor clad 
In naked majesty, seemed lords of all : 
And worthy seemed ; for in their looks divine 
The image of their glorious Maker shone. 
Truth, wisdom, sanctitude severe and pure, 
(Severe, but in true filial freedom placed,) 
Whence true autliority in men ; though both 
Not equal, as their sex not equal seemed ; 
For contemplation he and valor formed ; 
For softness she and sweet attractive grace ; 
He for God only, she for God in him : 
His fair large front and ej^e sublime declared 
Absolute rule ; and hyacinthine locks 
Eound from his parted forelock manly hung 
Clustering, but not beneath his shoulders broad ; 
She, as a veil, down to the slender waist 
Her unadorned golden tresses wore 
Dishevelled, but in wanton ringlets waved. 
As the vine curls her tendrils, which implied 
Subjection, but required with gentle sway, 
And by her yielded, by him best received, 
Yielded with coy submission, modest pride, 
And sweet, reluctant, amorous delay. 

So passed they naked on, nor shunned the sight 
Of God or angel ; for they thought no ill : 



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So hand in hand they passed, the loveliest pair, 
That ever since in love's embraces met : 
Adam the goodliest man of men since born 
His sons, the fairest of her daughters Eve. 
Under a tuft of shade that on a green 
Stood whispering soft, by a fresh fountain side 
They sat them down : and, after no more toil 
Of their sweet gardening labor than sufficed 
To recommend cool Zephyr, and made ease 
More easy, wholesome thirst and appetite 
More grateful, to their supper-fruits they fell, 
ISTectarine fruits which the compliant boughs 
Yielded them, sidelong as they sat recline 
On the soft downy bank damasked with flowers : 
The savory pulp they chew, and in the rind. 
Still as they thirsted, scoop the brimming stream ; 
Nor gentle purpose, nor endearing smiles 
Wanted, nor youthful dalliance, as beseems 
Fair couple, linked in happy nuptial league. 
Alone as they. About them frisking played 
All beasts of the Earth, since wild, and of all chase 
In wood or wilderness, forest or den ; 
Sporting the lion ramped, and in his paw 
Dandled the kid ; bears, tigers, ounces, pards, 
Gambolled before them ; the unwieldy elephant, 
To make them mirth, used all his might, and 

wreathed 
His little proboscis ; close the serpent sly, 
Insinuating, wove with Gordian twine 
His braided train, and of his fatal guile 
Gave proof unheeded ; others on the grass 
Couched, and now filled with pasture gazing sat. 
Or bedward ruminating ; for the Sun, 
Declined, was hastening now with prone career 
To the ocean isles, and in the ascending scale 
Of Heaven the stars that usher evening rose. 

Milton. 



CLEOPATRA. 

FROM "ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA," ACT II. SC. 2. 

Enobarbus. The barge she sat in, like a bur- 
nished throne, 
Burned on the water : the poop was beaten gold ; 
Purple the sails, and so perfumed that 
The winds were lovesick with them ; the oars 

were silver, 
Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made 
The water, which they beat, to follow faster. 
As amorous of their strokes. For her own person, 
It beggared all description : she did lie 
In her pavilion (cloth-of-gold of tissue), 
O'erpicturing that Venus, where we see 
The fancy outwork nature ; on each side her 
Stood pretty dimpled boys, like smiling Cupids, 
With divers-colored fans, whose wind did seem 



To glow the delicate cheeks which they did cool, 
And what they undid, did. 

Agrippa. 0, rare for Antony ! 

Eno. Her gentlewomen, like the Nereides, 
So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes. 
And made their bends adornings : at the helm 
A seeming mermaid steers ; the silken tackle 
Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands. 
That yarely frame the office. From the barge 
A strange invisible perfume hits the sense 
Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast 
Her people out upon her ; and Antony, 
Enthroned in the market-place, did sit alone, 
Whistling to the air ; which, but for vacancy, 
Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too, 
And made a gap in nature. 

Agr. Rare Egyptian ! 

Eno. Upon her landing, Antony sent to her, 
Invited her to supper : she replied. 
It should he better he became her guest ; 
Which she entreated. Our courteous Antony, 
Whom ne'er the word of "No" woman heard 

speak. 
Being barbered ten times o'er, goes to the feast ; 
And, for his ordinary, pays his heart 
For what his eyes eat only. 

Agr. Royal wench ! • 

Mec^nas. Now Antony must leave her utterly. 

Eno. Never ; he will not : 

Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale 

Her infinite variety : other women cloy 

The appetites they feed, but she makes hungrj"- 

Where most she satisfies. For vilest things 

Become themselves in her ; that the holy priests 

Bless her when she is riggish. 

Shakespeare. 



THE VANITY OF THE BEAUTIFUL. 

They course the glass, and let it take no rest ; 
They pass and spy who gazeth on their face ; 
They darkly ask whose beauty seemeth best ; 
They hark and mark who marketh most their 

grace ; 
They stay their steps, and stalk a stately pace ; 
They jealous are of every sight they see ; 
They strive to seem, but never care to be. 

What grudge and grief our joys may then sup- 
press. 
To see our hairs, which yellow were as gold, 
Now gray as glass ; to feel and find them less ; 
To scrape the bald skull which was W'ont to hold 
Our lovely locks with curling sticks controul'd ; 
To look in glass, and spy Sir Wrinkle's chair ^ 
Set fast on fronts which erst were sleek and fair. 

GEORGE GASCOIGNE. 






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THE TOILET. 

FROM "THE RAPE OF THE LOCK," CANTO I. 

And now, unveiled, the toilet stands displayed, 
Each silver vase in mystic order laid. 
First, robed in white, the nymph intent adores, 
With head uncovered, the cosmetic powers. 
A heavenly image in the glass appears, 
To that she bends, to that her eyes she rears ; 
The inferior priestess, at her altar's side. 
Trembling begins the sacred rites of pride. 
Unnumbered treasures ope at once, and here 
The various offerings of the world appear ; 
From each she nicely culls with curious toil. 
And decks the goddess with the glittering spoil. 
This casket India's glowing gems unlocks, 
And all Arabia breathes from yonder box. 
The tortoise here and elephant unite, 
Transformed to combs, thespeckled and the white. 
Here files of pins extend their shining rows, 
Puffs, powders, patches, bibles, billets-doux. 
Now awful beauty puts on all its arms ; 
The fair each moment rises in her charms, 
Repairs her smiles, awakens every grace, 
And calls forth all the wonders of her face ; 
Sees by degrees a purer blush aiise, 
And keener lightnings quicken in her eyes. 
The busy sylphs surround their darling care. 
These set the head, and those divide the hair. 
Some fold the sleeve, while others plait the gown ; 
And Betty 's praised for labors not her own. 

Alexander Pope. 



FREEDOM IN DRESS. 

FROM "EPICCENE; OR, THE SILENT WOMAN," ACT I. SC. I 

Still to be neat, still to be drest, 

As you were going to a feast ; 

Still to be powdered, still perfumed, — 

Lady, it is to be presumed. 

Though art's hid causes are not found. 

All is not sweet, all is not sound. 

Give me a look, give me a face, 
That makes simplicity a grace ; 
Robes loosely flowing, hair as free, — 
Such sweet neglect more taketh me 
Than all the adulteries of art ; 
They strike mine eyes, but not my heart. 
Ben Jonson. 



DELIGHT IN DISORDER. 

A SWEET disorder in the dress 
Kindles in clothes a wantonness ; 
A lawn about the shoulders thrown 
Into a fine distraction ; 



An erring lace, which here and there 

Inthralls the crimson stomacher ; 

A cuff neglectful, and thereby 

Ribbons to flow confusedly ; 

A winning wave, deserving note, 

In the tempestuous petticoat ; 

A careless shoestring, in whose tie 

I see a wild civility ; — 

Do more bewitch me than when art 

Is too precise in every part. 

ROBURT HERRICK. 



SILLY FAIR. 

When Lesbia first I saw, so heavenly fair, 
With eyes so bright and with that awful air, 
I thought my heart which durst so high aspire 
As bold as his who snatched celestial fire. 
But soon as e'er the beauteous idiot spoke, 
Forth from her coral lips such folly broke, 
Like balm the trickling nonsense healed my 

wound. 
And what her eyes inthralled her tongue un- 
bound. 

William Congreve. 



CONSTANCY. 

One eve of beauty, when the sun 

Was on the streams of Guadalquiver, 
To gold converting, one by one, 

The ripples of the mighty river, 
Beside me on the bank was seated 

A Seville girl, with auburn hair. 
And e3^es that might the woild have cheated, — 

A wild, bright, wicked, diamond pair ! 

She stooped, and wrote upon the sand. 

Just as the loving sun was going, 
With such a soft, small, shining hand,, 

I could have sworn 't was silver flowing. 
Her words were three, and not one more. 

What could Diana's motto be ? 
The siren wrote upon the shore, — 

' ' Death, not inconstancy ! " 

And then her two large languid ej'es 

So turned on mine, that, devil take me ! 
I set the air on fire with sighs. 

And was the fool she chose to make me 1 
Saint Francis would have been deceived 

With such an eye and such a hand ; 
But one week more, and I believed 

As much the woman as the sand, 

ANONYMOUS. 






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TO lANTHE, SLEEPING. 

FROM "QUEEN MAB" ; I. 

How wonderful is Death ! 

Decath and his brother Sleep ! 
One, pale as yonder waning moon, 

With lips of lurid blue ; 

The other, rosy as the morn 
When, throned on ocean's wave, 

It blushes o'er the world : 
Yet both so passing wonderful ! 

Hath then the gloomy Power, 
Whose reign is in the tainted sepulchres, 
Seized on her sinless soul ? 
Must then that peerless form 
Which love and admiration cannot view 
Without a beating heart, those azure veins 
Which steal like streams along a field of snow, 
That lovely outline, which is fair 
As breathing marble, perish ? 
Miist putrefaction's breath 
Leave nothing of this heavenly sight 

But loathsomeness and ruin ? 
Spare nothing but a gloomy theme, 
On which the lightest heart might moralize ? 
Or is it only a sweet slumber 
Stealing o'er sensation, 
Which the breath of roseate morning 
Chaseth into darkness ? 
Will lanthe wake again. 
And give that faithful bosom joy. 
Whose sleepless spirit waits to catch 
Light, life, and rapture from her smile ? 

Yes ! she will wake again, 
Although her glowing limbs are motionless, 
And silent those sweet lips, 
Once breathing eloquence 
That might have soothed a tiger's rage, 
Or thawed the cold heart of a conqueror. 
Her dewy eyes are closed, 
And on their lids, whose texture fine 
Scarce hides the dark blue orbs beneath, 
The baby Sleep is pillowed : 
Her golden tresses shade 
The bosom's stainless pride. 
Curling like tendrils of the parasite 
Around a marble column. 

A gentle start convulsed lanthe's frame : 
Her veiny eyelids quietly unclosed ; 
Moveless awhile the dark bli;e orbs remained. 
She looked around in wonder, and beheld 
Henry, who kneeled in silence by her couch, 
Watching her sleep with looks of speechless love, 

And the bright-beaming stars 

That through the casement shone. 

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. 



THE BELLS. 

Hear the sledges with the bells — 
Silver bells J 
What a world of merriment their melody foretells ! 
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, 

In the icy air of night ! 
While the stars that oversprinkle 
All the heavens seem to twinkle 
With a crystalline delight, — 
Keeping time, time, time, 
In a sort of Runic rhyme. 
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells 
From the bells, bells, bells, bells, 
Bells, bells, bells, — 
From the jingling and the tinkling of the hells. 

Hear the mellow wedding bells — 
Golden bells ! 
What a world of happiness their harmony fore- 
tells ! 
Through the balmy air of night 
How they ring out their delight ! 
From the molten -golden notes, 

And all in tune, 
What a liquid ditty floats 
To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats 
On the moon ! 
0, from out the sounding cells, 
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells ! 
How it swells ! 
How it dwells 
On the Future ! how it tells 
Of the rapture that impels 
To the swinging and the ringing 

Of the bells, bells, bells. 
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, 
Bells, bells, bells, — 
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells. 

Hear the loud alarum bells — 
Brazen bells ! 
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells ! 
In the startled ear of night 
How they scream out their affright ! 
Too much horrified to speak. 
They can onlj'^ shriek, shriek, 
Out of tune, 
Ih the clam orous appealing to the mercy of the fire, 
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic 
fire 
Leaping higher, higher, higher. 
With a desperate desire, 
And a resolute endeavor. 
Now — now to sit, or never. 
By the side of the pale-faced moon. 
the bells, bells, bells. 
What a tale their terror tells 



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Of despair ! 
How they clang and clash and roar ! 
What a horror they outpour 
On the bosom of the palpitating air ! 
Yet the ear it fully knows, 
By the twanging, 
And the clanging, 
How the danger ebbs and flows ; 
Yet the ear distinctly tells. 
In the jangling, 
And the wrangling. 
How the danger sinks and swells. 
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of 
the bells, — 
Of the bells, — 
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, 
Bells, bells, bells, — 
In the clamor and the clangor of the bells ! 

Hear the tolling of the bells — 
Iron bells ! 
What a world of solemn tliought their monody 
compels ! 
In the silence of the night, 
How we shiver with affright 
At the melancholy menace of their tone ! 
For every sound that floats 
From the rust within theii throats 

Is a groan. 
And the people — ah, the people — 
They that dwell up in the steeple, 

All alone. 
And who tolling, tolling, tolling, 

In that muffled monotone. 
Feel a glory in so rolling 

On the human heart a stone, — 
They are neither man nor woman, — 
They are neither brute nor human, — 

They are ghouls : 
And their king it is who tolls ; 
And he rolls, rolls, rolls, 
Rolls, 
A psean from the bells ! 
And his merry bosom swells 

With the pfean of the bells ! 
And he dances and he yells ; 
Keeping time, time, time, 
In a sort of Runic rhyme, 
To the pcean of the bells, — 
Of the bells : 
Keeping time, time, time, 
In a sort of Runic rhyme, 

To the throbbing of the bells, — 
Of the bells, bells, bells, — 

To the sobbing of the bells ; 
Keeping time, time, time. 
As he knells, knells, knells, . . 



In a happy Runic rhyme, 

To the rolling of the bells, — 
Of the bells, bells, bells, — 

To the tolling of the bells, 
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells — 
Bells, bells, bells, — 
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells. 
Edgar Allan poe. 



THE BELLS OF SHANDON, 

Sabbata panijo ; 
Funera plango ; 
Soieiiinia clango. 

INSCRIPTION ON AN OLD BELL, 

With deep affection 
And recollection 
I often think of 

Those Shandon bells. 
Whose sounds so wild would, 
In the days of childhood, 
Fling round my cradle 

Their magic spells. 

On this I ponder 
Where'er I wander, 
And thus grow fonder, 

Sweet Cork, of thee, — 
With thy bells of Shandon, 
That sound so grand on 
The pleasant waters 

Of the river Lee. 

I Ve heard bells chiming 
Full many a clime in. 
Tolling sublime in 

Cathedral shrine. 
While at a glib rate 
Brass tongues would vibrate ; 
But all their music 

Spoke naught like thine. 

For memory, dwelling 
On each proud swelling 
Of thy belfry, knelling 

Its bold notes free, 
Made the bells of Shandon 
Sound far more grand on 
The pleasant waters 

Of the river Lee. 

I Ve heard bells tolling 
"Old Adrian's Mole" in, 
Their thunder rolling 

From the Vatican, — 
And cymbals glorious 
Swinging uproarious 
In the gorgeous turrets 

Of Notre Dame ; 



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But thy sounds were sweeter 
Than the dome of Peter 
Flings o'er the Tiber, 

Pealing solemnly. 
0, the bells of Shandon 
Sound far more grand on 
The pleasant waters 

Of the I'iver Lee. 

There 's a bell in Moscow ; 
While on tower and kiosko , 
In St. Sophia 

The Turkman gets, 
And loud in air 
Calls men to prayer, 
From the tapering summit 

Of tall minarets. 

Such empty phantom 
I freely grant them ; 
But there 's an anthem 

More dear to me, — 
'T is the bells of Shandon, 
That sound so gi'and on 
The pleasant waters 

Of the river Lee. 

Francis Mahony (Father Prouf). 



CITY BELLS. 

FROM " THE LAY OF ST. ALOY'S." 

Loud and clear 
From the St. Nicholas tower, on the listening 
ear. 

With solemn swell, 

The deep-toned bell 
Flings to the gale a funeral knell ; 

And hark ! — at its sound, 

As a cunning old hound. 
When he opens, 'at once causes all the young 

whelps 
Of the cry to put in their less dignified yelps, 

So the little bells all, 

No matter how small. 
From the steeples both inside and outside the 
wall. 

With bell-metal throat 

Respond to the note. 
And join the lament that a prelate so pious is 
Forced thus to leave his disconsolate diocese, 

Or, as Blois' Lord May'r 

Is heard to declare, 

"Should leave this here world for to go to that 

there." 

Richard Harris Barham. 



THOSE EVENING BELLS. 

Those evening bells ! those evening bells ! 
How many a tale their music tells 
Of youth, and home, and that sweet time 
When last I heard their soothing chime ! 

Those joyous hours are passed away ; 
And many a heart that then was gay 
Within the tomb now darkly dwells, 
And hears no more those evening bells. 

And so 't will be when I am gone, — 
That tuneful peal will still ring on ; 
While other bards shall walk these dells. 
And sing your praise, sweet evening bells. 

Thomas moore. 



CARILLON. 

In the ancient town of Bruges, 
In the quaint old Flemish city, 
As the evening shades descended. 
Low and loud and sweetly blended. 
Low at times and loud at times. 
And changing like a poet's rhymes. 
Rang the beautiful wild chimes 
From the Belfry in the market 
Of the ancient town of Bruges. 

Then, with deep sonorous clangor 
Calmly answering their sweet anger, 
When the wrangling bells had ended. 
Slowly struck the clock eleven. 
And, from out the silent heaven. 
Silence on the town descended. 
Silence, silence everywhere. 
On the earth and in the air. 
Save that footsteps here and there 
Of some burgher home returning, 
By the street lamps faintly burning. 
For a moment woke the echoes 
Of the ancient town of Bruges. 

But amid my broken slumbers 
Still 1 heard those magic numbei-s, 
As they loud proclaimed the flight 
And stolen marches of the night ; 
Till their chimes in sweet collision 
Mingled with each wandering vision, 
Mingled with the fortune-telling 
Gypsy-bands of dreams and fancies, 
Which amid the waste expanses 
Of the silent land of trances 
Have their solitary dwelling. 
All else seemed asleep in Bruges, 
In the quaint old Flemish city. 



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And I thought how like these chimes 
Are the poet's airy rhymes, 
All his rhymes and roundelays, 
His conceits, and songs, and ditties. 
From the belfry of his brain. 
Scattered downward, though in vain, 
On the roofs and stones of cities ! 
For by night the drowsy ear 
Under its curtains cannot hear. 
And by day men go their ways. 
Hearing the music as they pass, 
But deeming it no more, alas ! 
Than the hollow sound of brass. 

Yet perchance a sleepless wight, 

Lodging at some humble inn 

In the narrow lanes of life. 

When the dusk and hush of night 

Shut out the incessant din 

Of daylight and its toil and strife, 

May listen with a calm delight 

To the poet's melodies. 

Till he hears, or dreams he hears, 

Intermingled with the song. 

Thoughts that he has cherished long ; 

Hears amid the chime and singing 

The bells of his own village ringing. 

And wakes, and finds his slumberous eyes 

Wet with most delicious tears. 

Thus dreamed I, as by night I lay 
In Bruges, at the Fleur-de-Ble, 
Listening with a wild delight 
To the chimes that, through the night. 
Rang their changes from the Belfry 
Of that quaint old Flemish city. 

Henry wadsworth Longfellow. 



THE CUCKOO CLOCK. 

FROM "THE BIRTHDAY." 

But chief — surpassing all — a cuckoo clock ! 

That crowning wondei ! miracle of art ! 

How have I stood entranced uncounted minutes. 

With held-m breath, and eyes intently fixed 

On that small magic door, that when complete 

The expiring hour — the irreversible — 

Flew open with a startling suddenness 

That, though expected, sent the rushing blood 

In mantling flushes o'er my upturned face ; 

And as the bird, (that more than mortal fowl !) 

With peifect mimicry of natural tone. 

Note after note exact Time's message told, 

How my heart's pulse kept time with the charmed 

voice ! 
And when it ceased made simultaneous pause 
As the small door clapt to, and all was still. 

Caroline Bowles (iMrs. Southey). 



OZYMANDIAS OF EGYPT. 

I MET a- traveller from an antique land 
Who said : Two vast and trunkless legs of stone 
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand, 
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown 
And wi-inkled lip and sneer of cold command 
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read 
Which yet survive, stamped ou these lifeless 

things, 
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed; 
And on the pedestal these words appear : 
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: 
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair ! " 
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay 
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare. 
The lone and level sands stretch far away. 

Percy Bysshe Shelley. 



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ADDRESS TO THE MUMMY AT BEL- 
ZONI'S EXHIBITION, 

And thou hast walked about (how strange a 
story !) 

In Thebes's streets three thousand years ago, 
When the Memnonium was in all its glory. 

And time had not begun to overthrow 
Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous, 
Of which the very ruins are tremendous. 

Speak ! for thou long enough hast acted dummy ; 
Thou hast a tongue, — come, let us hear its 
tune ; 
Thou 'rt standing on thy legs, above ground, 
mummy ! 
Revisiting the glimpses of the moon, — 
Not like thin ghosts or disembodied creatures. 
But with thy bones and flesh and limbs and 
features. 

Tell us — for doubtless thou canst recollect — 
To whom should we assign the Sphinx's fame ? 

Was Cheops or Cephrenes architect 

Of either pyramid that bears his name? 

Is Pompey's Pillar really a misnomer ? 

Had Thebes a hundred gates, as sung by Homer ? 

Perhaps thou wert a Mason, and forbidden 
By oath to tell the seci'ets of thjr trade, — 

Then say what secret melody was hidden 

In Memnon's statue, which at sunrise played ? 

Perhaps thou wert a priest, — if so, my struggles 

Are vain, for priestcraft never owns its juggles. 

Perhaps that very hand, now pinioned flat. 
Has hob-a-nobbed with Pharaoh, glass to glass ; 

Or dropped a halfpenny in Homer's hat ; 
Or doff'ed thine own to let Queen Dido pass ; 



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Or held, by Solomon's own invitation, 
A torch at the great temple's dedication. 

I need not ask thee if that hand, when armed. 
Has any Roman soldier mauled and knuckled ; 

For thou wert dead and buried and embalmed 
Ere Romulus and Remus had been suckled : 

Antiquity appears to have begun 

Long after thy primeval race was run. 

Thou couldst develop — if that withered tongue 
Might tell us what those sightless orbs have 
seen — 

How the world looked when it was fresh and young, 
And the great deluge still had left it green ; 

Or was it then so old that history's pages 

Contained no record of its early ages ? 

Still silent ! incommunicative elf ! 

Art sworn to secrecy ? then keep thy vows ; 
But prithee tell us something of thyself. 

Reveal the secrets of thy prison-house ; 
Since in the world of spirits thou hast slumbered. 
What hast thou seen, what strange adventures 
numbered ? 

Since first thy form was in this box extended 
We have, above ground, seen some strange 
mutations : 
The Roman empire has begun and ended. 

New worlds have risen, we have lost old na- 
tions ; 
And countless kings have into dust been humbled, 
While not a fragment of thy flesh has crumbled. 

Didst thou not hear the pother o'er thy head. 
When the great Persian conqueror, Cambyses, 

Marched armies o'er thy tomb with thundering 
tread, — 
O'erthrew Osiris, Orus, Apis, Isis ; 

And shook the pyramids with fear and wonder, 



If the tomb's secrets may not be confessed, 
The nature of thy private life unfold : 

Aheart has throbbed beneath that leathern breast, 
And tears adown that dusty cheek have rolled ; 

Have children climbed those knees, and kissed 
that face ? 

What was thy name and station, age and race ? 

Statue of flesh, — immortal of the dead ! 

Imperishable type of evanescence ! 
Posthumous man , — who quit'st thy narrow bed, 

And standest undecayed within our presence ! 
Thou wilt hearnothing till the judgment morning, 
When the great trump shall thrill thee with its 



Why should this worthless tegument endure. 
If its undying guest be lost forever ? 

0, let us keep the soul embalmed and pure 
In liviug virtue, that when both must sever, 

Although corruption may our frame consume. 

The immortal spirit in the skies may bloom ! 

Horace Smith. 



ODE ON A GRECIAN URN. 

Thou still unravished bride of quietness ! 

Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time, 
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express 

A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme : 
What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape 

Of deities or mortals, or of both. 
In Teuipe or the dales of Aready ? 

What men or gods are these ? What maidens 
loath ? 
What mad pursuit ? What struggles to escape ? 

What pipes and timbrels ? What wild ecstasy ? 

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard 

Are sweeter ; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on ; 
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endeared. 

Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone. 
Fair youth beneath the trees, thou canst not 
leave 
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare. 
Bold lover, never, never canst thou kiss. 
Though winning near the goal, — yet do not 
grieve : 
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy 
bliss ; 
Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair ! 

Ah, happy, happy boughs ! that cannot shed 

Your leaves, nor ever bid the spring adieu ; 
And happy melodist, unwearied. 

Forever piping songs forever new ; 
More happy love ! more happy, happy love ! 

Forever warm and still to be enjoyed. 
Forever panting and forever young ; 
All bi'eathing human passion far above. 

That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloyed, 
A burning forehead, and a parching tongue. 

Who are these coming to the sacrifice ? 

To what gi-een altar, mysterious priest, 
Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies, 

And all her silken flanks with garlands drest ? 
What little town by river or sea-shore. 

Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel, 
Is emptied of its folk, this pious morn ? 
And, little town, thy streets forevermore 

Will silent be, and not a soul to tell 
Why thou art desolate can e'er return. 



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Attic shape ! Fair attitude ! with brede 
Of marble men and maidens overwrought, 
With forest branches and the trodden weed ; 

Tliou, silent form ! dost tease us out of thought 
As doth eternity. Cold Pastoral ! 

When old age shall this generation waste, 

Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe 
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou 
say'st, 
" Beauty is truth, truth beauty," — that is all 
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. 

John Keats. 



FRAGMENTS. 

The King of Day. 

thou that, with surpassing glory crowned, 
Look'st from thy sole dominion like the God 
Of this new world, at whose sight all the stars 
Hide their diminished heads . . . 
Sun ! 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON. 

Fires the proud tops of the eastern pines. 

King Richard II., Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

The lessening cloud. 
The kindling azure, and the mountain's brow, 
Illumed with fluid gold, his near approach 
Betoken glad. Lo ! now, apparent all 
Aslant the dew-bright earth, and colored air. 
He looks in boundless majesty abroad ; 
And sheds the shining day, that burnished plays 
On rocks, and hills, and towers, and wand'ring 

streams. 
High gleaming from afar. 

The Seasons : Summer. THOMSON. 



Sunset in the Mountains. 

The western waves of ebbing day 
Rolled o'er the glen their level way ; 
Each purple peak, each flinty spire, 
Was bathed in floods of living fire. 
But not a setting beam could glow 
Within the dark ravines below, 
Where twined the path in shadow hid. 
Round many a rocky pyramid. 
Shooting abruptly from the dell 
Its thunder-splintered pinnacle ; 
Rounc^ many an insulated mass. 
The native bulwarks of the pass. 

Their rocky summits, split and rent. 
Formed turret, dome, or battlement. 



Or seemed fantasticallj' set 

With cupola or minaret, 

Wild crests as pagod ever decked. 

Or mosque of Eastern architect. 

Nor were these earth-born castles bare, 

Nor lacked they many a banner fair ; 

For, from their shivered brows displayed, 

Far o'er the unfathomable glade. 

All twinkling ^^■ith the dew-drops' sheen, 

The brier-rose fell in streamers green, 

And creeping shrubs, of thousand dyes. 

Waved in the west-wind's summer sighs. 

The Lady of the Lake, Caizt. i. SCOTT. 



Indian Summer. 

From gold to gray 

Our mild sweet day 
Of Indian summer fades too soon ; 

But tenderly 

Above the sea 
Hangs, white and calm, the hunter's moon. 

The Eve oy Election . J. G. WHITTIER. 



The Poet's Retirement. 

Fair Quiet, have I found thee here. 
And Innocence, thy sister dear ? 
Mistaken long, I sought you then 
In busy companies of men. 
Your sacred plants, if here below. 
Only among the plants will grow ; 
Society is all but rude 
To this delicious solitude. 

Here at the fountain's sliding foot. 
Or at some fruit-tree's mossy root, 
Casting the body's vest aside. 
My soul into the boughs does glide : 
There, like a bird, it sits and sings. 
Then whets and claps its silver wings. 
And, till prepared for longer flight, 
Waves in its plumes the various light. 



T^tc Garden ( Translated). 



A. MARVELL. 



Eden. 

Yea, more, 
A heaven on earth : for blissful paradise 
Of God the garden was, by him in the east 
Of Eden planted. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MIL' 



Athens. 

On the i'Egean shore a city stands, 
Built nobly, pure the air, and light the soil, 
Athens, the eye of Greece, mother of arts 
And eloquence, native to famous wits, 



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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS. 



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Or hospitable, in her sweet recess, 

(Jity or subiiiban, studious walks and shades ; 

See there the olive grove of Academe, 

Plato's retirement, where the Attic bird 

Trills her thick-warbled notes the summer long. 

Paradise Regained, Book iv. MILTON. 



KOME. 

Home ! my country ! city of the soul ! 
The orphans of the heart must turn to thee. 
Lone mother of dead emi)ires ! 

The Niobe of nations ! there she stands, 
Childless and crownless, in her voiceless woe ; 
An empty ui'n within her withered hands, 
Whose holy dust was scattered long ago. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 



Temple of the Clitumnus. 
But thou, Clitumnus ! in thy sweetest wave 
Of the most living crystal that was e'er 
The haunt of river nymph, to gaze and lave 
Her limbs where nothing hid them, thou dost 

rear 
Thy grassy banks. . . . 
And on thy happy shore a temple still. 
Of small and delicate proportion, keeps, 
Upon a mild declivity of hill, 
Its memory of thee ; beneath it sweeps 
Thy current's calmness ; oft from out it leaps 
The finny darter with the glittering scales. 
Who dwells and revels in thy glassy deeps ; 
While, chance, some scattered water-lily sails 
Down where the shallower wave still tells its 
bubbling tales. 

Childe Harold, Ca?i/. iv. BYRON. 



The Fall of Tekni. 
The roar of waters ! — from the headlong height 
Velino cleaves the wave-worn precipice ; 
The fall of waters ! rapid as the light 
The flashing mass foams shaking the abyss ; 
The hell of waters ! where they howl and hiss. 
And boil in endless torture. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 



Venice. 
I stood in Venice, on the Bridge of Sighs ; 
A palace and a prison on each hand : 
I saw from out the wave her structures rise 
As from the stroke of the enchanter's wand : 
A thousand years their cloudy wings expand 
Around me, and a dying glory smiles 
O'er the far times, when many a subject land 
Looked to the winged Lion's marble piles. 
Where Venice sate in state, throned on her hun- 
dred isles ! 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. BVRON. 



An Italian Eavine. 

Beneath this crag. 
Huge as despair, as if in weariness, 
The melancholy mountain yawns ; below. 
You hear but see not an impetuous torrent 
Raging among the caverns, and a bridge 
Crosses the chasm ; and high above there grow, 
With intersecting trunks, from crag to crag. 
Cedars and yews and pines, whose tangled hair 
Is matted into one solid roof of shade 
By the dark ivy's twine. At noonday hei'e 
'T is twilight, and at sunset blackest night. 

The Cenci. SHELLEY. 



The River Thames. 

My eye descending from the Hill, surveys 
Where Thames among the wanton valleys strays. 
Thames ! the most loved of all the Ocean's sons. 

Though with those streams he no resemblance 

hold. 
Whose foam is amber, and their gravel gold : 
His genuine and less guilty wealth to explore, 
Search not his bottom, but survey his shore. 
O'er which he kindly spreads his spacious wing 
And hatches plenty for the ensuing spring. 

No unexpected inundations spoil 

The mower's hopes, nor mock the ploughman's 

toil; 
But godlike his unwearied bounty flows ; 
First loves to do, then loves the good he does. 

Cooper's Hill. SIR J. Denham. 

Macbeth 's Castle. 

DuNC.\N. This castle hath a pleasant seat : the 
air 
Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself 
Unto our gentle senses. 

Banquo. . . . The heaven's breath 
Smells wooingly here : no jutty, frieze. 
Buttress, nor coign e of vantage, but this bird 
Hath made his pendent bed and pi'ocreant cradle : 
Where they most breed and haunt, I have ob- 
served, 
The air is delicate. 

.Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE. 



Personal Appearance. 

Who hatli not proved how feebly words essay 
To fix one spark of Beaiity's heavenly ray ? 
Who dotli not feel, until his failing sight 
Faints into dimness with its own delight. 
His changing cheek, his sinking heart confess 
The might — the majesty of Loveliness ? 

The Bride o/Abydos. Cant. i. BYRON 



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Framed in the prodigality of nature. 

A'i>i^ Richard ///., Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

First likes the whole, then separates what he sees ; 
On several parts a several praise bestows, 
The ruby lips, the well-proportioned nose, 
The snowy skin, and raven-glossy hair, 
The dimpled cheek, and forehead rising fair. 
And e'en in sleep itself, a smiling air. 
From thence his eyes descending viewed the rest, 
Her plump round arms, white hands, and heaving 
breast. 

Cytntm a7id Iphigenia. Drvden. 

That whiter skin of hers than snow, 
And smooth as monumental alabaster. 

Othello, Act V. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE. 

There she sees a damsel bright, 
Drest in a silken robe of white. 
That shadowy in the moonlight shone : 
The neck that made that white robe wan, 
Her stately neck, and arms were bare ; 
Her blue-veined feet unsandalled were, 
And wildly glittered here and there 
The gems entangled in her hair. 
I guess, 't was frightful there to see 
A lady so richly clad as she, — 
Beautiful exceedingly ! 

Christabel. S. T. COLERIDGE. 

Rich and rare were the gems she wore. 

And a bright gold ring on her wand she bore. 

Rich and Rare. MOORE. 

Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of night 
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear. 

Rmneo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Alas ! how little can a moment show 

Of an eye where feeling plays 

In ten thousand dewy rays ; 

A face o'er which a thousand shadows go. 

The Triad. WORDSWORTH. 

Stabbed with a white wench's black eye. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act ii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

The fringed curtains of thine eye advance. 

Tlu Tempest, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Heart on her lips, and soul within her eyes. 
Soft as her clime, and sunny as her skies. 

Beppo. BVRON. 

As she fled fast through sun and shade. 
The happy winds upon her played. 
Blowing the ringlets from the braid. 

Sir Laujicelot a7td Qiicen Guinevere. TENNYSON. 



And ne'er did Grecian chisel trace 
A Nymph, a Naiad, or a Grace, 
Of finer form, or lovelier face. 

What though no rule of courtly grace 

To measured mood had trained her pace — 

A foot more light, a step more true. 

Ne'er from the heath-flower dashed the dew. 

The Lady of the Lake, Cant. i. SCOTT. 

Her pretty feet 

Like snailes did creep 
A little out, and then, 
As if they played at bo-peep. 
Did soon draw in agen. 

upon her Feet. R. Herkick. 

No longer shall thy bodice, aptly laced, 
From thy full bosom to thy slender waist, 
That air and harmony of shape express. 
Fine by degrees, and beautifully less. 

Henyy and Emma. M. Prior. 

A rosebud set with little wilful thorns, 

And sweet as English air could make her, she. 

The Princess. TENNYSON. 

It was a lovely sight to see 
The Lady Christabel, when she 
Was praying at the old oak-tree. 

Amid the jagged shadows 

Of mossy leafless boughs. 

Kneeling in the moonlight, 

To make her gentle vows ; 
Her slender palms together prest, 
Heaving sometimes on her breast ; 
Her face resigned to bliss or bale, — 
Her face, 0, call it fair, not pale. 

Christabel. S. T. COLERIDGE 

Look here, upon this picture, and on this ; 
The counterfeit presentment of two brothers. 
See, what a grace was seated on this brow : 
Hyperion's curls ; the front of Jove himself ; 
An eye like Mars, to threaten and command ; 
A station like the herald Mereuiy, 
New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill ; 
A combination, and a form, indeed. 
Where every god did seem to set his seal, 
To give the world assurance of a man. 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

HoR. I saw him once ; he was a goodly king. 
Ham. He was a man, take him for all in all, 
I shall not look upon his like again. 

Hamlet, Act\. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Ay, every inch a king. 

King Lear, Act iv. Sc. 6. 



SHAKESPEARK. 



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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS. 



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The glass of fashion, and the mould of form, 
The observed of all observers ! 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

The wealthy curled darlings of our nation. 

Othello, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

We '11 have a swashing and a martial outside. 

As You Like It, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy. 

But not expressed in fancy ; rich, not gaudy : 

For the ttpparel oft proclaims the man. 

Hamlet, Ait\. S^. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

They brought one Pinch, a hungry lean-faced 

villain, 
A mere anaton^y, a mountebank, 
A threadbare juggler, and a fortune-teller, 
A needy, hollow-eyed, sharp-looking wretch, 
A living-dead man. 

Comedy of Errors, Act v. Jc. j. SHAKESPEARE. 

Mislike me not for my complexion, 

The shadowed livery of the burnished sun, 

To whom I am a neighbor, and near bred. 

Bring me the fairest creature northward born. 

Where Phoebus' fire scarce tiiaws the icicles. 

And let us make incision for your love, 

To prove whose blood is reddest, his or mine. 

Merchant of Venice, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Falstaff sweats to death. 
And lards the lean earth as he walks along. 
Were 't not for laughing, I should pity him. 

R'i!i£- Henry IV., Part I. Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Yond' Cassius has a lean and hungry look ; 
He thinks too much : such men are dangerous. 

Julius Ccesar, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

The ornament of beauty is suspect, 

A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest air. 

Soimet LA'A'. SHAKESPEARE. 

My tables, my tables, — meet it is, I set it down, 
That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Conditions of Life. 

My nature is subdued 
To what it works in, like the dyer's hand. 

Sonnet CXI. SHAKESPEARE. 

I saw a smith stand with his hammer, thus, 
The whilst his iron did on the anvil cool. 
With open mouth swallowing a tailor's news ; 
Who, with his shears and measure in his hand. 
Standing on slippers (which his nimble haste 
Had falsely thrust upon contrary feet), 
Told of a many thousand warlike French 
That were embattailed and ranked in Kent : 



Another lean, unwashed artificer 

Cuts off his tale and talks of Arthur's death. 

King John, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Mechanic slaves 
With greasy aprons, rules, and hammers. 

Antony and Cleopatra, Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

The charge is prepared, the lawyers are met, 
The judges all ranged ; a terrible show ! 



Tlie Beggar's Opera, Act iii. Sc- 



J. GAY. 



The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling. 
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to 
heaven. 

Midsummer Night's Dream, Act v. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 

0, now, forever 
Farewell the tranquil mind ! farewell content ! 
Farewell the plumed troop, and the big wars, 
That make ambition virtue ! 0, farewell ! 
Farewell the neighing steed, and the shrill trump. 
The spirit-stirring drum, the ear-piercing fife. 
The royal banner, and all quality. 
Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war ! 
And, you mortal engines, whose rude throats 
The immortal Jove's dread clamors counterfeit. 
Farewell ! Othello's occupation 's gone ! 

Othello, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Lives like a drunken sailor on a mast 
Ready with every nod to tumble down. 

Richard III., Act in. Sc. 4. 



Kin 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Not all the water in the rough rude sea 
Can wash the balm from an anointed king. 

King Richard II., Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

"There 's such divinity doth hedge a king. 
That treason can but peep to what it would, 
Acts little of his will. 

Hamlet, Activ. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Besides, the king's name is a tower of strength. 

King Richard III., Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

High on a throne of royal state, which far 
Outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind, 
Or where the gorgeous East with richest hand 
Showers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold, 
Satan exalted sat, by mei'it raised 
To that bad eminence. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON. 



Personal Characteristics — Women. 

A maid 
That paragons description and wild fame ; 
One that excels the quirks of blazoning pens 
And in th' essential vesture of creation 
Does bear all excellency. 

Othello, Act ii. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 



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I have marked 
A thousand blushing apparitions 
To start into her face, a thousand innocent 

shames, 
In angel whiteness, beat away those blushes. 

Muc/i Ado about Nothing, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Ladies like variegated tulips show, 

'T is to their changes half their charms we owe. 

Fine by defect, and delicately weak, 

Their happy spots the nice admirer take. 

Moral Essays, Part //. POPE. 

Or ere those shoes were old 
With which she followed my poor father's body, 
Like Niobe, all tears ; — why she, even she 
(0 God ! a beast that wants discourse of reason 
Would have mourned longer) married with my 

uncle, 
My father's brother. 



Hajnlet, Act i. Sc. 2. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



I have no other but a woman's reason ; 
I think him so because I think him so. 

T-uio Gentlemen 0/ Verona, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Had she been true. 
If heaven would make me such another world 
Of one entire and perfect chrysolite, 
I 'd not have sold her for it. 

Othello, Act V. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Iago. Come on, come on ; you are pictures 
out of doors. 
Bells in your parlors, wild-cats in your kitchens, 
Saints in your injuries, devils being offended. 

For I am nothing, if not critical. 

Desdemona. . . . But what praise couldst 
thou bestow on a deserving woman indeed ? . . . 

Iago. She that was ever fair and never proud. 
Had tongue at will and yet was never loud, 
Never lacked gold and yet went never gay. 
Fled from her wish, and yet said, — " Now I 

may;" 
She that being angered, her revenge being nigh. 
Bade her wrong stay and her displeasure tly ; 
She that in wisdom never was so frail 
To change the cod's head for the salmon's tail ; 
She that could think and ne'er disclose her mind. 
See suitors following and not look behind ; 
She was a wight, — if ever such wight were, — 

Des. To do what ? 

Iago. To suckle fools and chronicle small beer. 

Des. 0, most lame and impotent conclusion ! 

Othello, Act ii. Sc, i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Her voice was ever soft. 
Gentle, and low, — an excellent thing in woman. 

King Lear, Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Not stepping o'er the bounds of modesty. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Shalt show us how divine a thing 
A woman may be made. 



To a Young Lady, 



WORDSWORTH. 



Earth's noblest thing, a woman perfected. 

IrenK J. R. LOWELI.. 



Persoival Charactekistics — Men. 
Patience, my lord ! why, 't is the soul of peace ; 
Of all the virtues 't is nearest kin to heaven ; 
It makes men look like gods. The best of men 
That e'er wore earth about him was a suflerer, 
A soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit, 
The first true gentleman that ever breathed. 



The Honest IVhore, Part I. Act i. Sc. : 



T. DEKKER. 



0, could I flow like thee,* and make thy stream 

My great example, as it is my theme ! 

Though deep yet clear, though gentle yet not 

dull ; 
Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full. 

Cooper's Hill. SIR J. Denham. 

He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one ; 
Exceeding wise, fair-spoken, and persuading : 
Lofty, and sour to them that loved him not ; 
But to those men that sought him sweet as 
summer. 

King Henry VHL, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Delivers in such apt and gracious words, 
That aged ears play truant at his tales. 
And younger hearings are quite; ravished, 
So sweet and voluble is his discourse. 

Love's Labor Lost, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Frank, haughty, rash, 

Tlie New Timon, Part I, 



the Kupert of debate. 
E. Bulwer-Lytton. 



For though I am not splenetive and rash. 
Yet have I in me something dangerous. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Turn him to any cause of policy. 
The Gordian knot of it he will unloose, 
Familiar as his garter : that, when he speaks. 
The air, a chartered libertine, is still. 

King Henry V., Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE, 



A Daniel come to judgment ! . , 
wise young judge ! 

Merchant of Venice, Act iv. Sc. i. 

* Tlie river Tliames. 



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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS. 



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A merrier man, 
AVithin the limit of becoming mirth, 
I never spent an hour's talk withal. 

Lave's Labor Lost, Act ii. Sc. i.- SHAKESPEARE. 



As merry as the day is long. 

Much Ado about Nothutg, Act ii. Sc. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



In all thy humors, whether grave or mellow, 
Thou 'rt such a touchy, testy, pleasant fellow ; 
Hast so much wit and mirth and spleen about 

thee. 
There is no living with thee, nor without thee. 

spectator, No. 6S. J. ADDISON. 

Who the silent man can prize, 

If a fool he be or wise ? 

Yet, though lonely seem the wood. 

Therein maj' lurk the beast of blood ; 

Often bashful looks conceal 

Tongue of fire and heart of steel ; 

And deem not thou in forest gray, 

Every dappled skin thy prey. 

Lest thou rouse, with luckless spear, 

The tiger for the fallow-deer ! 

The Gulistan. BISHOP Heber. 

A shallow bi'ain behind a senior's mask. 
An oracle within an empty cask, 
The solemn fop ; significant and budge ; 
A fool with judges, amongst fools a judge. 

Con-uersatioji. COWPER. 



A snapper-up of unconsidered trifles. 



IVinter^s Talc, Act iv. Sc. 2. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Dubious is such a scrupulous good man — 
Yes — you may catch him tripping if you can. 
He would not, with a peremptory tone. 
Assert the nose upon his face his own ; 
With hesitation admirably slow, 
He humbly hopes — presumes — it may be so. 

Cojiversation. COVVPER. 

Seemed washing his hands with invisible soap 
In imperceptible water. 

Miss Kilmansegg. T. HoOD. 

In a bondman's key. 
With 'bated breath, and whisp'ring humbleness. 

Merchant 0/ Venice, Act\. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



I am the very pink of courtesy. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act ii. Sc. 4. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Smooth runs the water where the brook is deep. 
And in his simple show he harbors treason. 
The fox barks not, wheu he would steal the lamb. 

Kins- Henry VL, Part II. Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



All was false and hollow ; though his tongue 
Dropped manna, and could make the worse 

appear 
The better i-eason, to perplex and dash 
Maturest counsels ; for his thoughts were low ; 
To vice industrious, but to nobler deeds 
Timorous and slothful : yet he pleased the ear, 
And with persuasive accent thus began. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MiLTON. 

A little more than kin, and less than kind. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Yet do I fear thy nature : 
It is too full 0' the milk of human kindness. 

Macbeth, Acti.'Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Of manners gentle, of affections mild ; 
In wit a man, simplicity a child. 

A safe companion and an easy friend 
Unblamed through life, lamented in thy end. 

Epitaph on Gay. POPE. 

Here lies David Gan'ick, describe me who can, 
An abridgment of all that was pleasant in man. 

Retaliation. GOLDSMITH, 

He hath a tear for pity, and a hand 
Open as day for melting charity. 

King Henry IV., Part II. Act iv. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

A happy soul, that all the way 
To heaven hath a summer's day. 

In Praise o/Lessius's Rule of Health. R. CrASHAW. 

An idler is a watch that wants both hands ; 
As useless if it goes as if it stands. 

Retirement. COWPER. 

A lazy lolling sort, 
Unseen at church, at senate, or at court 
Of ever-listless idlers, that attend 
No cause, no trust, no duty, and no friend. 
There too, my Paridell ! she marked thee there. 
Stretched on the rack of a too easy chair. 
And heard thy eveilasting yawn confess 
The pains and penalties of idleness. 

The Dunciad, Book iv. POPE. 

I pray you, in your letters. 
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate. 
Speak of me as I am ; nothing extenuate. 
Nor set 'down aught in malice : then, must you 

speak 
Of one that loved, not wisely, but too well ; 
Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought, 
Perplexed in the extreme ; of one, whose hand. 
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away, 
Eicher than all his tribe ; of one, whose subdued 

eyes, 



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FRAGMENTS. 



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Albeit unused to the melting mood, 
Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees 
Their medicinal gum. Set you down this. 

Othello, Act V. Sc, 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Moods. 

Unpack my heart with words, 
And fall a cursing, like a very drab. 
A scullion ! 
Fie upon 't ! Foh ! 

Hamlet. Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

I am very sorry, good Horatio, 
Tliat to Laertes I forgot myself, 

But, sure, the bravery of his grief did put me 
Into a towering passion. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

A woman moved is like a fountain troubled, 
Muddy, ill-seeming, tliick, bereft of beauty. 

Tami}ig o/tlie Shrew, Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Had it pleased Heaven 

To try me with affliction ; had he rained 

All kinds of sores and shames on my bare head, 

Steeped me in poverty to the very lips, 

Given to captivity me and my utmost hopes, — 

I should have found in some part of my soul 

A drop of patience : but, alas, to make me 

A fixed figure, for the time of scorn 

To point liis slow unmoving finger at ! 

0:heUo, Activ. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

But that I am forbid 
To tell the secrets of my prison-house, 
I could a tale unfold, whose lightest word 
"Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young 

blood, 
ilake thy two eyes, like stars, start from their 

spheres. 
Thy knotted and combined locks to part, 
And each particular hair to stand on end, 
Like quills upon the fretful porcupine : 
But this eternal blazon must not be 
To ears of flesh and blood. 

Hamlet, Acti. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

I feel my sinews slacken with the friglit. 

And a cold sweat thrills down o'er all my limbs, 

As if I were dissolving into water. 

The Tempest. Drvden. 

Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind : 
The thief doth fear each bush an officer. 

King Richard II., Act v. Sc. 6, SHAKESPEARE. 

I cannot .speak, tears so obstruct my words, 
And choke me with unutterable joy. 

Caiics Mariiis. T. OTVVAY. 



Men met each other with erected look. 
The steps were higher that they took. 
Friends to congratulate their friends made haste 
And long-inveterate foes saluted as they passed. 

Threiwdici Augiistalis. Dryde.n. 

There is a mood 
(I sing not to the vacant and the young). 
There is a kindly mood of melanciioly , 
That wings the soul and points her to the skies. 



Ruins o/Rome. 



J. DYER. 



Battle. 
By Heaven ! it is a splendid sight to see 
(For one who hath no friend, no brother there) 
Their rival scarfs of mixed embroidery, 
Their various arms that glitter in tlie air ! 
What gallant war-hounds rouse them from 

their lair. 
And gnash their fangs, loud yelling for the prey ! 
All join the chase, but few the triumph share ; 
The grave shall bear the chiefest prize awa}^ 
And havoc scarce for joy can number their array. 

Childe Harold, Cant. i. BYRON. 

From the glittering staff unfurled 
Th' imperial ensign, which, full high advanced. 
Shone like a meteor, streaming to the wind. 
With gems and golden lustre rich imblazed, 
Seraphic arms and trophies ; all the while 
Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds : 
At which the universal host up sent 
A shout that tore hell's concave, and beyond 
Frighted the reign of Chaos and old Night. 

Paradise Lost, Book L MiLTO.N. 



Panic. 

Such a numerous host 
Fled not in silence through the frighted deep, 
With ruin upon ruin, rout on rout. 
Confusion worse confounded. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MiLTON 



Distance. 

How he fell 
From heaven they fabled, thrown by angry Jove 
Sheer o'er the crystal battlements ; from morn 
To noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve, 
A summer's day ; and with the setting sun 
Dropt from the zenith like a falling star. 

Paradise Lost, Book \. MILTON. 

What ! will the line stretch out to the crack of 
doom ? 

Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. t. SHAKESPEARE. 



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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS. 



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St. Peter's at Rome. 
Vastness which grows, but grows to harmonize, 
All musical in its immensities ; 
Rich marbles, richer painting, shrines where 

flame 
The lamps of gold, and haughty dome which 

vies 
In air with earth's chief structures, though 

their frame 
Sits on the firm-set ground, — and this the cloud 

must claim. 

Here condense thy soul 
To more immediate objects, and control 
Thy thoughts until thy mind hath got by heart 
Its eloquent proportions, and unroll 
In mighty graduations, part by part. 
The glory which at once upon thee did not dart. 

C/iiide Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 



The Apollo Belvidere, 

Or view the lord of the unerring bow. 
The god of life, and poesy, and light, — 
The sun in human limbs arrayed, and brow 
All radiant from his triumph in the fight ; 
The shaft hath just been shot, — the arrow 

bright 
With an immortal's vengeance ; in his eye 
And nostril beautiful disdain, and might 
And majesty, flash their full lightnings by, 
Developing in that one glance the Deity. 

But in his delicate form — a dream of love, 
Shaped by some solitary nymph, whose breast 
Longed for a deathless lover from above, 
And maddened in that vision — are exprest 
All that ideal beauty ever blessed 
The mind with in its most unearthly mood, 
When each conception was a heavenly guest, 
A ray of immortality, and stood. 
Starlike, around, until they gathered to a god ! 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 



A Lady's Chamber, 

The moon shines dim in the open air. 
And not a moonbeam enters here. 
But they without its light can see 
The chamber carved so curiously. 
Carved with figures strange and sweet, 
All made out of the carver's brain. 
For a lady's chamber meet : 
The lamp with twofold silver chain 
Is fastened to an angel's feet. 
The silver lamp burns dead and dim ; 
But Christabel the lamp will trim. 
She trimmed the lamp, and made it bright, 
And left it swinging to and fro. 
While Geraldine, in wretched plight, 
Sank down upon the floor below. 

, Christabel. S. T. COLERIDGE. 



Music. 

Can any mortal mixture of earth's mould 
Breathe such divine enchanting ravishment ? 
Sure something holy lodges in that breast, 
And with these raptures moves the vocal air 
To testify his hidden residence. 
How sweetly did they float upon the wings 
Of silence, through the empty-vaulted night, 
At every fall smoothing the raven down 
Of darkness till it smiled. 

Comus. Milton. 



Perfection. 

To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, 

To throw a perfume on the violet, 

To smooth the ice, or add another hue 

Unto the rainbow, or with taper-light 

To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish, 

Is wasteful and ridiculous excess. 

King John, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Anthology. 
Infinite riches in a little room. 

The yew of Malta, Act i. 



C. MARLOWE. 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND EEELECTION. 



GOOD LIFE, LONG LIFE. 

It is not gi'owing like a tree 
In bulk, doth make man better be ; 
Or standing long an oak, three hundred year, 
To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sear : 
A lily of a day 
Is fairer far in May, 
Although it fall and die that night, — 
It was the plant and flower of Light. 
In small proportions we just beauties see, 
And in short measures life may perfect be. 

Ben Jonson. 



MY MINDE TO ME A KINGDOM IS. 

My minde to me a kingdom is ; 

Such perfect joy therein I finde 
As farre exceeds all earthly blisse 

That God or nature hath assignde ; 
Though much I want that most would have, 
Yet still my minde forbids to crave. 

Content I live ; this is my stay, — 
I seek no more than may suffice. 

I presse to beare no haughtie sway ; 
Look, what I lack my mind supplies. 

Loe, thus I triumph like a king. 

Content with that my mind doth bring. 

I see how plentie surfets oft, 

And hastie clymbers soonest fall ; 

I see that such as sit aloft 

Mishap doth threaten most of all. 

These get with toile, and keepe with feare ; 

Such cares my mind could never beare. 

No princely pompe nor welthie store, 

No force to A\du the victorie, 
No wylie wit to salve a sore, 

No shape to winne a lover's eye, — 
To none of these I yceld as thrall ; 
For Avhj', my mind despiseth all. 



Some have too much, yet still they crave ; 

I little have, yet seek no more. 
They are but poore, though much they have 

And I am rich with little store. 
They poor, I rich ; they beg, I give ; 
They lacke, I lend ; they pine, I live. 

I laugh not at another's losse, 

• I grudge not at another's gaine ; 
No worldly wave my mind can tosse ; 

I brooke that is another's bane. 
I feare no foe, I fawne no friend ; 
I lothe not life, nor dread mine end. 

I joj^ not in no earthly blisse ; 

I weigh not Cresus' wealth a straw ; 
For care, I care not what it is ; 

I feare not fortune's fatal law ; 
My mind is such as may not move 
For beautie bright, or force of love. 

I M'ish but what I have at will ; 

I wander not to seeke for more ; 
I like the plaine, I clime no hill ; 

In greatest stormes I sitte on shore, 
And laugh at them that toile in vaine 
To get what must be lost againe. 

I kisse not wliei-e I wish to kill ; 

I feigne not love where most I hate ; 
I breake no sleepe to winne my will ; 

I wayte not at the migbtie's gate. 
I scorne no poore, I feare no rich ; 
I feele no want, nor have too much. 

The court ne cart I like ne loath, — 
Extreames are counted worst of all ; 

The golden meane Itetwixt them botli 
Doth surest sit, and feares no fall ; 

This is my clioyce ; for why, I finde 

No wealth is like a quiet minde. 

My wealth is health and perfect ease ; 
My conscience clere my chiefe defence ; 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND llEFLECTION. 



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I neither seeke by bribes to please, 

Nor by desert to breed otfence. 
Thus do I live ; thus will I die ; 
Would all did so as well as I ! 

Sir Edward dyer.* 



TO THE HON. CHARLES MONTAGUE. 

Our hopes, like towering falcons, aim 
At objects in an airy height ; 

But all the pleasui-e of the game 
Is afar off to view the flight. 

The worthless prey but only shows 
The joy consisted in the strife ; 

Whate'er we take, as soon we lose 
In Homer's riddle and in life. 

So, whilst in feverish sleeps we think 
We taste what waking we desire. 

The dream is better than the drink, 
Which only feeds the sickly fire. 

To the mind's eye things well appear. 
At distance through an artful glass ; 

Bring but the flattering objects near, 
They 're all a senseless gloomy mass. 

Seeing aright, we see our woes : 
Then what avails it to have eyes ? 

From ignorance our comfort flows, 
The only wretched are the wise. 

MATTHEW PRIOR. 



OF MYSELF. 

This only grant me, that my means may lie 
Too low for envy, for contempt too high. 

Some honor I would have, 
Not from great deeds, but good alone ; 
The unknown are better than ill known : 

Rumor can ope the grave. 
Acquaintance I would have, but when 't depends 
Not on the number, but the choice, of friends. 

Books should, not business, entertain the light. 
And sleep, as undisturbed as death, the night. 

My house a cottage more 
Than palace ; and should fitting be 
For all my use, no luxury. 

My garden painted o'er 
With Nature's hand, not Art's ; and pleasures 

yield, 
Horace might envy in his Sabine field. 

* This is frequently attributed to William Byrd. Bartlett, how- 
ever, gives it to Sir Edward Dyer, referring to Hannah's Courtly 
Pocfs as authority ; so, also. Ward, in his English Poets, Vol. I., i8So. 



Thus would 1 double my life's fading space ; 
For he that runs it well twice runs his race. 

And in this true delight. 
These mibought sports, this happy state, 
I would not fear, nor wish, my fate ; 

But boldly say each night, 
To-morrow let my sun his beams display, 
Or in clouds hide them ; I have lived to-day. 

Abraham Cowley. 



BEAUTY. 

'T IS much immortal beaiity to admire. 
But more immortal beauty to withstand ; 
The perfect soul can overcome desire. 
If beauty with divine delight be scanned. 
For what is beauty but the blooming child 
Of fair Olympus, that in night must end, 
And be forever from that bliss exiled. 
If admiration stand too much its friend ? 
The wind may be enamored of a flower, 
The ocean of the green and laughing shore, 
The silver lightning of a lofty tower, — 
But must not with too near a love adore ; 
Or flower and margin and cloud-capped tower 
Love and delight shall with delight devour ! 

Lord Edward Thurlow. 



BEAUTY. 

FROM "HYMN IN HONOR OF BEAUTY." 

So every spirit, as it is most pure, 

And hath in it the more of heavenly light, 

So it the fairer body doth procure 

To habit in, and it more fairly dight 

With cheerful grace and amiable sight ; 

For of the soul the body form doth take ; 

For soul is form, and doth the body make. 

Therefore wherever that thou dost behold 
A comely corpse, with beauty fair endued. 
Know this for certain, that the same doth hold 
A beauteous soul, with fair conditions theweil, 
Fit to receive the seed of virtue strewed ; 
For all that fair is, is by nature good ; 
That is a sign to know the gentle blood. 

Yet oft it falls that many a gentle mind 
Dwells in deformed tabernacle drowned. 
Either by chance, against the course of kind, 
Or tlirough unaptnesse in the substance found. 
Which it assumed of some stubborne ground. 
That will not yield unto her form's direction, 
But is performed with some foul imperfection. 



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And oft it falls (aye me, the more to rue !) 
That goodly beauty, albeit heavenly born, 
Is foul abused, and that celestial hue. 
Which doth tlie world with her delight adorn, 
jVIade but the bait of sin, and sinners' scorn. 
Whilst every one doth seek and sue to have it, 
But every one doth seek but to deprave it. 

Yet nathemore is that faire beauty's blame, 
But theirs that do abuse it unto ill : 
Nothing so good, but that through guilty shame 
Ma}- be corrupt, and wrested unto will : 
Natheless the soule is fair and beauteous still, 
However fleshe's fault it filthy make ; 
For things immortal no corruption take. 

EDWARD SPENSER. 



THOUGHT. 

Thought is deeper than all speech, 
Feeling deeper than all thought ; 

Souls to souls can never teach 

What unto themselves was taught. 

We are spirits clad in veils ; 

Man by man was never seen ; 
All our deep communing fails 

To remove the shadowy screen. 

Heart to heart was never known ; 

Mind with mind did never meet ; 
We are colunms left alone 

Of a temple once complete. 

Like the stars that gem the sky. 
Far apart, though seeming near, 

In our light we scattered lie ; 
All is thus but starlight here. 

What is social company 

But a babbling summer stream ? 
What our wise philosophy 

But the glancing of a dream ? 

Only when the sun of love 

Melts the scattered stars of thought. 
Only when we live above 

What the dim-eyed world hath taught, 

Only when our souls are fed 

By the fount which gave them birth, 
And by inspiration led 

Which they never drew from earth, 

We, like parted drops of rain. 
Swelling till they meet and run, 

Shall be all absorbed again. 
Melting, flowing into one. 

Christopher Pearse Cranch. 



CONTENTMENT. 

I WEIGH not fortune's frown or smile ; 

I joy not much in earthly joys ; 
I seek not state, I reck not style ; 

I am not fond of fancy's toys : 
I rest so pleased with what I have, 
I wish no more, no more I crave. 

I quake not at the thunder's crack ; 

I tremble n ot at news of war ; 
I swouud not at the news of wrack ; 

I shrink not at a blazing star ; 
I fear not loss, I hope not gain, 
I envy none, I none disdain. 

I see ambition never pleased ; 

I see some Tantals starved in store ; 
I see gold's dropsy seldom eased ; 

I see even Midas gape for more ; 
I neither want nor yet abound, — 
Enough 's a feast, content is crowned. 

I feign not friendship where I hate ; 

I fawn not on the great (in show) ; 
I prize, I praise a mean estate, — 

Neither too lofty nor too low : 
This, this is all my choice, my cheer, — 
A mind content, a conscience clear. 

Joshua Sylvester. 



CONTENT. 

FROM " farewell TO FOLLIE," 1617. 

Sweet are the thoughts that savor of content ; 

The quiet mind is richer than a crown ; 
Sweet are the nights in careless slumber spent, — ■ 

The poor estate scorns Fortune's angry frown : 
Such sweet content, such minds, such sleep, such 

bliss, 
Beggars enjoy, when princes oft do miss. 

The homely house that harbors quiet rest. 
The cottage that affords no pride or care, 

The mean, that 'grees with country music best, 
The sweet consort of mirth's and music's fare. 

Obscured life sets down a type of bliss ; 

A mind content both crown and kingdom is. 

Robert Greene. 



IN PRISON. 

Beat on, proud billows ; Boreas, blow ; 

Swell, curled waves, high as Jove's roof ; 
Your incivility doth show 

That innocence is tempest proof ; 
Though surly N ei'eus frown, my thoughts are calm ; 
Then strike. Affliction, for thy wounds arebnlm. 



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POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



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That which the world miscalls a jail 

A private closet is to me ; 
Whilst a good conscience is my bail, 

And innocence my liberty : 
Locks, bars, and solitude together met, 
Make me no prisoner, biit an anchoret. 

I, whilst I wisht to be retired, 

Into this private room was turned ; 

As if their wisdoms had conspired 
The salamander should be burned ; 

Or like those sophists, that would drown a fish, 

I am constrained to suffer what I wish. 

The cynic loves his poverty ; 

The pelican her wilderness ; 
And 't is the Indian's pride to be 

Naked on frozen Caucasus : 
Contentment cannot smart ; stoics we see 
Make torments easier to their apathy. 

These manacles upon my arm 

I as my mistress' favors wear ; 
And for to keep my ankles warm 

I have some iron shackles there : 
These walls are but my garrison ; this cell, 
Which men call jail, doth prove my citadel. 

I 'm in the cabinet lockt up. 

Like some high-prized margarite. 
Or, like the Great Mogul or Pope, 

Am cloistei'ed up from public sight : 
Eetiredness is a piece of majesty, 
And thus, proud Sultan, I 'm as great as thee. 
Sir Roger L'Estrange. 



CLEON AND I. 

Cleon hath a million acres, ne'er a one have I ; 
Cleon dwelleth in a palace, in a cottage I ; 
Cleon hath a dozen fortunes, not a penny I ; 
Yet the poorer of the twain is Cleon, and not I. 

Cleon, true, possesseth acres, but the landscape I ; 

Half the charms to me it yieldeth money can- 
not buy. 

Cleon harbors sloth and dulness, freshening 
vigor I ; 

He in velvet, I in fustian, richer man am I. 

Cleon is a slave to grandeur, free as thought am I ; 
Cleon fees a score of doctors, need of none have I ; 
"Wealth-surrounded, care-environed, Cleon fears 

to die ; 
Death may come, he '11 find me ready, — happier 

man am I. 



Cleon sees no charms in nature, in a daisy I ; 
Cleon hears no anthems ringing in the sea and 

sky ; 
Nature sings to me forever, earnest listener I ; 
State for state, with all attendants, who would 

change ? Not I. 

Charles Mackay. 



THE WANTS OF MAN. 

"Man wants but little here below, 

Nor wants that little long." 
'T is not with me exactly so ; 

But 't is so in the song. 
My wants are many and, if told, 

Would muster many a score ; 
And were each wish a mint of gold, 

1 still should long for more. 

What first I want is daily bread — 

And canvas-backs — and wine — • 
And all the realms of nature spread 

Before me, when I dine. 
Four courses scarcely can provide 

My appetite to quell ; 
With four choice cooks from France beside, 

To dress my dinner well. 

What next I want, at princely cost, 

Is elegant attire : 
Black sable furs for winter's frost, 

And silks for summer's fire. 
And Cashmere shawls, and Brussels lace 

My bosom's front to deck, — 
And diamond rings my hands to grace, 

And rubies for my neck. 

I want (who does not want ?) a wife, — 

Affectionate and fair ; 
To solace all the woes of life, 

And all its joys to share. 
Of temper sweet, of yielding will, 

Of firm, yet placid mind, — 
With all my faults to love me still 

With sentiment refined. 

And as Time's car incessant runs. 

And Fortune fills my store, 
1 want of daughters and of sons 

From eight to half a score. 
I want (alas ! can mortal dare 

Such bliss on earth to crave ?) 
That all the girls be chaste and fair. 

The boys all wise and brave. 

I want a warm and faithful friend, 
To cheer the adverse hour ; 



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Who ne'er to flatter will descend, 
Nor bend the knee to power, — 

A friend to chide me when I "m wrong, 
My inmost soul to see ; 

And that my friendship prove as strong 
For him as his for me. 

I want the seals of power and place, 

The ensigns of command ; 
Charged by the People's unbonght grace 

To rule my native land. 
Nor crown nor sceptre would I ask 

But from my country's will. 
By day, by night, to ply the task 

Her cup of bliss to fill. 

I want the voice of honest praise 

To follow me behind. 
And to be thought in future days 

The friend of human kind, 
That after ages, as they rise, 

Exulting maj'' proclaim 
In choral union to the skies 

Their blessings on my name. 

These are the Wants of moi'tal Man, — 

I cannot want them long. 
For life itself is but a span. 

And earthly bliss — a song. 
My last great Want — absorbing all — 

Is, when beneath the sod. 

And summoned to my final call. 

The Mercy of my God. 

John Quincy Adams. 



CONTENTMENT. 

" Man wants but little here below." 

Little I ask ; my wants are few ; 

I only wish a hut of stone, 
(A wcr//7?fom brown stone will do,) 

That I may call my own ; 
And close at hand is such a one, 
In yonder street that fronts the sun. 

Plain food is quite enough for me ; 

Three courses are as good as ten ; — 
If nature can subsist on three, 

Thank Heaven for three. Amen ! 
I always thought cold victual nice ; — • 
My choice would be vanilla-ice. 

I care not much for gold or land ; — 

Give me a mortgage here and there, — 
Some good bank-stock, — some note of hand, 

Or trifling railroad share, — 
I only ask that Fortune send 
A little more than I shall spend. 



Honors are silly toys, I know. 

And titles are but empty names ; 
I would, i)erhaps, be Plenipo, — 

But only near St. James ; 
I 'm very sure I should not care 
To fill our Gubernator's chair. 

Jewels ai'e baubles ; 't is a sin 

To care for such unfriiitful things ; — 
One good-sized diamond in a pin, — 

Some, not so large, in rings, — 
A ruby, and a pearl or so. 
Will do for me ; — I laugh at show. 

My dame should dress in cheap attire ; 
(Good heavy silks are never dear ;) — 
I own perhaps I might desire 

Some shawls of true Cashmere, — 
Some marrowy crapes of China silk. 
Like wrinkled skins on scalded milk. 

I would not have the horse I drive 

So fast that folks must stop and stare ; 
An easy gait — two, forty-five — 
Suits me ; I do not care ; — 
Perhaps, for just a single spurt. 
Some seconds less would do no hurt. 

Of pictures, I should like to own 

Titians and Piaphaels three or four — 
I love so much their style and tone — 

One Turner, and no more, 
(A landscape — foreground golden dirt — 
The sunshine painted with a squirt.) 

Of books but few, — some fifty score 
For daily use, and bound for wear ; 
The rest upon an upper floor ; — 

Some little luxury there 
Of red morocco's gilded gleam. 
And vellum rich as country cream. 

Busts, cameos, gems, — such things as these, 

Which others often show for pride, 
I value for their power to please, 

And selfish churls deride ; 
One Stradivarius, I confess, 
Tivo meerschaums, I would fain possess. 

AVealth's wasteful tricks I will not learn, 

Nor ape the glittering upstart fool ; 
Shall not carved tables serve my turn. 

But all must be of buhl ? 
Give grasping pomp its double share, — 
I ask but one recumbent chair. 

Thus humble let me live and die. 
Nor long for Midas' golden touch ; 



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c&t 



734 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



-Si 



If Heaven more generous gifts deny, 
I shall not miss them mioch, — 
Too grateful for the blessing lent 
Of simple tastes and mind content ! 

Oliver Wendell Holmes. 



CONTENTATION. 

DIRECTED TO MY DEAR FATHER, AND MOST WORTHY 
FRIEND, MR. ISAAK WALTON. 

Heaven, what an age is this ! what race 
Of giants are sprung up, that dare 

Thus fly in the Almighty's face, 

And with his providence make war ! 

I can go nowhere but I meet 

With malcontents and mutineers, 

As if in life was nothing sweet. 

And we must blessings reap in tears. 

senseless man ! that murmurs still 
For happiness, and does not know, 

Even though he might enjoy his will, 
What he would have to make him so. 

Is it true happiness to be 

By undiscerning Fortune placed 

In the most eminent degree. 
Where few arrive, and none stand fast ? 

Titles and wealth are Fortune's toils, 
Wherewith the vain themselves insnare : 

The gi-eat are proud of borrowed spoils. 
The miser's plenty breeds his care. 

The one supinely yawns at rest. 
The other eternally doth toil ; 

Each of them equally a teast, 

A pampered horse, a laboring moil : 

The titulado 's oft disgraced 

By public hate or private frowTi, 

And he whose hand the creature raised 
Has ,yet a foot to kick him down. 

The drudge who would all get, all save, 
Like a brute beast, both feeds and lies ; 

Prone to the earth, he digs his grave, 
And in the very labor dies. 

Excess of ill-got, ill-kept pelf 

Does only death and danger breed ; 

Whilst one rich worldling starves himself 
With what would thousand others feed. 

By which we see that wealth and power. 
Although they make men rich and great, 

The sweets of life do often sour. 
And gull ambition with a cheat. 



Nor is he happier than these. 

Who, in a moderate estate. 
Where he might safely live at ease. 

Has lusts that are immoderate. 

For he, by those desires misled. 

Quits his own vine's securing shade, 

To expose his naked, empty head 

To all the storms man's peace invade. 

Nor is he happy who is trim. 
Tricked up in favors of the fair, 

Mirrors, with every breath made dim. 
Birds, caught in every wanton snare. 

Woman, man's greatest woe or bliss. 
Does oftener far than serve, enslave. 

And with the magic of a kiss 

Destroys whom she was made to save. 

fruitful grief, the world's disease ! 

And vainer man, to make it so, 
Who gives his miseries increase 

By cultivating his own woe ! 

There are no ills but what we make 

By giving shapes and names to things, — 

Which is the dangerous mistake 
That causes all our sutferings. 

We call that sickness which is health, 
That persecution which is grace. 

That poverty which is true wealth. 
And that dishonor which is praise. 

Alas ! our time is here so short 

That in what state soe'er "t is spent, 

Of joy or woe, does not impoi't, 
Provided it be innocent. 

But we may make it pleasant too. 
If we will take our measures right, 

And not what Heaven has done undo 
By an unruly appetite. 

The world is full of beaten roads. 

But yet so slippery withal. 
That where one walks secure 'tis odds 

A hundred and a hundred fall. 

Untrodden paths ai'e then the best, 
Where the frequented are unsure j 

And he comes soonest to liis rest 

Whose journey has been most secure. 

It is content alone that makes 

Our pilgrimage a pleasure here ; 

And who buys sorrow cheapest takes 

An ill commodity too dear. 

Charles Cotton. 



B- 



^ 




MILTON ON HIS BLINDNESS. 



^'- Doth God exact day-labor, light denied?'''' 
I fondly aik : But Patiefice, to prevent 
That inurnnir^ soon replies^ .... 

" They also serve luho only stand and 'wait: 



a- 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



ttQ} 



THE TOUCHSTONE. 

A MAN there came, whence none could tell, 
Bearing a Touchstone in his hand. 
And tested all things in the land 
By its unerring spell. 

A thousand transformations rose 
From fair to foul, from foul to fair : 
The golden crown he did not spare. 
Nor scorn the beggar's clothes. 

Of heirloom jewels, prized so much, 
Were manj^ changed to chips and clods ; 
And even statues of the Gods 
Crumbled beneath its touch. 

Then angiily the people cried, 
" The loss outweighs the profit far ; 
Our goods suffice us as they are : 
We will not have them tried." 

And, since they could not so avail 
To check his unrelenting quest, 
They seized him, saying, " Let him test 
Flow real is our jail ! " 

But though tliey slew him with the sword. 
And in a fire his Touchstone burned. 
Its doings could not be o'erturned. 
Its undoings restored. 

And when, to stop all future harm, 
They strewed its ashes on the breeze. 
They little guessed each grain of these 
Conveyed the perfect charm. 

WILLIAM ALLINGHAM. 



t 



ON HIS OWN BLINDNESS. 

TO CYRIACK SKINNER. 

Cyeiack, this three years' day, these eyes, though 
clear, 
To outward view, of blemish or of spot, 
Bereft of light, their seeing have forgot : 

Nor to their idle orbs doth sight appear 

Of sun, or moon, or star, throughout the year. 
Or man or Avoman, yet I argue not 
Against Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a jot 

Of heart or hope ; but still bear up and steer 

Eight onward. What supports me, dost thou ask ? 

The conscience, friend, to have lost them overplied 

In Liberty's defence, my noble task, 

Of which all Europe rings i'rom side to side. 

This thought might lead me through the world's 
vain mask, 

Content, though blind, had I no better guide. 

Milton. 



THE HAPPY MAN. 

FROM "THE WINTER WALK AT NOON:" 
"THE TASK," BOOK VI. 

He is the happy man whose life even now 
Shows somewhat of that happier life to come ; 
Who, doomed to an obscure but tranquil state. 
Is pleased with it, and, were he free to choose. 
Would make his fate his choice ; whom peace, 

the fruit 
Of virtue, and whom virtue, fruit of faith. 
Prepare for happiness ; bespeak him one 
Content indeed to sojourn while he must 
Below the skies, but having there his home. 
The world o'erlooks him in her bus}"^ search 
Of objects, more illiistrious in her view ; 
And, occupied as earnestly as she. 
Though more sublimely, he o'erlooks the w'orld. 
She scorns his pleasures, for she knows them 

not ; 
He seeks not hers, for he has proved them vain, 
He cannot skim the ground like summer birds 
Pursuing gilded flies ; and such he deems 
Her honors, her emoluments, her joys. 
Therefore in contemplation is his bliss. 
Whose power is such that whom she lifts from 

earth 
She makes familiar with a heaven unseen. 
And shows him glories yet to be revealed. 
Not slothful he, though seeming unemployed, 
And censured oft as useless. Stillest streams 
Oft water fairest meadows, and the bird 
That flutters least is longest on the wing. 

William Cowper. 



THE PKOBLEM. 

I LIKE a church ; I like a cowl ; 
I love a prophet of the soul ; 
And on my heart monastic aisles 
Fall like sweet strains or pensive smiles ; 
Yet not for all liis faith can see 
Would I that cowled churchman be. 
Why should the vest on him allure, 
Which I could not on me endure ? 

Not from a vain or shallow thouglit 
His awful Jove young Phidias brought ; 
Never from lips of cunning fell 
The thrilling Delphic oracle ; 
Out from the heart of nature rolled 
The burdens of the Bible old ; 
The litanies of nations came, 
Like the volcano's tongue of flame, 
Up from the burning core below, — 
The canticles of love and woe. 



-^E? 



fi 



36 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



"^ 



The hand that rounded Peter's dome, 
And groined the aisles of Christian Korne, 
Wrought in a sad sincerity ; 
Himself from God he could not free ; 
He builded better than he knew ; — 
The conscious stone to beauty grew. 

Know'st thou what wove yon woodbird's nest 
Of leaves, and feathers from her breast ? 
Or how the fish outbuilt her shell, 
Painting with morn each annual cell ? 
Or how the sacred pine-tree adds 
To her old leaves new myriads ? 
Such and so grew these holy piles. 
Whilst love and terror laid the tiles. 
Earth proudly wears the Parthenon, 
As the best gem upon her zone ; 
And Morning opes with haste her lids, 
To gaze upon the Pyramids ; 
O'er England's abbeys bends the sky, 
As on its friends, with kindred eye ; 
For, out of Thought's interior sphere, 
These wonders rose to upper air ; 
And Nature gladly gave them place. 
Adopted them into her race. 
And granted them an equal date 
With Andes and with Ararat. 

These temples grew as grows the grass ; 
Art might obey, but not surpass. 
The passive Master lent his hand 
To the vast Soul that o'er him planned ; 
And the same power that reared the shrine 
Bestrode the tribes that knelt within. 
Ever the fiery Pentecost 
Girds with one flame the countless host. 
Trances the heart through chanting choirs, 
And through the priest the mind inspires. 
The word unto the prophet spoken 
Was writ on tables yet unbroken ; 
The word by seers or sibyls told. 
In groves of oak, or fanes of gold. 
Still floats upon the morning wind, 
Still whispers to the willing mind. 
One accent of the Holy Ghost 
The heedless world hath never lost. 
I know what say the fathers wise, — 
The Book itself before me lies, — 
Old Chrysostom, best Augustine, 
And he who blent both in his line, 
The younger Golden Lips or mines, 
Taylor, the Shakespeai-e of divines. 
His words are music in my ear, 
I see his cowled portrait dear ; 
And yet, for all his faith could see, 
I would not the good bishop be. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



HAPPINESS. 

FROM "AN ESSAY ON MAN," EPISTLE IV. 

Happiness ! our being's end and aim ! 
Good, Pleasure, Ease, Content ! whate'er thy 

name : 
That something still which prompts the eternal 

sigh. 
For which we bear to live or dare to die. 
Which still so near us, yet beyond us lies, 
O'erlooked, seen double, by the fool, and wise. 
Plant of celestial seed ! if dropped below, 
Saj', in what mortal soil thou deign'st to grow ? 
Fair opening to some court's propitious shine, 
Or deep with diamonds in the flaming mine ? 
Twined with the wreaths Parnassian laurels yield, 
Or reaped in iron harvests of the field ? 
Where grows ? — where grows it not ? If vain 

our toil. 
We ought to blame the culture, not the soil : 
Fixed to no spot is happiness sincere ; 
'T is nowhere to be found, or everywhere : 
'T is never to be bought, but always free, 
And, fled from monarchs, St. John ! dwells with 

thee. 
Ask of the learned the way ? The learned are 

blind ; 
This bids to serve, and that to shun, mankind ; 
Some place the bliss in action, some in case. 
Those call it pleasure, and contentment these ; 
Some, sunk to beasts, find pleasure end in pain ; 
Some, swelled to gods, confess even virtue vain ; 
Or, indolent, to each extreme they fall, — 
To trust in everything, or doubt of all. 

Who thus define it, say they more or less 
Than this, that happiness is happiness ? 

Take Nature's path, and mad Opinion's leave ; 
All states can reach it, and all heads conceive ; 
Obvious her goods, in no extreme thej^ dwell ; 
Thei'e needs but thinking right, and meaning 

well; 
And, mourn our various portions as we please. 
Equal is common sense and common ease. 

Alexander Pope. 



THE CHARACTER OF A HAPPY LIFE. 

How happy is he born and taught 
That serveth not another's will ; 

Whose armor is his honest thought. 
And simple truth his utmost skill ! 

Whose passions not his masters are ; 

Whose soul is still prepared for death, 
Not tied unto the world with care 

Of public fame or private breath ; 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



737 *— ' 



AVho envies none that chance doth raise, 
Or vice ; who never understood 

How deepest wounds are given by praise, 
Nor rules of state, but rules of good ; 

"Who hath his life from rumors freed ; 

Whose conscience is his strong retreat ; 
Whose state can neither flatterers feed. 

Nor ruin make accusers great ; 

Who God doth late and early pray 
More of his grace than gifts to lend, 

And entertains the harmless day 

With a well-chosen book or friend, — 

This man is freed from servile bands 

Of hope to rise, or fear to fall ; 
Lord of himself, though not of lands ; 

And, having nothing, yet hath all. 

Sir Henry Wotton. 



THE HERMIT. 

At the close of the day, when the hamlet is still, 
And mortals the sweets of forgetfulness prove. 
When naught but the torrent is heard on the hill. 
And naught but the nightingale's song in the'grove, 
'T was thus, by the cave of the mountain afar. 
While his harp rung symphonious, a hermit be- 
gan ; 
No more with himself or with nature at war, 
He thought as a sage, though he felt as a man : 

"Ah ! why, all abandoned to darkness and woe, 
Whj', lone Philomela, that languishing fall ? 
For spring shall return, and a lover bestow. 
And sori'ow no longer thj^ bosom inthrall. 
But, if pity inspire thee, renew the sad lay, — 
Mourn, sweetest coniplainer, man calls thee to 

mourn ! 
0, soothe him whose pleasures like thine pass 

away ; 
Full quickly they pass, ■ — but they never return. 

"Now, gliding remote on the verge of the skj, 
The moon, half extinguished, her crescent dis- 
plays ; 
But lately I marked v/hen majestic on high 
She shone, and the planets were lost in her blaze. 
Roll on, thou fair orb, and with gladness pursue 
The path that conducts thee to splendor again ! 
But man's faded glory what change shall renew ? 
Ah, fool ! to exult in a glory so vain ! 

'"T is night, and the landscape is lovely no more. 
I mourn, — but, ye woodlands, I mourn not for 
you ; 



For morn is approaching your charms to restore. 
Perfumed with fresh fragrance, and glittering 

with dew. 
Nor yet for the ravage of winter I mourn, — ■ 
Kind nature the embryo blossom will save ; 
But when shall spring visit the mouldering urn ? 
0, when shall day dawn on the night of the grave ? 

' "T was thus, by the glare of false science betrayed, 
Tha.t leads to bewilder, and dazzles to blind. 
My thoughts wont to roam from shade onward to 

shade, 
Destruction before me, and sorrow behind. 
' pity, great Father of light,' then I cried, 
' Thy creature, who fain would not wander from 

thee ! 
Lo, humbled in dust, I relinquish my pride ; 
From doubt and from darkness thou only canst 

free.' 

" And darkness and doubt are now flying away ; 
No longer I roam in conjecture forlorn. 
So bi'eaks on the traveller, faint and astray. 
The bright and the balmy effulgence of moi'n. 
See truth, love, and mercy in triumph descending. 
And nature all glowing in Eden's first bloom ! 
On the cold cheek of death smiles and roses are 

blending. 
And beauty immortal awakes from the tomb." 

James Beattie. 



THE RETIREMENT. 

Farewell, thou busy world, and may 
We never meet again ; 
Here I can eat and sleep and pray. 
And do more good in one short day 
Than he who his whole age outwears 
Upon the most conspicuous theatres, 
AVhere naught but vanity and vice appears. 

Good God ! hoM^ sweet are all things here ! 
How beautiful the fields appear ! 

How cleanly do we feed and lie ! 
Lord ! what good hours do we keep ! 
How quietly we sleep ! 

What peace, what unanimity I 
How innocent from the lewd fasliion 
Is all our business, all our recreation I 

0, how happy here 's our leisure ! 
O, how innocent our pleasure ! 
ye valleys ! ye mountains ! 
ye groves and crystal fountains ! 
How I love, at liberty, 
By turns to come and visit ye ! 



(S-z 



738 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



--n 



Dear solitude, the soul's best friend, 
That man acquainted with himself dost make, 
And all his Maker's wonders to intend, 
"With thee I here converse at will, 
And would be glad to do so still. 
For it is thou alone that keep'st the soul awake. 

How calm and quiet a delight 

Is it, alone. 
To read and meditate and write. 

By none offended, and offending none ! 
To v/alk, ride, sit, or sleep at one's own ease ; 
And, pleasing a man's self, none other to displease. 

my beloved nymph, fair Dove, 
Princess of rivers, how I love 

Upon thy flowery banks to lie. 
And view thy silver stream. 
When gilded by a summer's beam ! 
And in it all thy wanton fry 
Playing at liberty. 
And with my angle upon them 
The all of treachery 

1 ever learned, industriously to try ! 

Such streams Piome's yellow Tiber cannot show, 
The Iberian Tagus, or Ligurian Po ; 
The Maese, the Danube, and the Rhine, 
Are puddle-water, all, compared with thine ; 
And Loire's pure streams yet too polluted are 
With thine, much purer, to compare ; 
The rapid Garonne and the winding Seine 
Are both too mean. 

Beloved Dove, with thee 

To vie priority ; 
Nay, Tame and I sis, when conjoined, submit, 
And lay their trophies at thy silver feet. 

my beloved rocks, that rise 

To awe the earth and brave the skies ! 

From some aspiring mountain's crown 

How dearly do I love. 
Giddy with pleasure to look down. 
And from the vales to view the noble heights 
above ! 
my beloved caves ! from dog-star's heat. 
And all anxieties, my safe retreat ; 
What safety, privacy, what true delight, 
In the artificial night 
Your gloomy entrails make. 
Have I taken, do I take ! 
How oft, when grief has made me fl}'. 
To hide me from society 
E'en of my dearest friends, have I, 

In your recesses' fiiendly shade. 
All my sorrows open laid. 
And my most secret woes intrusted to your 
privacy ! 



Lord ! would men let me alone. 
What an over-happy one 

Should I think myself to be, — 
Might I in this desert place 
(Which most men in discourse disgrace) 

Live but undisturbed and free ! 
Here in this despised recess. 

Would I, maugre winter's cold 
And the summer's worst excess. 

Try to live out to sixty full years old ; 
And, all the wliile. 

Without an envious eye 
On any thriving under Fortune's smile, 
Contented live, and then contented die. 

Charles Cotton. 



VERSES 

SUPPOSKD TO BE WRITTEN BY ALEXANDER SELKIRK 
DURING MIS SOLITARY ABODE IN THE ISLAND OF JUAN 
FERNANDEZ. 

I AM monarch of all I survey, — 
My right thei'e is none to dispute ; 

From the centre all round to the sea, 
I am lord of the fowl and the brute. 

Solitude ! where are the charms 
That sages have seen in thy face ? 

Better dwell in the midst of alarms 
Than reign in this horrible place. 

1 am out of humanity's reach ; 

I must finish my journey alone. 
Never hear the sweet music of speech, — • 

I start at the sound of my own. 
The beasts that roam over the jjlain 

My form with indiii'erence see ; 
They are so unacquainted with man. 

Their tameness is shocking to me. 

Society, friendship, and love. 

Divinely bestowed wpon man ! 
0, had 1 the wings of a dove. 

How soon would I taste you again ! 
My sorrows I then might assuage 

In the ways of religion and truth, — 
Might lear-n from the wisdom of age. 

And be cheered by the sallies of youth. 

Religion ! what treasure untold 

Resides in that heavenly word ! — ■ 
More precious than silver and gold. 

Or all that this earth can afford ; 
But the sound of the church -going bell 

These valleys and rocks never heard. 
Never sighed at the sound of a knell. 

Or smiled when a Sabbath appeared. 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



^ 



Ye winds that have made me your sport, 

Convey to this desolate shore 
Some cordial, endearing report 

Of a land I shall visit no more ! 
My friends, — do they now and then send 

A wish or a thought after me ? 
0, tell me I yet have a friend, 

Though a friend I am never to see. 

How fleet is a glance of the mind ! 

Compared with the speed of its flight. 
The tempest itself lags behind. 

And the swift- winged arrows of light. 
When I think of my own native land. 

In a moment I seem to be there ; 
But, alas ! recollection at hand 

Soon hurries me back to despair. 

But the sea-fowl is gone to her nest. 

The beast is laid down in his laii- ; 
Even here is a season of rest, 

And I to my cabin repair. 
There 's mercy in every place, 

And mercy — encouraging thought ! — 
Gives even affliction a grace. 

And reconciles man to his lot. 

William Cowper. 



THE GOOD GREAT MAN. 

How seldom, friend, a good great man inherits 
Honor and wealth, with all his worth and pains! 
It seems a story from the world of spirits 
When any man obtains that which he merits, 
Or any merits that which he obtains. 



For shame, my friend ! renounce this idle strain ! 
What wouldst thou have a good great man obtain ? 
Wealth, title, dignity, a golden chain. 
Or heap of corses which his sword hath slain ? 
Goodness and greatness are not means, but ends. 

Hath he not always treasures, always friends, — 
The good great man ? Three treasures, — love, 
and light, 
And calm thoughts, equable as infant's breath ; 
And three fast friends, more sure than day or 
night, — 
Himself, his Make)-, and the angel Death. 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 



EXAMPLE. 

We scatter seeds with careless hand, 

And dream we ne'er shall see them more ; 
But for a thousand years 
Their fruit appears. 
In weeds that mar the land, 
Or healthful store. 



The deeds we do, the words we say, — 
Into still air they seem to fleet. 
We count them ever past ; 
But they shall last, — 
In the dread judgment they 
And we shall meet. 

I charge thee by the years gone by, 

For the love's sake of brethren dear, 

Keep thou the one true way, 

In work and play. 

Lest in that world their cry 

Of woe thou hear. 

John Keble. 



LIVING WATERS. 

There are some hearts like wells, green-mossed 
and deep 

As ever Sunmier saw ; 
And cool their water is, — yea, cool and sweet ; — 

But you must come to draw. 
They hoard not, yet they rest in calm content. 

And not unsought will give ; 
They can be quiet with their wealth unspent. 

So self-contained they live. 

And there are some like springs, . that bubbling 
burst 

To follow dusty ways. 
And run with off'ered cup to quench his thirst 

Where the tired traveller strays ; 
That never ask the meadows if they want 

What is their joy to give ; — 
Unasked, their lives to other life they grant. 

So self-bestowed they live ! 

And One is like the ocean, deep and wide. 

Wherein all waters fall ; 
That girdles the broad earth, and draws the tide, 

Feeding and bearing all ; 
That broods the mists, that sends the clouds,' 
abroad, 

That takes, again to give ; — 
Even the great and loving heart of God, 

Whereby all love dotli live. 

Caroline S. Spencer. 



THE SEASIDE WELL. 

" Waters flowed over my head ; then I said, I am cut off." 
Layiie^Uations, iii. 54. 

One day I wandered where the salt sea-tide 

Backward had drawn its wave. 
And found a spring as sweet as e'er hillside 
. To wild-flowers gave. 



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740 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



-a 



Freshly it sparkled in the sun's bright look, 

And mid its pebbles strayed, 
As if it thought to join a happy brook 

In some green glade. 

But soon the heavj^ sea's resistless swell 

Came rolling in once more. 
Spreading its bitter o'er the clear sweet well 

And pebbled shore. 
Like a fair star thick buried in a cloud, 

Or life in the grave's gloom. 
The well, enwrapped in a deep watery shroud. 

Sunk to its tomb. 

As one who by the beach roams far and wide, 

Piemnant of wreck to save, 
Again I wandered when the salt sea-tide 

Withdrew its wave ; 
And there, unchanged, no taint in all its sweet. 

No anger in its tone, 
Still as it thought some happy brook to meet. 

The spring flowed on. 

While waves of bitterness rolled o'er its head, 

Its heart had folded deep 
Within itself, and quiet fancies led. 

As in a sleep ; 
Till, when the ocean loosed his heavy chain, 

And gave it back to daj'-. 
Calmly it turned to its own life again 

And gentle way. 

Happy, I thought, that which can draw its life 

Deep from the nether springs, 
Safe 'neath the pressure, tranquil mid the strife. 

Of surface things. 
Safe — for the sources of the nether springs 

Up in the far hills lie ; 
Calm — for the life its power and freshness brings 

Down from the sky. 

So, should temptations threaten, and should sin 

EoU in its whelming flood, 
Make strong the fountain of thy grace within 

My soul, God ! 
If bitter scorn, and looks, once kind, grown 
strange. 

With crushing chillness fall. 
From secret wells let sweetness rise, nor change 

My heart to gall ! 

When sore thy hand doth press, and waves of 
thine 

Afflict me like a sea, — 
Deep calling deep, — infuse from source divine 

Thy peace in me ! 
And when death's tide, as with a brimful cup. 

Over my soul doth pour. 
Let hope survive, — a well that springeth up 

Forevermore ! 



Above my head the waves may come and go, 

Long brood the deluge dire. 
But life lies hidden in the depths below 

Till waves retire, — 
Till death, that reigns with overflowing flood, 

At length withdraw its swaj^. 
And life rise sparkling in the sight of God 

An endless day. 

Anonymous. 



THE MEN OF OLD. 

I KNOW not that the men of old 

Were better than men now, 
Of heart more kind, of hand more bold, 

Of more ingenuous brow ; 
I heed not those who pine for force 

A ghost of time to raise. 
As if they thus could check the course 

Of these appointed days. 

Still it is true, and over-true, 

That I delight to close 
This book of life self-wise and new, 

And let my thoughts repose 
On all that humble happiness 

The world has since foregone, — 
The daylight of contentedness 

That on those faces shone ! 

With rights, though not too closely scanned, 

Enjoyed as far as known. 
With will by no reverse unmanned. 

With pulse of even tone. 
They from to-day, and from to-night. 

Expected nothing more 
Than yesterday and yesternight 

Had proft'ered them before. 

To them was life a simple art 

Of duties to be done, 
A game where each man took his part, 

A race where all must run ; 
A battle whose great scheme and scope 

They little cared to know, 
Content, as men-at-arms, to cope 

Each with his fronting foe. 

Man now his virtue's diadem 

Puts on, and proudly wears . — 
Great thoughts, great feelings, came to them, 

Like instincts unawares ; 
Blending their souls' sublimest needs 

With tasks of every day 
They went about their gravest deeds 

As noble boys at play. 



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And what if Nature's fearful wound 

They did not probe and bare, 
For that their spirits never swooned 

To watch the misery there, — 
For that their love but flowed more fast, 

Their charities more free, 
Not conscious what mere drops they cast 

Into the evil sea. 

A man's best things are nearest him, 

Lie close about his feet ; 
It is the distant and the dim 

That we are sick to greet ; 
J'or flowers that grow our hands beneath 

We struggle and aspire, — 
Oar hearts must die, except they breathe 

The air of fresh desire. 

Yet, brothers, who up reason's hill 

Advance with hopeful clieer, — 
Oh, loiter not, those heights are chill, 

As chill as they are clear ; 
And still restrain your haughty gaze 

The loftier that ye go, 
Eemembering distance leaves a haze 

On all that lies below. 

Richard Monckton Milnes, Lord Houchtox. 



HISTORY OF A LIFE. 

Day dawned ; — within a curtained room, 
Filled to faintness with perfume, 
A lady lay at point of doom. 

Day closed ; — a Child had seen the light : 
But, for the lady fair and bright, 
She rested in undreaming night. 

Spring rose ; — the lady's grave was green ; 
And near it, oftentimes, was seen 
A gentle Boy with thoughtful mien. 

Years fled ; — he wore a manly face. 
And struggled in the world's rough race. 
And won at last a lofty place. 

And then he died ! Behold before ye 

Humanity's poor sum and story ; 

Life, — Death, — and all that is of Glory. 

BRYAN WALLER PROCTER {Harry Coniwall). 



THE ROSE-BUSH. 

A CHILD sleeps under a rose-bush fair, 
The buds swell out in the soft May air ; 
Sweetly it rests, and on dream-wings flies 
To play with the angels in Paradise. 
And the years glide by. 



A Maiden stands by the rose-bush fair, 
The dewy blossoms perfume the air ; 
She presses her baud to her throbbing breast. 
With love's first wonderful rapture blest. 
And the years glide by. 

A Mother kneels by the rose-bush fair, 
Soft sigh the leaves in the evening air ; 
Sorrowing thoughts of the past arise. 
And tears of anguish bedim her eyes. 
And the years glide by. 

Naked and lone stands the rose-bush fair, 
Whirled are the leaves in the autumn air, 
Withered and dead they fall to the ground, 
And silently cover a new-made mound. 
And the years glide by. 

From the German, by WILLIAM W. CALDWELL. 



LIFE. 



I MADE a posie, while the day ran by : 
"Here will 1 smell my remnant out, and tie 

My life within this band." 
But Time did beckon to the flowers, and they 
By noon most cunningly did steal away. 

And withered in my hand. 

My hand was next to them, and then my heart ; 
I took, without more thinking, in good part 

Time's gentle admonition ; 
Who did so sweetly death's sad taste convey. 
Making my minde to smell my fatall day, 

Yet sug'ring the suspicion. 

Farewell, dear flowers ! sweetly your time ye 

spent ; 
Fit, while ye lived, for smell or ornament, 

.And after death for cures. 
I follow straight without complaints or grief ; 
Since, if my scent be good, I care not if 
It be as short as youi's. 

George Herbert. 



THE RIVER OF LIFE. 

The more we live, more brief appear 
Our life's succeeding stages ; 

A day to childhood seems a year. 
And years like passing ages. 

The gladsome current of our youth, 
Ere passion yet disorders. 

Steals lingering like a river smooth 
Along its grassy borders. 



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But, as the careworn cheek grows M'an, 
And sorrow's shafts fly thicker, 

Ye stars, that measure life to man, 
Why seem your courses quicker ? 

When joys have lost their bloom and breath, 

And life itself is vapid, 
Why, as we near the Falls of Death, 

Feel we its tide more rapid ? 

It may be strange, — yet who would change 
Time's course to slower speeding, 

When one by one our friends have gone, 
And left our bosoms bleeding ? 

Heaven gives our years of fiiding strength 

Indemnifying fleetness ; 
And those of youth, a seemhig length. 

Proportioned to their sweetness. 

Thomas Ca.mpbell. 



THE VOYAGE OF LIFE. 

FROM "THE SPLEEN." 

Thus, then, I steer my bark, and sail 
On even keel with gentle gale ; 
At helm I make my reason sit, 
My crew of passions all submit. 
If dark and blustering prove some nights, 
Philosophy puts forth her lights ; 
Experience holds the cautious glass, 
To shun the breakers, as I pass. 
And frequent throws the wary lead. 
To see what dangers may be hid ; 
And once in seven j'ears I 'm seen 
At Bath or Tunbridge to careen. 
Though pleased to see the dolphins play, 
I mind my compass and my way. 
With store sufficient for belief, 
And wisely still prepared to reef. 
Nor wanting the dispersive bowl 
Of cloudy weather in the soul, 
I make (may Heaven propitious send 
Such wind and weather to the end). 
Neither becalmed nor overblown, 
Life's voyage to the world unknown. 

Matthew Green. 



THE ROSARY OF MY TEARS. 

Some reckon their age by years. 

Some measure their life by art ; 
But some tell their days by the flow of their tears. 

And their lives by the moans of their heart. 

The dials of earth may show 

The length, not the depth of j'ears, — 



Few or many they come, few or many they go, — 
But time is best measured by tears. 

Ah ! not by the silver gray 

That creeps through the sunny hair, 

And not by the scenes that we pass on our way, 
And not by the furrows the fingers of care 

On forehead and face have made, — 

Not so do we count our years ; 
Not by the sun of the earth, but the shade 

Of our souls, and the fall of our tears. 

For the young are ofttimes old. 

Though their brows be bright and fair ; 

While their blood beats warm, their hearts are 
cold — 
O'er them the spring — but winter is there. 

And the old are ofttimes young 

When their hair is thin and white ; 

And they sing in age, as in youth thty sung, 
And they laugh, for their cross was light. 

But, bead by bead, I tell 

The Rosary of my years ; 
From a cross — to a cross they lead ; 't is well, 

And they 're blest with a blessing of tears. 

Better a day of strife 

Than a century of sleep ; 
Give me instead of a long stream of life 

The tempests and tears of the deep. 

A thousand joys may foam 

On the billows of all the years ; 
But never the foam brings the lone back home, — 

He reaches the haven through tears. 

Abram J. Ryan. 



THE AIM OF LIFE. 

FROM " FESTUS." 

We live in. deeds, not years ; in thoughts, not 

breaths ; 
In feelings, not in figures on a dial. 
We should count time by heart-throbs. He most 

lives. 
Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best. 
And he whose heart beats quickest lives the 

longest : 
Lives in one hour more than in years do some 
Whose fat blood sleeps as it slips along their 

veins. 
Life is but a means unto an end ; that end. 
Beginning, mean, and end to all things, — God. 
The dead have all the glory of the world. 

Philip James Bailey 



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LIFE. 

My life is like the summer rose, 
That opens to the morning sky, 
But, ere the shades of evening close, 
Is scattered on the ground — to die ! 
Yet on the rose's humble bed 
The sweetest dews of night are shed, 
As if .she wept the waste to see, — 
But none shall weep a tear for me ! 

My life is like the autumn leaf 
That trembles in the moon's pale ray ; 
Its hold is frail, — its date is brief. 
Restless, and soon to pass away ! 
Yet, ere that leaf shall fall and fade, 
The parent tree will mourn its shade, 
The winds bewail the leafless tree, — - 
But none shall bi'eathe a sigh for me ! 

My life is like the prints which fm; 
Have left on Tamjia's desert strand ; 
Soon as the rising tide shall beat. 
All ti-ace will vanish from the sand ; 
Yet, as if grieving to efface 
All vestige of the human race, 
On that lone shore loud moans the sea, — 
But none, alas ! shall mourn for me ! 

Richard Henry Wilde. 



"BLESSED ARE THEY THAT MOURN." 

0, DEEM not they are blest alone 
Whose lives a peaceful tenor keep ; 

The Power who j)ities man has shown 
A blessing for the eyes that weep. 

The light of smiles shall fill again 
The lids that overflow with tears ; 

And weary hours of woe and pain 
Are promises of happier years. 

There is a da}' of sunny rest 

For every dark and troubled night ; 

And grief may bide an .evening guest, 
But joy shall come with early light. 

And thou who, o'er thy friend's low bier, 
Sheddest the bitter drops like rain, 

Hope that a brighter, happier sphere 
Will give him to thy arms again. 

Nor let the good man's trust depart. 
Though life its common gifts deny, — 

Though with a pierced and bleeding heart. 
And spurned of men, he goes to die. 



For God hath marked each sorrowing day 
And numbered every secret tear, 

And heaven's long age of bliss shall pay 
For all his children suff'er here. 

William Cullen Bryant. 



HOPE. 



FRO.M "-IHE PLEASURES OF HOPE."* 

UxFADiNG Hope ! when life's last embers burn, 
When soul to soul, and dust to dust return ! 
Heaven to thy charge resigns the awful hour ! 
0, then thy kingdom comes ! Immortal Power ! 
What though each spark of earth-born rapture fly 
The quivering lip, pale cheek, and closing eye ! 
Bright to the soul thy seraph hands convey 
The morning dream of life's eternal day, — 
Then, then, the triumph and the trance begin. 
And all the phoenix spirit burns within ! 

Daughter of Faith, awake, arise, illume 
The dread unknown, the chaos of the tomb ; 
Melt, and dispel, ye spectre-doubts, that I'oll 
Cimmerian darkness o'er the parting soul ! 
Fly, like the moon-eyed herald of Dismay, 
Chased on his night-steed by the star of day ! 
The strife is o'er, — the pangs of Nature close. 
And life's last rapture triumphs o'er her woes. 
Hark ! as the spirit eyes, with eagle gaze, 
The noon of Heaven untlazzled by the blaze, 
On heavenly winds that waft her to the sky, 
Float the sweet tones of star-born melody ; 
Wild as that hallowed anthem sent to hail 
Bethlehem's shepherds in the lonely vale. 
When Jordan hushed his waves, and midnightstill 
Watched on the holy towers of Zion hill ! 

Eternal Hope ! when yonder s])heres sublime 
Pealed their first notes to sound the march of Time, 
Thy joyous youth began, — but not to fade. 
When all the sister planets have decaj^ed ; 
When wrapt in fire the I'ealms of ether glow, 
And Heaven's last thunder shakes the world 

below ; 
Thou, undismayed, shalt o'er the ruins smile, 
And light thy torch at Nature's funeral pile. 

Thomas Ca.mpbell. 



THE VANITY OF THE WORLD. 

Fal.se world, thou ly'st : thou canst not lend 

The least delight : 
Thy favors cannot gain a friend, 

They are so slight : 

* This poem was written when the author w.is but twenty-one 
years of age. ' 



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Thy morning pleasures make an end 

To please at night : 
Poor are the wants that tliou snpply'st, 
And yet thou vaunt'st, and yet thou vy'st 
"With heaven : fond earth, thou boasts ; false 
world, thou ly'st. 

Thy babbling tongue tells golden tales 

Of endless treasure ; 
Thy bounty offers easy sales 

Of lasting pleasure ; 
Thou ask'st the conscience what she ails, 

And swear'st to ease her ; 
There 's none can want where thou supply'st ; 
There 's none can give where thou deny'st. 
Alas ! fond world, thou boasts ; false world, thou 
ly'st. 

What well-advised ear regards 

What earth can say ? 
Thy words are gold, but thy rewards 

Are painted clay : 
Thy cunning can but pack the cards, 

Tliou canst not play : 
Thy game at weakest, still thou vy'st ; 
If seen, and then revy'd, deny'st : 
Thou art not what thou seem'st ; false world, 
thou ly'st. 

Thy tinsel bosom seems a mint 

Of new-coined treasure ; 
A paradise, that has no stint, 

No change, no measure ; 
A painted cask, but nothing in 't, 

Nor wealth, nor pleasure : 
Vain earth ! that falsely thus comply'st 
AVith man ; vain man ! that thou rely'st 
On earth ; vain man, thou dot'st ; vain earth, 
thou ly'st. 

What mean dull souls, in this high measure. 

To haberdash 
In earth's base wares, whose greatest treasure 

Is dross and trash ? 
The height of whose enchanting pleasure 

Is but a flash ? 
Are these the goods that thou supply'st 
Us mortals with ? Are these the high'st ? 
Can these bring cordial peace ? false world, thou 
ly'st. 

FRANCES QUARLES. 



GOOD BY. 

Coon by, proud world, I 'm going home : 
Thou art not my friend, and I'm not thine. 
Long through thy weary crowds I roam ; 
A river-ark on the ocean brine. 
Long I 've been tossed like the driven foam, 
But now, proud world, I 'm going home. 



Good by to Flattery's fawning face ; 

To Grandeur with his wise grimace ; 

To upstart Wealtii's averted eye ; 

To sujiple Office, low and high ; 

To crowded halls, to court and street ; 

To frozen hearts and hasting feet ; 

To those who go, and those who come ; 

Good by, proud world ! I 'm going home. 

I 'm going to my own hearth-stone, 
Bosomed in yon green hills alone, — 
A secret nook in a pleasant land, 
Wliose groves the fi-olic fairies planned ; 
Where arches green, the livelong daj^ 
Echo the blackbird's roundelay, 
And vulgar feet have never trod 
A spot that is sacred to thought and God. 

0, when I am safe in my sylvan home, 
I tread on the pride of Greece and Rome ; 
And when I am stretched beneath the pines, 
Where the evening star so holj' shines, 
I laugh at the lore and the pride of man, 
At the sophist schools, and the learned clan ; 
For what are they all, in their high conceit. 
When man in the bush with God may meet ? 
Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



THE NEVEPvMORE. 

Look in my face ; my name is Might-ha\'e-been ; 

I am also called No-moie, Too-late, Farewell ; 

Unto thine ear I hold the dead-sea shell 
Cast up thy Life's foam -fretted feet between ; 
Unto thine ej'es the glass where that is seen 

AVliich had Life's form and Love's, but by nij^ 
spell 

Is now a shaken shadow intolerable. 
Of ultimate things unuttered the frail screen. 

Mark me, how still I am ! But should there dart 
One moment through Tuy soul the soft surprise 
Of that winged Peace which lulls the breath of 
sighs, — 
Then shalt thou see me smile, and turn apart 
Thy visage to mine ambush at thy heart 
Sleepless with cold commemorative eyes. 

Dante Gabriel Rossetti. 



THE GENIUS OF DEATH. 

What is death ? 'T is to be free, 
No more to love or hope or fear, 

To join the great equality ; 

All, all alike are humbled there. 



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The mighty grave 

Wraps lord and slave ; 
Nor pride nor poverty dares come 
"Within that refuge-house, — the tomb. 

Spirit with the drooping wing 

And the ever-weeping eye, 
Thou of all earth's kings art king ; 
Empires at thy footstool lie ; 
Beneath thee strewed, 
Their multitude 
Sink like waves upon the shore ; 
Storms shall never raise them more. 

What 's the grandeur of the earth 

To the grandeur round thy throne ? 
Riches, glory, beauty, birth. 
To thy kingdom all have gone. 
Before thee stand 
The wondrous band, — 
Bards, heroes, sages, side by side, 
Who darkened nations when they died. 

Earth has hosts, but thou canst show 

Many a million for her one ; 
Through thy gates the mortal flow 
Hath for countless -years rolled on. 
Back from the tomb 
No step has come. 
There fixed till the last thunder's sound 
Shall bid thy prisoners be unbound. 

George Croly. 



LINES 

WRITTEN BY ONE IN THE TOWER, BEING YOUNG AND 
CONDEMNED TO DIE. 

My prime of youth is but a frost of cares ; 

My feast of joy is but a dish of pain ; 
My crop of corn is but a field of tares ; 

And all my good is but vain hope of gain : 
The day is [fled], and yet I saw no sun ; 
And now I live, and now my life is done ! 

The spring is past, and yet it hath not sprung ; 

The fruit is dead, and yet the leaves are green ; 
My youth is gone, and yet I am biit young; 

I saw the world, and yet I was not seen : 
]\Iy thread is cut, and yet it is not spun ; 
And now I live, and now my life is done ! 

I sought my death, and found it in my womb ; 

I looked for life, and saw it was a shade ; 
I trod the earth, and knew it was my tomb ; 

And now I die, and now I am but made : 
The glass is full, and now my glass is run ; 
And now I live, and now my life is done ! 

Chidiock Tychborn. 



LINES 

found in his BIBLE IN THE GATE-HOUSE AT 
WESTMINSTER. 

E'en such is time ; that takes in trust 
Our youth, our joys, our all we have, 
And pays us but with earth and dust ; 

Who in the dark and silent grave. 
When we have wandered all our ways, 
Shuts up the story of our days : 
But from this earth, this grave, this dust, 
My God shall raise me up, I trust. 

Sir Walter Raleigh. 



THE SOUL'S ERRAND. 

Go, soul, the body's guest, 
Upon a thankless arrant ! 

Fear not to touch the best. 

The truth shall be thy warrant : 

Go, since I needs must die. 

And give the world the lie. 

Go, tell the court it glows 
And shines like rotten wood ; 

Go, tell the church it shows 

What 's good, and doth no good , 

If church and court reply, 

Then give them both tlae lie. 

Tell potentates they live 
Acting by others' action, 

Not loved unless they give. 
Not strong but by a faction : 

If potentates reply. 

Give potentates the lie. 

Tell men of high condition 

That manage the estate, 
Their purpose is ambition, 

Their practice only hate : 
And if they once reply, 
Then give them all the lie. 

Tell them that brave it most. 
They beg for more by spending. 

Who, in their greatest cost. 

Seek nothing but commending : 

And if they make reply, 

Then give them all the lie. 

Tell zeal it wants devotion ; 

Tell love it is but lust ; 
Tell time it is but motion ; 

Tell flesh it is but dust : 
And wish them not reply, 
For thou must give the lie. 



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Tell age it daily wasteth ; 

Tell honor how it alters ; 
Tell beaiity how she blasteth ; 

Tell favor how it falters : 
And as they shall reply, 
Give every one the lie. 

Tell wit how much it wrangles. 
In tickle points of niceness ; 

Tell wisdom she entangles 
Herself in over-wiseness : 

And when they do reply, 

Straight give them both the lie. 

Tell physic of her boldness ; 

Tell skill it is pretension ; 
Tell charity of coldness ; 

Tell law it is contention : 
And as they do reply. 
So give them still the lie. 

Tell fortune of her blindness ; 

Tell nature of decay ; 
Tell friendship of unkindness ; 

Tell justice of delay : 
And if they will reply, 
Then give them all the lie. 

Tell arts they have no soundness, 

But vary by esteeming ; 
Tell schools they want profoundness. 

And stand too much on seeming : 
If arts and schools reply. 
Give arts and schools the lie. 

Tell faith it 's fled the city ; 

Tell how the country erreth ; 
Tell, manhood shakes off pity ; 

Tell, virtue least pref erreth : 
And if they do reply, 
Spare not to give the lie. 

So when thou hast, as I 

Commanded thee, done blabbing, — 
Although to give the lie 

Deserves no less than stabbing, — 
Yet, stab at thee that will. 
No stab the soul can kill. 

Sir Walter Raleigh. 



LETTERS. 

Evert day brings a ship, 
Every ship brings a word ; 
Well for those who have no fear, 
Looking seaward well assured 
That the word the vessel brings 
Is the word they wish to hear. 

RALPH WALDO Emerson. 



BRAHMA. 

If the red slayer think he slays. 
Or if the slain think he is slain. 

They know not well the subtle ways 
I keep, and pass, and turn again. 

Far or forgot to me is near ; 

Shadow and sunlight are the same ; 
The vanished gods to me appear ; 

And one to me are shame and fame. 

They reckon ill who leave me out ; 

When me they &j, I am the wings ; 
I arn the doubter and the doubt. 

And I the hymn the Brahmin sings. 

The strong gods pine for my abode. 
And pine in vain the sacred Seven ; 

But thou, meek lover of the good ! 

Find me, and turn thy back on heaven. 
Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



BRAHMA'S ANSWER. 

Once, when the days were ages. 
And the old Earth was young. 
The high gods and the sages 
From Nature's golden pages 
Her open secrets wrung. 
Each questioned each to know 
Whence came the Heavens above, and whence the 
Earth below. 

Indra, the endless giver 

Of every gracious thing 
The gods to him deliver. 
Whose bounty is the river 

Of which they are the spring — 
Indra, with anxious heart, 
Ventures with Vivochunu where Brahma is a 
part. 

" Brahma ! Supremest Being ! 

By whom the worlds are made. 
Where we are blind, all-seeing. 
Stable, where we are fleeing. 
Of Life and Death afraid, — 
Instruct us, for mankind. 
What is the body, Brahma ? Brahma ! what 
the mind ? " 

Hearing as though he heard not 

So perfect ■was his rest. 
So vast the soul that erred not, 
So wise the lips that stirred not — 
His hand upon his breast 
He laid, whereat his face 
Was mirrored in the river that girt that holy 
place. 



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They questioned each, the other 

What Brahma's answer meant. 
Said Vivochunu, " Brother, 
Through Brahma the great Mother 
Hath spoken her intent : 
Man ends as he began, — • 
The shadow on the water is all there is of man ! " 

" The earth with woe is cumbered. 

And no man understands ; 
They see their days are numbered 
By one that never slumbered 

Nor stayed his dreadful hands. 

/ see with Brahma's eyes — 
The body is the shadow that on the water lies : " 

Thus Indra, looking deeper, 

With Brahma's self possessed. 
So dry thine eyes, thou weeper ! 
And rise again, thou sleeper ! 
The hand on Brahma's breast 
Is his divine assent. 
Covering the soul that dies not. This is what 
Brahma meant. 

Richard Henry Stoddard. 



EETEIBUTION. 

'0\p£ BeSiv aXeovai, fivKoi, aKeovcn Se KetrTa., 

{" The mills of the gods grind late, but they grind fine.") 

Greek Poet. 

Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they 

grind exceeding small ; 
Though with patience he stands waiting, with 

exactness grinds he all. 

From the German of F. VON LOGAU. Trans- 
lation of H. W. LONGFELLOW. 



TIME. 



FROM 'NIGHT THOUGHTS," NIGHT I. 

The bell strikes one : we take no note of time. 
But from its loss. To give it, then, a tongue. 
Is wise in man. As if an angel spoke, 
I feel the solemn sound. If heard aright. 
It is the knell of my departed hours : 
Where are they ? With the years beyond the flood. 
It is the signal that demands despatch ; 
How much is to be done ! my hopes and fears 
Start up alarmed, and o'er life's narrow verge 
Look down — on what ? a fathomless abyss ; 
A dread eternity ; how surely mine ! 
And can eternity belong to me. 
Poor pensioner on the bounties of an hour ? 



Time the supreme ! — Time is eternity ; 
Pregnant with all eternity can give ; 
Pregnant with all that makes archangels smile. 
Who murders time, he crushes in the birth 
A power ethereal, only not adored. 

Ah ! how unjust to Nature and himself, 
Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man ! 
Like children babbling nonsense in their sports, 
We censure Nature for a spaia too short : 
That span too short, we tax as tedious too ; 
Torture invention, all expedients tire, 
To lash the lingering moments into speed, 
And whirl us (happy riddance !) from ourselves. 
Art, bi'ainless Art ! our furious charioteer 
(For Nature's voice, unstifled, would recall), 
Drives headlong towards the precipice of death ! 
Death, most our dread ; death, thus more di'ead- 

ful made : 
0, what a riddle of absurdity ! 
Leisure is pain ; takes off our chariot wheels ; 
How heavily we drag the load of life ! 
Blest leisure is our curse : like that of Cain, 
It makes us wander ; wander earth around 
To fl}'- that tyrant, Thonght. As Atlas groaned 
The world beneath, we groan beneath an hour. 
We cry for mercy to the next amusement : 
The next amusement mortgages our fields ; 
Slight inconvenience ! prisons hardly frown, 
From hateful Time if prisons set us free. 
Yet when Death kindly tenders us relief, 
We call him cruel ; years to moments shrink, 
Ages to years. The telescope is turned. 
To man's false optics (from his folly false) 
Time, in advance, behind him hides his wings, 
And seems to creep, decrepit with his age ; 
Behold him when past by ; what then is seen 
But his broad pinions, swifter than the winds ? 
And all mankind, in contradiction strong, 
Rueful, aghast, cry out on his career. 

Ye well arrayed ! ye lilies of our land ! 
Ye lilies male ! who neither toil nor spin 
(As sister-lilies might) if not so wise 
As Solomon, more sumptuous to the sight ! 
Ye delicate ! who nothing can support, 
Yourselves most insupportable ! for whom 
The winter rose must blow, the sun put on 
A brighter beam in Leo ; silky-soft 
Favonius, breathe still softer, or be chid ; 
And other worlds send odors, sauce, and song, 
And robes, and notions, framed in foreign looms ! 
ye Lorenzos of our age ! who deem 
One moment una,mused a misery 
Not made for feeble man ! who call aloud 
For every bawble drivelled o'er by sense ; 
For rattles, and conceits of every cast. 
For change of follies and relays of joy. 



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To drag you patient through the tedious length 
Of a short winter's day, — say, sages ! say, 
Wit's oracles ! say, dreamers of gay dreams ! 
How will you weather an eternal night, 
"Where such expedients fail ? 

DR. EDWARD YOUNG. 



PEOCRASTINATION. 

FROM " NIGHT THOUGHTS," NIGHT I. 

Be wise to-day ; 't is madness to defer ; 
Next day the fatal precedent will plead ; 
Thus on, till wisdom is pushed out of life. 
Procrastination is the thief of time ; 
Year after year it steals, till all are fled, 
And to the mercies of a moment leaves 
The vast concerns of an eternal scene. 
If not so frequent, would not this he strange ? 
That 't is so frequent, this is stranger still. 

Of man's miraculous mistakes this bears 
The palm, " That all men are about to live," 
Forever on the brink of being born. 
All pay themselves the compliment to think 
They one day shall not drivel : and their pride 
On this reversion takes up ready praise ; 
At least, their own ; their future selves applaud : 
How excellent that life they ne'er will lead ! 
Time lodged in their own hands is folly's veils ; 
That lodged in Fate's, to wisdom they consign ; 
The thing they can't but purpose, they postpone : 
'T is not in folly not to scorn a fool, 
And scarce in human wisdom to do more. 
All promise is poor dilatory man. 
And that through every stage. When young, 

indeed, 
In full content we sometimes nobly rest, 
Unanxious for ourselves, and only wish. 
As duteous sons, our fathers were more wise. 
At thirty, man suspects himself a fool ; 
Knows it at forty, and reforms his plan ; 
At iifty, chides his infamous delay. 
Pushes his prudent purpose to resolve ; 
In all the magnanimity of thought, 
Picsolves, and re-resolves ; then dies the same. 

And why ? Because he thinks himself immortal. 
All men' think all men mortal but themselves ; 
Themselves, when some alarming slrock of fate 
Strikes through their wounded hearts the sudden 

dread ; 
But their hearts wounded, like the wounded air, 
Soon close ; where passed the shaft, no trace is 

found. 
As from the wing no scar the sky retains, 
The parted wave no furrow from the keel, 
So dies in human hearts the thought of death : 
Even with the tender tears which Nature sheds 
O'er those we love, we drop it in their grave. 

Dr. Edward Young. 



WHAT IS TIME? 

I ASKED an aged man, with hoary hairs, 

Wrinkled and curved with worldly cares : 

" Time is the warp of life," said he ; " 0, tell 

The young, the fair, the gay, to weave it well ! " 

I asked the ancient, venerable dead. 

Sages who wrote, and warriors who bled : 

From the cold grave a hollow murmur flowed, 

" Time sowed the seed we reap in this abode ! " 

I asked a dying sinner, ere the ide 

Of life had left his veins : " Time ! " he replied ; 

" I 've lost it ! ah, the treasure.! " and he died. 

I asked the golden sun and silver spheres. 

Those bright chronometers of days and years : 

They answered, "Time is but a meteor glare," 

And bade me for eternity prepare. 

I asked the Seasons, in their annual round. 

Which beautify or desolate the ground ; 

And they replied (no oracle more Avise), 

"'Tis Folly's blank, and Wisdom's highest 

prize ! " 
I asked a spirit lost, — but the shriek 
That pierced my soul ! I shudder while I speak. 
It cried, ' ' A particle ! a speck ! a mite 
Of endless years, duration infinite ! " 
Of things inanimate my dial I 
Consulted, and it made me this reply, — 
" Time is the season fair of living well, 
The path of glory or the path of hell." 
I asked my Bible, and methinks it said, 
" Time is the present hour, the past has fled ; 
Live ! live to-day ! to-morrow never yet 
On any human being rose or set." 
I asked old Father Time himself at last ; 
But in a moment he flew swiftly past ; 
His chariot was a cloud, the viewless wind 
His noiseless steeds, which left no trace behind. 
I asked the mighty angel who shall stand 
One foot on sea and one on solid land : 
"Mortal ! " he cried, " the mystery now is o'er ; 
Time was, Time is, but Time shall be no more ! " 
William Marsden. 



THE JESTER'S SEEMON. 

The Jester shook his hood and bells, and leaped 
upon a chair ; 

The pages laughed, the women screamed, and 
tossed their scented hair ; 

The falcon whistled, staghounds bayed, the lap- 
dog barked without. 

The scullion drop]3ed the pitcher brown, the cook 
railed at the lout ; 

The steward, counting out his gold, let pouch 
and money fall, — 

And why ? because the Jester rose to say grace 
in the hall ! 



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The page played with the heron's plume, the 

steward with his chain ; 
The butler drummed upon the board, and laughed 

with might and main ; 
The grooms beat on their metal cans, and i-oared 

till they were red, — 
But still the Jester shut his eyes and rolled his 

witty head, 
And when they grew a little still, read half a 

yard of text, 
And, waving hand, struck on the desk, then 

frowned like one perplexed. 



"Dear sinners all," the fool began, "man's life 

is but a jest, 
A dream, a shadow, bubble, air, a vapor at the 

best. 
In a thousand pounds of law I find not a single 

ounce of love ; 
A blind man killed the parson's cow in shooting 

at the dove ; 
The fool that eats till he is sick must fast till he 

is well ; 
The wooer who can flatter most will bear away 

the belle. 



" Let no man halloo he is safe till he is through 

the wood ; 
He who will not when he may, must tarry when 

he should ; 
He who laughs at crooked men should need walk 

very straight ; 
0, he who once has won a name may lie abed 

till eight ; 
Make haste to purchase house and land, be very 

slow to wed ; 
True coral needs no painter's brush, nor need be 

daubed with red. 



"The friar, p)reaching, cursed the thief (the 

pudding in his sleeved ; 
To fish for sprats with golden hooks is foolish, 

by your leave ; 
To travel well, — an ass's ears, hog's mouth, and 

ostrich legs ; 
He does not care a pin for thieves who limps 

about and begs ; 
Be always first man at a feast and last man at a 

fray ; 
The short way round, in spite of all, is still the 

longest way ; 
When the hungry curate licks the knife, there 's 

not much for the clerk ; 
When the pilot, turning pale and sick, looks up 

— the storm grows dark." 



Then loud they laughed ; the fat cook's tears ran 
down into the pan ; 

The steward shook, that he was forced to drop 
the brimming can ; 

And then again the women screamed, and every 
staghound bayed, — 

And why ? because the motley fool so wise a ser- 
mon made. 

GEORGE Walter Thornbury. 



ON AN" INTAGLIO HEAD OF MINERYA. 

The cunning hand that carved this face, 

A little helmeted Minerva, — 
The hand, I say, ere Phidias wrought, 

Had lost its subtile skill and fervor. 

Who was he ? Was he glad or sad. 
Who knew to carve in such a fashion ? 

Perchance he shaped this dainty head 

For some brown girl that scorned his passio n. 

But he is dust : we may not know 

His happy or unhapjjy story : 
Nameless, and dead these thousand years. 

His work outlives him, — there 's his glory ! 

Both man and jewel lay in earth 

Beneath a lava-buried city ; 
The thousand summers came and went, 

With neither haste nor hate nor pity. 

The years wiped out the man, but left 

The jewel fresh as an}- blossom. 
Till some Visconti dug it up, — 

To rise and fall on Mabel's bosom ! 

Roman brother ! see how Time 

Your gracious handiwork has guarded, 

See how your loving, patient art 
Has come, at last, to be rewarded ! 

Who would not suffer slights of men. 
And pangs of hopeless passion also, 

To have his carven agate-stone 
On such a bosom rise and fall so ! 

THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH. 



ON A FAN 

THAT BELONGED TO THE MARQUISE DE POMPADOUR. 

(ballade.) 

Chicken-skin, delicate, white, 

Painted by Carlo Yanloo, 
Loves in a riot of light, 



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Roses and vaporous blue ; 

Hark to the dainty frou-frou ! 
Picture above, if you can, 

Eyes that could melt as the dew, — 
This was the Pompadour's fan ! 

See how they rise at the sight, 

Thronging the (Eil cle Bceuf through, 
Courtiers as butterflies bright, 

Beauties that Fragonard drew, 

Talon-rouge, falaba, queue, 
Cardinal, duke, — to a man, 

Eager to sigh or to sue, — 
This was the Pompadour's fan ! 

Ah, but things more than polite 

Hung on this toy, voyez-vousl 
Matters of state and of might. 

Things that great ministers do ; 

Things that, maybe, overthrew 
Those in whose brains they began ; — 

Here was the sign and the cue, — 
This was the Pompadour's fan ! 



"Where are the secrets it knew ? 

Weavings of plot and of plan ? 
— But where is the Pompadour, too ? 

This was the Pompadour's fan ! 

Austin dobson. 



THE FLOOD OF YEARS. 

A MIGHTY Hand, from an exhaustless urn, 
Poiu'S forth the never-ending Flood of Years 
Among the nations. How the rushing waves 
Bear all before them ! On their foremost edge. 
And there alone, is Life ; the Present there 
Tosses and foams and fills the air with roar 
Of mingled noises. There are they who toil, 
And they who strive, and they who feast, and they 
Who hurry to and fro. The sturdy hind — 
Woodman and delver with the spade — are there, 
And busy artisan beside his bench, 
And pallid student with his written roll. 
A moment on the mounting billow seen — 
The flood sweeps over them and they are gone. 
There groups of revellers, whose brows are twined 
With roses, ride the topmost swell awhile. 
And as they raise their flowing cups to touch 
The clinking brim to brim, are whirled beneath 
The waves and disappear. I hear the jar 
Of beaten drums, and thunders that break forth 
From cannon, where the advancing billow sends 
Up to the sight long files of armedmen, 
That hurry to the charge through flame and smoke. 
The torrent bears them under, whelmed and hid, 



Slayer and slain, in heaps of bloody foam. 

Down go the steed and rider ; the plumed chief 

Sinks with his followers ; the head that wears 

The imperial diadem goes down beside 

The felon's with cropped ear and branded cheek. 

A funeral train — the torrent sweeps away 

Bearers and bier and. mourners. By the bed 

Of one who dies men gather sorrowing, 

And women weep aloud ; the flood rolls on ; 

The wail is stifled, and the sobbing group 

Borne under. Hark to that shrill sudden shout — 

The cry of an applauding multitude 

Swayed by some loud-tongued orator who wields 

The living mass, as if he were its soul. 

The waters choke the shout and all is still. 

Lo, next, a kneeling crowd and one who spreads 

The hands in prayer ; the engulfing wave o'er- 

takes 
And swallows them and him. A sculptor wields 
The chisel, and the stricken marble grows 
To beauty ; at his easel, eager-eyed, 
A painter stands, and sunshine, at his touch. 
Gathers upon the canvas, and life glows ; 
A poet, as he paces to and fro, 
Murmurs his sounding line. Awhile they ride 
The advancing billow, till its tossing crest 
Strikes them and flings them under while their 

tasks 
Are yet unfinished. See a mother smile 
On her young babe that smiles to her again — 
The torrent wrests it from her arms ; she shrieks, 
And weeps, and midst her tears is carried down. 
A beam like that of moonlight turns the spray 
To glistening pearls ; two lovers, hand in hand. 
Rise on the billowy swell and fondly look 
Into each other's eyes. The rushing flood 
Flings them apart ; the youth goes down ; the 

maid. 
With hands outstretched in vain and streaming 

eyes, 
Waits for the next high wave to follow him. 
An aged man succeeds ; his bending form 
Sinks slowly ; mingling with the sullen stream 
Gleam the white locks and then are seen no more. 

Lo, wider grows the stream ; a sea-like flood 
Saps earth's walled cities ; massive palaces 
Crumble before it ; fortresses and towers 
Dissolve in the swift waters ; populous realms. 
Swept by the torrent, see their ancient tribes 
Engulfed and lost, their very languages 
Stifled and never to be uttered more. 

I pause and turn my eyes, and, looking back. 
Where that tumultuous flood has passed, I see 
The silent Ocean of the Past, a waste 
Of waters weltering over graves, its shores 
Strewn with the wreck of fleets, where mast and 

hull 



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Drop away piecemeal ; battlemented walls 
Frown idly, green with moss, and temples stand 
Unroofed, forsaken by the worshippers. 
There lie memorial stones, whence time has 

gnawed 
The graven legends, thrones of kings o'erturned. 
The broken altars of forgotten gods, 
Foundations of old cities and long streets 
Where never fall of human foot is heard 
Upon the desolate pavement. I behold 
Dim glimmerings of lost jewels far within 
The sleeping waters, diamond, sardonyx, 
Euby and topaz, pearl and chrysolite. 
Once glittering at the banquet on fair brows 
That long ago were dust ; and all around. 
Strewn on the waters of that silent sea. 
Are withering bridal wreaths, and glossy locks 
Shorn from fair brows by loving hands, and scrolls 
O'erwritten — haplj' with fond words of love 
And vows of friendship — and fair pages flung 
Fresh from the printer's engine. There they lie 
A moment and then sink away from sight. 

I look, and the quick tears are in my eyes. 
For I behold, in every one of these, 
A blighted hope, a separate history 
Of human sorrow, telling of dear ties 
Suddenly broken, dreams of happiness 
Dissolved in air, and happy days, too brief. 
That sorrowfully ended, and I think 
How painfully must the poor heart have beat 
In bosoms without number, as the blow 
Was struck that slew their hope or broke their 
peace. 

Sadly I turn, and look before, where yet 
The Flood must pass, and I behold a mist 
Where swarm dissolving forms, the brood of Hope, 
Divinely fair, that rest on banks of flowers 
Or wander among rainbows, fading soon 
And reappearing, haply giving place 
To shapes of grisly aspect, such as Fear 
Moulds from the idle air ; where sei'pents lift 
The head to strike, and skeletons stretch forth 
The bony arm in menace. Further on 
A belt of darkness seems to bar the way. 
Long, low and distant, where the Life that Is 
Touches the Life to come. The Flood of Years 
Rolls toward it, nearer and nearer. It must pass 
That dismal barrier. What is there beyond ? 
Hear what the wise and good have said. Beyond 
That belt of darkness still the years roll on 
More gently, but with not less mighty sweep. 
They gather up again and softly bear 
All the sweet lives that late were overwhelmed 
And lost to sight — all that in them was good. 
Noble, and truly great and worthy of love — 
The lives of infants and ingenuous youths. 
Sages and saintly women who have made 



Their households happy — all are raised and borne 
By that gi-eat current on its onward sweep. 
Wandering and rippling with caressing waves 
Around green islands, fragrant with the breath 
Of flowers that never wither. So they pass, 
From stage to stage, along the shining course 
Of that fair river broadening like a sea. 
As its smooth eddies curl along their waj^, 
They bring old friends together ; hands are 

clasped 
In joy unspeakable ; the mother's arms 
Again are folded round the child she loved 
And lost. Old sorrows are forgotten now, 
Or but remembered to make sweet the hour 
That overpays them ; wounded hearts that bled 
Or broke are healed forever. In the room 
Of this grief-shadowed Present there shall be 
A Present in whose reign no grief shall gnaw 
The heart, and never shall a tender tie 
Be broken — in whose reign the eternal Change 
That waits on growth and action shall proceed 
With everlasting Concord hand in hand. 

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 



■ THREE DAYS. 

So much to do : so little done ! 

Ah ! yesternight I saw the sun 

Sink beamless down the vaulted gray, — 

The ghastly ghost of Yesterday. 

So little done : so much to do ! 
Each morning breaks on conflicts new ; 
But eager, brave, I '11 join the fray, 
And fight the battle of To-day. 

So much to do : so little done ! 
But when it 's o'er, — the victory won, — 
Oh ! then, my soul, this strife and sorrow 
Will end in that great, glad To-moreow. 
James R. Gilmore. 



INSIGNIFICANT EXISTENCE. 

There are a number of us creep 
Into this world, to eat and sleep ; 
And know no reason why we 're born, 
But only to consume the corn. 
Devour the cattle, fowl, and fish, 
And leave behind an empty dish. 
The crows and ravens do the same. 
Unlucky birds of hateful name ; 
Ravens or crows might fill their places, 
And swallow corn and carcasses. 



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Then if their tombstone, when they die, 
Be n't taught to flatter and to lie. 
There 's nothing better will be said 
Than that "they've eat up all their bread. 
Drunk up their drink, and gone to bed." 

ISAAC WATTS. 



NEW YEAR'S EVE. 

FROM "IN MEMORIAM." 

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, 
The flying cloud, the frosty light ; 
The year is dying in the night ; 

Ring out, wild bells, and let him die. 

Ring out the old, ring in the new ; 

Ring, happy bells, across the snow ; 

The year is going, let him go ; 
Ring out the false, ring in the true. 

Ring out the grief that saps the mind, 
For those that here we see no more ; 
Ring out the feud of rich and poor. 

Ring in redress to all mankind. 

Ring out a slowly dying cause 

And ancient forms of party strife ; 
Ring in the nobler modes of life. 

With sweeter manners, purer laws. 

Ring out false pride in place and blood, 
The civic slander and the spite ; 
Ring in the love of truth and right, 

Ring in the common love of good. 

Ring out old shapes of foul disease. 
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold ; 
Ring out the thousand wars of old, 

Ring in the thousand years of peace. 

Ring in the valiant man and free. 
The larger heart, the kindlier hand ; 
Ring out the darkness of the land. 

Ring in the Christ that is to be. 

ALFRED TENNYSON. 



THE CLOSING YEAR. 

'T IS midnight's holy hour, — and silence now 

Is brooding like a gentle spirit o'er 

The still and pulseless world. Hark ! on the 

winds 
The bell's deep tones are swelling,- — 'tis the 

knell 
Of the departed year. No funeral train 
Is sweeping past ; yet, on the stream and wood. 
With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest 



Like a pale, spotless shroud ; the air is stirred 
As by a mourner's sigh ; and on yon cloud 
That floats so still and placidly through heaven. 
The spirits of the seasons seem to stand, — 
Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn 

form. 
And Winter with its aged locks, — and breathe. 
In mournful cadences that come abroad 
Like the far wind-harp's wild and touching wail, 
A melancholy dirge o'er the dead year, 
Gone from the earth forever. 

'T is a time 
For memory and for tears. Within the deep. 
Still chambers of the heart, a spectre dim, 
Whose tones are like the wizard's voice of Time 
Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold 
And solemn finger to the beautiful 
And holy visions that have passed away. 
And left no shadow of their loveliness 
On the dead waste of life. That spectre lifts 
The coffin-lid of Hope and Joy and Love, 
And bending mournfully above the pale. 
Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead 

flowei's 
O'er what has passed to nothingness. 

The year 
Has gone, and with it, many a glorious throng 
Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow. 
Its shadow in each heart. In its swift course 
It waved its sceptre o'er the beautiful, 
And they are not. It laid its pallid hand 
Upon the strong man, and the haughty form 
Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim. 
It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged 
The bright and joyous, and the tearful wail 
Of stricken ones is heard whei-e erst the song 
And reckless shout resounded. 

It passed o'er 
The battle-plain where sword and spear and 

shield 
Flashed in the light of midday, and the strength 
Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass. 
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above 
The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came. 
And faded like a wreath of mist at eve ; 
Yet ere it melted in the viewless air 
It heralded its millions to their home 
In the dim land of dreams. 

Remorseless Time ! 
Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe ! — what 

power 
Can stay him in his silent course, or melt 
His iron heart to pity ? On, still on, 
He presses, and forever. The proud bird. 
The condor of the Andes, that can soar 



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Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave 
The fury of the northern hurricane, 
And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home. 
Furls his broad wings at nightfall, and sinks 

down 
To rest upon his mountain crag, — but Time 
Knows not the weight of sleej) or weariness. 
And night's deep darkness has no cliai]i to bind 
His rushing pinions. 

Revolutions sweep 
O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast 
Of dreaming sorrow ; cities rise and sink 
Like bubbles on the water ; fiery isles 
Spring blazing from the ocean, and go back 
To their mysterious caverns ; mountains rear 
To heaven their bald and blackened cliffs, and 

bow 
Their tall heads to the plain ; new empires rise. 
Gathering the strength of hoary centuries. 
And rush down like the Alpine avalanche. 
Startling the nations ; and the very stars, 
Yon bright and burning blazonry of God, 
Glitter awhile in their eternal depths, 
And, like the Pleiads, loveliest of their train, 
Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away 
To darkle in the trackless void, — yet Time, 
Time the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career, 
Dark, stern, all-pitiless, and pauses not 
Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path 
To sit and muse, like other conquerors. 
Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought. 

George denison prentice. 



THE DEATH OF THE OLD YEAR. 

Full knee-deep lies the winter snow. 
And the winter winds are wearily sighing : 
Toll ye the church-bell sad and slow, 
And tread softly and speak low. 
For the old year lies a-dying. 

Old year, you must not die ; 

You came to us so readily, 

You lived with us so steadily. 

Old year, you shall not die. 

He lieth still : he doth not move : 

He will not see the dawn of day. 

He hath no other life above. 

He gave me a friend, and a true true-love. 

And the New-year will take 'em away. 

Old year, you must not go ; 

So long as you have been with us. 

Such joy as you have seen with us, 

Old year, you shall not go. 



He frothed his bumpers to the brim ; 
A jollier year we shall not see. 
But, though his eyes are waxing dim, 
And though his foes speak ill of him. 
He was a friend to me. 

Old year, you shall not die ; 
■ We did so laugh and ciy with you, 

I 've half a mind to die with you, 

Old year, if you must die. 

He was full of joke and jest, 
But all his merry quips are o'er. 
To see him die, across the waste 
His son and heir doth lide post-haste. 
But he '11 be dead before. 

Every one for his own. 

The night is sta:rry and cold, my friend, 

And the New-year, blithe and bold, my fritind, 

Comes up to take his own. 

Flow hard he breathes ! over the. snow 
I heard just now the crowing cock. 
The shadows flicker to and fro : 
The cricket chirps : the light burns low : 
'T is nearly twelve o'clock. 

Shake hands before you die. 

Old year, we '11 dearly rue for you : 

What is it we can do for you ? 

Speak out before you die. 

His face is growing sharp and thin. 

Alack ! our friend is gone. 

Close up his eyes : tie up his chin : 

Step from the corpse, and let him in 

That standeth there alone. 

And waiteth at the door. 

There 's a new foot on the floor, my friend, 

And a new face at the door, my friend, 

A new face at the door. 

Alfred Tennyson. 



THE APPROACH OF AGE. 



SONNET XII. 



When I do count the clock that tells the time, 
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night ; 
When I behold the violet past prime. 
And sable curls all silvered o'er with white ; 
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves. 
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd. 
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves. 
Borne on the bier with white and bristly^ beard : 
Then of thy beauty do I question make. 
That thou among the wastes of time must go. 
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake, 



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And die as fast as they see others grow ; 

And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make 

defence, 

Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee 

hence. 

Shakespeare. 



TO THE VIRGINS. 

Gather the rosebuds while ye maj^, 

Okl Time is still a flying ; 
And this same flower that smiles to-day 

To-morrow will be dying. 

The glorious lamp of Heaven, the sun. 

The higher he 's a getting, 
The sooner will his race be run, 

And nearer he 's to setting. 

The age is best which is the first. 
When youth and blood are warmer ; 

But being spent, the worse and worst 
Times still succeed the former. 

Then be not coy, but use your time, 

And, while ye may, go marry ; 
For having lost but once your prime. 

You may forever tarry. 

Robert Herrick. 



TO-MORROW. 



from "IRENE." 



To-MOREOw's action ! can that hoary wisdom. 
Borne down with years, still doat upon to-morrow ! 
The fatal mistress of the young, the lazy. 
The coward and the fool, condemned to lose 
An useless life in waiting for to-morrow. 
To gaze with longing eyes uj)on to-morrow, 
Till interposing death destroys the prospect. 
Strange that this general fraud from day to day 
Should fill the world with wretches, undetected ! 
The soldier, laboring through a winter's march, 
Still sees to-morrow drest in robes of triumph ; 
Still to the lover's long-expecting arms 
To-morrow brings the visionary bride. 
But thou, too old to bear another cheat, 
Learn that the present hour alone is man's. 

Samuel Johnson. 



GOING AND COMING. 

Going — the great round Sun, 
Dragging the captive Day 

Over behind the frowning hill, 
Over beyond the bay, — 



Dying : 
Coming — the dusky Night, 

Silently stealing in, 
Wrapping himself in the soft warm couch 
Where the golden-haired Day hath been 
Lying. 

Going — the bright, blithe Spring ; 

Blossoms ! how fast ye fall, 
Shooting out of your starry sky 

Into the darkness all ■ 
Blindly ! 
Coming — the mellow days : 

Crimson and yellow leaves ; 
Languishing purple and amber fruits 

Kissing the bearded sheaves 
Kindly ! 

Going — our early friends ; 

Voices we loved are dumb ; 
Footsteps grow dim in the morning dew ; 

Fainter the echoes come 

Ringing : 

Coming to join our march, — 

Shoulder to shoulder pressed, — 
Gray-haired veterans strike their tents 

For the far-off purple West — 
Singing ! 

Going — this old, old life ; 

Beautiful world, farewell ! 
Forest and meadow ! river and hill ! 

Ring ye a loving knell 
O'er us ! 
Coming — a nobler life ; 

Coming — a better land ; 
Coming — a long, long, nightless day ; 

Coming — the grand, grand 

Chorus ! 

Edward A. Jenks. 



THE FOOLISH VIRGINS. 

FROM "IDYLS OF THE KLNG." 

The Queen looked up, and said, 
" maiden, if indeed you list to sing, 
Sing, and unbind my heart, that I may weep." 
Whereat full willingly sang the little maid : 

" Late, late, so late ! and dark the night and 
chill ! 
Late, late, so late ! but we can enter still. 
Too late, too late ! Ye cannot enter now. 

"No light had we : for that we do repent ; 
And leai'ning this, the bridegroom will relent. 
Too late, too late ! Ye cannot enter now. 



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"No light ; so late ! and dark and chill the 
night ! 
0, let us in, that we may find the light ! 
Too late, too late ! Ye cannot enter now. 

"Have we not heard the bridegroom is so sweet ? 
0, let us in, though late, to kiss his feet ! 
No, no, too late ! Ye cannot enter now." 

So sang the novice, while full passionately. 
Her head upon her hands, wept the sad Queen. 
Alfred Tennyson. 



OLD AGE AND DEATH. 

FROM "VERSES UPON HIS DIVINE POESY." 

The seas are quiet when the winds give o'er ; 
So calm are we when passions are no more. 
For then we know how vain it was to boast 
Of fleeting things, too certain to be lost. 
Clouds of affection from our younger eyes 
Conceal that emptiness which age descries. 

The soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed, 
Lets in new light through chinks that time has 

made : 
Stronger by weakness, wiser men become, 
As they draw near to their eternal home. 
Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view, 
That stand upon the threshold of the new. 

Edmund Waller. 



THE ONE GEAY HAIR. 

The wisest of the wise 
Listen to pretty lies, 

And love to hear them told ; 
Doubt not that Solomon 
Listened to many a one, — 
Some in his youth, and more when he grew old. 

I never sat among 

The choir of Wisdom's song, 

But pretty lies loved I 
As much as any king, — 
AVhen youth was on the wing. 
And (must it then be told ?) when youth had 
quite gone by, 

Alas ! and I have not 
The pleasant hour forgot, 

When one pert lady said, — 
" Landor ! I am quite 
Bewildered with affright ; 
I see (sit quiet now !) a white hair on your head ! " 



Another, more benign, 
Drew out that hair of mine. 
And in her own dark hair 
Pretended she had found 
That one, and twirled it round. — 
Fair as she was, she never was so fair. 

Walter Savage Landor. 



GROWING GRAY. 

"On a I'age de son cceur." — A. d'Houdetot. 

A LITTLE more toward the light. 

Me miserum. Here 's one that 's white, 

And one that 's turning ; 
Adieu to song and "salad days." 
My Muse, let 's go at once to Jay's 

And order mourning. 

We must reform our rhymes, my dear, 
Renounce the gay for the severe, — 

Be grave, not witty ; 
We have no more the right to find 
That Pyrrha's hair is neatly twined, 

That Chloe 's pretty. 

Young Love 's for us a farce that 's played ; 
Light canzonet and serenade 

No more may tempt us ; 
Gray hairs but ill accord with dreams ; 
From aught but sour didactic themes 

Our years exempt us. 

" A la bonne lieure ! " You fancy so ? 
You think for one white streak we grow 

At once satiric ? 
A fiddlestick ! Each hair 's a string 
To which our graybeard Muse shall sing 

A younger lyric. 

Our heart 's still sound. Shall " cakes and ale ' 
Grow rare to youth because we rail 

At school-boy dishes ? 
Perish the thought ! 'T is ours to sing. 
Though neither Time nor Tide can bring 

Belief with wishes. 

AUSTIN DOBSON. 



TOO LATE. 

" Ah ! si la jeunesse savait —si la vieillesse pouvait ! " 

There sat an old man on a rock, 

And unceasing bewailed him of Fate, — 
That concern where we all must take stock, 
Though our vote has no hearing or weight ; 
And the old man sang him an old, old song, - 
Never sang voice so clear and strong 
That it could drown the old man's long. 
For he sang the song ' ' Too late ! too late ! ' 



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" When we want, we have for our pains 

The promise that if we but wait 
Till the want has burned out of our brains, 
Every means shall be present to sate ; 

While we send for the napkin the soup gets 

cold, 
While the bonnet is trimming the face grows 

old, 
When we 've matched our buttons the pat- 
tern is sold, 
And everything comes too late — too late ! 

"When strawberries seemed like red heavens, 

Terrapin stew a wild dream. 
When my brain was at sixes and sevens. 
If my mother had ' folks ' and ice-cream. 
Then I gazed with a lickerish hunger 
At the restaurant man and fruit-monger 
But 0, how I wished I were younger 

When the goodies all came in a stream — 
in a stream ! 

" I 've a splendid blood-horse, and — ■ a liver 

That it jars into torture to trot ; 
My row-boat 's the geui of the river, — 
Gout makes every knuckle a knot ! 

I can buy boundless credits on Paris and 

Eome, 
But no palate for onenus, no eyes for a dome — 
Those belonged to the youth who must tarry 
at home. 
When no home but an attic he 'd got — 
he 'd got ! 

" How I longed, in that lonest of garrets. 

Where the tiles baked my brains all July, 
For ground to grow two pecks of carrots, 
Two pigs of my own in a sty, 

A rosebush — a little thatched cottage — 
Two spoons — love — a basin of pottage ! — 
Now in freestone I sit — and my dotage — 
With a woman's chair empty close by — 
close by ! 

"Ah ! now, though I sit on a rock, 

I have shared one seat with the great ; 
I have sat — knowing naught of the clock — 
On love's high throne of state ; 

But the lips that kissed, and the arras that 

caressed, 
To a mouth grown stern with delay were 

pressed, 
And circled a breast that their clasp had 
blessed 
Had they only not come too late — too 
late ! " 



FITZ HUGH LUDLOW. 



THE THPtEE WARNINGS. 

The tree of deepest root is found 
Least willing still to quit the ground ; 
'T was therefore said by ancient sages, 

That love of life increased with years 
So much, that in our latter stages, . 
When pains grow sharp and sickness rages, 

The greatest love of life appears. 
This great affection to believe. 
Which all confess, but few perceive, 
If old assertions can't prevail, 
Be pleased to hear a modern tale. 

When sports went round, and all were gay, 
On neighbor Dodson's wedding-day. 
Death called aside the jocund groom 
With him into another room. 
And, looking grave, " You must," says he, 
"Quit your sweet bride, and come with me." 
"With you ! and quit my Susan's side ? 
With you ! " the hapless husband cried ; 
"Young as I am, 'tis monstrous hard ! 
Besides, in truth, I 'm not prepared : 
My thoughts on other matters go ; 
This is my wedding-day, you know." 

What more he urged I have not heard, 

His reasons could, not well be stronger ; 
So Death the poor delinquent spared, 

And left to live a little longer. 
Yet calling up a serious look. 
His hour-glass trembled while he spoke — 
" Neighbor," he said, "farewell ! no more 
Shall Death disturb your mirthful hour ; 
And further, to avoid all blame 
Of cruelty upon my name, 
To give you time for preparation, 
And fit you for your future station, 
Three several warnings you shall have, 
Before you 're summoned to the grave ; 
Willing for once I 'U quit my prey. 

And gi-ant a kind reprieve. 
In hopes you '11 have no more to say, 
But when I call again this way. 

Well pleased the world will leave." 
To these conditions both consented, 
And parted perfectly contented. 

What next the hero of our tale befell. 
How long he lived, how wise, how well, 
How roundly he pursued his course, 
And smoked his pipe, and stroked his horse, 

The willing muse shall tell : 
He chaffered then, he bought and sold, 
Nor once perceived his growing old. 

Nor thought of Death as near : 



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His friends not false, his wife no shrew, 
Many his gains, his children few. 

He passed his hours in peace. 
But while he viewed his wealth increase, 
While thus along life's dustj'- road 
The heaten track content he trod, 
Okl Time, whose haste no mortal spares, 
Uncalled, unheeded, unawares. 

Brought on his eightieth year. 
And now, one night, in musing mood, 

As all alone he sate. 
The unwelcome messenger of Fate 

Once more before him stood. 

Half killed with anger and surprise, 
"So soon returned ! " Old Dodson cries. 
"So soon, d' ye call it ! " Death replies ; 
"Surely, my friend, you're but in jest ! 

Since I was here before 
'Tis six-and-thirty years at least, 

And you are now fourscore." 

"So much the worse," the clown rejoined ; 
" To spare the aged would be kind : 
However, see your search be legal ; 
And your authority, — is 't regal '! 
Else you are come on a fool's ei'rand. 
With but a secretary's warrant. 
Beside, you promised me three warnings, 
Wliich I have looked for nights and mornings ; 
But for that loss of time and ease 
I can recover damages." 

" I know," cries Death, "that at the best 
I seldom am a welcome guest ; 
But don't be captious, friend, at least : 
I little thought you 'd still be able 
To stump about your farm and stable : 
Your years have run to a great length ; 
I wish you joy, though, of your strength ! " 

"Hold," says the farmei', "not so fast ! 
I have been lame these four years past." 

"And no great wonder," Death replies : 
' ' However, you still keep your eyes ; 
And sure, to see one's loves and friends 
For legs and arms would make amends." 

" Perhaps," says Dodson, "so it might. 
But latterly I 've lost my sight." 

" This is a shocking tale, 'tis true ; 
But still there 's comfort left for you : 
Each strives your sadness to amuse ; 
I warrant you hear all the news." 

" There 's none," cries he ; " and if there were, 
I 'm grown so deaf, I could not hear." 

" Nay, then," the spectre stern rejoined, 
" These are unjustifiable yearnings : 

If you are lame and deaf and blind. 



You 've had your three sufficient warnings ; 
So come along, no more we '11 part." 
He said, and touched him with his dart. 
And now, Old Dodson, turning pale. 
Yields to his fate, — so ends my tale. 

HESTER LY.NCH THRALE. 



WITHOUT AND WITHIN. 

If every man's internal care_ 

Were written on his brow. 
How many would our pity share 

Who raise our envy now ? 

The fatal secret, when revealed. 

Of every aching breast, 

Would prove that only while concealed 

Their lot appeared the best. 

Metastasio. 



ODE. 

INTIJIATIONS OF IMMORTALITY FROM RECOLLECTION'S OF 
EARLY CHILDHOOD. 

There was a time when meadow, gi'ove, and 

stream, 
The earth, and every common sight. 
To me did seem 
Apparelled in celestial liglit, — 
The glory and the freshness of a dream. 
It is not now as it hath been of yore : 
Turn wheresoe'er I may. 
By night or day, 
The things which I have seen I now can see no 
more. 

The rainbow comes and goes. 
And lovely is the rose ; 
The moon doth with delight 
Look round her when the heavens are bare ; 
Waters on a starry night 
Are beautiful and fair ; 
The sunshine is a glorious birth ; 
But yet I know, where'er I go. 
That there hath passed away a glory from the 
earth. 

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song, 
And while the young lambs bound 

As to the tabor's sound. 
To me alone there came a thought of grief ; 
A timely utterance gave that thought relief. 

And I again am strong. 
The cataracts blow their trumpets fi-om the 

steep, — 
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong. 
I hear the echoes through the mountains throng ; 
The winds come to me from the fields of sleep, 



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And all the earth is gay ; 
Land and sea 
Give themselves up to jollity ; 
And with the heart of May 
Doth every beast keep holiday ; — 
Thou child of joy, 
Shoiit round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou 
happy shepherd boy ! 

Ye blessed creatures ! I have heard the call 

Ye to each other make ; I see 
The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee ; 

My heart is at yoirr festival. 
My head hath its coronal, — 
The fulness of your bliss, I feel, I feel it all. 

evil day ! if I were sullen 
"While Earth herself is adorning, 

This sweet May moi'ning, 
And the children are culling, 

On every side, 
In a thousand valleys far and wide. 
Fresh flowers ; while the sun shines warm, 
And the babe leaps up on his mother's arm ; — 

1 hear, I hear, with joy I hear ! ■ — 
But there 's a tree, of many, one, 

A single field which I have looked upon, — 
Both of them speak of something that is gone ; 

The pansy at my feet 

Doth the same tale repeat. 
"Whither is fled the visionary gleam ? 
"Where is it now, the glory and the dream 

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting ; 
The soul that rises with us, our life's star, 

Hath had elsewhere its setting, 
And cometh from afar : 

Not in entire forgetfulness, 

And not in utter nakedness. 
But trailing clouds of glory, do Ave come 

From God, who is our home : 
Heaven lies about us in our infancy ! 
Shades of the prison-house begin to close 

Upon the growing Boy ; 
But he beholds the light, and whence it flows, — 

He sees it in his joy ; 
The Youth, who daily farther from the east 

Must ti'avel, still is nature's priest 

And by the vision splendid 

Is on his way attended : 
At length the Man perceives it die away. 
And fade into the light of common day. 

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own ; 

Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind. 

And even with something of a mother's mind. 
And no unworthy aim. 
The homely nurse doth all she can 

To make her foster-child, her inmate man, 



Forget the glories he hath known, 
And that imperial palace whence he came. 

Behold the child among his new-born blisses, — 
A six years' darling of a pygmy size ! 
See, where mid work of his own hand he lies. 
Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses, 
With light upon him from his father's eyes ! 
See, at his feet, some little plan or chart, 
Some fragment from his dream of human life, 
Shaped by himself with newly learned art, — • 

A wedding or a festival, 

A mourning or a funeral ; — 
And this hath now his heart, 

And unto this he frames his song : 
Then will he fit his tongue 
To dialogues of business, love, or strife ; 

But it will not be long 

Ere this be thrown aside. 

And with new joy and pride 
The little actor cons another part, — 
Filling fi'om time to time his " humorous stage " 
"With all the persons, down to palsied age, 
That Life brings with her in her equipage ; 

As if his whole vocation 

"Were endless imitation. 

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie 

Thy soul's immensity ! 
Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep 
Thy heritage ! thou eye among the blind, 
That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,- 
Haunted forever by the eternal mind ! — 

Mighty prophet ! Seer blest ! 

On whom those truths do rest 
"WHrich we are toiling all our lives to find, 
In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave ; 
Thou over whom thy immortality 
Broods like the day, a master o'er a slave, 
A presence which is not to be put by ; 
Thou little child, yet glorious in the might 
Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's height, 
"Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke 
The years to bring the inevitable yoke. 
Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife ? 
Full soon thy soul shall have her earthly freight, 
And custom lie ripon thee with a weight 
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life ! 

joy ! that in our embers ■ 

Is something that doth live ; I 
That Nature yet remembers 
"What was so fugitive ! 
The thought of our past years in me doth breed 
Perpetual benediction : not, indeed. 
For that which is most worthy to be blest, — 
Delight and libert}'', the simple creed 
Of childhood, whether busy or at rest. 



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With new-fledged hops ' still fluttering in his 
breast : — / 
Not for these l/raise 
The song of thanks and praise ; 
But for those obstinate questionings 
Of sense and outward things, 
Fallings from us, vanishings ; 
Blank misgivings of a creature 
Moving about in worlds not realized, 
High instincts, before which our mortal nature 
Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised : 
But for those first aftections. 
Those shadowy recollections, 
Which, be they what they may, 
Are yet the fountain-light of all our day, 
Are yet a master light of all our seeing ; 

Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make 
Our noisy years seem moments in the being 
Of the eternal silence : truths that wake. 

To perish never ; 
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavor. 

Nor man nor boy. 
Nor all that is at enmity with joy, 
Can utterly abolish or destroy ! 

Hence, in a season of calm weather, 
Though inland far we be. 
Our souls have sight of that immortal sea 
Which brought us hither, — 
Can in a moment travel thither. 
And see the children sport upon the shore, 
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore. 

Then sing, ye birds, sing, sing a joyous song ! 

And let the young lambs bound 

As to ty,e tabor's sound ! 
We in thought will join your throng, 

Ye that pipe and ye that play. 

Ye that through your hearts to-day 

Feel the gladness of the JMay ! 
Wliat though the radiance which was once so 

bright 
Be now forever taken from my sight, 

Though nothing can bring back the hour 
Of splendor in the grass, of glory in the flower ; 

We will grieve not, rather find 

Strength in what remains behind ; 

In the primal sympathy 

Which, having been, must ever be ; 

In the soothing thoughts that spring 

Out of human suffering ; 

In the faith that looks through death. 
In years that bring the philosophic mind. 

And ye fountains, meadows, hills, and groves, 
Forebode not any severing of our loves ! 
Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might ; 
I only have relinquished one delight 



To live beneath your more habitual swaJ^ 
I love the brooks which down their channels fret, 
Even more than when I tripped lightly as they ; 
The innocent brightness of a new-born day 

Is lovely yet ; 
The clouds that gather round the setting sun 
Do take a sober coloring from an eye 
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality ; 
Another race hath been, and other palms are won. 
Thanks to the human heart by which we live. 
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears, — 
To me the meanest flower that blows can give 
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears. 

William Wordsworth. 



SOLILOQUY: ON IMMORTALITY. 

FROM " CATC," ACT V. SC. I. 

SCENE. — CATC, sitti7ig in a tho7ight/nl posture, luith Plato's 
book on the I?nmortality oj^ the Soul in his hand, and a draivn 
sTuord on ike table by him. 

It must be so — Plato, thou reasonest well ! — 
Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, 
This longing after immortality ? 
Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror. 
Of falling into naught ? Why shrinks the soul 
Back on herself, and startles at destruction ? 
'T is the divinity that stirs within us ; 
'T is Heaven itself, that points out a hereafter, 
And intimates eternity to man. 

Eternity ! — thou pleashig, dreadful thought ! 
Through what variety of untried being, 
Through what new scenes and changes, must we 

pass ! 
The wide, the unbounded prospect lies before me ; 
But shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it. 
Here will I hold. If there 's a Power above us 
(And that there is, all Nature cries aloud 
Through all her works), he must delight in 

virtue ; 
And that which he delights in must be happj^ 
But when ? or where ? This Avorld was made for 

Cfesar. 
I 'm weary of conjectures, — this must end 'em. 
(Laying his hand on his'sivord.) 

Thus am I doubly armed : my death and life, 
My bane and antidote, are both before me : 
This in a moment brings me to an end ; 
But this informs me I shall never die. 
The soul, secured in her existence, smiles 
At the drawn dagger, and defies its point. 
The stars shall fade away, the sun liimself 
Grow dim witli age, and Nature sink in years ; 
But thoir shalt flourish in immortal youth, 
Unhurt amid the war of elements. 
The wrecks of matter, and the crush of worlds ! 

Joseph Addison. 



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0, MAY I JOIN THE CHOIR INVISIBLE ! 

0, MAY I join the choir invisible 

Of those immortal dead who live again 

In minds made better by their presence ; live 

In pulses stirred to generosity, 

In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn 

Of miserable aims that end with self, 

In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like 

stars. 
And with their mild persistence urge men's minds 
To vaster issues. 

So to live is heaven : 
To make undying music in the world, 
Breathing a beauteous order, that controls 
With growing sway the growing life of man. 
So we inherit that sweet purity 
For which we struggled, failed, and agonized 
"With widening retrospect that bred despair. 
Rebellious flesh that would not be subdued, 
A vicious parent shaming still its child, 
Poor anxious penitence, is quick dissolved ; 
Its discords quenched by meeting harmonies. 
Die in the large and charitable air. 
And all our rarer, better, truer self, 
That sobbed religiously in yearning song, 
That watched to ease the burden of the world. 
Laboriously tracing what must be. 
And what may yet be better, — saw within 
A worthier image for the sanctuary. 
And shaped it forth before the multitude. 
Divinely human, raising worship so 
To higher reverence more mixed with love, 
That better self shall live till human Time 
Shall fold its eyelids, and the human skj^ 
Be gathered like a scroll within the tomb. 
Unread forever. 

This is life to come, 
Which martyred men have made more glorious 
For us, who strive to follow. 

May I reach 
That purest heaven, — be to other souls 
The cup of strength in some great agony. 
Enkindle generous ai'dor, feed pure love. 
Beget the smiles that have no cruelty, 
Be the sweet presence of a good diffused. 
And in diffusion ever more intense ! 
So shall I join the choir invisible, 
Whose music is the gladness of the world. 

Marian Evans Lewes Cross (George _E Hot). 



PRE-EXISTENCE. 

While sauntering through the crowded street, 
Some half-remembered face I meet, 

Albeit upon no mortal shore 

That face, methinks, has smiled before. 



Lost in a gaj' and festal throng, 
I tremble at some tender song, — 

Set to an air whose golden bars 
I must have heard in other stars. 

In sacred aisles I pause to share 
The blessings of a priestly prayer, — 

When the whole scene which greets mine eyes 
In some strange mode I recognize 

As one whose every mystic part 
I feel prefigured in my heart. 

At sunset, as I calmly stand, 
A stranger on an alien strand, 

Familiar as my childhood's home 

Seems the long stretch of wave and foam. 

One sails towai'd me o'er the bay. 
And what he comes to do and say 

I can foretell. A prescient lore 
Springs from some life outlived of yore. 

swift, instinctive, startling gleams 
Of deep soul-knowledge ! not as dreams 

For aye ye vaguely dawn and die, 
But oft with lightning certainty 

Pierce through the dark, oblivious brain, 
To make old thoughts and memories plain, 

Thoughts which perchance must travel back 
Across the wild, bewildering track 

Of countless iBons ; memories far, 
High-reaching as yon pallid star, 

Unknown, scarce seen, whose flickering grace 
Faints on the outmost rings of space ! 

Paul Hamilton Hayxe. 



A LOST CHORD. 

Seated one day at the organ, 
I was weary and ill at ease, 

And my fingers wandered idly 
Over the noisy keys. 

I do not know what I was playing, 
Or what I was dreaming then. 

But I struck one chord of music. 
Like the sound of a great Amen. 

It flooded the crimson twilight, 
Like the close of an angel's psalm, 

And it lay on my fevered spirit. 
With a touch of infinite calm. 



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It quieted pain and sorrow, 
Like love overcoming strife ; 

It seemed the harmonious echo 
From our discordant life. 

It linked all perplexed meanings 

Into one perfect peace, 
And trembled away into silence, 

As if it were loath to cease. 

I have sought, hut I seek it vainly, 

That one lost chord divine. 
That came from the soul of the organ. 

And entered into mine. 

It may be that Death's bright angel 
Will speak in that chord again ; 

It may be that only in heaven 
I shall hear that grand Amen. 

ADELAIDE ANNE PROCTER. 



TO A SKELETON. 

[The MS. of this poem, which appeared during the first quarter 
of the present century, was said to liave been found in the Museum 
of the Royal College of Surgeons, in London, near a perfect Iiuman 
skeleton, and to have been sent by the curator to the Morning 
Chr07iicle for publication. It excited so much attention that every 
effort was made to discover the autjior, and a responsible party 
went so far as to offer a reward of fifty guineas for information that 
would discover its origin. The author preserved his incognito^ and, 
we believe, has never been discovered.] 

Behold this ruin ! 'T was a skull 
Once of ethereal spirit full. 
This narrow cell was Life's retreat ; 
This space was Thought's mysterious seat. 
"What beauteous visions filled this spot ! 
"What dreams of pleasure long forgot ! 
Nor hope, nor joy, nor love, nor fear 
Has left one trace of record here. 

Beneath this mouldering canopy 

Once shone the bright and busy eye : 

But start not at the dismal void, — 

If social love that eye employed. 

If with no lawless fire it gleamed. 

But through the dews of kindness beamed, 

That eye shall be forever bright 

"When stars and sun are sunk in night. 

"Within this hollow cavern hung 

The ready, swift, and tuneful tongue : 

If Falsehood's honey it disdained. 

And when it could not praise was chained ; 

If bold in "Virtue's cause it spoke. 

Yet gentle concord never broke, — 

This silent tongue shall plead for thee 

When Time imveils Eternity ! 



Say, did these fingers delve the mine. 
Or with the envied rubies shine ? 
To hew the rock, or wear a gem. 
Can little now avail to them ; 
But if the page of Truth they sought. 
Or comfort to the mourner brought, 
These hands a richer meed shall claim 
Than all that wait on AVealth and Fame. 

Avails it whether bare or shod 
These feet the paths of duty trod ? 
If from the bowers of Ease they fled, 
To seek Affliction's humble shed ; 
If Grandeur's guilty bribe they spurned. 
And home to Virtue's cot returned, — 
These feet with angel wings shall vie. 
And tread the palace of the sky ! 

Anonymous. 



THE BROTHERS. 

Slumber, Sleep, — they were two brothers, ser- 
vants to the gods above ; 

Kind Prometheus lured them downwards, ever 
filled with earthly love ; 

But what gods could bear so lightly, pressed too 
hard on men beneath ; 

Slumber did his brother's duty, — Sleep was 
deepened into Death. 

From the German of GOETHE. 



INVOCATION TO SLEEP. 

FROM " VALENTINIAN." 

Come, Sleep, and with thy sweet deceiving 

Lock me in delight awhile ; 

Let some pleasing dreams beguile 

All my fancies, that from thence 

I may feel an influence. 
All my powers of care bereaving ! 

Though but a shadow, but a sliding, 

Let me know some little joy ! 

We that suflfer long annoy 

Are contented with a thought, 

Through an idle fancy wrought : 
0, let my joys have some abiding ! 

JOHN FLETCHER. 



SLEEP. 



Come, gentle sleep ! attend thy votary's prayer. 
And, though death's image, to my couch repair : 
How sweet, though lifeless, yet with life to lie. 
And, without dying, how sweet to die ! 

DR. JOHN WOLCOTT I^Peter Pindar). 



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SLEEP. 

Weep ye no more, sad fountains ! 

What need you flow so fast ? 
Look how the snowy mountains 
Heaven's sun doth gently waste. 
But my sun's heavenly eyes 
View not your weeping, 
That now lies sleeping 
Softly, now softly lies 
Sleeping. 

Sleep is a reconciling, — 

A rest that peace begets ; 
Doth not the sun rise smiling, 
When fair at even he sets ? 
Eest you then, rest, sad eyes, — • 
Melt not in weeping. 
While she lies sleeping 
Softly, now softly lies 
Sleeping. 

JOHN DOWLAND. 

SLEEP. 

FROM "ASTROPHEL AND STELLA." 

Come, Sleep, Sleep, the certain knot of peace. 
The baiting-place of wit, the balm of woe, 
The poor man's wealth, the prisoner's release. 
The indifferent judge between the high and low. 
With shield of proof shield me from out the prease* 
Of those fierce darts Despair at me doth throw ; 
0, make me in those civil wars to cease : 
I will good tribute pay, if thou do so. 
Take thou of me smooth pillows, sweetest bed, 
A chamber deaf to noise, and blind to light, 
A rosy garland, and a weary head : 
And if these things, as being thine in right, 
Move not thy heavy grace, thou shalt in me 
Livelier than elsewhere Stella's image see. 

Sir Philip Sidney. 



SLEEP. 

*' He givcth his beloved sleep." — Psa!m cxxvi. 2. 

Of all the thoughts of God that are 
Borne inward unto souls afar. 
Among the Psalmist's music deep, 
Now tell me if that any is, 
For gift or grace, surpassing this, — 
" He giveth his beloved sleep " ? 

What would we give to our beloved ? 
The hero's heart, to be unmoved, — 
The poet's star-tuned harp, to sweep, — 
The patriot's A'^oice, to teach and rouse, — 
The monarch's crown, to light the brows ? 
" He giveth his beloved sleep." 

* Press — throng. 



What do we give to our beloved ? 
A little faith, all undisproved, — 
A little dust to overweep. 
And bitter memories, to make 
The whole earth blasted for our sake, 
" He giveth his beloved sleep." 

"Sleep soft, beloved ! " we sometimes say, 

But have no tune to charm away 

Sad dreams that through the eyelids creep ; 

But never doleful dream again 

Shall break the happy slumber when 

" He giveth his beloved sleep." 

earth, so full of dreary noise ! 
men, with wailing in your voice ! 
delved gold the wailers heap ! 
strife, curse, that o'er it fall ! 
God strikes a silence through you all. 
And "giveth his beloved sleep." 

His dews drop mutely on the hill, 
His cloud above it saileth still. 
Though on its slope men sow and reap ; 
More softly than the dew is shed, 
Or cloud is floated overhead, 
" He giveth his beloved sleep." 

For me, my heart, that erst did go 
Most like a tired child at a show. 
That sees through tears the mummers leap, 
Would now its wearied vision close. 
Would childlike on his love repose 
Who "giveth his beloved sleep." 

ELIZABETH Barrett Browning. 



SLEEP. 



FROM "SECOND PART OF HENRY IV.," ACT IIL SC. I. 

King Henry. How many thousand of my 

poorest subjects 
Are at this hour asleep ! — sleep ! gentle 

sleep ! 
Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee. 
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down, 
And steep my senses in fol'get fulness ? 
Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs, 
Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee, 
And hushed with buzzing night-flies to thy 

slumber. 
Than in the perfumed chambers of the gi'eat, 
L^^nder the canopies of costly state. 
And lulled with sounds of sweetest melody ? 
thou dull god ! why liest thou with the vile. 
In loathsome beds, and leav'st the kingly couch 
A watch-case, or a common 'larum-bell ? 



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Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast 
Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains 
In cradle of the rude imperious surge, 
And in the visitation of the winds, 
Who take the ruffian billows by the top, 
Curling their monstrous heads, and hanging them 
With deafening clamors in the slippery clouds, 
That, with the hurly, death itself awakes ? 
Canst thou, partial sleep ! give thy repose 
To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude ; 
And in the calmest and most stillest night, 
With all appliances and means to boot. 
Deny it to a king ? Then, happy low, lie down ; 
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. 



Shakespeare. 



SLEEPLESSNESS. 

A FLOCK of sheep that leisurely pass by 
One after one ; the sound of rain, and bees 
Murmuring ; the fall of rivers, winds and seas. 
Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure 

sky ; — 
I 've thought of all by turns, and still I lie 
Sleepless ; and soon the small birds' melodies 
Must hear, first uttered from my orchard trees, 
And the first cuckoo's melancholy cry. 
Even thus last night, and two nights more, I laj^ 
And could not win thee. Sleep, by any stealth : 
So do not let me wear to-night away : 
Without thee what is all the morning's wealth ? 
Come, blessed barrier between day and day. 
Dear mother of fresh thoughts and joyous health ! 
William Wordsworth. 



HYMN TO NIGHT. 

Yks ! bear them to their rest ; 
The rosy babe, tired with the glare of day, 
The prattler, fallen asleep e'en in his play ; 

Clasp them to thy soft breast, 
night ! 
Bless them in dreams with a deep, hushed delight. 

Yet must they wake again. 
Wake soon to all the bitterness of life. 
The pang of sorrow, the temptation strife, 

Aye to the conscience pain : 
night ! 
Canst thou not take with them a longer flight ? 

Canst thou not bear them far 
E'en now, all innocent, before they know 
The taint of sin, its consequence of woe, 

The world's distracting jar, 
night ! 
To some ethereal, holier, happier height ? 



Canst thou not bear them up 
Through starlit skies, far from this planet dim 
And sorrowful, e'en while they sleep, to Him 

Who drank for us the cup, 
night ! 
The cup of wrath, for hearts in faith contrite ? 

To Him, for them who slept 
A babe all holy on his mother's knee, 
And from that hour to cross-crowned Calvary, 
In all our sorrow wept, 
night ! 
That on our souls might dawn Heaven's cheering 
light. 

Go, lay their little heads 
Close to that human heart, with love divine 
Deep-breathing, while his arms immoi-tal twine 
Around them, as lie sheds, 
night ! 
On them a brother's grace of God's own bound- 
less might. 

Let theni immortal wake 
Among the deathless flowers of Paradise, 
Where angel songs of welcome with surprise 

This their last sleep may break, 
night ! 
And to celestial joy their kindred souls invite. 

There can come no sorrow ; 
The brow shall know no shade, the eye no tears. 
Forever young, through heaven's eternal yeara 
In one unfading morrow, 
night ! 
Nor sin nor age nor pain their cherub beauty 
blight. 

Would we could sleep as they, 
So stainless and so calm, — at rest with Thee, — 
And only wake in immortality ! 
Bear us with them away, 
night ! 
To that ethereal, holier, happier height. 

George Washington Bethune. 



WATCHING. 

Sleep, love, sleep ! 

The dusty day is done. 

Lo ! from afar the freshening breezes sweep 

Wide over groves of balm, 

Down from the towering palm, 

In at the open casement cooling run, 

And round thy lowly bed, 

Thy bed of pain, 

Bathing thy patient head, 

Like grateful showers of rain, 



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They come ; 

While the white curtains, waving to and fro, 

Fan the sick air ; 

And pitj-ingly the shadows come and go, 

"With gentle human care, 

Compassionate and dumb. 

The dusty day is done. 

The night begun ; 

While prayeiful watch I keep, 

Sleep, love, sleep ! 

Is there no magic in the touch 

Of fingers thou dost love so much ? 

Fain would they scatter poppies o'er thee now ; 

Or, with its mute caress, 

The tremulous lip some soft nepenthe press 

Upon thy weary lid and aching brow ; 

While prayerful watch I keep. 

Sleep, love, sleep ! 

On the pagoda spire 

The bells are swinging, 

Their little golden circlet in a flutter 

With tales the wooing winds have dared to utter. 

Till all are ringing, 

As if a choir 

Of golden-nested birds in heaven were singing , 

And with a lulling sound 

The music floats around. 

And drops like balm into the drowsy ear ; 

Commingling with the hum 

Of the Sepoy's distant drum. 

And lazy beetle ever droning near. 

Sounds these of deepest silence born. 

Like night made visible by morn ; 

So silent that I sometimes start 

To hear the throbbings of my heart. 

And watch, with shivering sense of pain, 

To see thy pale lids lift again. . 

The lizard, with his mouse-like eyes. 

Peeps from the mortise in sui-prise 

At such strange quiet after day's harsh din ; 

Then boldly ventures out. 

And looks about. 

And with his hollow feet 

Treads his small evening beat, 

Darting upon his prey 

In sucli a tricky, winsome sort of way. 

His delicate marauding seems no sin. 

And still the curtains swing, 

But noiselessly ; 

The bells a melancholy murmur ring, 

As tears were in the sky : 

More heavily the shadows fall. 

Like the black foldings of a pall. 

Where juts the rough beam from the wall ; 



The candles flare 
With fresher gusts of air ; 
The beetle's drone 

Turns to a dirge-like, solitary moan ; 
Night deepens, and I sit, in cheerless doubt alone. 
Emily Chubbuck Judson. 



THE DPtEAM. 

Our life is twofold ; sleep hath its own world, 

A boundary between the things misnamed 

Death and existence : sleep hath its own world. 

And a wide realm of wild reality, 

And dreams in their develojiment have breath, 

And tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy ; 

They leave a weight upon our waking thoughts. 

They take a weight from off our waking toils, 

They do divide our being ; they become 

A portion of ourselves as of our time, 

And look like heralds of eternity ; 

They pass like spirits of the past, ■ — they speak 

Like sibyls of the future ; they have power, — 

The tyranny of pleasure and of pain ; 

They make us what we were not, — what they 

will. 
And shake us with the vision that 's gone by. 
The dread of vanished shadows. — Are they so ? 
Is not the past all shadow ? What are they ? 
Creations of the mind ? — The mind can make 
Substances, and people planets of its own 
With beings brighter than have been, and give 
A breath to forms which can outlive all flesh. 
I would recall a vision which I dreamed 
Perchance in sleep, — for in itself a thought, 
A slumbering thought, is capable of years. 
And curdles a long life into one hour. 

I saw two beings in the hues of youth 
Standing upon a hill, a gentle hill, 
Gi-een and of a mild declivitj'', the last 
As 't were the cape of a long ridge of such. 
Save that there was no sea to lave its base, 
But a most living landscape, and the wave 
Of woods and cornfields, and the abodes of men 
Scattered at intervals, and wreathing smoke 
Ai'ising from such rustic I'oofs ; the hill 
Was ci'owned with a peculiar diadem 
Of trees, in circular array, so fixed, 
Not by the sport of nature, but of man : 
These two, a maiden and a youth, were there 
Gazing, — the one on all that was beneath 
Fair as herself, — but the boy gazed on her ; 
And both were young, and one was beautiful ; 
AtuI both were young, — yet not alike in youth. 
As the sweet moon on the horizon's verge, 
The maid was on the eve of womanhood ; 



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The boy had fewer summers, but his heart 
Had far outgrown his years, and to his eye 
There was but one beloved face on earth. 
And that was shining on him ; he had looked 
Upon it till it could not pass away ; 
He had no breath, no being, but in hers ; 
S-he was his voice ; he did not speak to her, 
But trembled on her words ; she was his sight, 
For his eye followed hers, and saw with hers. 
Which colored all his objects ; — he had ceased 
To live within himself : she was his life, 
The ocean to the river of his thoughts. 
Which terminated all ; upon a tone, 
A touch of hers, his blood would ebb and flow. 
And his cheek change tempestuously, — his heart 
Unknowing of its cause of agony. 
But she in these fond feelings had no share : 
Her sighs were not for him ; to her he was 
Even as a brother, — but no more ; 't was much. 
For brotherless she was, save in the name 
Her infant friendship had bestowed on him ; 
Herself the solitary scion left 
Of a time-honored race. It was a name 
Which pleased him, and yet pleased him not, — 

and why ? 
Time taught him a deep answer — when she 

loved 
Another ; even now she loved another, 
And on the summit of that hill she stood. 
Looking afar if yet her lover's steed 
Kept pace with her expectancy, and flew. 



Was traced, and then it faded, as it came ; 

He dropped the hand he held, and with slow 

steps 
Retired, but not as bidding her adieu. 
For they did part with mutual smiles ; he passed 
From out the massy gate of that old Hall, 
And mounting on his steed he went his way ; 
And ne'er repassed that hoary threshold more. 

A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 
The boy was sprung to manhood ; in the wilds 
Of fiery climes he made himself a home. 
And his soul drank their sunbeams ; he was girt 
With strange and dusky aspects ; he was not 
Himself like what he had been ; on the sea 
And on the shore he was a wanderer ; 
There was a mass of many images 
Crowded like waves upon me, but he was 
A part of all ; and in the last he lay 
Reposing from the noontide sultriness. 
Couched among fallen columns, in the shade 
Of ruined walls that had survived the names 
Of those who reared them ; by his sleeping side 
Stood camels grazing, and some goodly steeds 
Were fastened near a fountain ; and a man. 
Clad in a flowing garb, did watch the while. 
While many of his tribe slumbered around : 
And they were canopied by the blue sky. 
So cloudless, clear, and purely beautiful. 
That God alone was to be seen in heaven. 



A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 

There was an ancient mansion, and before 

Its walls there was a steed caparisoned ; 

Within an antique oratory stood 

The boy of whom I spake ; — he was alone. 

And pale, and pacing to and fro : anon 

He sate him down, and seized a pen, and traced 

Words which I could not guess of ; then he leaned 

His bowed head on his hands and shook, as 

't were 
With a convulsion, — then arose again, 
And with his teeth and quivering hands did tear 
What he had written, but he shed no tears. 
And he did calm himself, and fix his brow ' 
Into a kind of quiet ; as he paused, 
The lady of his love re-entered there ; 
She was serene and smiling then, and yet 
She knew she was by him beloved ; she knew — 
For quickly comes such knowledge — that his 

heart 
Was darkened with her shadow, and she saw 
That he was wetched, but she saw not all. 
He rose, and with a cold and gentle grasp 
He took her hand ; a moment o'er his face 
A tablet of unutterable thoughts 



A change came o'er the spirit of my di-eam. 

The lady of his love was wed with one 

Who did not love her better : in her home, 

A thousand leagues from his, — her native home. 

She dwelt, begirt with growing infancy. 

Daughters and sons of beauty, — but behold ! 

Upon her face tliere was the tint of grief. 

The settled shadow of an inward strife, 

And an unquiet drooping of the eye. 

As if its lid were charged with unshed tears. 

What could her grief be ? — she had all she loved, 

And he who had so loved her was not there 

To trouble with bad hopes, or evil wish, 

Or ill-repressed affliction, her pure thoughts. 

What could her grief be ? — she had loved him 

not. 
Nor given him cause to deem himself beloved, 
Nor could he be a part of that which preyed 
Upon her mind — a spectre of the past. 

A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 
The wanderer was returned. — I saw him stand 
Before an altar — with a gentle bride ; 
Her face was fair, but was not that which made 
The starlight of his boyhood ; — as he stood 
Even at the alt.ar, o'er his brow there came 



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The selfsame aspect and the quivering shock 
That in the antique oratory shook 
His bosom in its solitude ; and then — 
As in that hour — a moment o'er his face 
The tablet of unutterable thoughts 
Was traced, — and then it faded as it came, 
And he stood calm and quiet, and he spoke 
The fitting vows, but heard not his own words, 
And all things reeled around him ; he could see 
Not that which was, nor that which should have 

been, — 
But the old mansion, and the accustomed hall, 
And the remembered chambers, and the place. 
The day, the hour, the sunshine, and the shade, 
All things pertaining to that place and hour. 
And her who was his destiny, came back 
And thrust themselves between him and the 

light ; 
What business had they there at such a time ? 

A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 
The lady of his love ; — 0, she was changed, 
As by the sickness of the soul ! her mind 
Had wandered from its dwelling, and her eyes. 
They had not their own lustre, but the look 
Which is not of the earth ; she was become 
The queen of a fantastic realm ; her thoughts 
Were combinations of disjointed things. 
And forms impalpable and unperceived 
Of others' sight familiar were to hers. 
And this the world calls frenzy ; but the wise 
Have a far deeper madness, and the glance 
Of melancholy is a fearful gift ; 
What is it but the telescope of truth. 
Which strips the distance of its fantasies, 
And brings life near in utter nakedness, 
Making the cold reality too real ! 

A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 
The wanderer was alone as heretofore, 
The beings which surrounded him were gone. 
Or were at war with him ; he was a mark 
For blight and desolation, compassed round 
With hatred and contention ; jiain was mixed 
In all which was served up to him, until, 
Like to the Pontic monarch of old days, 
He fed on poisons, and they had no power, 
Bat were a kind of nutriment ; he lived 
Through that which had been death to many men. 
And made him friends of mountains : with the 

stars 
And the quick Spirit of the universe 
He held his dialogues ; and they did teach 
To him the magic of their mysteries ; 
To him the book of Night was opened wide. 
And voices from the deep abyss revealed 
A marvel and a secret. — Be it so. 



My dream was past ; it had no further change. 

It was of a strange order, that the doom 

Of these two creatures should be thus traced out 

Almost like a reality, — the one 

To end in madness — both in misery. 

LORD BYRON. 



THE SCHOLAR. 



FROM " EDWIN THE FAIR." 



Thls life, and all that it contains, to him 

Is but a tissue of illuminous dreams 

Filled with book-wisdom, pictured thought and 

love 

That on its own creations spends itself. 

All things he understands, and nothing does. 

Profusely eloquent in copious praise 

Of action, he will talk to you as one 

Whose wisdom lay in dealings and transactions ; 

Yet so much action as might tie his shoe 

Cannot his will command ; himself alone 

By his own wisdom not a jot the gainer. 

Of silence, and the hundred thousand things 

'T is better not to mention, he will speak, 

And still most wisely. 

HENRY Taylor. 



UNKNOWN POETS. 

FROM " THE E.XCURSION," BOOK I. 

0, MANY are the poets that are sown 

By nature ; men endowed with highest gifts, 

The vision and the faculty divine ; 

Yet wanting the accomplishment of versef 

(Which, in the docile season of their youth. 

It was denied them to acquire, through lack 

Of culture and the inspiring aid of books, 

Or hapl}' by a temper too severe. 

Or a nice backwardness afraid of shame). 

Nor having e'er, as life advanced, been led 

By circumstance to take unto the height 

The measure of themselves, these favored beings, 

All but a scattered few, live out their time, 

Husbanding that which they possess within. 

And go to the grave, unthought of. Strongest 

minds 

Are often those of whom the noisy world 

Hears least. 

William Wordsworth. 



THE POET OF NATURE. 



FROM "FESTUS." 



He had no times of study, and no place ; 
All places and all times to liim were one. 
His soul was like the wind-harji, which he loved, 
And sounded oidy when the spirit blew, 



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Sometime in feasts and follies, for he went 
Lifelike through all things ; and his thoughts 

then rose 
Like sparkles in the bright wine, brighter still ; 
Sometimes in dreams, and then the shining words 
Would wake him in the dark before his face. 
All things talked thoughts to him. The sea 

went mad 
To show his meaning ; and the awful sun 
Thundered his thoughts into him ; and at night 
The stars would whisper theirs, the moon sigh 
hers. 

Philip James Bailey. 



If Thought and Love desert us, from that day- 
Let us break off all commerce with the Muse : 

With Thought and Love comi^anions of our way, 

Whate'er the senses take or may refuse, 

The mind's internal Heaven shall shed her dews 
Of inspiration on the humblest lay. 

William Wordsworth. 



THE POET'S IMPULSE. 

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE," CANTO IIL 

Sky, mountains, river, winds, lake, lightnings ! 

ye! 
With night, and clouds, and thunder, and a 

soul 
To make these felt and feeling, well may be 
Things that have made me watchful : the far 

roll 
Of j'our departing voices is the knoll 
Of what in me is sleepless, — if I rest. 
But where of ye, tempests ! is the goal ? 
Are ye like those within the human breast ? 
Or do ye find, at length, like eagles, some hic^h 

nest ? 

Could I embody and unbosom now 
That which is most within me, — could I wreak 
My thoughts upon expression, and thus throw 
Soul, heart, mind, passions, feelings, strong or 

weak. 
All that I would have sought, and all I seek. 
Bear, know, feel, and yet breathe — into one 

Avord, 
And that one word were Lightning, I would 

speak ; 
But as it is, I live and die unheard, 
With a most voiceless thought, sheathing it as a 

sword. 

^ LORD Byron. 

THE INNER VISION. 

Most sweet it is with unuplifted eyes 

To pace the ground, if path there be or none, 

While a fair region round the traveller lies 

Which he forbears again to look upon ; 

Pleased rather with some soft ideal scene, 

The work of fancy, or some hap])y tone 

Of meditation, slipping in between 

The beauty coming and the beauty gone. 



THE POET OF TO-DAY. 

More than the soul of ancient song is given 
To thee, poet of to-day ! — thy dower 

Comes, from a higher than Olympian heaven, 
In holier beauty and in larger power. 

To thee Humanity, her woes revealing. 
Would all her griefs and ancient wrongs re- 
hearse ; 

Would make thy song the voice of her appealing, 
And sob her mighty sorrows through thy verse. 

While in her season of great darkness sharing. 
Hail thou the coming of each promise-star 

Which climbs the midnight of her long despair- 
ing, 
And watch for morning o'er the hills afar. 

Wherever Truth her holy warfare wages, 

Or Freedom pines, there let thy voice be heard ; 

Sound like a prophet- warning down the ages 
The human utterance of God's living word. 

But bring not thou the battle's stormy chorus, 
The tramp of armies, and the roar of fight. 

Not war's hot smoke to taint the sweet morn 
o'er us, 
Nor blaze of pillage, reddening up the night. 

0, let thy lays prolong that angel-singing, 

Girdling with music the Redeemer's star, 
And breathe God's peace, to earth "glad tidings " 
bringing 
From the near heavens, of old so dim and far ! 
Sarah Jane Lippincott {Gi-<tcs Greenwood). 



BOOKS. 



FROM " THE KALEDER OF SHEPERDES," 1528. 

He that many bokes redys, 
Cnnnyinge shall he be. 
Wysedome is soone caught ; 
In many leues it is sought : 
But slouth, that no boke bought, 
For reason taketh no thought ; 
His thryfte cometh behynde 



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BOOKS. 

For why, who writes such histories as these 
Doth often bring the reader's heart such ease, 
As when they sit and see what he doth note, 
Well fare his heart, say they, this book that 
wrote ! 

JOHN HIGGINS. 



THE FLOWER. 

How fresh, Lord, how sweet and clean 
Are thy returns ! even as the flowers in spring ; 

To which, besides their own demean, 
The late-past frosts tributes of pleasure bring. 
Grief melts away 
Like snow in May, 
As if there were no such cold thing. 

Who would have thought my shrivelled heart 
Could have recovered greenness ? It was gone 

Quite underground ; as flowers depart 
To see their mother root, when they have blown ; 
Where they together 
All the hard weather. 
Dead to the world, keep house unknown. 

These are thy wonders. Lord of power. 
Killing and quickning, bringing down to hell 

And up to heaven in an houre ; 
Making a chiming of a passing-bell. 
We say amisse. 
This or that is : 
Thy word is all, if we could spell. 

that I once past changing were. 

Fast in thy paradise, where no flower can wither ! 

Many a spring I shoot up fair, 
Offring at heav'n, growing and groning thither ; 
Nor doth my flower 
Want a spring-showre. 
My sinnes and I joining together. 

But, while I gi'ow in a straight line. 
Still upwards bent, as if heav'n were mine own. 

Thy anger comes, and I decline : 
What frost to that ? what pole is not the zone 
Whei'e all things burn. 
When thou doat turn. 
And the least frown of thine is shown ? 

And now in age I bud again ; 
After so many deaths I live and write ; 

1 once more smell the dew and rain, 
And relish versing : my only light, 

It cannot be 
That I am he 
On whom thy tempests fell all night ! 



These are thy wonders. Lord of love. 
To make us see we are but flowers that glide ; 

Which when we once can finde and prove, 
Thou hast a garden for us where to bide. 
Who would be more. 
Swelling through store. 
Forfeit their paradise by their pride. 

George Herbert. 



YUSSOUF. 

A STRANGER came one night to Yussouf's tent, 
Saying, " Behold one outcast and in dread. 
Against whose life the bow of power is bent. 
Who flies, and hath not where to lay his head ; 
I come to thee for shelter and for food. 
To Yussouf, called through all our tribes ' The 
Good.' " 

" This tent is mine," said Yussouf, "but no more 

Than it is God's ; come in, and be at peace ; 

Freely shalt thou partake of all my store 

As I of his who buildeth over these 

Our tents his glorious roof of night and day. 

And at whose door none ever yet heard Nay." 

So Yussouf entertained his guest that night. 
And, waking him ere day, said : " Here is gold. 
My swiftest horse is saddled for thy flight. 
Depart before the prying day grow bold." 
As one lamp lights another, nor grows less^ 
So nobleness enkindleth nobleness. 

That inward light the stranger's face made grand, 
Which shines from all self-conquest ; kueelinglow, 
He bowed his forehead upon Yussouf's hand. 
Sobbing : "0 Sheik, I cannot leave thee so ; 
I will repay thee ; all this thou hast done 
Unto that Ibrahim who slew thy son ! " 

" Take thrice the gold," said Yussouf, "for with 

thee 
Into the desert, never to return. 
My one black thought shall ride away from me ; 
First-born, for whom by day and night I yearn, 
Balanced and just are all of God's decrees ; 
Thou art avenged, my first-born, sleep in peace ! " 
James Russell Lowell. 



ABOU BEN ADHEM. 

Abou Ben Adiiem (may his tribe increase !) 
Awoke one night from a deep dr(!am of peace. 
And saw within the moonlight in his room. 
Making it rich and like a lily in bloom. 
An angel writing in a book of gold : 
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold, 



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And to the presence in the room he said, 
"What writest thou?" The vision raised its 

head, 
And, with a look made of all sweet accord, 
Answered, ' ' The names of those who love the 

Lord." 
"And is mine one ?" said Abou. "Nay, not so," 
Replied the angel. Ahou spoke more low, 
But cheerly still ; and said, " I pray thee, then, 
Write me as one that loves his fellow-men." 

The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night 
It came again, with a great wakening light. 
And showed the names whom love of God had 

blessed, — - 
And, lo ! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest ! 

LEIGH Hunt. 



HARMOSAN. 

Now the third and fatal conflict for the Persian 

throne w^as done, 
And the Moslem's fiery valor had the crowning 

victory won. 

Harmosan, the last and boldest the invader to 
defy. 

Captive, overborne by numbers, they were bring- 
ing forth to die. 

Then exclaimed that noble captive : " Lo, I 

perish in my thirst ; 
Give me but one drink of water, and let then 

arrive the w^orst ! " 

In his hand he took the goblet ; but awhile the 

draught forbore. 
Seeming doubtfully the purpose of the foeman to 

explore. 

Well might then have paused the bravest, — for 

around him angry foes 
With a hedge of naked weapons did that lonely 

man enclose. 

"But what fear'st thou?" cried the caliph; 
" is it, friend, a secret blow ? 

Fear it not ! our gallant Moslems no such treach- 
erous dealing know. 

"Thou mayst quench thy thirst securely, for 
thou shalt not die before 

Thou hast drunk that cup of water, — this re- 
prieve is thine — no more ! " 

Quick the satrap dashed the goblet down to earth 
with I'eady hand. 

And the liquid sank forever, lost amid the burn- 
ing sand. 



"Thou hast said that mine my life is, till the 

water of that cup 
I have drained ; then bid thy servants that 

spilled water gather up ! " 

For a moment stood the caliph as by doubtful 

passions stirred ; 
Then exclaimed, "Forever sacred must remain 

a monarch's word. 

" Bring another cup, and straightway to the 

noble Persian give : 
Drink, I said before, and perish, — now I bid 

thee drink and live ! " 

Richard Chenevix Trench. 



VANITY. 

The sun comes up and the sun goes down. 

And day and night are the same as one ; 

The year grows green, and the year grows brown. 

And what is it all, when all is done ? 

Grains of sombre or shining sand, 

Gliding into and out of the band. 

And men go down in ships to the seas, 
And a hundred ships are the same as one ; 
And backward and forward blows the breeze. 
And what is it all, when all is done ? 
A tide with never a shore in sight 
Getting steadily on to the night. 

The fisher droppeth his net in the stream, 
And a hundred streams are the same as one ; 
And the maiden dreameth lier love-lit dream. 
And what is it all, when all is done ? 
The net of the fisher the burden breaks, 
And alway the dreaming the dreamer wakes. 

Harriet Prescott Spofford. 



A PSALM OF LIFE. 

Tell me not, in mournful numbers, 
Life is but an empty dream ! 

For the soul is dead that slumbers, 
And things are not what they seem. 

Life is real ! Life is earnest ! 

And the grave is not its goal ; 
Dust thou art, to dust returnest, 

Was not spoken of the soul. 

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow, 
Is our destined end or way ; 

But to act, that each to-morrow 
Find us farther than to-day. 



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Art is long, and Time is iieeting, 

And our hearts, though stout and hrave, 

Still, like muffled drums, are beating 
Funeral marches to the grave. 

In the world's broad field of battle, 

In the bivouac of Life, 
Be not like dumb, driven cattle ! 

Be a hero in the strife ! 

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant ! 

Let the dead Past bury its dead ! 
Act, — act in the living Present ! 

Heart within, and God o'erhead ! 

Lives of great men all remind us 
We can make oiir lives sublime, 

And, departing, leave behind us 
Footprints on the sands of time ; — 

Footprints, that perhaps another, 

Sailing o'er life's solemn main, 
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother. 

Seeing, shall take heart again. • 

Let us, then, be up and doing, 

With a heart for any fate ; 
Still achieving, still pursuing. 

Learn to labor and to wait. 

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 



MY LEGACY. 

They told nie I was heir : I turned in haste. 

And ran to seek my treasure, 

And wondered, as I ran, how it was placed, — 

If I should find a measure 

Of gold, or if the titles of fair lands 

And houses would be laid within my hands. 

I journeyed many roads ; I knocked at gates ; 

I spoke to each wayfarer 

I met, and said, "A heritage awaits 

Me. Art not thou the bearer 

Of news ? some message sent to me whereby 

I learn which way my new possessions lie ? " 

Some asked me in ; naught lay beyond their door ; 

Some smiled, and would not tarry. 

But said that men were just behind who bore 

More gold than I could carry ; 

And so the morn, the noon, the day, were spent. 

While empty-handed up and down I went. 

At last one cried, whose face I could not see. 
As through the mists he hasted : 
" Poor child, what evil ones have hindered thee 
Till this whole day is wasted ? 



Hath no man told thee that thou art joint heir 
With one named Christ, who waits the goods to 
share ? " 

The one named Christ I sought for many days, 

In many places vainly ; 

I heard men name his name in many ways ; 

I saw his temples plainly ; 

But they who named him most gave me no sign 

To find him by, or prove the heirship mine. 

And when at last I stood before his face, 

I knew him by no token 

Save subtle air of joy which filled the place ; 

Our greeting was not spoken ; 

In solemn silence I received my .share, 

Kneeling before my brother and "joint heir." 

My share ! No deed of house or spreading lands, 

As I had dreamed ; no measure 

Heaped up with gold ; my elder brother's hands 

Had never held such treasure. 

Foxes have holes, and birds in nests are fed : 

My brother had not where to lay his head. 

My share ! The right like him to know all pain 

Which hearts are made for knowing ; 

The right to find in loss the surest gain ; 

To reap my joy from sowing 

In bitter tears ; the right with him to keep 

A watch by day and night with all who weep. 

My share ! To-day men call it grief and death ; 

I see the joy and life to-morrow ; 

I thank my Father with my every breath, 

For this sweet legacy of sorrow ; 

And through my tears I call to each "jointheir" 

With Christ, " Make haste to ask him lor thy 

share." 

Helen Hunt Jackson. 



SYMPATHY. 



FROM " ION," ACT I. SC. 2. 



'T IS a little thing 
To give a cup of water ; yet its draught 
Of cool refreshment, drained by fevered lips. 
May give a shock of pleasure to the frame 
More exquisite tlian when nectarean juice 
Renews the life of joy in happier hours. 
It is a little thing to speak a phrase 
Of common comfort which by daily use 
Has almost lost its sense, yet on the ear 
Of him who thought to die unmourned 'twill fall 
Like choicest music, fill the glazing eye 
With gentle tears, relax the knotted hand 
To know the bonds of fellowship again ; 
And shed on the departing soul a sense, 



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More precious than the benison of friends 
About the honored death-bed of the rich, 
To him who else were lonelj^ that another 
Of the great family is near and feels. 

Sir Thomas Noon talfourd. 



ALEXANDER'S FEAST ; OR, THE POWER 
OF MUSIC. 

AN ODE. 

'T WAS at the royal feast, for Persia won 
By Philip's warlike son : 
Aloft in awful state 
The godlike hero sate 

On his imperial throne : 
His valiant peers were placed around, 
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound 
(So should desert in arms be crowned) ; 
The lovely Thais, by his side. 
Sate like a blooming Eastern bride 
In flower of 3^outh and beauty's pride. 
Happy, happy, happy pair ! 
None but the brave, 
None but the brave. 
None but the brave deserves the fair. 

CHonus. 
Happy, happy, happy pair I 

None but the brnve, 

None hut the brave, 
None but the brave deserves the fair. 

Timotheus, placed on high 
Amid the tuneful choir. 
With Hying lingers touched the lyre ; 
The trembling notes ascend the sky, 

And heavenly joys inspire. 
The song began from Jove, 
Who left his blissful seats above 
(Such is the power of mighty love). 
A dragon's fiery form belied tlie god ; 
Sublime on radiant spires he rode. 
When he to fair Olympia pressed. 
And while he sought her snowy breast ; 
Then round her slender waist he curled. 
And stamped an image of himself, a sovereign 

of the world. 
The listening crowd admire the lofty sound, 
A present deity ! they shout around ; 
A present deity ! the vaulted roofs rebound. 
With ravished ears 
The monarch hears, 
Assumes the god, 
Affects to nod. 
And seems to shake the spheres. 



CliOKUS. 

With ravished ears 
The monareh hears. 
Assumes tJie god, 
Affects to nod. 
And seems to shake the spheres. 

The praise of Bacchus then the sweet musician 
sung, 
Of Bacchus — ever fair and ever young : 
The jolly god in triumph comes ; 
Sound the trumpets ; beat the drums : 
Flushed with a purple grace 
He shows his honest face : 
Now give the hautboys breath. He comes ! he 
comes ! 
Bacchus, ever foir and young, 

Drinking joys did first ordain ; 

Bacchus' blessings are a treasure. 

Drinking is the soldier's pleasure ; 

Rich the treasure, 

Sweet the pleasure, 

Sweet is pleasure after pain. 

CHOKUS. 

Bacchus' blessings are a treasure, 

Drinking is the soldier's pleasure ; 

Rich the treasure, 

Stvcet the pleasure. 

Sweet is pleasure after pain. 

Soothed with the sound the king grew vain ; 
Fought all his battles o'er again ; 
And thrice he routed all his foes, and thrice he 
slew the slain. 
The master saw the madness rise ; 
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes ; 
And, while he heaven and earth defied. 
Changed his hand and checked his pride. 
He chose a mournful muse. 
Soft pity to infuse : 
He sung Darius, great and good. 

By too severe a fate, 
Fallen, fallen, fallen, fallen. 
Fallen from his high estate, 

And weltering in his blood ; 
Deserted, at his utmost need, 
By those his former bounty fed ; 
On the bare earth exposed he lies. 
With not a friend to close his eyes. 
With downcast looks the joyless victor sate, 
Revolving in his altered soul 

The various turns of chance below ; 
And, now and then, a sigh he stole ; 
And tears began to How. 



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CHORUS. 

Bevolving in his altered soul 

The various turns of chance below; 

And, now and then, a sigh he stole ; 
And tears began to flow. 

The mighty master smiled, to see 
That love was in the next degree ; 
'T was but a kindred sound to move, 
For pity melts the mind to love. 
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures, 
Soon he soothed his soul to pleasures. 
War, he sung, is toil and trouble ; 
Honor, but an empty bubble ; 

Never ending, still beginning, 
Fighting still, and still destroying : 

If the world be worth thy winning. 
Think, 0, think it worth enjoying ! 
Lovely Thais sits beside thee, 
Take the good the gods provide thee. 
The many rend the skies with loud applause ; 
So Love was crowned, but Music won the cause. 
The prince, unable to conceal his pain, 
Gazed on the fair 
Who caused his care. 
And sighed and looked, sighed and looked. 
Sighed and looked, and sighed again : 
At length, with love and wine at once oppressed. 
The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast. 



The prince, unable to conceal his pain. 
Gazed on the fair 
Who ca,used, his care, 
And sighed and looked, sighed, and looked, 
Sighed and looked, and sighed again : 
At length, with love and wine at once oppressed. 
The vanquished victor sunk upon lier breast. 

Now strike the golden lyre again : 
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain. 
Break his bands of sleep asunder. 
And rouse him, like a rattling peal of thunder. 
Hark, hark, the horrid sound 
Has raised up his head ; 
As awaked from the dead. 
And amazed, he stares around. 
Revenge ! revenge ! Timotheus cries, 
See the furies arise ! 
See the snakes that they rear. 
How they hiss in their hair. 
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes ! 
Behold a ghastly band. 
Each a torch in his hand ! 
Those are Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain, 
And unburied remain. 
Inglorious on the plain : 



Give the vengeance due 

To the valiant crew. 
Behold how they toss their torches on high, 
How they point to the Persian abodes. 
And glittering temples of their hostile gods ! 
The princes applaud with a furious joy ; 
And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to de- 
stroy : 

Thais led the way. 

To light him to his prey. 
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy ! 



And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to de- 
stroy : 

Thais led the way. 

To light him to his prey, 
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy ! 

Thus, long ago, 
Ere heaving bellows learned to blow, 
While oi'gans yet were mute ; 
Timotheus, to his breathing flute. 
And sounding lyre. 
Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire. 
At last divine Cecilia came, 
Inventress of the vocal frame ; 
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store, 
Enlarged the former narrow bounds. 
And added length to solemn sounds, 
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown 
before. 
Let old Timotheus yield the prize. 

Or both divide the crown ; 
He raised a mortal to the skies. 
She drew an angel down. 

GRAND CHORUS. 

At last divine Cecilia came, 

Inventress of the vocal frame ; 

The siveet enthusiast, from her sacred store. 

Enlarged the former narrow bounds, 

And added length to sole7nn soimds. 

With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknoum 

before. 

Let old Timotheus yield the prize. 

Or both divide the crourn; 

He raised a mortal to the skies. 

She drew an angel down, 

John Dryden. 



INVOCATION. 



FROM "THE DAV:DEIS. 



Awake, awake, my Lyre ! 

And tell thy silent master's humble tale 

In sounds that may prevail ; 

Sounds that gentle thoughts inspire : 



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Though so exalted she, 
And I so lowly be, 

Tell her, such dififerent notes make all thy har- 
mony. 

Hark ! how the strings awake : 

And, though the moving hand approach not near, 

Themselves with awful fear 

A kind of numerous trembling make. 

Now all thy forces try ; 

Now all thy charms apply ; 

Eevenge upon her ear the conquests of her eye. 

"Weak Lyre ! thy virtue sure 

Is useless here, since thou art only found 

To cure, but not to wound. 

And she to wound, but not to cure. 

Too weak, too, wilt thou prove 

My passion to remove ; 

Physic to other ills, thou 'rt nourishment to love. 

Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre ! 

For thou canst never tell my humble tale 

In sounds that will prevail. 

Nor gentle thoughts in her inspire ; 

All thy vain mirth lay by, 

Bid thy strings silent lie. 

Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre, and let thy master 

die. 

Abraham Cowley. 



THE PASSIONS. 



AN ODE FOR MUSIC. 



When Music, heavenly maid, was young, 
"While yet in early Greece she sung, 
The Passions oft, to hear her shell. 
Thronged around her magic cell, — 
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting, — 
Possessed beyond the muse's painting ; 
By turns they felt the glowing mind 
Disturbed, delighted, raised , refined ; 
Till once, 't is said, when all were fired, 
Filled with fury, rapt, inspired, 
From the supporting myrtles round 
They snatched her instruments of sound ; 
And, as they oft had heard apart 
Sweet lessons of her forceful art. 
Each (for madness ruled the hour) 
"Would prove his own expressive power. 

First Fear his hand, its skill to try, 
Amid the chords bewildered laid. 

And back recoiled, he knew not why, 
E'en at the sound himself had made. 



Next Anger rushed ; his eyes, on fire, 
In lightnings owned his secret stings : 

In one rude clash he struck the lyre, 
And swept with hurried hand the strings. 

"With woful measures wan Despair, 

Low, sullen sounds, his grief beguiled, — 

A solemn, strange, and mingled air ; 
'T was sad by fits, by starts 't was wild. 

But thou, Hope, with eyes so fair, — 

"What was thy delightful measure ? 
Still it whispered promised pleasure, 

And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail ! 
Still would her touch the strain prolong ; 

And from the rocks, the woods, the vale. 
She called on Echo still, through all the song ; 
And where her sweetest theme she chose, 
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close; 
And Hope, enchanted, smiled, and waved her 

golden hair. 
And longer had she sung — but, with a frown, 

Eevenge impatient rose ; 
He threw his blood-stained sword in thunder 
down ; 
And, with a withering look, , 
The war-denouncing trumpet took. 
And blew a blast so loud and dread, 
"Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe ! 
And ever and anon he beat 
The doubling drum with furious heat ; 
And though, sometimes, each dreary pause be- 
tween, 
Dejected Pity, at his side. 
Her soul-subduing voice applied. 
Yet still he kept his wild, unaltered mien, 
While each strained ball of sight seemed bursting 
from his head. 

Thy numbers, Jealousy, to naught were fixed,— 
Sad proof of thy distressful state ; 

Of differing themes the veering song was mixed ; 
And now it courted Love, — now, raving, 
called on Hate. 

With eyes upraised, as one inspired, 
Pale Melancholy sate retired ; 
And from her wild sequestered seat. 
In notes by distance made more sweet, 

Poured through the mellow horn her pensive 
soul : 
And, dashing soft from rocks around, 
Bubbling runnels joined the sound ; 
Through glades and glooms the mingled meas- 
ure stole ; 
Or o'er some haunted stream, with fond delay, 
Round an holy calm diffusing, 
Love of peace, and lonely musing. 
In hollow murmurs died away. 



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But 0, how altered was its sprightlier tone 
When Cheerfuhiess, a nymph of healthiest hue, 
Her bow across her shoulder flung, 
Her buskins gemmed with morning dew, 
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket 
rung, — 
The hunter's call, to faun and dryad known ! 
The oak-crowned sisters, and their chaste-eyed 
queen, 
Satyrs and sylvan boys, were seen 
Peeping from forth their alleys green : 
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear ; 

And Sport leapt up, and seized his beechen 
spear. 

Last came Joy's ecstatic trial : 
He, with viny crown advancing. 

First to the lively pipe his hand addrest ; 
But soon he saw the brisk-awakening viol. 

Whose sweet entrancingvoice he loved the best ; 
They would have thought, who heard the strain. 
They saw, in Tempe's vale, her native maids 
Amidst the festal-sounding shades. 
To some unwearied minstrel dancing, 
While, as his flying lingers kissed the strings. 
Love framed with Mirtli a gay fantastic round : 
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound ; 
And he, amidst his frolic play. 
As if he would the charming air repay. 
Shook thousand odors from his dewy wings. 

Music ! sphere-descended maid. 
Friend of pleasure, wisdom's aid ! 
Why, goddess, why, to us denied, 
Lay'st thou thy ancient lyre aside ? 
As, in that loved Athenian bower. 
You learned an all-commanding power. 
Thy mimic soul, nymph endeared. 
Can well recall what then it heard. 

Where is thy native simple heart, 
Devote to virtue, fancy, art? 
Arise, as in that elder time. 
Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime ! 
Thy wonders, in that godlike age, 
Fill thy recording sister's page ; 
'T is said — and I believe the tale — 
Thy humblest reed could more prevail, 
Had more of strength, diviner rage, 
Than all which charms this laggard age, — 
E'en all at once together found, — 
Cecilia's mingled world of sound. 
O, bid our vain endeaA'^ors cease ; 
Revive the just designs of Greece ! 
Return in all thy simple state, — • 
Confirm the tales her sons relate ! 

WILLIAM Collins. 



THE NIGHTINGALE'S SONG. 

FROM "MUSIC'S DUEL." 

Now westward Sol had spent the richest beams 
Of noon's high glory, when, hard by the streams 
Of Tiber, on the scene of a green plat. 
Under protection of an oak, there sat 
A sweet lute's-inaster, in whose gentle airs 
He lost the day's heat and his own hot cares. 
Close in the covert of the leaves there stood 
A nightingale, come from the neighboring wood 
(The sweet inhabitant of each glad tree. 
Their muse, their siren, harmless siren she) : 
There stood she listening, and did entertain 
The music's soft report, and mould the same 
In her own murmurs ; that whatever mood 
His curious fingers lent, her voice made good. 

This lesson too 
She gives them back ; her supple breast thrills 

out 
Sharp airs, and staggers in a warbling doubt 
Of dallying sweetness, hovers o'er her skill, 
And folds in waved notes, with a trembling bill. 
The pliant series of her slippery song ; 
Then starts she suddenly into a throng 
Of short thick sobs, whose thiindering volleys 

float. 
And roll themselves over her lubric throat 
In panting murmurs, stilled out of her breast ; 
That ever-bubbling spring, the sugared nest 
Of her delicious soul, that there does lie 
Bathing in streams of liquid melody ; 
Music's best seed-plot ; when in ripened airs 
A golden-headed harvest faiily rears 
His honey-dropping tops ploughed by her breath 
Which there i-eciprocally laboreth. 
In that sweet soil it seems a holy quire. 
Sounded to the name of great Apollo's lyre ; 
Whose silver roof rings with the sprightly notes 
Of sweet-lipped angel-imps, that swill their 

throats 
In cream of morning Helicon, and then 
Prefer soft anthems to the ears of men, 
To woo them from their beds, still murmuring 
That men can sleep while they their matins sing 
(Most divine service), whose so early lay 
Prevents the eyelids of the blushing day. 
There might you hear her kindle her soft voice 
In the close murmur of a sparkling noise ; 
And lay the groundwork of her hopeful song, 
Still keeping in the forward stream so long, 
Till a sweet whirlwind (striving to get out) 
Heaves her soft bosom, wandei's round about, 
And makes a pretty earthquake in her breast. 
Till the fledged notes at length forsake their nest. 
Fluttering in wanton shoals, and to the sky. 
Winged with their own wild echoes, prattling fly. 



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She opes the. floodgate, and lets loose a tide 
Of streaming sweetness, which in state doth ride 
On the waved back of every swelling strain. 
Rising and falling in a pompous train ; 
And while she thus discharges a shrill peal 
Of flashing airs, she qualifies their zeal 
With the cool epode of a graver note ; 
Thus high, thus low, as if her silver throat 
Would reach the brazen voice of war's hoarse bird; 
Her little soul is ravished, and so poured 
Into loose ecstasies, that she is placed 
Above herself, music's enthusiast. 

RICHARD CRASHAW. 



t 



A SONG FOR ST. CECILIA'S DAY, 1687. 

Fr.OJi harmony, from heavenly harmony, 
This universal frame began ; 
When Nature underneath a heap 
Of jarring atoms lay. 
And could not heave her head. 
The tun(iful voice was heard fi-om high, 

Arise, ye more than dead ! 
Then cold and hot, and moist and dry, 
In order to their stations leap, 
And Music's power obey. 
From harmony, from heavenly harmony. 
This universal frame began : 
From harmony to harmony. 
Through all the compass of the notes it ran. 
The diapason closing full in man. 

What passion cannot Music raise and quell ? 
When Jubal struck the chorded shell. 
His listening brethren stood around. 

And, wondering, on their faces fell. 
To worship that celestial sound. 
Less than a God they though t thei'e could not dwell 
Within the hoi low of that shell, 
That spoke so sweetly and so well. 
What passion cannot Music raise and quell ? 

The trumpet's loud clangor 

Excites us to arms, 
With shrill notes of anger. 

And mortal alarms. 
The double double double beat 

Of the thundering drum 

Cries, Hark ! the foes come ; 
Charge, charge, 't is too late to retreat ! 

The soft complaining flute 
In dying notes discovers 
The woes of hopeless lovers. 
Whose dirge is whispered by the warbling lute. 



Sharp violins proclaim 

Their jealous pangs, and desperation. 

Fury, frantic indignation, 

Depth of pains, and height of passion 

For the fair, disdainful dame. 

But 0, what art can teach, 

What human voice can reach, 
The sacred organ's praise ? 
Notes inspiring holy love, 
Notes that wing their heavenly ways 
To mend the choirs above. 

Orpheus could lead the savage race ; 
And trees uprooted left their place, 

Sequacious of the lyre ; 
But bright Cecilia raised the wonder higher ; 
When to her organ vocal breath was given, 
An angel heard, and straight appeared 

Mistaking earth for heaven. 

GRAND CHORUS. 

As from the 2:)ower of sacred lays 

The spheres began to move, 
Jnd sung the great Creator's praise 

To all the blessed above ; 
So, lohen the last and dreadful hour 
This crumbling p)ageant shall devour, 
The trumpet shall be heard on high. 
The dead shall live, the living die. 
And Music shall untune the sky. 

John Dryden. 



MUSIC. 

FROM "THE MERCHANT OF VENICE," ACT V. SC. I. 

Lorenzo. How sweet the moonlight sleeps 
upon this bank ! 
Here will we sit, and let the sounds of music 
Creep in our ears : soft stillness, and the night, 
Become the touches of sweet harmony. 
Sit, Jessica : look, liow the floor of heaven 
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold : 
There 's not the smallest orb which thou be- 

hold'st, 
But in liis motion like an angel sings. 
Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins ; 
Such harmomy is in immortal souls : 
But whilst this muddy vesture of decay 
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it. 

Jessica. I am never merry when I hear sweet 

music. 
Lor. The reason is your spirits are attentive. 

Therefore the poet 
Did feign that Orpheus drew trees, stones, and 
floods ; 



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Since naught so stockish, hard, and full of rage, 
But music for the time doth change his nature. 
The man that hath no music in himself, 
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, 
Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils ; 
The motions of his spirit are dull as night. 
And his affections dark as Erebus : 
Let no such man be trusted. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



TO 



Music, when soft voices die, 
Vibrates in the memory, — 
Odors, when sweet violets sicken, 
Live within the sense they quicken. 

Rose-leaves, when the rose is dead, 
Are heaped for the beloved's bed ; 
And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone, 
Love itself shall slumber on. 

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. 



MAN. 



FROM " NIGHT THOUGHTS," MGHT I. 

How poor, how rich, how abject, how august, 
How complicate, how wonderful, is man ! 
How passing wonder He who made him such ! 
Who centi'ed in our make such strange extremes, 
From diti'erent natures marvellously mixed. 
Connection exquisite of distant worlds ! 
Distinguished link in being's endless chain ! 
Midway from nothing to the Deity ! 
A beam ethereal, sullied, and absorpt ! 
Though sullied and dishonored, still divine ! 
Dim miniature of greatness absolute ! 
An heir of glory ! a frail child of dust ! 
Helpless immortal ! insect infinite ! 
A worm ! a god ! — I tremble at myself. 
And in myself am lost. At home a stranger. 
Thought wanders xip and down, surprised, aghast. 
And wondering at her own. How reason reels ! 
0, what a miracle to man is man ! 
Triumphantly distressed ! "What joy ! what dread ! 
Alternately transported and alarmed ! 
"What can preserve my life ? or what destroy ? 
An angel's arm can't snatch me from the grave ; 
Legions of angels can't confine me there. 

DR. EDWARD YOUNG. 



MAN — WOMAN. 

Man's home is everywhere. On ocean's flood. 
Where the strong ship with storm-defying tether 
Doth link in stormy brotherhood 
Earth's utmost zones together, 



Where'er the red gold glows, the spice-trees wave, 
Where the rich diamond ripens, mid the flame 
Of vertic suns that ope the stranger's grave. 
He with bronzed cheek and daring step doth 
rove ; 
He, with short pang and slight, 
Doth turn him from the checkered light 
Of the fair moon through his own forests 
dancing. 
Where music, joy, and love 

Were his young hours entrancing ; 
And where ambition's thunder-claim 
Points out his lot. 
Or fitful wealth allures to I'oam, 
There doth he make his home. 
Repining not. 

It is not thus ivith Woman. The far halls, 

Though ruinous and lone. 
Where first her pleased ear drank a nursing- 
mother's tone ; 
The home with humble Avails, 
Where breathed a parent's prayer around her 
bed; 
The valley where, with playmates true, 
She culled the strawberry, bright with dew ; 
The bower where Love her timid footsteps led ; 
The hearthstone where her children grew ; 
The damp soil where she cast 
The flower-seeds of her hope, and saw them bide 
the blast, — 
Affection with unfading tint recalls. 
Lingering round the ivied walls. 
Where every rose hath in its cup a bee. 

Making fresh honey of remembered things, — 
Each rose \^'ithout a thorn, each bee bereft of 
stings. 

LYDIA HUNTLEY SiGOURNEY. 



WOMAN. 

There in the fane a beauteous creature stands, 
The first best work of the Creator's hands, 
Whose slender limbs inadequately bear 
A full-orbed bosom and a weight of care ; 
Whose teeth like pearls, whose lips like cherries, 

show. 
And fawn-like eyes still tremble as they glow. 

From the Portug^uese of CALIDASA, 
Translation of WILSON. 



APR^S. 



Dov\fN, down, Ellen, my little one. 

Climbing so tenderly up to my knee ; 

Why should you add to the thoughts that are 

taunting me. 
Dreams of your mother's arms clinging to me ? 



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CONTENTMENT. 



*'7W>'«> Fortune, turn thy "wheel loitli smile (r frown; 
With that wild wheel we go not up or down .- 
Our hoard is little, but our hearts are great.''' 



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Cease, cease, Ellen, my little one. 

Warbling so fairily close to ni}'' ear ; 

Why should you choose, of all songs that are 

haunting me, 
This that I made for your mother to hear ? 

Hush, hush, Ellen, my little one, 

Wailing so wearily under the stars ; 

Why should I think of her tears, that might 

light to me 
Love that had made life, and sorrow that mars ? 

Sleep, sleep, Ellen, my little one ! 

Is she not like her whenever she stirs ? 

Has she not eyes that will soon be as bright to me, 

Lips that will some day be honeyed like hers ? 

Yes, yes, Ellen, my little one, 

Though her white bosom is stilled in the gi-ave. 

Something more white than her bosom is spared 

to me, — 
Something to cling to and something to crave. 

Love, love, Ellen, my little one ! 

Love indestructible, love undefiled. 

Love through all deeps of her spirit lies bared 

to me. 
Oft as I look on the face of her child. 

Arthur J. Munby. 



FORTUNE. 



FROM "FANNY. 



But Fortune, like some others of her sex, 
Delights in tantalizing and tormenting. 

One day we feed upon their smiles, — the next 
Is spent in swearing, sorrowing, and repenting. 

Eve never walked in Paradise more pure 

Than on that morn when Satan played the devil 

With her and all her race. A lovesick wooer 
Ne'er asked a kinder maiden, or more civil, 

Tiian Cleopatra was to Antony 

The day she left him on the Ionian sea. 

The serpent — loveliest in his coiled ring. 

With eye that charms, and beauty that outvies 

The tints of the rainbow — bears upon his sting 
The deadliest venom. Ere the dolphin dies 

Its hues are brightest. Like an infant's breath 

Are tropic winds before the voice of death 

Is heard upon the waters, summoning 

The midnight earthquake from its sleep of years 

To do its task of woe. The clouds that fling 
The lightning brighten ere the bolt appears ; 



The pantings of the warrior's heart are proud 
Upon that battle-morn whose night-dews wet his 

shroud ; 
The sun is loveliest as he sinks to rest ; 

The leaves of autumn smile when fading fast ; 
The swan's last song is sweetest. 

FITZ-GREENE HALLECK. 



ENID'S SONG. 

FROM "IDYLS OF THE KING." 

Turn, Fortune, turn thy wheel and lower the 

proud ; 
Turn thy wild wheel through sunshine, storm, 

and cloud ; 
Thy wheel and thee we neither love nor hate. 

Turn, Fortune, turn thy wheel with smile or 
frown ; 
With that wild wheel we go not up or down ; 
Our hoard is little, but our hearts are great. 

Smile and we smile, the lords of many lands ; 
Frown and we smile, the lords of our own hands ; 
For man is man and master of his fate. 

Turn, turn thy wheel above the staring crowd ; 
Thy wheel and thou are shadows in the cloud ; 
Thy wheel and thee we neither love nor hate. 

ALFRED TENNYSON. 



EXCELSIOR. 

The shades of night were falling fast. 
As through an Alpine village passed 
A yoirth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice, 
A banner with the strange device — 
Excelsior ! 

His brow was sad ; his eye beneath 
Flashed like a falchion from its sheath ; 
And like a silver clarion rung 
The accents of that unknown tongirc — 
Excelsior ! 

In happy homes he saw the light 
Of household fires gleam warm and bright 
Above, the spectral glaciers shone, 
And from his lips escaped a groan — 
Excelsior ! 

" Try not the pass," the old man said : 
" Dark lowers the tempest overhead ; 
The roaring torrent is deep and wide ! " 
And loud that clarion voice replied, 

Excelsior ! 



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" stay," tlie maiden said, "and rest 
Thy weary head upon this breast ! " 
A tear stood in liis bright blue eye, 
But still he answered, with a sigh, , 

Excelsior ! 

" Beware the pine-tree's withered branch I 
Beware the awful avalanche ! " 
This was the peasant's last good-night : 
A voice replied, far up the height, 
Excelsior ! 

At break of day, as heavenward 
The pious monks of Saint Bernard 
Uttered the oft-i'epeated prayer, 
A voice cried, through the startled air. 
Excelsior ! 

A traveller, by the faithful hound. 
Half buried in the snow was found, 
Still grasping in his hand of ice 
That banner with the strange device — 
Excelsior ! 

There in the twilight cold and gray, 
Lifeless, but beautiful, he lay. 
And from the sky, serene and far, 
A voice fell, like a falling star — 
Excelsior ! 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 



THE GIFTS OF GOD. 

When God at first made man. 
Having a glass of blessings standing by. 
Let us (said he) pour on him all we can : 
Let the world's riches, which dispersed lie, 

Contract into a span. 

So strength first made a way ; 
Then beauty flowed, then wisdom, honor, pleasure : 
When almost all was out, God made a stay, 
Perceiving that, alone, of all his treasure, 

Rest in the bottom lay. 

For if I should (said he) 
Bestow this jewel also on my creature, 
He would adore my gifts instead of me. 
And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature : 

So both should losers be. 

Yet let him keep the rest. 
But keep them with repining restlessness : 
Let him be rich and weary, that, at least, 
If goodness lead him not, yet weariness 

May toss him to my breast. 

George Herbert. 



A RIDDLE.* 



THE LETTER " H.'' 



'T WAS in heaven pronounced, and 't was mut- 
tered in hell. 
And echo caught faintly the sound as it fell ; 
On the confines of earth 't was permitted to rest, 
And the depths of the ocean its presence con- 
fessed ; 
'T will be found in the sphere when 't is riven 

asunder. 
Be seen in the lightning and heard in the thunder. 
'T was allotted to man with his earliest breath, 
Attends him at birth, and awaits him in death, 
Presides o'er his happiness, honor, and health. 
Is the prop of his house, and the end of his wealth. 
In the heaps of the miser 't is hoarded with care, 
But is sure to be lost on his prodigal heir. 
It begins every hope, every wish it must bound. 
With the husbandman toils, and with monarchs 

is crowned. 
Without it the soldiei', the seaman may roam. 
But woe to the wretch who expels it from home ! 
In the whispers of conscience its voice will be 

found. 
Nor e'en in the whirlwind of jiassion be drowned. 
'T will not soften the heart ; but though deaf be 

the ear, 
It will make it acutely and instantly hear. 
Yet in shade let it rest, like a delicate flower, 
Ah, breathe on it softly, — it dies in an houi-. 

CATHARINE FANSHAWH. 



FATHER LAND AND MOTHER TONGUE. 

Our Father Land ! and wouldst thou know 

W^hy we should call it Father Land ? 
It is that Adam here below 

Was made of earth by Nature's hand ; 
And he, our father made of earth. 

Hath peopled earth on every hand ; 
And we, in memory of his birth. 

Do call our country Father Land. 

At first, in Eden's bowers, they say, 

No sound of speech had Adam caught. 
But whistled like a bird all day, — 

And maybe 't was for want of thought : 
But Nature, with resistless laws. 

Made Adam soon surpass the birds ; 
She gave him lovely Eve because 

If he 'd a wife they must have loords. 

And so the native land, I hold, 
By male descent is proudly mine ; 

The language, as the tale hath told, 
Was given in the female line. 

• Sometimes attributed to Byron. 



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And thus we see on either hand 

We name onr blessings whence they've sprung; 
We call our country Father Land, 

We call our language Mother Tongue. 

Sahuel Lover. 



SMALL BEGINNINGS. 

A TRAVELi-ER through a dusty road strewed 

acorns on the lea ; 
And one took root and sprouted up, and grew 

into a tree. 
Love sought its shade, at evening time, to breathe 

its eai'ly vows ; 
And age was pleased, in heats of noon, to bask 

beneath its boughs ; 
The dormouse loved its dangling twigs, the birds 

sweet music bore ; 
It stood a glory in its place, a blessing evermore. 

A little spring had lost its way amid the grass 

and fern, 
A passing stranger scooped a well, where weary 

men nught turn ; 
He walled it in, and hung with care a ladle at 

the brink ; 
He thought not of the deed he did, but judged 

that toil might drink. 
He passed again, and lo ! the well, by summers 

never dried. 
Had cooled ten thousand parching tongues, and 

saved a life beside. 

A dreamer dropped a random thought ; 't was 
old, and yet 't was new ; 

A simple fancy of the brain, but strong in being 
true. 

It shone upon a genial mind, and lo ! its light 
became 

A lamp of life, a beacon ray, a monitory flame. 

The thought was small ; its issue great ; a watch- 
fire on the hill. 

It sheds its radiance far adown, and cheers the 
valley still ! 

A nameless man, amid a crowd that thronged 

the daily mart. 
Let fall a word of Hope and Love, unstudied, 

from the heart ; 
A whisper on the tumult thrown, — a transitory 

breath, — 
It raised a brother from the dust ; it saved a 

soul from death. 
germ ! fount ! word of love ! thought 

at random cast ! 
Ye Avere but little at the first, but mighty at the 

last. 

Charles Mackay. 



THE RULING PASSION. 

. FROM " MORAL ESSAYS," EPISTLE I. 

Search thou the ruling passion ; there, alone. 
The wild are constant, and the cunning known ; 
The fool consistent and the false sincere ; 
Priests, princes, women, no dissemblers here. 

In this the lust, in that the avarice, 

Were means, not ends ; ambition was the vice. 

In this one passion man can strength enjoj% 
As fits give vigor just when they destroy. 
Time, tliat on all things lays his lenient hand. 
Yet tames not this ; it sticks to our last sand. 
Consistent in our follies and our sins. 
Here honest Nature ends as she begins. 

Old politicians chew on wisdom past. 
And totter on in business to the last ; 
As weak, as earnest ; and as gravely out. 
As sober Lanesborough dancing in the gout. 

Behold a reverend sire, whom want of grace 
Has made the father of a nameless race. 
Shoved from the wall perhaps, or rudely pressed 
By his own son, that passes by unblessed : 
Still to his wench he crawls on knocking knees. 
And envies every sparrow that he sees. 

A salmon's belly, Helluo, was thy fate. 
The doctor, called, declares all help too late. 
"Mercy !" cries Helluo, "mercy on my soul ! 
Is there no hope ? — Alas ! — then bring the jowl." 

The frugal crone, whom praying priests attend, 
Still tries to save the hallowed taper's end, 
Collects her breath, as ebbing life retires. 
For one puff more, and in that puff expires. 

"Odious! in woollen! 'twould a saint pro- 
voke," 
Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke ; 
" No, let a charming chintz and Brussels lace 
Wrap my cold limbs, and shade my lifeless face : 
One would not, sure, be frightful when one 's 

dead, — 
And — Betty — give this cheek a little red." 

The courtier smooth, who forty years had 
shined 
An humble servant to all human-kind, 
Just brought out this, when scarce his tongue 

could stir, 
"If — where I 'm going — I could serve you, sir ? " 

" I give and I devise " (old Euclio said. 
And sighed) " my lands and tenements to Ned." 
Your money, sir ? " My money, sir ! what, all ? 
Why — if I must " (then wept) — "I give it 

Paul." 
The manor, sir ? " The manor, hold ! " he cried, 
"Not that, — I cannot part with that," — and 
died. 



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And you, brave Cobham ! to the latest bi-eath 
Shall feel your ruling passion strong in death ; 
Such in those moments as in all the past, ♦ 
" 0, save my country, Heaven ! " shall be your 
last. 



Alexander Pope. 



CONTRADICTION. 

FROM " CONVERSATION. ' 

Ye powers who rule the tongue, if such there 
are. 
And make colloquial happiness your care. 
Preserve me from the thing I dread and hate, 
A duel in the form of a debate. 
The clash of arguments and jar of words. 
Worse than the mortal brunt of rival swords. 
Decide no question with their tedious length. 
For opposition gives opinion strength, 
Divert the champions prodigal of breath. 
And put the peacefully disposed to death. 
0, thwart me not. Sir Soph, at every turn, 
Nor carp at every flaw you may discern ! 
Though syllogisms hang not on my tongue, 
I am not surely always in the wrong ; 
'T is hard if all is false that I advance, 
A fool must now and then be right by chance. 
Not that all freedom of dissent I blame ; 
No, — there I grant the privilege I claim. 
A disputable point is no man's ground ; 
Rove where you please, 't is common all around. 
Discourse may want an animated No, 
To brush the surface, and to make it flow ; 
But still remember, if you mean to please. 
To press your point with modesty and ease. 
The mark at which my j aster aim I take, 
Is contradiction for its own dear sake. 
Set yoiir opinion at whatever pitch. 
Knots and impediments make something hitch ; 
Adopt his own, 't is equally in vain. 
Your thread of argument is snapped again. 
The wrangler, rather than accord with you, 
Will judge himself deceived, and prove it too. 
Vociferated logic kills me quite ; 
A noisy man is always in the right. 
I twirl my thumbs, fall back into my chair. 
Fix on the wainscot a distressful stare. 
And, when I hope his blunders are all out, 
Reply discreetly, — "To be sure — no doubt ! " 

WILLIAM COWPER. 



DUELLING. 



FROM "CONVERSATION.' 



The point of honor has been deemed of use, 
To teach good manners, and to curb abuse ; 
Admit it true, the consequence is clear, 
Our polished manners are a mask we wear. 



And, at the bottom, barbarous still and rude, 
We are restrained, indeed, but not subdued. 
The very remedy, however sure. 
Springs from the mischief it intends to cure, 
And savage in its principle appears. 
Tried, as it should be, by the fruit it bears. 
'T is hard, indeed, if nothing will defend 
Mankind from (}uarrels but their fatal end ; 
That now and then a hero must decease. 
That the surviving world may live in peace. 
Perliaps at last close scrutiny may show 
The practice dastardly and mean and low ; 
That men engage in it compelled by force, 
And fear, not courage, is its proper source ; 
The fear of tyrant custom, and the fear 
Lest fops should censure us, and fools should 

sneer ; 
At least, to trample on our Maker's laws. 
And hazard life for any or no cause, 
To rush into a fixed eternal state 
Out of the very flames of rage and hate, 
Or send another shivering to the bar 
With all the guilt of such unnatural war, 
Whatever Use may urge, or Honor plead, 
On Reason's verdict is a madman's deed. 
Am I to set my life upon a throw 
Because a bear is rude and surly ? No, — 
A moral, sensible, and well-bred man 
Will not aff'ront me ; and no other can. 
Were I empowered to regulate the lists. 
They should encounter with well-loaded fists ; 
A Trojan combat would be something new, 
Let Dares beat Entdlus black and blue ; 
Then each might show, to his admiring friends, 
In honorable bumps his rich amends. 
And carry, in contusions of his skull, 
A satisfactory receipt in full. 

William Cowper. 



FAME. 



from "an essay on man," epistle IV. 

What's fame? — a fancied life in others' 
breath, 

A thing beyond us, e'en before our death. 

Just what you hear, yoi; have ; and what 's un- 
known 

The same (my lord) if Tully's, or your own. 

All that we feel of it begins and ends 

In the small circle of our foes or friends ; 

To all beside, as much an empty shade 

A Eugene living as a Cresar dead ; 

Alike or when or where they shone or shine. 

Or on the Rubicon, or on the Rhine. 

A wit 's a feather, and a chief a rod ; 

An honest man 's the noblest work of God. 



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Fame but from death a villain's name can save, 
As justice tears his body from the grave ; 
When what to oblivion better were resigned 
Is hung on high, to poison half mankind. 
All fame is foreign, but of true desert ; 
Plays round the head, but conies not to the heart ; 
One self-approving hour whole years outweighs 
Of stupid starers and of loud huzzas ; 
And more true joy Marcellus exiled feels 
Than Cffisar with a senate at his heels. 

Alexander pope. 



FAME. 



Her house is all of Echo made 

Where never dies the sound ; 
And as her brows the clouds invade, 

Her feet do strike the ground. 

Ben Jonson. 



PERSEVERANCE. 

In facile natures fancies quickly grow. 
But such quick fancies have but little root. 
Soon the narcissus flowers and dies, but slow 
The tree whose blossoms shall mature to fruit. 
Grace is a moment's happy feeling, Power 
A life's slow growth ; and we for many an hour 
Must strain and toil, and wait and weep, if w"e 
The perfect fruit of all we are would see. 

From the Italian of LEONARDO DA VINCI. 
Translation of W. W. STORV. 



GREATNESS. 

FROM "AN ESSAY ON MAN," EPISTLE IV. 

Honor and shame from no condition rise ; 
Act well your part, there all the honor lies. 
Fortune in men has some small difference made. 
One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade ; 
The cobbler aproned, and the parson gowned, 
The fiiar hooded, and the monarch crowned. 
" What differ more (you cry) than crown and 

cowl ? " 
I '11 tell you, friend ; a wise man and a fool. 
You '11 iind, if once the monarch acts the monk 
Oi', cobbler-like, the parson will be drunk, 
Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow ; 
The rest is all but leather or prunella. 

Stuck o'er with titles, and hung round M'ith 
strings. 
That tliou mayst be by kings, or whores of kings ; 
Boast the pure blood of an illustrious race. 
In quiet flow from Lucrece to Lucrece ; 
But by your fathers' worth if yours you rate, 
Count me those only who were good and gi'eat. 



Go ! if your ancient but ignoble blood 

Has crept through scoundrels ever since the flood. 

Go ! and pretend your family is young. 

Nor own your fathers have been fools so long. 

What can ennoble sots, or slaves, or cowards ? 

Alas ! not all the blood of all the Howards. 

Who wickedly is wise, or madly brave. 
Is but the more a fool, the more a knave. 
Who noble ends by noble means obtains. 
Or, failing, smiles in exile or in chains. 
Like good Aurelius let him reign, or bleed 
Like Socrates, that man is great indeed. 

ALEXANDER POPE. 



REASON AND INSTINCT. 

FROM " AN ESSAY ON MAN," EPISTLE IIL 

Whether with reason or with instinct blest. 
Know, all enjoy that powerwhich suits them best; 
To bliss alike by that direction tend. 
And find the means proportioned to their end. 
Say, where full instinct is the unerring guide. 
What pope or council can they need beside ? 
Reason, however able, cool at best, 
Cares not for service, or but serves when prest, 
Staj-s till we call, and then not often near ; 
But honest instinct comes a volunteer. 
Sure never to o'ershoot, but just to hit ; 
While still too wide or short is human wit, 
Sure by quick nature happiness to gain. 
Which heavier reason labors at in vain. 
This too serves always, reason never long ; 
One must go right, the other may go wrong. 
See then the acting and comparing powers 
One in their nature, which are two in ours ; 
And reason raise o'er instinct as you can, 
In this 'tis God directs, in that 'tis man. 

Who taught the nations of the field and wood 
To shun their poison and to choose their food ? 
Prescient, the tides or tempests to withstand, 
Build on the wave, or arch beneath the sand ? 
Who made the spider parallels design. 
Sure as De Moivre, without rule or line ? 
Who bid the stork, Coluiiibus-like, explore 
Heavens not his own, and worlds unknown before? 
Who calls the council, states the certain day, 
Who forms the phalanx, and who points the way? 

ALEXANDER POPE. 



SCANDAL. 

FROM "EPISTLE TO DR. ARBUTHNOT," BEING THE "PRO- 
LOGUE TO THE SATIRES." 

Cttrsed be the verse, how well soe'er it flow, 
That tends to make one worthy man my foe, 
Give virtue scandal, innocence a fear, 
Or from the soft-eyed virgin steal a tear ! 



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But he who hurts a hamiless neighbor's peace, 
Insults fallen worth, or beauty in distress, 
Who loves a lie, lame slander helps about, 
Who writes a libel, or who co].)ies out ; 
That fop whose pride affects a patron's name. 
Yet absent wounds an author's honest fame ; 
Who can your merit selfishly approve, 
And show the sense of it without the love ; 
Who has the vanity to call you friend. 
Yet wants the honor, injured, to defend ; 
Who tells whate'er you think, whate'er you 

say, 
And, if he lie not, must at least betray ; 
Who to the Dean and silver bell can swear. 
And sees at Canons what was never there ; 
Who reads but with a lust to misapply. 
Make satii'e a lampoon, and fiction lie ; 
A lash like mine no honest man shall dread, 
But all such babbling blockheads in his stead. 
Alexander Pope. 



HUMANITY. 

FROM "THE WINTER WALK AT NOON :" 
"THE TASK," BOOK VI. 

I WOULD not enter on my list of friends 
(Though graced with polished manners and fine 

se:ise. 
Yet wanting sensibility) the man 
Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm. 
An inadvertent step may crush the snail 
That crawls at evening in the public path ; 
But he that has humanity, forewarned. 
Will tread aside, and let the reptile live. 
The creeping vermin, loathsome to the sight, 
And charged perhaps with venom, that intrudes, 
A visitor unwelcome, into scenes 
Sacred to neatness and repose, the alcove. 
The chamber, or refectory, may die : 
A necessary act incurs no blame. 
Not so when, held within their proper bounds. 
And guiltless of offence, they range the air, 
Or take their pastime in the spacious field : 
There they are privileged ; and he that hunts 
Or harms them there is guilty of a wrong, 
Disturbs the economy of Nature's realm, 
Who, when she formed, designed them an abode. 
The sum is this : If man's convenience, health. 
Or safety interfere, his rights and claims 
Are paramount, and must extinguish theirs. 
Else they are all — the meanest things that are — 
As free to live, and to enjoy that life, 
As God was free to form them at the first. 
Who in his sovereign wisdom made them all. 
Ye, therefore, who love mercy, teach your sons 
To love it too. 

William Cowper. 



OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS. 

FROM " PROVERBIAL PHILOSOPHY." 

Shame upon thee, savage monarch-man, proud 

monopolist of reason ; 
Shame upon creation's lord, the fierce ensan- 
guined despot : 
What, man ! are there not enough, hunger and 

diseases and fatigue, — 
And yet must thy goad or thy thong add another 

sorrow to existence '/ 
What ! art thou not content thy sin hath dragged 

down suffering and death 
On the poor dumb servants of thy comfort, and 

yet must thou rack them with thy spite ? 
The prodigal heir of creation hath gambled away 

his all, — 
Shall he add torment to the bondage that is 

galling his forfeit serfs ? 
The leader in nature's ptean himself hath marred 

her psalter}', — 
Shall he multiply the din of discord by over- 
straining all the strings ? 
The rebel hath fortified his stronghold, shutting 

in his vassals with him, — 
Shall he aggravate the woes of the besieged by 

oppression from within ? 
Thou twice-deformed image of thy Maker, thou 

hateful representative of Love, 
For very shame be merciful, be kind unto the 

creatures thou hast ruined ! 
Earth and her million tribes are cursed for thy 

sake. 
Earth and her million tribes still writhe beneath 

thy cruelty : 
Liveth there but one among the million that shall 

not bear witness against thee, 
A pensioner of land or air or sea that hath not 

whereof it will accuse thee ? 
From the elephant toiling at a launch, to the 

shrew-mouse in the harvest-field. 
From the whale which the harpooner hath 

stricken, to the minnow caught upon a pin. 
From the albatross wearied in its flight, to the 

wren in her covered nest, 
From the death-moth and lace-winged dragon-fly 

to the lady-bird and the gnat, 
The verdict of all things is unanimous, finding 

their master cruel : 
The dog, thy humble friend, thy trusting, honest 

friend ; 
The ass, thine uncomplaining slave, drudging 

from morn till even ; 
The lamb, and the timorous hare, and the laboring 

ox at plough ; 
The speckled trout basking in the shallow, and 

the partridge gleaming in the stubble. 



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And the stag at bay, and the worm in thy patli, 
and the wild bird pining in captivity, 

And all things that minister alilce to thy life and 
thy comfort and thy pride, 

Testify with one sad voice that man is a cruel 
master. 

MARTIN FARQUHAR TUPPER. 



PLEA FOR THE ANIMALS. 

FROM "THE SEASONS : SPRING." 

Ensanguined man 
Is now become the lion of the plain, 
And worse. The wolf, who from the nightly fold 
Fierce drags the bleating prey, ne'er drunk her 

milk. 
Nor wore her warming fleece ; nor has the steer, 
At wliose strong chest the deadly tiger hangs. 
E'er ploughed for him. They too are tempered 

high. 
With hunger stung and wild necessity ; 
Nor lodges pity in their shaggy breast. 
But man, whom nature formed of milder clay, 
With every kind emotion in his heart. 
And taught alone to weep, — while from her lap 
She pours ten thousand delicacies, herbs, 
And fruits as numerous as the drops of rain 
Or beams that gave them birth, — shall he, fair 

form ! 
Who wears sweet smiles, and looks erect on 

heaven, 
E'er stoop to mingle with the prowling herd, 
And dip his tongue in gore ? The beast of i^rey, 
Blood-stained, deserves to bleed ; but you, ye 

Hocks, 
What have ye done ? ye peaceful people, what, 
To merit death ? you who have given us milk 
In luscious sti-eanis, and lent us your own coat 
Against the winter's cold ? And the plain ox, 
That harmless, honest, guileless animal, 
In what has he ofi'ended ? he whose toil. 
Patient and ever-ready, clothes the land 
With all the pomp of harvest, — shall he bleed, 
And struggling groan beneath the cruel hand, 
Even of the clown he feeds ? and that, perhaps. 
To swell the riot of the autumnal feast, 
Won by his labor ? 

James Thomson. 



h 



QUACK MEDICINES. 

FROM "THE BOROUGH." 

But now our Quacks are gamesters, and they 
play 
With craft and skill to ruin and betray ; 
With monstrous promise they delude the mind, 
And thrive on all that tortures human -kind. 



Void of all honor, avaricious, rash. 
The daring tribe compound their boasted trash, — 
Tincture or syrup, lotion, drop or pill ; 
All tempt the sick to trust the lying bill ; 
And twenty names of cobblers turned to squires 
Aid the bold language of these blushless liars. 
There are among them those who cannot read. 
And yet they '11 buy a patent, and succeed ; 
Will dare to promise dying sufferers aid. 
For who, when dead, can threaten or upbraid ? 
With cruel avarice still they recommend 
More draughts, more syrup, to the journey's end. 
" I feel it not." "Then take it every hour." 
"It makes me worse." "Why, then it shows 

its power." 
" 1 fear to die." " Let not your spirits sink. 
You're always safe while you believe and drink." 

Troubled with something in your bile or blood. 
You think your doctor does you little good ; 
And, grown imjiatient, you re(]^uire in haste 
The nervous cordial, nor dislike the taste ; 
It comforts, heals, and strengthens ; nay, you 

think 
It makes you better ever}' time you drink ; 
Who tipples brandy will some comfort feel. 
But will he to the medicine set his seal ? 

No class escapes them — from thepoor man's pay 
The nostrum takes no trifling part away ; 
See ! those square patent bottles from the shop 
Now decoration to the cupboard's top ; 
And there a favorite hoard you '11 find within. 
Companions meet ! the julep and the gin. 

Observe what ills to nervous females flow, 
When the heart flutters and the pulse is low ; 
If once induced these cordial sips to try, 
All feel the ease, and few the danger fly ; 
For, while obtained, of drams they 've all tlie 

force. 
And when denied, then drams are the resource. 

Who would not lend a sympathising sigh. 
To hear yon infant's pity-moving cry ? 
Then the good nui'se (who, had she borne a brain, 
Had sought the cause that made her babe com- 
plain) 
Has all her efl"orts, loving soul ! applied 
To set the cry, and not the cause, aside ; 
She gave her powerful sweet without remorse, 
The sleeping cordial, — she had tiled its force, 
Repeating oft ; the infant, freed from pain, 
Rejected food, but took the dose again. 
Sinking to sleep, while she her joy expressed. 
That her dear charge could sweetly take his rest. 
Soon may she spare her cordial ; not a doubt 
Remains but quickly he will rest without. 



Georgk crabeh. 



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TO THE UNCO QUID. 

My son, these maxims make a rule 

And lump them aye thegither : 
The Rigid Righteous is a fool, 

The Rigid Wise anither : 
The cleanest corn that e'er was dight 

May hae some pyles o' caff in ; 
Sae ne'er a fellow-creature slight 

For random fits o' daftin. 

Solomon, Eccies. vii. i6. 

YE wha are sae guid yoursel', 

Sae pious and sae holy, 
Ye 've nought to do but mark and tell 

Your neebor's fauts and folly : — 
AVhase life is like a -weel-gaun mill. 

Supplied wi' store o' -water, 
The heapet happer's ebbing still. 

And still the clap plays clatter. 

Hear me, ye Yenerable core. 

As counsel for poor mortals, 
That frequent pass douce Wisdom's door, 

For glaikit Folly's portkls I 
I, for their thoughtless, careless sakes. 

Would here propone defences. 
Their donsie tricks, their black mistakes. 

Their failings and mischances. 

Ye see your state 'vvi' theirs compared. 

And shudder at the niffer ; 
But cast a moment's fair regard. 

What maks the mighty differ ? 
Discount what scant occasion gave 

That purity ye pride in. 
And (what 's aft mair than a' the lave) 

Your better art o' hidin'. 

Think, when your castigated pulse 

Gies now and then a wallop. 
What ragings must his veins convulse. 

That still eternal gallop : 
Wi' wind and tide fair i' your tail, 

Eight on ye scud your sea-way ; 
But in the teeth o' baith to sail. 

It makes an unco leeway. 

See Social life and Glee sit do-wn. 

All joyous and unthinking, 
Till, quite transmugrified, they 're gi'O'STO 

Debauchery and Drinking : 
0, Avould they stay to calculate 

The eternal consequences ; . 
Or your more dreaded hell to state. 

Damnation of expenses ! 

Ye high, exalted, virtuous dames. 

Tied up in godly laces. 
Before ye gie poor Frailty names. 

Suppose a change o' cases ; 



A dear-loved lad, convenience snug, 

A treacherous inclination, ■ — 
But, let me whisper i' your lug, 

Ye 're aibliiis nae temptation. 

Then gently scan your brother man. 

Still gentler sister woman ; 
Though they may gang a kennin' ■nrang, 

To step aside is human. 
One point must still be greatly dark, 

The moving why they do it ; 
And just as lamely can ye mark 

How far perhaps they rue it. 

Who made the heart, 't is He alone 

Decidedly can try us ; 
He knows each chord, — its various tone, 

Each spring, — its various bias : 
Then at the balance let 's be mute, 

We never can adjust it ; 
What 's done we partly may compute. 

But know not what 's resisted. 

ROBERT BURNS. 



JUDGE NOT. 

Judge not ; the workings of his brain 
And of his heart thou canst not see ; 

What looks to thy dim eyes a stain. 
In God's pure light may only be 

A scar, brought from some well-won field, 

Where thou wouldst only faint and yield. 

The look, the air, that frets thy sight 

May be a token that below 
The soul has closed in deadly iight 

With some infernal fiery foe. 
Whose glance would scorch thy smiling grace. 
And cast thee shuddering on thy face ! 

The fall thou darest to despise, — 
May be the angel's slackened hand 

Has suffered it, that he may rise 
And take a firmer, surer stand ; 

Or, trusting less to earthly things, 

May henceforth learn to use his wings. 

And judge none lost ; but wait and see, 
With hopeful pity, not disdain ; 

The depth of the abyss may be 
The measure of the height of pain 

And love and glory that may raise 

This soul to God in after days ! 

Adelaide Anne Procter. 



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L' ALLEGRO. 

Hence, loathed Melancholy, 

Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born, 

In Stygian cave forlorn, 
'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights 
unholy ! 

Find out some uncouth cell, 
Where brooding. Darkness spreads his jealous 

wings, 
And the night-raven sings ; 
There under ebon shades, and low-browed rocks. 
As ragged as thy locks. 

In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell. 
But come, thou goddess fair and free, 
In heaven ycleped Euphrosyne, 
And, by men, heart-easing Mirth ; 
Whom lovely Venus, at a birth, 
With two sister Graces more. 
To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore ; 
Or whether (as some sager sing) 
The frolic wind that breathes the spring, 
Zephyr, with Aurora playing, — 
As he met her once a-Maying, — 
There, on beds of violets blue 
And fresh-blown roses washed in dew, 
Filled her with thee, a daughter fair, 
So buxom, blithe, and debonair. 

Haste thee, nymph, and bring with thee 
Jest, and youtliful Jollity, — 
Quips and cranks and wanton wiles. 
Nods and becks and wreathed smiles, 
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek. 
And love to live in dimple sleek, — 
Sport, that wrinkled Care derides, 
And Laughter,. holding both his sides. 
Come ! and trip it, as you go, 
On the light fantastic toe ; 
And in thy right hand lead with thee 
The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty ; 
And if I give thee honor due, 
Mirth, admit me of thy crew. 
To live wii.h her, and live with thee, 
In unreproved pleasures free, — 
To hear the lark begin his flight. 
And singing startle the dull Night, 
From his watch-tower in the skies, 
Till the dappled dawn doth rise ; 
Then to come, in spite of sorrow. 
And at my window bid good morrow, 
Through the sweet-hrier, or the vine, 
Or the twisted eglantine ; 
While the cock with lively din 
Scatters the rear of darkness thin. 
And to the stack, or the barn door, 
Stoutly sti'uts his dames before ; 
Oft listening how the hounds and horn 



Cheerly rouse the slumbering Morn, 
From the side of some hoar hill 
Through the high wood echoing shrill ; 
Sometime walking, not unseen. 
By hedgerow elms, on hillocks green. 
Right against the eastern gate. 
Where the great Sun begins his state. 
Robed in flames, and amber light. 
The clouds in thousand liveries dight ; 
While the ploughman, near at hand. 
Whistles o'er the furrowed land. 
And the milkmaid singeth blithe. 
And the mower whets his scythe. 
And every shepherd tells his tale 
Under the hawthorn in the dale. 

Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures. 

Whilst the landscape round it measures 

Russet lawns, and fallows gray. 

Where the nibbling flocks do stray, — 

Mountains, on whose barren breast 

The laboring clouds do often rest, — 

Meadows trim with daisies pied. 

Shallow brooks, and livers wide. 

Towers and battlements it sees 

Bosomed high in tufted trees. 

Where perhaps some beauty lies. 

The cynosure of neighboring eyes. 

Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes 

From betwixt two aged oaks, 

Where Corydon and Thyrsis, met. 

Are at their savory dinner set 

Of herbs, and other country messes, 

Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses : 

And then in haste her bower she leaves. 

With Thestylis to bind the sheaves ; 

Or, if the earlier season lead. 

To the tanned haycock in the mead. 

Sometimes with secure delight 

The upland hamlets will invite, 

When the merry bells ring round. 

And the jocund rebecks sound 

To many a youth and many a maid. 

Dancing in the checkered shade ; 

And young and old come forth to play 

On a sunshine holiday, 

Till the livelong daylight fail ; 

Then to the spicy nut-brown ale 

With stories told of many a feat : 

How fairy Mai) the junkets eat, — 

She was pinched and pulled, she said, 

And he, by friar's lantern led ; 

Tells how the drudging goblin sweat 

To earn his cream-bowl duly set, 

When in one night, ere glimpse of morn. 

His shadowy flail had thrashed the corn 

That ten day-laborers could not end ; 

Then lies him down the lubber fiend, 



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And, stretched out all the chimney's length, 
Basks at the fire his hairy strength, 
And, croiJ-fuU, out of doors he dings 
Ere the first cock his matin rings. 
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep. 
By whispering winds soon lulled asleep. 

Towered cities please us then, 

And the busy hum of men, 

Where throngs of knights and harons bold 

In weeds of peace high triumphs hold, — 

With store of ladies, whose bright eyes 

Rain influence, and judge the prize 

Of wit or arms, while both contend 

To win her grace whom all commend. 

There let Hymen oft appear 

In saffron robe, with taper clear, 

And pomp and feast and revelry. 

With mas(.i[ue, and antique pageantry, — 

Such sights as youthful poets dream 

On summer eves by haunted stream ; 

Then to the well-trod stage anon. 

If Jonson's learned sock be on. 

Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy's child, 

Warble his native wood-notes wild. 

And ever, against eating cares, 

Lap me in soft Lydian airs, 

Married to imnwrtal verse, — 

Such as the meeting soul may pierce, 

In notes with many a winding bout 

Of linked sweetness long drawn out, 

With wanton heed and giddy cunning 

The melting voice through mazes running. 

Untwisting all the chains that tie 

The hidden soul of harmony, — 

That Oi'pheus' self may heave his head 

From golden slumber on a bed 

Of heaped Elysian flowers, and hear 

Such strains as would have won the ear 

Of Pluto, to have quite set free 

His half-regained Eurydice. 

These delights if thou canst give. 
Mirth, with thee I mean to live. 



IL PENSEROSO. 

Hexce, vain deluding joys. 

The brood of Folly without father bred '. 

How little you bestead. 
Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys ! 

Dwell in some idle brain. 
And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess, 
As thick and numberless 
As the gay motes that people the sunbeams, 
Or lilvcst hovering dreams. 

The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train. 



But hail, thou goddess, sage and holy ! 

Hail, divinest Melancholy ! 

Whose saintly visage is too bright 

To hit the sense of human sight. 

And therefore, to our weaker view, 

O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue, — 

Black, but such as in esteem 

Prince Memnon's sister might beseem. 

Or that starred Ethiop queen that strove 

To set her beauty's praise above 

The Sea-Nymplis, and their powers offended. 

Yet thou art higher far descended ; 

Thee bright-haired Vesta, long of yore, 

To solitary Saturn bore, — 

His daughter she (in Saturn's reign 

Such mixture was not held a stain). 

Oft in glimmering bowers and glades 

He met her, and in secret shades 

Of woody Ida's inmost grove. 

While yet .there was no fear of Jove. 

Come, pensive nun, devout and pui'e, 

Sober, steadfast, and demure. 

All in a robe of darkest grain 

Flowing with majestic train. 

And sable stole of cyprus-lawn 

Over thy decent shoulders drawn. 

Come, but keep thy wonted state, 

AVith even step, and musing gait, 

And looks commercing with the skies, 

Thy rai)t soul sitting in thine eyes ; 

There held in holy passion still, 

Forget thyself to marble, till 

With a sad, leaden, downward cast 

Thou fix them on the earth as fast ; 

And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet, — 

Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet, 

And hears the Muses in a ring 

Aj'e round about Jove's altar sing ; 

And add to these retired Leisure, 

That in trim gardens takes his pleasure : 

But first and chiefest, with tliee bring 

Him that yon soars on golden wing. 

Guiding the fiery- wheeled throne, — 

The chenrb Contemplation ; 

And the mute Silence hist along, 

'Less Philomel will deign a song 

In her sweetest, saddest plight, 

Smoothing the rugged brow of Night, 

While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke 

Gently o'er the accustomed oak. 

Sweet bird, that shun'st the noise of folly, — 

Most musical, most melancholy ! 

Thee, chantress, oft, the woods among, 

I woo, to hear thy even-song . 

And, missing thee, I walk unseen 

On the dry, smooth-shaven green. 



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To behold the wandering moon 
Riding near her highest noon, 
Like one that had been led astray- 
Through the heaven's wide pathless way ; 
And ot't, as if her head she bowed, 
Stooping through a fleecy cloud. 
Oft, on a plat of rising ground, 
I hear the far-off curfew sound 
Over some wide-watered shore, 
Swinging slow with sullen roar ; 
Or if the air will not permit, 
Some still removed place will fit, 
Where glowing embers through the room 
Teach light to counterfeit a gloom, — 
Far from all resort of mirth. 
Save the cricket on the hearth, 
Or the bellman's drowsy charm, 
To bless the doors from nightly harm ; 
Or let my lamp at midnight hour 
Be seen in some high lonely tower, 
"Where I may oft out-watch the Bear 
"With thrice-great Hermes, or unsphere 
The spirit of Plato, to unfold 
"What worlds or what vast regions hold 
The immortal mind that hath forsook 
Her mansion in this fleshly nook ; 
And of those demons that are found 
In fire, air, flood, or under ground, 
"Whose power hath a true consent 
With planet or with element. 
Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy 
In sceptred pall come sweeping by. 
Presenting Thebes, or Pelops' line. 
Or the tale of Troy divine. 
Or what (though rare) of later age 
Ennobled hath the buskined stage. 

But, sad Virgin, that thy power 
Might raise Musteus from his bower ! 
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing 
Such notes as, warbled to the string. 
Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek, 
And made hell grant what love did seek ! 
Or call up him that left half told 
The story of Cambuscan bold, — 
Of Camball, and of Algarsife, — 
And who had Canace to wife, 
That owned the virtuous ring and glass, — 
And of the wondrous horse of brass, 
On which the Tartar king did ride ! 
And, if aught else great bards beside 
In sage and solemn tunes have sung, — 
Of tourneys and of trophies hung. 
Of forests, and enchantments drear. 
Where more is meant than meets the ear. 

Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career. 
Till civil-suited Morn appear, — 



Not tricked and frounced, as she was wont 

With the Attic boy to hunt. 

But kerchiefed in a comely cloud. 

While rocking wiuds are piping loud. 

Or ushered with a shower still 

When the gust hath blown his fill. 

Ending on the rustling leaves, 

With minute drops from oflT the caves. 

And when the sun begins to fling 

His flaring beams, me, goddess, bring 

To arched walks of twilight groves. 

And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves. 

Of pine, or monumental oak. 

Where the rude axe with heaved stroke 

Was never heard the Nymphs to daunt. 

Or fright them from their hallowed haunt. 

There in close covert by some brook, 

Where no profaner eye may look. 

Hide me from day's garish eye, 

While the bee with honeyed thigh, 

That at her flowery work doth sing, 

And the waters mui'muring 

With such consort as they keep, 

Entice the dewy-feathered Sleep ; 

And let some strange mysterious dream 

Wave at his wings, in airy stream 

Of lively portraiture displayed, 

Softlj' on my eyelids laid ; 

And, as I wake, sweet music breathe 

Above, about, or underneath, • 

Sent by some Spirit to mortals good. 

Or the unseen Genius of the wood. 

But let my due feet never fail 

To walk the studious cloisters pale. 

And love the high embowed roof. 

With antic pillars massy proof. 

And storied windows, richly dight. 

Casting a dim religious light. 

There let the pealing organ blow 

To the full-voiced quire below, 

In service high and anthems clear. 

As may with sweetness, through mine ear. 

Dissolve me into ecstasies. 

And bring all heaven before mine eyes. 

And may at last my weary age 
Find out the peaceful hermitage. 
The hairy gown and mossy cell. 
Where I may sit and rightly spell 
Of every star that heaven doth shew, 
And every herb that sips the dew, 
Till old experience do attain 
To something like prophetic strain. 

These pleasures. Melancholy, give. 
And I with thee will choose to live. 



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HALLOWED GROUND. 

What 's hallowed ground ? Has earth a clod 
Its Maker meant not shoi;ld be trod 
By man, the image of his God, 

Erect and free, 
Unscourged by Superstition's rod 

To bow the knee ? 

That 's hallowed ground where, mourned and 

missed, 
The lips repose our love has kissed ; — 
But where 's their memory's mansion ? Is 't 

Yon churchyard's bowers ? 
No ! in ourselves their souls exist, 

A part of ours. 

A kiss can consecrate the ground 
Where mated hearts are mutual bound : 
The spot where love's first links were wound, 

That ne'er are riven, 
Is hallowed down to earth's profound, 

And up to heaven ! 

For time makes all but true love old ; 
The burning thoughts that then were told 
Run molten still in memory's mould ; 

And will not cool 
Until the heart itself be cold / 

In Lethe's pooL 

What hallows ground where heroes sleep ? 
'T is not the sculptured piles you heap ! 
In dews that heavens far distant weep 

Their turf may bloom ; 
Or Genii twine beneath the deep 

Their coral tomb. 

But strew his ashes to the wind 

Whose sword or voice has served mankind, — 

And is he dead, whose glorious mind 

Lifts thine on high ? — 
To live in hearts we leave behind 

Is not to die. 

Is 't death to fall for Freedom's right ? 
He 's dead alone that lacks her light ! 
And murder sullies in heaven's sight 

The sword he draws : — 
What can alone ennoble fight ? 

A noble cause ! 

Give that, — and welcome War to brace 
Her drnms, and rend heaven's reeking space ! 
The colors planted face to face. 

The charging cheer, 
Though Death's pale horse lead on the chase, 

Shall still be dear. 



And place our trophies where men kneel ^ 
To Heaven ! — but Heaven rebukes my zeal ! 
The cause of Truth and human weal, 

God above ! 
Transfer it from the sword's appeal 

To Peace and Love. 

Peace, Love ! the cherubim, that join 
Their spread wings o'er Devotion's shrine. 
Prayers sound in vain, and temples shine. 

Where they are not, • — 
The heart alone can make divine 

Religion's spot. 

To incantations dost thou trust. 
And pompous rites in domes august ? 
See mouldering stones and metal's rust 

Belie the vaunt, 
That man can bless one pile of dust 

With chime or chant. 

The ticking wood-worm mocks thee, man ! 
Thy temples, — creeds themselves grow wan ! 
But there 's a dome of nobler span, 

A temple given 
Thy faith, that bigots dare not ban, — 

Its space is heaven ! 

Its roof, star-pictured Nature's ceiling. 
Where, trancing the rapt spirit's feeling. 
And God himself to man revealing. 

The harmonious spheres 
Make music, though unheard their pealing 

By mortal ears. 

Fair stars ! are not your beings pure ? 
Can sin, can death, your worlds obscure ? 
Else why so swell the thoughts at your 

Aspect above ? 
Ye must be heavens that make us sure 

Of heavenly love ! 

And in your harmony sublime 
I read the doom of distant time ; 
That man's regenerate soul from crime 

Shall yet be drawn. 
And reason on his mortal clime 

Immortal dawn. 

What 's hallowed ground ? 'T is what gives birth 
To sacred thoughts in souls of worth ! — • 
Peace I Independence ! Truth ! go forth 

Earth's compass round ; 
And j'our high-priesthood shall make earth 

All hallowed ground. 



Thomas Campbell. 



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CEDARMERE. 

Bryant's Home at Roslyn. 

•' What's hallowed ground ? ' Tis -what gives birth 
To sacred thoughts in souls of -worth /" 



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FLOWERS WITHOUT FRUIT. 

Pritne thou thy words ; the thoughts control 
That o'er thee swell and throng ; — 

They will condense within thy soul, 
And change to purpose strong. 

But lie who lets his feelings run 

In soft luxurious flow, 
Shrinks when hard service must he done, 

And faints at every woe. 

Faith's meanest deed more favor bears, 
Where hearts and wills are weighed, 

Than briglitest transports, choicest prayers, 
Which bloom their hour, and fade. 

John Hrnry Newman. 



REVENGE OF INJURIES. 

FROM "MARIAM." 

The fairest action of our human life 

Is scorning to revenge an injury : 
For who forgives without a further strife 

His adversary's heart to him doth tie : 
And 't is a firmer conquest truly said 
To win the heart than overthrow the head. 

If we a worthy enemy do find, 

To yield to worth, it must be nobly done ; 
But if of baser metal be his mind, 

In base revenge there is no honor won. 
Who would a worthy courage overthrow ? 
And who would wrestle with a worthless foe ? 

We say our hearts are great, and cannot yield ; 

Because they cannot yield, it proves them poor : 
Great hearts are tasked beyond their power but 
seld ; 

The weakest lion will the loudest roar. 
Truth's school for certain does this same allow, 
High-heartedness doth sometimes teach to bow. 

LADY ELIZABETH CAREW. 



A TEAR. 

THAT the chemist's magic art 

Could crystallize this sacred treasure 

Long should it glitter near my heart, 
A secret source of pensive pleasure. 

The little brilliant, ere it fell, 

Its lustre caught from Chloe's eye ; 

Then, trembling, left its coral cell, — 
The spring of Sensibility ! 



Sweet drop of pure and pearly light ! 

In thee the luj^s of Virtue shine, 
More calmly clear, more mildly bright. 

Than any gem that gilds the mine. 

Benign restorer of tlie soul ! 

Who ever fliest to bring relief, 
When first we feel the rude control 

Of Love or Pity, Joy or Grief. 

The sage's and the poet's theme. 

In every clime, in every age, 
Thou charm'st in Fancy's idle dream. 

In Reason's philosophic page. 

That very law which moulds a tear, 
And bids it trickle from its source, — 

That law preserves the earth a sphere, 
And guides the planets in their course. 

SAMUEL ROGERS. 



MIGNON'S SONG. 



FROM "WILHELM MEISTER." 



U^ 



Know'st thou the land where bloom the citron 

bowers. 
Where tlie gold-orange lights the dusky grove ? 
High waves the laurel there, the myrtle flowers, 
And through a still blue heaven the sweet winds 

rove. 
Know'st thou it well ? 

There, there Avith thee, 
friend, loved one ! fain my steps would flee. 

Know'st thou the dwelling? — there the pillars 

rise, 
Soft shines tlie hall, the painted chambers glow ; 
And forms of marble seem with pitying eyes 
To say, " Poor child ! what thus hath wrought 

thee woe ? " 
Know'st thou it well ? 

There, there with thee, 
my protector ! homewards might I flee ! 

Know'st thou the mountain? — high its bridge 

is hung. 
Where the mule seeks thi'ough mist and cloud 

his way ; 
There lurk the dragon-race, deep caves among, 
O'er beetling rocks there foams the torrent spray. 
Know'st thou it well ? 

With thee, with thee, 
There lies my path, father ! let us flee ! 

From the German of GOETHE. Trans- 
lation of FELICIA HEMANS. 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



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THE OLD MAID. 

Why sits she thus in solitude ? Her heart 

Seems melting in her eyes' delicious blue ; 
And as it heaves, her ripe lips lie apart, 

As if to let its heavy throbbiugs through ; 
In her dark eye a depth of softness swells, 

Deeper than that her careless girlhood wore ; 
And hei' cheek crimsons with the hue that tells 

The rich, fair fruit is ripened to the core. 

It is her thirtieth birthday ! With a sigh 
Her soul hath turned fronr youth's luxuriant 
bowers, 
And her heart taken up the last sweet tie 
. That measured out its links of golden hours ! 
She feels her inmost soul within her stir 

With thoughts too wild and passionate to 
speak ; 
Yet her full heart — its own interpreter — 
Translates itself in silence on her cheek. 

Joy's opening buds, affection's glowing flowers, 

Once lightly sprang within her beaming track ; 
0, life was beautiful in those lost hours, 

And yet she does not wish to wander back ! 
No ! she but loves in loneliness to think 

On pleasures past, though nevermore to be ; 
Hope links her to the future, — but the link 

That binds her to the- past is memory. 

Ajielia B. Welby. 



LOVE AGAINST LOVE. 

As unto blowing roses summer dews, 

Or morning's amber to the tree-top choirs, 

So to my bosom are the beams that use 

To rain on me from eyes that love inspires. 

Your love, — vouchsafe it, royal-hearted Few, 

And I will set no common price thereon ; 

0, I will keep, as heaven his holy blue, 

Or night her diamonds, that dear treasure won. 

But aught of inward faith nmst I forego. 

Or miss one drop from truth's baptismal hand, 

Think poorer thoirghts, pray cheaper prayers, 

and grow 
Less worthy trust, to meet your heart's demand, — 
Farewell ! Your wish I for your sake deny : 
Rebel to love, in truth to love, am I. 

DAVID A. WASSOiN. 



A RENUNCIATION. 

If women could be fair, and yet not fond. 
Or thiit their love were firm, not fickle still, 
I would not marvel that they make men bond 
By service long to purchase their good-will ; 



But when I see how frail those creatures are, 
I muse that men forget themselves so far. 

To mark the choice they make, and how they 

change. 
How oft from Phcebus they do flee to Pan ; 
Unsettled still, like haggards wild they range, 
These gentle birds that fly from man to man ; 
Who would not scorn and shake them from the 

fist, 
And let them fl}^, fair fools, which way they list ? 

Yet for disport we fawn and flatter both. 
To pass the time when nothing ekse can please, 
And train them to our lure with subtle oath, 
Till, weary of their wiles, ourselves we ease ; 
And then we say when we their fancy trj'^. 
To play with fools, 0, what a fool was I ! 

Edward vere, Earl of Oxford. 



FAITH. 



Better trust all and be deceived. 
And weep that trust and that deceiving. 
Than doubt one heart that, if believed. 
Had blessed one's life with true believing. 

0, in this mocking. world too fast 

The doubting fiend o'ertakes our youth ; 

Better be cheated to the last 

Thau lose the blessed hope of truth. 

Frances Annh Kemble Butler. 



THE SUM OF LIFE. 

FROM "THE GARDEN": "THE TASK," BOOK VI. 

I WAS a stricken deer, that left the herd 
Long since ; with many an arrow deep infixed 
My panting side was charged, when I withdrew. 
To seek a tranfjuil death in distant shades. 
There was I found by one who had hin)self 
Been hurt by the archers. In his side he bore, 
And in his hands and feet, the cruel scars. 
With gentle force soliciting the darts. 
He drew them forth, and healed, and bade me live. 
Since then, with few associates, in remote 
And .silent woods I wander, far from those 
My former partners of the peopled scene ; 
With few associates, and not wisliing more. 
Here much I ruminate, as much I may. 
With other views of men and manners now 
Than once, and others of a life to come. 
I see that all are wanderers, gone astray 
Each in his own delusions ; they are lost 
In chase of fancied happiness, still wooed 
And never won. Dream after dream ensues ; 



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791 



And still they dream, that they shall still succeed ; 

And still are disappointed. Rings the world 

With the vain stir. I sum up half mankind, 

And add two-thirds of the remaining half. 

And find the total of their hopes and fears 

Dreams, empty dreams. 

William Cowper. 



THE WILL. 

Before I sigh ray last gasp, let me breathe, 
Great Love, sonie legacies : here I bequeathe 
Mine eyes to Argus, if mine eyes can see, 
If they be blmd, then, Love, I give them thee ; 
My tongue to Fame ; to embassadors mine ears ; 
To women, or the sea, my tears ; 
Thou, Love, hast taught me heretofore 
By making me serve her who had twenty more. 
That I should give to none, but such as had too 
much before. 

My constanc}'- 1 to the planets give ; 
My truth to them who at the court do live ; 
Mine ingenuity and openness 
To Jesuits ; to buffoons my pensiveness ; 
My silence to any who abroad have been ; 
My money to a Capuchin. 
Thou, Love, taught' st me, by appointing me 
To love there, where no love received can be, 
Onlj^ to give to such as have an incapacity.* 

My faith I give to Eoman Catholics ; 
All my good works unto the schismatics 
Of Amsterdam ; my best civility 
And courtship to an University ; 
My modesty I give to shoulders bare ; 
My patience let gamesters share. 
Thou, Love, taught'st me, by making me 
Love her, that holds my love disparity, 
Only to give to those that count my gifts indig- 
nity. 

I give my reputation to those 
Which were my friends ; mine industry to foes ; 
To schoolmen I berj^ueathe my doubtfulness ; 
My sickness to physicians, or excess ; 
To Nature all that I in rhyme have writ ; 
And to my company my wit. 
Thou, Love, by making me adore 
Her, who begot this love in me before, 
Taught'st me to make, as though I gave, when I 
do but restore. 

To him, for whom the passing-bell next tolls, 
I give my physic-books ; my written rolls 
Of moral counsels I to Bedlam give : 
My brazen medals r;nto them which live 



No good capacity. 



In want of bread ; to them which pass among 
All foreigners, mine English tongue. 
Thou, Love, by making me love one 
Who thinks her friendship a tit portion 
For younger lovers, dost my gifts thus dispro- 
portion. 

Therefore I '11 give no more, but I '11 undo 

The world by dying ; because Love dies too. 

Then all your beauties will be no more worth 

Than gold in mines, where none doth draw it 

forth ; 

And all your graces no more use shall have, 

Than a sun-dial in a grave. 

Thou, Love, taught'st me, by making me 

Love her, who doth neglect both me and thee. 

To invent and practise this one way to annihilate 

all three. 

Dr. John Donne. 



FEAGMENTS. 

THE COURSE OF LIFE. 
Time. 
Time rolls his ceaseless course. 

Lady of the Lake, Cant. iii. SCOTT. 

The heavens on high perpetually do move ; 
By minutes meal the hour doth steal away, 
By hours the days, by days the months remove, 
And then by months the yeai's as fast decay ; 
Yea, Virgil's ver.se and Tully's truth do say 
That Time flieth, and never claps her wings ; 
But rides on clouds, and forward still she flings. 

G. Gascoignu. 

On our quick 'st decrees 
Th' inaudible and noiseless foot of Time 
Steals, ere we can effect them. 

.Ill's Well that Ends IFell, Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

And then he drew a dial from his poke, 

And, looking on it with lack-lustre eye. 

Says very wisely, "It is ten o'clock : 

Thus may we see," quoth he, " how the world 

wags : 
'T is but an hour ago since it-was nine ; 
And after one hour more 't will be eleven ; 
And so, from hour to hour, we ripe and ripe, 
And then, from hour to hour, we rot and rot ; 
And thereby hangs a tale." 

As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

Come what come may. 
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day. 

Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



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Life. 

Let ns (since life can little more supply 
Than just to look about us, and to die) 
Expatiate free o'er all this scene of man ; 
A mighty maze ! but not without a plan. 

Together let us beat this ample field, 
Try why the open, what the covert yield. 

Bssay OH Mii7i, Epistle I. POPE. 

The world 's a theatre, the earth a stage 
Which God and nature do with actors fill. 

Apology for Actors. T. HEYWOOD. 

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, 
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, 
To the last syllable of recorded time ; 
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools 
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle ! 
Life 's but a walking shadow ; a poor plaj'er, 
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, 
And then is heard no more : it is a tale 
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, 
Signifying nothing. 

Macbeth, Act v. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Life is a jest, and all things show it ; 
I thought so once, but now I know it. 

My Own Epitaph. J. GAY. 

The web of our life is of a mingled 
Yarn, good and ill together. 

All 's n 'ell that Ends I'/ell, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

And what 's a life ? — a weary pilgrimage, 
Whose glory in one day doth till the stage 
With childhood, manhood, and decrepit age. 

niiat is Life ? F. QUARLES. 

But thought 's the slave of life, and life time's 
fool. 

Kins Henry IV., Pt. I. Act v. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

On life's vast ocean diversely we sail. 
Reason the card, but passion is the gale. 

Essay on Man, Epistle II. POPE. 



Mankind. 

Man ! 
Thou pendulum betwixt a smile and tear. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 

More servants wait on man 
Than he '11 take notice of. In ev'ry path 
He treads down that which doth befriend him 
When sicknesse makes him pale and wan. 
mightie love ! Man is one world, and hath 
Another to attend him. 

Man. G. HERBERT. 



Like leaves on trees the race of man is found. 
Now green in youth, now withering on the ground: 
Another race the following spring supplies ; 
They fall successive, and successive rise. 

Iliad, Book \\. Translation of POPE. HOMER. 

Know then thyself, presume not God to scan ; 
The proper study of mankind is man. 

Created half to rise, and half to fall ; 
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all ; 
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurled ; 
The gloiy, jest, and riddle of the world ! 

Essay on Man, Epistle //. POPE. 



The Past. 
0, call back yesterday, bid time return. 

To-day, unhappy day, too late. 

King Richard //., Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Things without all remedy, 
Should be without regard : what 's done is done. 

Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Gone, glimmering through the dream of things 
that were, 

A school-boy's tale, the wonder of an hour ! 

Childe Harold, Cant. ii. EVKO.V. 

Not heaven itself upon the past has power ; 
But what has been, has been, and 1 have had my 
hour. 

Imitation of Horace, Book i. Ode 29. DrVDEN. 

Applause 
To that blest son of foresight ; lord of fate ! 
That awful independent on to-morrow 
Whose work is <lone ; who triumphs in the past ; 
Whose yesterdaj^s look backwards with a smile. 

Night Thoughts, Night ii. DR. E. YOUNG. 

Achilles. . . . What ! are my deeds forgot ? 
Ulysses. Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his 
back, 
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion. 

For time is like a fashionable host, 

That slightly shakes liis parting guest by the 

liand, 
And with his arms outstretched, as he would fly, 
Grasps-in the comer. Welcome ever smiles, 
And farewell goes out sighing. 

Troilus and Cressida, Actm. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE." 



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The Present. 

This narrow isthmus 'twixt two boundless seas, 
The past, the future, two eternities ! 

LMlla Rookh : Tlte Veiled Prophet o/Khorassan. T. MOORE. 

Lo ! on a narrow neck of land, 
'Twi.xt two unbounded seas I stand. 



Hymn, 



C. WESLEY. 



Heaven from all creatures hides the book of Fate, 
All but the page prescribed, their present state. 

Essay on Man, Epistle I. POPE. 

Nothing is there to come, and nothing past. 
But an eternal Now does always last. 

Davideis, Vol. I. Book i. A. CoWLEY. 

Defer not till to-morrow to be wise. 
To-morrow's sun to thee may never rise. 

Letter to Cobham. W. CONGRUV'E. 

Happy the man, and happy he alone, 

He who can call to-day his own : 

He who, secure within, can say, 
To-morrow, do thy worst, for I have lived to-day. 

Imitation of Horace, Book i. Ode 29. DRYDEN. 



The Future. 
The best of prophets of the Future is the Past. 

Letter, Jan. 28, 1821. BYRON. 

As though there were a tie. 
And obligation to posterity. 
We get them, bear them, breed and nurse. 
What has posterity done for us. 
That we, lest they their rights should lose, 
Should trust our necks to gi'ipe of noose. 

McFingal, Cant. ii. J. TRUMBULL. 

All that 's bright must fade, — 

The brightest still the fleetest ; 
All that 's sweet was made 

But to be lost when sweetest ! 

National Airs : All that 's bright must fade. T. MoORE. 

When I consider life, 't is all a cheat. 

Yet, fooled with hope, men favor the deceit ; 

Trust on, and think to-morrow will repa}"- : 

To-morrow 's falser than the former day ; 

Lies worse ; and, while it says we shall be blest 

With some new joys, cuts off what we possest. , 

Strange cozenage ! none would live past years 

again. 
Yet all hope pleasure in what yet remain. 

Aureng-Zebe : or, T/te Great Mogul, Acthr.Sc.i. DRYDEN. 

Beware of desperate steps. The darkest day, 
Live till to-moiTow, will have passed away. 

The Needless Alarm. COWPER. 



Fate. 

Men at some time are masters of their fates ; 
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, 
But in ourselves, that we are underlings. 

Julius Casar, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Man is his own star, and the soul that can 
Render an honest and a perfect man 
Commands all light, all influence, all fate. 
Nothing to him falls early, or too late. 

upon an Honest Man^s Fortune. J. FLETCHER. 

Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie. 
Which we ascribe to Heaven : the fated sky 
Gives us free scope ; only, doth backward pull 
Our slow designs, when we ourselves are dull. 

All 's Well that Ends IVell, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

There 's a divinity that shapes our ends, 
Rough-hew them how we will. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

I '11 make assurance doubly sure, 
And take a bond of Fate. 

Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Youth. 

Gay hope is theirs, by fancy fed, 

Less pleasing when possessed ; 
The tear forgot as soon as shed, 

The sunshine of the breast. 
Theirs buxom health of rosy hue, 
Wild wit, invention ever new. 
And lively cheer of vigor born ; 

The thoughtless day, the easy night, 

The spirits pure, the slumbers light. 
That fly the approach of morn. 

On a Distant Prospect of Eton College. T. GRAY. 

Long as the year's dull circle seems to run 
When the brisk minor pants for twenty-one. 

Imitations of Horace, Epistle I. Book \. POPE. 

Returning, he proclaims by many a grace. 
By shrugs and strange contortions of his face. 
How much a dunce that has been sent to roam. 
Excels a dunce that has been kept at home. 

The Progress of Error. COWPER. 

The nimble-footed mad-cap Prince of Wales, 
And his comrades, that daffed the world aside, 
And bid it pass. 

King Henry IV., Part I. Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Manhood. 

Be wise with speed : 
A fool at forty is a fool indeed. 



Love of Fame, Satire ii. 



Dr. e. Young. 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



Not two strong men the enormous weight could 

raise ; 
Such men as live in these degenerate days. 

Iliad, Book \. Translation of "POVE.. HOMER. 

Nor love thy life, nor hate ; but what thou liv'st 
Live well ; how long or short permit to heaven. 

Paradise Lost, Book xi. MILTON. 

What tho' short thy date ? 
Virtue, not rolling suns, the mind matures. 
That life is long which answers life's great end. 
The time that bears no fruit deserves no name. 
The man of wisdom is the man of years. 
In hoary youth Methusalems may die ; 
0, how nusdated on their liatt'ring tombs ! 

Night Thoughts, Nights. DR. E. YOUNG. 

Live while you live, the epicure would say, 
And seize the pleasures of the present day ; 
Live while you live, the sacred preacher cries. 
And give to God each moment as it Hies. 
Lord, in my views, let both united be ; 
I live in pleasure when I live to thee. 

Epigram on his Family Arms. [Dum vivimus vivamus.] 

P. DODDRIDGE. 



SHAKESPEARE. 

-d democrats, won't flatter. 

BYRON. 



Old Age. 

My May of life 
Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf ; 
And that which should accompany old age, 
As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, 
I must not look to have ; but, in their stead. 
Curses, not loud, but deep, mouth-honor, breath. 
Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare 
not. 

Macbeth, Act v. Sc. 3. 

And wrinkles, the d- 

Don Juan, Cant. x. 

Strange ! that a harp of thousand strings 
Should keep in tune so long. 

Hymns and Spiritual Songs, Book ii. Hymn 19. WATTS. 

In sober state, 
Through the sequestered vale of rural life, 
The venerable patriarch guileless held 
The tenor of his way. 

Death. B. PORTEUS. 

Time has laid his hand 
Upon my heart, gently, not smiting it, 
But as a harper lays his open palm 
Upon his harp, to deaden its vibrations. 

The Golden Legend. LONGFELLOW. 

But gi-ant, the virtues of a temp'rate prime 
Bless with an age exempt from scorn or crime ; 
An age that melts with unperceived decay, 
And glides in modest innocence away. 

Vanity 0/ Human Wishes. DR. S. JOHNSON. 



The soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed, 
Lets in new light through chinks that time has 

made. 
Stronger by weakness, wiser men become. 
As they draw near to their eternal home. 

Verses upon his Divine Poesy. E. WALLER. 



Death. 

Man wants but little, nor that little long. 
How soon he must resign his very dust ! 

Night Thoughts, Night iv. Dr. E. YOUNG. 

" While there is life, there 's hope," he cried ; 
" Then why such haste ? " so groaned and died. 

The Sick Man and the Angel. J. GAY. 

Lovely in death the beauteous ruin lay ; 
And if in death still lovely, lovelier there ; 
Far lovelier ! pity swells the tide of love. 

Night Thoughts, Night iii. Dr. E. YOUNG. 

Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail 
Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contemi^t, 
Dispraise or blame, nothing but well and fair. 
And what may quiet us in a death so noble. 

Samson Agonistes. MlLTON. 

There is a calm for those who weep, 
A rest for weary pilgrims found, 
They softly lie and sweetly sleep 

Low in the ground. 

The Grave. J. MONTGOMERY. 



Immortality. 

I know no evil death can show, which life 
Has not already shown to those who live 
Embodied longest. If there be indeed 
A shore, where mind survives, 't will be as mind 
All unincorporate. 

Sarda7iapalus. BYRON. 

To be no more — sad cure ; for who would lose. 
Though full of pain, this intellectual being. 
Those thoughts that wander through eternity. 
To perish rather, swallowed up and lost 
In the wide womb of uncreated night. 
Devoid of sense and motion ? 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. ' MiLTON. 

I have asked that dreadful question of the hills 
That look eternal ; of the flowing streams 
That lucid flow forever ; of the stars, 
Amid whose fields of azure my raised spirit 
Hath trod in glory : all were dumb ; but now, 
While I thus gaze upon thy living face, 
I feel the love that kindles through its beauty 
Can never wholly perish : we shall meet 
Again, Clemanthe ! 

I07t. T. N. TALFOURD. 



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THE SEXES. 

Woman. 

First, then, a woman will, or won't, depend on 't ; 
If she will do't, she will ; and there 's an end on 't. 
But if she won't, since safe and sound your trust is, 
Fear is affront, and jealousy injustice. 

Epilogue to Zara, A. HILL. 

Women, like princes, find few real friends. 

Advice to a Lady. LORD LYTTELTON- 

What mighty ills have not been done by woman ? 
Who was 't betrayed the Capitol ? A woman ! 
Who lost Mark Antony the world ? A woman ! 
Who was the cause of a long ten years' war, 
And laid at last old Troy in ashes ? Woman ! 
Destructive, damnable, deceitful woman ! 

T/ie Orphan, Act iii. Sc. i. T. Otway. 



She and comparisons are odious. 

The Comparison. 



DR. J. Donne. 



So doth one sound the sleeping spirit wake 
To brave the danger, and to bear the harm — 
A low and gentle voice — dear woman's chiefest 
charm. 

An excellent thing it is ! and ever lent 

To truth and love, and meekness ; they who 
own 
This gift, by the all-gracious Giver sent. 

Ever by quiet step and smile are known ; 
By kind eyes that have wept, hearts that have 

sorrowed — 
By patience never tired, from their own trials 
boiTovved. 

jroman's Voice. E. ARNOLD. 



Woman's gentle brain. 

As You Like It, Act iv. Sc. 3. 



Shakespeare. 



Not she with traitoroirs kiss her Saviour stung, 
Not she denied him with unholy tongue ; 
Slie, while apostles shrank, could danger brave. 
Last at his cross and earliest at his grave. 

IVoman, her Character ajtd Influence. E. S. BARRETT. 

And yet believe me, good as well as ill, 
Woman 's at best a contradiction still. 

Moral Essays, Epistle II, POPE. 

A native grace 
Sat fair-proportioned in her polished limbs. 
Veiled in a simple robe their best attire. 
Beyond the pomp of dress ; for loveliness 
Needs not the foreign aid of ornament. 
But is, when unadorned, adorned the most. 

J. Thomson. 



The Seasons : Autumn. 



The maid who modestly conceals 
Her beauties, while she hides, reveals ; 
Give but a glimpse, and fancy draws 
Whate'er the Grecian Venus was. 



The Spider and the Bee, 



« 



Th' adorning thee with so much art 

Is but a barb'rous skill ; 
'T is like the poisoning of a dart, 

Too apt before to kill. 

T/ie IVaiting-Maid. A. COWLEY. 

For where is any author in the world 
Teaches such beauty as a woman's eye ? 

Lon.'c's Labors Lost, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Neither her outside formed so fair, nor aught 

So much delights me, as those graceful acts, 

Those tliousand decencies that daily flow 

From all her words and actions, mixed with love 

And sweet compliance, which declare unfeigned 

Union of mind, or in us both one soul ; 

Harmony to behold in wedded pair 

More gi-ateful than harmonious sound to the ear. 

Paradise Lost, Book viii. MiLTON. 

Accuse not Nature, she hath done her part ; 
Do thou but thine. 

Paradise Lost, Book viii. MiLTON. 



^ 



Man — Woman. 

If the heart of a man is depressed with cares, 
The mist is dispelled when a woman appears. 

The Beggars Opera, Act ii. Sc, i. J. GAY. 

Without the smile from partial beauty won, 
0, what were man ? — a world without a sun. 

Pleasures of Hope, Part II. T. CAMPBELL. 

She 's beautiful, and therefore to be wooed ; 
She is a woman, therefore to be won. 

King Henry VI, Part I. Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

He was a lover of the good old school. 

Who still become more constant as they cool. 

Beppo, Cant, xxxiv. BYRON. 

The man that hath a tongue, I say, is no man, 
If with his tongue he cannot win a woman. 

Ttuo Gentlemen of Verona, Act iu. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

I give thee all — I can no more. 

Though poor the offering be ; 
My heart and lute are all the store 

That I can bring to thee. 

My Heart and Lute, T. MOORE. 



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796 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



--a 



Maidens, like moths, are ever caught by glare, 
And Mammon wins his way where Seraphs might 
despair. 

ChiSiie Harold, Cant. i. BYRON. 



The woman that deliberates is lost. 

Cato, Act'vi. Sc. I. 



T. ADDISON. 



My friends were poor but honest ; so 's my love. 
Be not offended, for it hurts not him 
That he is loved of me. 

All 's IVell that Ends Well, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

In her fii-st passion, woman loves her lover : 
In all the otheife, all she loves is love. 

Don Juan, Cant. iii. BYRON. 

True as the needle to the pole. 

Or as the dial to the sun ; 
Constant as gliding waters roll, 

Whose swelling tides obey the moon '; 
From every other charmer free, 
My life and love shall follow thee. 

Sonff. B. BOOTH. 

Was ever woman in this humor wooed ? 
Was ever woman in this humor won ? 

King Richard III., Act i. Sc- 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Man's love is of man's life a thing apart ; 

'T is woman's whole existence. Man may range 
The court, camp, church, the vessel, and the mart. 

Sword, gown, gain, glory, offer in exchange 
Pride, fame, ambition, to fill up his heart. 

And few there are whom these cannot estrange : 
Men have all these resources, we but one, — 
To love again, and be again undone. 

Don yuan. Cant. i. BYRON. 

Thou wouldst be loved ? — then let thy heart 

From its present pathway part not ! 
Being everything which now thou art, 

Be nothing which thou art not. 
So with the world thy gentle ways. 

Thy gi-ace, thy more than beauty, 
Shall be an endless theme of praise, 

And love — a simple duty. 

To F. S. O. E. A. POE. 

All these good parts a perfect woman make ; 
Add love to me, they make a perfect wife ; 
Without her love, her beauty I should take 
As that of pictui'es dead — that gives it life ; 
Till then her beauty, like the sun, doth shine 
Alike to all ; — tliat only makes it mine. 

A Wife. Sir T. Overbury. 

And oft, when half induced to tread 

Such paths as unto sin decoy, 
I 've felt her fond hand press my head, 

And that soft touch hath saved her boy ! 

The Mothers H.tnd. C. SWAIN. 



CHARACTER AND ACTION. 

< Virtue. 
The world in all doth but two nations bear. 
The good, the bad, and these mixed everywhere. 

The Loyal Scot A. Marvell. 

He that has light within his own clear breast 
May sit in the centre and enjoy bright day ; 
But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts 
Benighted walks under the midday sun. 

Comus. MILTO.V. 

What nothing earthly gives or can destroy, — 
The soul's calm sunshine, and the heartfelt joy, 
Is Virtue's prize. 

Essay on Matt, Epistle IV, POPE. 

The morning pearls 

Dropt in the lily's spotless bosom 

Are less chastely cold. 

Ere the meridian sun 

Has kissed them into heat. 

Chastity. W. CHAMBERLAYNE. 

1st Bkother, What hidden strength. 

Unless the strength of Heaven, if you mean that ? 

2d Brother. I mean that too, but yet a 
hidden strength 
Which, if Heaven gave it, may be teraied her arm; 
'T is chastity, my Brother, chastity : 
She that has that is clad in complete steel. 

So dear to heaven is saintly chastity, 
That, when a soul is found sincerely so, 
A thousand liveried angels lacky her. 
Driving far off" each thing of sin and guilt. 
Comus. Milton. 

Adieu, dear, amiable youth ! 

Your heart can ne'er be wanting ! 
May prudence, fortitude, and truth 

Erect your brow undaunting ! 
In ploughman phrase, " God send you speed," 

Still daily to grow wiser ; 
And may you better reck the rede. 

Than ever did the adviser ! 

Epistle to a Young Friend. R. BURNS. 

What stronger breastplate than a heart untainted? 
Thrice is he armed that has his quarrel just ; 
And he but naked, though locked up in steel. 
Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted. 

King Henry VI., Part II. Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE, 

True, conscious honor is to feel no sin ; 

He 's armed without that 's innocent within. 

Imitations 0/ Horace, Epistle I. Book 1. POPE. 

Be noble ! and the nobleness that lies 
In other men, sleeping, but never dead. 
Will rise in majesty to meet thine own. 

Sonnet. J. R. LOWELL. 



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797 



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This above all, — to thine own self be true ; 
And it must follow, as the night the day, 
Thou canst not then be false to any man. 

i Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

And thus he bore without abuse 
The grand old name of gentleman, 
Defamed by every charlatan, 

And soiled with all ignoble use. 

In Memoriam, ex. Te.NNVSO.N. 



Noble Living. 

If our virtues 
Did not go forth of us, 't were all alike 
As if we had them not. Spirits are not finely 

touched. 
But to tine issues ; nor Nature never lends 
The .smallest scruple of her excellence, 
But, like a th rifty goddess, she determines 
Herself the glory of a creditor — 
Both thanks and use. 

Measure/or Measure, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

The flighty purpose never is o'ertook. 
Unless the deed go with it. 

Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Our acts our angels are, or good or ill. 
Our fatal shadows that walk by us still. 



A7t Honest Mans Fortune. 



J. Fletcher. 



That light we see is burning in my hall. 
How far that little candle throws his beams ! 
So shines a good deed in a naughty world. 

Merchant of Venice, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Duty. 

When I 'm not thanked at all, I 'm thanked 

enough. 
I 've done my duty, and I 've done no more. 

Tom, Thumb the Great, .'let i. Sc 3. H- FIELDING. 

Stern Daughter of the Voice of God ! 

Duty ! 

Through no disturbance of my soul, 
Or strong compunction in me wrought, 

1 supplicate for thy control ; 
But in the quietness of thought. 

To humbler functions, awful Power I 

1 call thee : I myself commend 

Unto thy guidance from this hour ; 

0, let my weakness have an end ! 

Give unto me, made lowly wise, 

The spirit of self-sacrifice ; 

The confidence of reason give ; 

And in the light of truth thy bondman let me live ! 

Ode to Duty, WORDSWORTH. 



Honesty. 

You yourself 
Are much condemned to have an itching palm. 

There is no terror, Cassius, in your threats ; 
For I am armed so strong in honesty, 
That they pass by me as the idle wind, 
Which I respect not. 



Julius Ccesar, Act iv. Sc, 3. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Falsehood. 
Who dares think one thing, and another tell, 
My heart detests him as the gates of hell. 

Iliad, Book ix. Translation e/TOPE. HOMER. 

Like one. 
Who having, unto ta'uth, by telling of it, 
Made such a sinner of his memory. 
To credit his own lie. 

The Tempest, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

He was a man 
Who stole the livery of the court of Heaven 
To serve the Devil in. 

Course of Time, Book viii. R. POLLOIC 

The Devil can cite Scripture for his purpose. 

An evil soul, producing holy witness. 

Is like a villain with a smiling cheek, 

A goodly apple rotten at the heart. 

0, what a goodly outside falsehood hath ! 

Mercliant of Venice, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



Benevolence. 
That man may last, but never lives, 
Who much receives but nothing gives ; 
Whom none can love, whom none can thank, 
Creation's blot, creation's blank. 

When Jesus dwelt. T. GIBBONS. 

Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame. 

Epilogue to Satires, Dial. L POPE. 

Who builds a church to God, and not to fame, 
Will never mark the marble with his name : 
Go, search it there, where to be born and die, 
Of rich and poor makes all the history ; 
Enough that virtue filled the space between, 
Proved by the ends of being to have been. 

Moral Essays, Epistle HI. POPE. 

B.* say, what sums that generous hand 
supply ? 
What mines to swell that boundless charity ? 

P.t Of debts and taxes, wife and children clear. 
This man possessed — five hundred pounds a year. 
Blush, grandeur, blush ; proud courts, withdraw 

your blaze ! 
Ye little stars, hide your diminished rays ! 

Moral Essays, Epistle HI. POPE. 



Lord Bathurst, 



t Pope. 



CQ-^ 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



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Mercy. 
Sweet mercy is nobility's true badge. 

Titus Aiidronims, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

The quality of mercy is not strained, — 

It droppetli as the gentle rain from heaven 

Upon the place beneath : it is twice blessed, — 

It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes ; 

'T is mightiest in the mightiest ; it becomes 

The throned monarch better than his crown ; 

His sceptre shows the force of temporal power, 

The attribute to awe and majesty. 

Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings : 

But mercy is above this sceptred sway, — 

It is enthroned in the hearts of kings. 

It is an attribute to God himself ; 

And earthly power doth then show likest God's, 

When mercy seasons justice. 

Merchant of Venice, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Folly and Wisdom. 

Wisdom is ofttimes nearer when we stoop 
Than when we soar. 

The Excursion, Book iii. WORDSWORTH. 

To know 
That which before us lies in daily life 
Is the prime wisdom. 

Paradise Lost, Book viii. MILTON. 

Good sense, which only is the gift of Heaven, 
And though no science, fairly worth the seven. 

Moral Essays, Epistle IV. POPE. 

The weak have remedies, the wise have joys, 
Superior wisdom is superior bliss. 

Nisht Thotiglits, Night viii. DR. E. YOUNG. 

Be wisely worldly, be not worldly wise. 

Emblems, Book ii. F. QUARLES. 

With wisdom fraught, 
Not such as books, but such as practice taught. 

On the King's Return. E. WALLER. 

Who are a little wise the least fools be. 

The Triple Fool. DR. J. DONNE. 

For fools rush in where angels fear to tread. 

Essay on Criticism, Part III. POPE. 



Those that I rev'rence, those I fear 
At fools I laugh, not fear them. 

Cymbeline, Act iv. Sc. 2. 



the wise 



SHAKESPEARE. 



In idle wishes fools supinely stay ; 

Be there a will, and wisdom finds a way. 

The Birth 0/ Flattery. G. CRABBE. 



Some positive, persisting fools we know, 
Who, if once wrong, will need be always so ; 
But you with pleasure own your errors past. 
And make each day a critique on the last. 

POPE. 

Yet proud of parts, with prudence some dispense, 
And play the fool because they 're men of sense. 



Epistle to Pope. 



DR. E. Young. 



This fellow 's wise enough to play the fool ; 
And to do that well craves a kind of wit. 

Twelfth Night, Act lii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Good Nature and Recklessness. 

Poor Jack, farewell. 
I could have better spared a better man. 

King Henry IV., Part I. Act v. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

But evil is wrought by want of thought 
As well as want of heart. 

The Lady s Dream. T. HOOD. 



Forgiveness and Resentment. 

The smallest worm will turn, being trodden on. 
And doves will peck in safeguard at their brood. 

King Henry VI., Part III. Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Forgiveness to the injured does belong ; 

But they ne'er pardon who have done the wrong. 

Conquest of Granada, Part II. Act i. Sc. 2. DR\'DIiN. 

Good nature and good sense must ever join ; 
To err is human, to forgive divine. 

Essay on Criticism, Part II. POPE. 



Ambition. 

I have no spur 
To prick the sides of my intent ; but only 
Vaulting ambition, which o'er-leapjs itself, 
And falls on the other. 

Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

But wild ambition loves to slide, not stand, 
And Fortune's ice prefers to Virtue's land. 

Absalom and Achitophel, Part I. DRYDEN. 

And he that stands upon a slippery place 
Makes nice of no vile hold to stay him up. 

King -John, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

No ; let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp ; 
And crook the pregnant hinges of the knee, 
Where thrift may follow fawning. 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



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Lowliness is young ambition's ladder, 
Whereto the climber-upward turns his face ; 
But when he once attains the upmost round, 
He then unto the ladder turns his back, 
Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees 
By which he did ascend. 

Julius Casar, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

To reign is worth ambition, though in hell : 
Better to reign in hell, than serve in heaven. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MiLTON. 



The Ruling Passion. 

The ruling passion, be it what it will. 
The ruling passion conquers reason still. 

Hear then the truth : 'T is Heav'n each passion 

sends. 
And different men directs to different ends. 
Extremes in nature equal good produce ; 
Extremes in man concur to general use. 

Moral Essays, Epistle III. POPE. 

And hence one master-passion in the breast, 
Like Aaron's serpent, swallows up the rest. 

Essay on Man, Epistle II. POPE. 



Self-Conceit. 

To observations which ourselves we make, 
We grow more partial for the observer's sake. 



Moral Essays, Epistle I. 



'T is with our judgments as our watches, none 
Go just alike, yet each believes his own. 

Essay 07t Criticism, Part I. POPE. 



& 



Pride and Vanity. 

'T is pride, rank pride, and haughtiness of soul ; 
I think the Eonians call it stoicism. 

Cata, Act i. Sc. 4. J. ADDISON. 

In pride, in reasoning pride, our error lies ; 
All quit their s])here and rush into the skies. 

Essay on Man, Epistle /, POPE. 

Pride, like an eagle, builds among the stars. 

Night Tkaiishts, Night v. Ur. e. VOUNG. 

Of all the causes which conspire to blind 
Man's erring judgment, and misguide the mind. 
What the weak hea<l with strongt^st bias rules. 
Is pride, the never failing vice of fools. 

Essay on Cri'icism, Part II. POPE. 

As eddies draw things frivolous and light, 
How is man's lieart by vanity drawn in ! 

Night Thoughts, Night viii. DR. E. YOUNG. 



The fashion wears out more apparel than the man. 

Much Ado about Nothing, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Nothing exceeds in ridicule, no doubt, 

A fool in fashion, but a fool that 's out ; 

His passion for absurdity 's so strong 

He cannot bear a rival in the \M-ong. 

Though wrong the mode, comply : more sense 

is shown 
In wearing others' follies than our own. 

Night Thoughts. DR. E. YOUNG. 

Sir Plume (of amber snuff-box justly vain, 
And the nice conduct of a clouded cane). 
With earnest eyes, and round unthinking face, 
He iirst the snuff-box opened, then the case. 

Rape of the Lock. I'OPE. 



PHASES OF FEELING. 
Pain and Weariness. 

So when a raging fever burns, 

We shift from side to side by turns, 

And 't is a poor relief we gain 

To change the place, but keep the pain. 

Hymns and Spiritual Songs, Book ii . Hyjnn 146. WATTS. 

Till this heroic lesson thou hast learned : 
To fro^vn at pleasure, and to smile in pain. 

Night Thoughts, Night viii, DR. E. YOUNG. 

There 's nothing in this world can make me joy 
Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale. 
Vexing the dull ear of a di'owsy man. 

King John, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

My heart is drowned with grief. 

My body round engirt with misery ; 

For what 's more miserable than discontent ? 

King Henry VI., Part II. Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Grief hath changed mn. 
And careful hours, with Time's deformed hand. 
Hath written strange defeatures in my face. 

Comedy 0/ Errors, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Remokse and Retribution. 

The mind is its own place, and in itself 
Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MiLTON. 

Amid the roses fierce Repentance rears 
Her snaky crest. 

The Seasons: Spring. J. THOMSON. 



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800 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND llEFLECTION. 



The thorns which I have reaped are of the tree 
I planted — they have torn me, and I bleed ; 
I should have known what fruit would spring 
from such a seed. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 

We hut teach 
Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return 
To plague the inventor. This even-handed jus- 
tice 
Commends the ingredients of our poisoned chalice 
To our own lips. 

Macbeth, Act\. Sc. ^. SHAKESPEARE. 

So the struck eagle, stretched upon the plain, 
No more through rolling clouds to soar again. 
Viewed his own feather on the fatal dart, 
And winged the shaft that quivered in his heart. 

English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. BYRON. 



Despair. 

Talk not of comfort ; 't is for lighter ills : 
I will indulge my sorrows, and give way 
To all the pangs and fury of despair. 

Cato. ]■ ADDISON. 

And, in that deep and utter agony, 
Though then than ever most unfit to die, 
I fell upon my knees and prayed for death. 

Bertram. C. MATURIN. 

All hope is lost 
Of my reception into grace ; what worse. 
For where no hope is left, is left no fear. 

Paradise Resained. MiLTON. 

No one is so accursed by fate. 
No one so utterly desolate, 
But some heart, though unknown, 
Responds unto his own. 



E^idymiott. 



LONGFELLOW. 



It is to hope, though hope were lost. 

Come here, fond youths A. L. BARBAULD. 



Fear and Doubt. 

Our doubts are traitors, 
And make us lose the good we oft might win. 
By fearing to attempt. 

Measure for Measure, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Lady Macbeth. Letting I dare not wait 
upon I would. 
Like the poor cat i' the adage. 

Macbeth. Prythee, peace : 

I dare do all that may become a man ; 
Who dares do more, is none. 

Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 



But now, I am cabined, cribbed, confined, bound in 
To saucy doubts and fears. 

Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Attempt the end, and never stand to doubt ; 
Nothing 's so hard but search will find it out. 

Seek and Find. R. HERRICK. 

Tender-handed stroke a nettle. 

And it stings you for your pains ; 
Grasp it like a man of mettle. 

And it soft as silk remains. 

Verses written 071 a IVijtdow in Scotland. A. HiLL. 

Fortune her gifts may variously dispose. 
And these be happy called, unhappy those ; 
But Heaven's just balance equal will appear. 
When those are placed in hope, and these in /car. 
Not present good or ill the joy or curse. 
But future views of better or of worse. 

Essay on Man, Epistle III. POPE. 

Often do the spirits 
Of great events stride on before the events, 
And in to-day already walks to-morrow. 

The Death o/lVallenstein. S. T. COLERIDGE. 



Hope. 



Hope ! of all ills that men endure, 
The only cheap and universal cure ! 

Hope ! thou first-fruits of happiness ! 
Thou gentle dawning of a bright success ! 

Brother of Faith ! 'twixt whom and thee 
The joys of Heaven and Earth divided be ! 

For Hope. A. COWLEY. 

Hope ! thou nurse of young desire. 



Ewe in a Village, Act i. Sc. i. 



I. Bickerstaff. 



True hope is swift, and flies with swallow's wings ; 
Kings it makes gods, and meaner creatures kings. 

King Richard U I., Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

The wretch, condemned with life to part. 

Still, still on hope relies. 
And every pang that rends the heart 

Bids expectation rise. 

Hope, like the glimm'ring taper's light, 

Adorns and cheers the way ; 
And still, as darker grows the night. 

Emits a brighter ray. 

Tlie Captivity. GOLDSMITH 

Thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought. 

KinfT Henry IV., Part 11. Act iv. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Cease, every joy, to glimmer on my mind. 

But leave — oh ! leave the light of Hope behind I 

Pleasures 0/ Hope, Part II. T. CAMPBELL- 



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Besides what hope the never-ending flight 
Of future days may bring. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MiLTON. 

Hope humbly then ; with trembling pinions 
soar ; 
Wait the gi-eat teacher Death, and God adore. 
What future bliss he gives not thee to know, 
But gives that hope to be thy blessing now. 
Hope springs eternal in the human breast : 
Man never is, but always to be, blest. 
The soul, uneasy and confined from home, 
Rests and expatiates in a life to come. 

Essay on Man, Epistle I. POPE. 



And, when the stream 
Which overflowed the soul was passed away, 
A consciousness remained that it had left, 
Deposited upon the silent shore 
Of memory, images and precious thoughts 
That shall not die, and cannot be destroyed. 

The Excursion, Book vii. WORDSWORTH. 

Joys too exquisite to last, 
— And yet more exquisite when past. 

The LMU Cloud. J. MONTGOMERY. 

How blessings brighten as they take their flight 

Night Thoughts, Night ii. Dr. E. YOUNG. 



'T is expectation makes a blessing dear ; : The face recalls some face, as 't were with pain, 

Heaven were not heaven, if we knew what it were. \ You once have seen, but ne'er will see again. 

Against Fruitict. SIR JOHN SUCKLING. I Beppo, Cant. xiii. BYRON. 



Disappointment. 

We 're charmed with distant views of happiness. 
But near approaches make the prospect less. 



Against Enjoyment. 



T. YALDEN. 



Oft expectation fails, and most oft there 
Where most it promises ; and oft it hits 
Where hope is coldest, and despair most fits. 

All's IVell that Ends IVell, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE: 

As distant prospects please us, but wheu near 
We find but desert rocks and fleeting air. 

TIu Dispensatory , Cant. iii. S. GARTH. 

Why wish for more ? 
Wishing, of all employments, is the worst ; 
Philosophy's reverse and health's decay. 

Night Thoughts, Night iv. DR. E. YOUNG. 



Memory. 

While memory holds a seat 
In this distracted globe. Remember thee ? 
Yea, from the table of my memory 
I '11 wipe away all trivial fond records, 
All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past. 
That youth and observation copied there ; 
And thy commandment all alone shall live 
Within the book and volume of my brain. 

Hamlet, Act \. Sc. I. SHAKESPEAKE. 

The leaves of memory seem to make 
A mournful rustling in the dark. 



The Fire of Dri/t--wood. 



Longfellow. 



Remembrance and reflection how allied ! 
What thin partitions sense from thought divide 

Essay on Man, Epistle I. POPE. 



Absent or dead, still let a friend be dear, 
(A sigh the absent claims, the dead a tear. ) 

Epistle to Robert, Earl of Oxford, and Earl of Mortimer. POPE. 

For it so falls out. 
That what we have we prize not to the worth, 
Whiles we enjoy it, but being lacked and lost. 
Why, then we rack the value ; then we find 
The virtue, that possession would not show us 
Whiles it was ours. So will it fare with Claudio: 
When he shall hear she died upon his words, 
Th' idea of her life shall sweetly creep 
Into his study of imagination, 
And every lovely organ of her life 
Shall come apparelled in more precious habit. 
More moving-delicate, and full of life. 
Into the eye and prospect of his soul. 
Than when she lived indeed. 

Much Ado about Nothing, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



PHASES OF FORTUNE. 

Fortune. 

Fortune, men say, doth give too much to many, 
But yet she never gave enough to any. 

EpigraiTis. Sir J. HARRINGTON. 

Are there not, dear Michal, 
Two points in the adventure of the diver. 
One — when, a beggar, he prepares to plunge ? 
One — when, a prince, he rises with his pearl ? 
Festus, I plunge. 

Paracelsus. R.BROWNING. 

When Fortune means to men most good. 
She looks upon them with a threatening eye. 

King John, .Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



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Yet true it is, as cow chews cud, 
And trees, at spring, do yield fortli bud. 
Except wind stands, as never it stood, 
It is an ill wind turns none to good. 

The It'inds. T. TUSSER. 

There is some soul of goodness in things evil, 
Would men observingly distil it out. 

King Hen7-y K, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

For 'tis a truth well known to most, 
That whatsoever thing is lost, 
We seek it, ere it come to light, 
In every cranny but the right. 



The Retired Cat. 



COVVPER. 



I have set my life upon a cast, 
And I will stand the hazard of the die. 

King Richard III., Act v. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 



Elements of Success. 

Macbeth. If we should fail, — 

Lady Macbeth. We fail ! 

But screw your courage to the sticking place. 

And we '11 not fail. 

Macbeth, Acti.Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

In the lexicon of youth, which fate reserves 
For a bright manhood, there is no such word 
As — fail. 

Richelieu, Act ii. Sc. 2. BULVVER-LVTTON. 

The star of the unconquered will. 

The Light of Stars. LONGFELLOW. 

'T is not in mortals to command success. 

But we '11 do more, Sempronius ; we '11 deserve it. 

Cato, Act i. Sc. 2. J. ADDISON. 

To niaken vertue of necessite. 

The Kiiightcs Tale. CHAUCER. 

And many strokes, though with a little axe, 
Hew down and fell the hardest-timbered oak. 

JCing Henry VI., Part til.. Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Striving to better, oft we mar what 's well. 

King Lear, Acti. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

A wild dedication of yourselves 

To unpathed waters, undreamed shores. 

I Glitter's Tale, Activ. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

There is a tide in the affairs of men. 
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune ; 
Omitted, all the voyage of their life 
Is bound in shallows and in miseries. 
On such a full sea ai'e we now afloat ; 
And we must take the current when it serves. 
Or lose our ventures. 

Julius Ccesar, Act iv. ^ir. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



In my school-days, when I had lost one shaft, 
I shot his fellow of the self-same flight 
The self-same way, with more advised watch, 
To find the other forth ; and by adventuring both, 
I oft found both. 

Merchant of Venice, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Who breaketli his credit, or cracketh it twice. 
Trust such, with a siiert)% if ye be wise : 
Or if he be angry, for asking thy due, 
Once even, to him afterward, lend not anew. 

Good HusbaTidry Lessons. T. TUSSER. 

He is well paid that is well satisfied. 



Merchant of Venice, Activ. Sc. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



A Prophecy of Enterprise. 
[17S1.] 
Soon shall thy arm, unconquered steam ! afar 
Drag the .slow barge, or drive the rapid car ; 
Or on wide waving wings expanded bear 
The flying-chariot through the field of air. 

Tlie Botanic Garden, Part /. Ch. i. E. DARWIN. 

Poverty. 

Take physic, pomp ; 
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel. 

King Lear, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Through tattered clothes small vices do appear ; 
Robes and furred gowns hide all. 

King Lear, Ac! iv. 5c. 6. SHAKESPEARE. 

Yon friendless man, at whose dejected eye 
Th' unfeeling proud one looks, and passes by, 
Condemned on penury's barren path to roam. 
Scorned by the world, and left without a home. 

Pleasures 0/ Hope. T. CAMPBELL. 

Rest here, distrest by poverty no more. 

Epitaph on C. Philips. DR. S. JOHNSON. 



fe 



Riches. 
Gold ! gold ! gold ! gold ! 
Bright and yellow, hard and cold. 
Molten, graven, hammered and rolled ; 
Heavy to get, and Hglit to hold ; 
Hoarded, bartered, bouglit, and sold, 
Stolen, borrowed, squandered, doled : 
Spurned by the young, but hugged by the old 
To the very verge of the churchyard mould ; 
Price of many a crime untold : 
Gold ! gold ! gold ! gold ! 
Good or bad a thousand-fold ! 

How widely its agencies vary, — 
To save, to ruin, to curse, to bless, — 
As even its minted coins express, 
Now stamped with the image of good Queen Bess, 

And now of a Bloody Mary. 

Miss Kilmansegg. T. Hood, 



-ff 



a- 



FRAGMENTS. 



803 



-a 



Mammon, the least erected spirit that fell 
From heaven ; foi- even in heaven his looks and 

thoughts 
Were always downward bent, admiring more 
The riches of heaven's pavement, trodden gold, 
Than aught divine or holy else enjoyed 
In vision bL-atitic. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MILTON. 

Religious, punctual, frugal, and so forth ; 
His word would pass for more than he was worth. 
One solid disli his week-day meal affords, 
An added pudding solemnized the Lord's. 
Constant at church and change, his gains were 

sure, 
His giving rare, save farthings to the poor. 

Moral Essays, EpistU III. POPE. 

The devil was piqued such saintship to behold, 
And longed to tempt him, like good Job of old ; 
For Satan now is wiser than of yore. 
And tempts by making rich, not making poor. 

Moral Essays, Epistle III. POPE. 

Here Wisdom calls, " Seek virtue first, be bold ; 
As gold to silver, virtue is to gold." 
There London's voice, " Get monej', money still, 
And then let Virtue follow if she will." 

Imitations of Horace, Epistle I. Book i. POPE. 

Be but great. 
With praise or infamy — leave that to fate ; 
Get place and wealth ; if possible, with grace ; 
If not, by any means get wealth and place. 

Imitations of Horace, Epistle I. Book i. POPE. 

For what is worth in anything, 
But so much money as 't will bi'ing ? 

Hudil/ras, Part II. DR. S. BUTLER. 

You have too much respect upon the world : 
They lose it, that do buy it with much care. 

Merchant of P'e?tice, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



INTELLECTUAL ACTIVITY. 

Conversation. 

Words are like leaves ; .and where they most 

abound, 
Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found. 

Essay on Criticism, Part II, POPE. 

And I oft have heard defended, 
Little said is soonest mended. 

The Shepherd s Himtms:. G. WITHER. 

Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit. 
And tediousness the limbs and outward flour- 
ishes, 
I will be brief. 

Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



King Richard. Be eloquent in my behalf to her. 
Queen Elizabeth. An honest tale speeds best, 
being plainly told. 

King Richard III., Act iv. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

And, when you stick on conversation's burrs. 
Don't strew your pathway with those dreadful 
urs. 

Urania. . O. W. HOLMES. 

In his brain — 
Which is as dry as the remainder biscuit 
After a voyage — he hath strange places crammed 
With observation, the which he vents 
In mangled forms. 

As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

They never taste who always drink ; 
They always talk who never think. 

upon a Passage in the Scaligerana. M. PRIOR. 

dear discretion ! how his words are suited. 

Merchant of Venice, Act iii. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

His wit invites you by his looks to come. 
But, when you knock, it never is at home. 

Conversation. CO\VPER. 

Bid me discourse, I will enchant thine ear. 

Venus and Adonis. SHAKESPEARE. 

And Thought leapt out to wed with Tliought 
Ere Thought could wed itself with Speech. 

In Memoriam, xxiii. TENNYSON. 

And gentle Dulness ever loves a joke. 

The Dunciad, Booh ii. POPE. 

0, many a shaft, at random sent, 

Finds mark the archer little meant ! 

And many a word, at random spoken. 

May soothe, or wound, a heart that 's broken ! 

Lord 0/ the Isles, Cant. V. SCOTT. 

Argument. 
And why, sir, must they so ? 
The why is plain as way to parish church. 

As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

Who shall decide, when doctors disagree. 
And soundest casuists doubt, like you and me ? 

Moral Essays, Epistle III. POPE. 



Much may be said on both sides. 

The Covent Garden Tragedy, Sc. 8, 

He that complies against his will 
Is of his own opinion stUl. 

Hudibras, Part III. 



H. Fielding. 



Dr. S. Butler. 



Quoth she, I 've heard old cunning stagers 
Say, fools for arguments use wagers. 

Hudibras, Part II. DR. S. BUTLER. 



B-- 



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804 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



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A second Daniel, a Daniel, Jew ! 
Now, infidel, I have thee on the hip. 

A Daniel, still say I ; a second Daniel ! — 
I thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word. 

Merchant 0/ Venice, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

To leave this keen encounter of our wits. 

Kiug Richard III., Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Oratory. 

For rhetoric, he could not ope 

His mouth, but out thei-e flew a trope. 

For all a rhetorician's rules 

Teach nothina- but to name his tools. 



Hudibras, Part J. Cant. L 



DR. S. BUTLER. 



Where nature's end of language is declined, 
And men talk only to conceal the mind. 



Lrnie o/Fa 



DR. E. YOUNG. 



To syllable-dissectors they appeal. 
Allow them accent-cadence, — fools may feel ; 
But, spite of all the criticising elves. 
Those who would make us feel — must feel them- 
selves. 

The Rosciad. C. CHURCHILL. 

Thence to the famous orators repair, 
Those ancient, whose resistless eloquence 
Wielded at will that fierce democratic, 
Shook the arsenal, and fulmined over Greece, 
To Macedon, and Artaxerxes' throne. 

Paradise Regained, Book iv. MiLTON. 

Words that weep and tears that speak. 

The Prophet. A. COWLEY. 



The Stage. 

I have heard 
That guilty creatures, sitting at a play. 
Have by the very cunning ot the scene 
Been struck so to the soul, that presently 
They have proclaimed their malefactions. 

The play 's the thing 
Wherein I '11 catch the conscience of the King. 

Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Lo, where the stage, the poor, degraded stage. 
Holds its warped mirror to a gaping age. 

Curiosity. C. SPRAGUE. 

Nay, an thou 'It mouth, 
I '11 rant as well as thou. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 



There still remains, to mortify a wit, 
The many-headed monster of the pit. 

Imitations 0/ Horace, Efistle I. Book ii. POPE- 

New forms arise, and different views engage, 
Superfluous lags the vet'ran on the stage. 
Till pitying Nature signs the last release, 
And bids afflicted worth retire to peace. 

Vanity of Hnjtian IVishes. Dr. S. JOHNSON. 

A veteran see ! whose last act on the stage 
Entreats your smiles for sickness and for age ; 
Their cause I plead, — plead it in heart and 

mind ; 
A fellow-feeling makes one wondrous kind. 

Prologue on Quittijtg the Stage in ztj(>. D. Garrick. 

I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano ; 
A stage, where every man must play a part. 
And mine a sad one. 

Merchant of Venice, Act'i. Sc. 1 SHAKESPEARE. 



Learning. 
'Tis education forms the common mind ; 
Just as the twig is bent the tree 's inclined. 

Moral Essays, Epistle I. POPE. 

With too much quickness ever to be taught ; 
AVith too much thinking to have common 
thought. 

Moral Essays, Epistle II. POPE. 

Glad that you thus continue your resolve 
To suck the sweets of sweet philosophy ; 
Only, good master, while we do admire 
This virtue and this moral discipline. 
Let 's be no stoics, nor no stocks, I pray. 

No profit grows where is no pleasure ta'en ; 
In brief, sir, study what you most affect. 

Taming oftjie Shrew, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Some, for renown, on scraps of learning dote. 
And think they grow immortal as they quote. 

Love of Fame, Satire L DR. E. YOUNG. 

With just enough of learning to misquote. 

E7tglish Bards and Scotch Reviewers. BYRON. 

Whence is thy learning ? Hath thy toil 
O'er books consumed the midnight oil ? 

Fables : The Shepherd and the Philosoplier. J. GAY. 

Small have continual plodders ever won, 
Save base authority from others' books. 

These earthly godl'athers of heaven's lights, 
That give a name to every fixed star. 

Have no more profit of their shining jiights 
Than those that M'alk, and wot not what they 
are. 

I.me's Labor Lost, Act i. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 



I& 



& 



[fi- 



PRAGMBNTS. 



805 



■a 



Love seldom liaiints the breast where learning 

lies, 
And Venus sets ere Mercuiy can rise. 

The Wife e/ Bath : Her Prologue. POPE. 

A little learning is a dangerous thing ; 
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring : 
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, 
And drinking largely sobers us again. 

Essay on Criticism, Part 11. POPE. 



Authors. 

Shut, shut the door, good John ! fatigued I said, 
Tie up the knocker, say I 'm sick, I 'rn dead. 
The Dog-star i-ages ! nay, 't is past a doubt, 
All Bedlam, or Parnassus, is let out : 
Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand, 
They rave, recite, and madden round the land. 

Epistle lo Dr. Arlfitthnot : Prologite to the Satires. POPE. 

Why did I write ? what sin to me unknown 
Dipped me in ink, — my parents', or my own ? 

Epistle to Dr. Arbitthnot : Prologue to the Satires. POPE. 

Whether the charmer sinner it, or saint it, 
If folly grow romantic, I must paint it. 

Moral Essays, Epistle If. POPE. 

Beneath the rule of men entirely great 
The pen is mightier than the sword. 

Richelieu, Act ii. Sc. 2. E. BULWER-LYTTON. 

And so I penned 
It down, until at last it came to be, 
For length and breadth, the bigness which you 
see. 

Pilgrim's Progress : Apology for his Book. J. BUNYAN. 



Books. 



If there 's a hole in a' your coats, 

I rede ye tent it ; 
A chiel 's amang ye takin' notes, 

And, faith, he '11 prent it. 

On Captain Grose's Percgrinatio>is through Scotland. BURNS. 

'T is pleasant, .sure, to see one's name in print ; 
A book 's a book, although there 's nothing in 't. 

English Bards and Scotch Revieiuers. BYRON. 

Lest men suspect your tale untnie, 
Keep probability in view. 
The traveller leaping o'er those bounds, 
The credit of his book confounds. 

The Painter -who pleased Nobody and Everybody. J, GAY. 



Immodest words admit of no defence, 
For want of decency is want of sense. 

But foul descriptions are offensive still, 
Either for being like or being ill. 

Essay on Tra7isla:ed Verse. EARL OF ROSCOMMON. 

But words are things, and a small drop of ink. 
Falling, like dew, upon a thought, produces 
That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, 
think. 

Don yuan. Cant. iii. BYRON. 

Me, poor man ! — My library 
Was dukedom large enough. 

Tempest, Act i. Sc. z. SH.\KESPEARE. 

His study ! with what authors is it stored ? 
In books, not authors, curious is my lord ; 
To all their dated backs he turns you round ; 
These Aldus printed, those Du Sueil has bound ! 
Lo, some are vellum, and the rest as good 
For all his lordship knows, but they are wood. 
For Locke or Milton 't is in vain to look. 
These shelves admit not any modern book. 

Moral Essays, Epistle /K. POPE. 

'T is strange — but true ; for truth is always 

strange ; 
Stranger than fiction, 

Don yuan. Cant. xiv. BYRON. 

Oh ! rather give me commentatoi's plain, 
Who with no deep researches vex the brain ; 
Who fronj the dark and doubtful love to runj 
And hold their glimmering tapers to the sun. 

The Parisii Register, Part /., Introductioft. G. CRABBE. 

The readers and the hearers like my books, 
But yet some writers cannot them digest ; 
But what care I ? for when I make a feast 
I would my guests should praise it, not the 
cooks. 

Epigrams. SIR J. HARRINGTON. 

Dreams, books, are each a world ; and books, we 

know, 
Are a substantial world, both pure and good ; 
Round these, with tendrils strong as llesh and 

blood. 
Our pastime and our happiness will gi'ow. 

Personal Talk. WORDSWORTH. 

And choose an author as you choose a friend. 

Essay on Tratislatcd Verse. EARL OF ROSCOMMON. 

Then felt I like some watcher of the skies 
When a new planet swims into his ken ; 

Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes 
He stared at the Pacific — ■ and all his men 

Looked at each other with a wild surmise — 
Silent, upon a peak in Darien. 

Onjirst looking into Chapman's Homer. KEATS. 



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805 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 






My clays among the Dead are passed ; 

Around ine I behold, 
Where'er these casual eyes are cast, 

The mighty minds of old ; 
My never-failing friends are they, 

With whom I converse day by day. 

Occasional Pieces, xvili. R- tOUTHEY. 

There studious let me sit. 
And hold high converse with the mighty dead ; 
Sages of ancient time, as gods revered. 
As gods beneficent, who blest mankind 
With arts, with arms, and humanized a world. 

r/te Seasons : IVinter. THOMSON. 



t 



Ckiticism and Satire. 

And finds, with keen, discriminating sight, 
Black 's not so black ; — nor white so very white. 

Ne-w Morality. G. CANNING. 

In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold. 
Alike fantastic if too new or old : 
Be not the first by whom the new are tried. 
Nor yet the last to lay the old aside. 

Essay on Criticism, Part II. POPE. 

Poets lose half the praise they should have got, 
Gould it be known what they discreetly blot. 

upon Roscommon's Translation 0/ Horace's De Arte Poctica. 

E. WALLER, 

Even copious Dryden wanted, or forgot. 
The last and greatest art, the art to blot. 

Imitations of Horace, Epistle I. Book ii. POPE. 

True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, 
As those move easiest who have learned to dance. 
'T is not enough no harshness gives offence ; 
The sound must seem an echo to the sense. 
Soft is the strain when zephyr gently blows. 
And the smooth stream in smoother numbers 

flows ; 
But when loud surges lash the sounding shore. 
The hoarse rough verse should like the torrent 

roar. 
When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to 

throw. 
The line too labors, and the words move slow ; 
Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain, 
Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along 

the main. 

Essay on Criticism, Part II. POPE. 

Then, at the last and only couplet fraught 
With some unmeaning thing they call a thought, 
A needless Alexandrine ends the song, 
That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length 
along. 

Essay on Criticism, Part II. POPE. 



As soon 
Seek roses in December, — ice in June ; 
Hope constancy in wind, or corn in chaff, 
Believe a woman, or an epitaph, 
Or any other thing that 's false, before 
You trust in critics. 

English Bards and Scotch Rcvieiuers. BVRON. 

Of all the griefs that harass the distressed, 
Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest ; 
Fate never wounds more deep the generous heart 
Than when a blockhead's insult points the dart. 

London. DR. S. JOHNSON. 

Prepare for rhyme — I '11 publish, right or wrong : 
Fools are my theme, let satire be my song. 

English Bards aitd Scotch Reviewers. BYRON. 

Satire 's my weapon, but I 'm too discreet 
To run amuck, and tilt at all I meet. 

Imitation of Horace, Satire I. Book ii. DRYDEN. 

Satire should, like a polished razor keen, 
Wound with a touch that 's scarcely felt or seen. 

To the Imitator of the first Satire of Horace, Book ii. 

LADY M. W. MONTAGU. 



Poets and Poetry. 

Of all those arts in which the wise excel, 
Nature's chief masterpiece is writing well ; 
No writing lifts exalted man so high 
As sacred and soul-moving poesy. 

Essay on Poetry. DUKE OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE. 

For his chaste Muse employed her heaven-taught 

lyre 
None but the noblest passions to inspire, 
Not one immoral, one corrupted thought, 
One line which, dying, he could wish to blot. 

Prologue to Thomson's Coriotanus. LORD LYTTELTON. 



Wisdom married to immortal verse. 



The Excursion, Book vii. 



WORDSWORTH. 



There is a pleasure in poetic pains 
Which only poets know. 

The Timepiece: The Task, Book ii. COWPER. 

Most wretched men 
Are cradled into poetry by wrong ; 
They learn in siitfei'ing what they teach in song. 

Julian and Maddalo. SHELLEY. 

Lovers and madmen have such seething brains, 
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend 
More than cool reason ever comprehends. \ 
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet ) 

Are of imagination all compact. - 

Midsummer Night's Dream, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



iS~^ 



FRAGMENTS. 



>-.^r^ 



807 



I do but sing because I must, 
And pipe but as tbe linnets sing. 

/;; Memofiam, xxi. TENNYSON. 

While pensive poets painful vigils keep, 
Sleepless themselves to give their readers sleep. 

r/!e Diinciad, Book i. POPE. 

For wheresoe'er I turn my ravished eyes. 
Gay gilded scenes and shining prospects rise, 
Poetic fields encompass me around, 
And still I seem to tread on classic ground. 

A Letter from Italy. ADDISON. 

Eye Nature's walks, shoot folly as it flies. 
And catch the manners living as they rise ; 
Laugh where we must, be candid wliere we can, 
But vindicate the ways of God to man. 

Essay on Man, Epistle I. POPE. 

Poets, like painters, thus unskilled to trace 
The naked nature and the living grace. 
With gold and jewels cover every part. 
And hide with ornaments their want of art. 
True wit is nature to advantage dressed, 
What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed. 

Essay on Criticism, Part II, POPE. 



Apt alliteration's artful aid. 

The Prophecy of Famine. 



C. CHURCHILL. 



But those that write in rhyme still make 
The one verse for the other's sake ; 
For one for sense, and one for rhyme, 
I think 's sufficient at one time. 

Hudibras, Part II. DR. S. BUTLER. 

For rhyme the rudder is of verses. 

With which, like ships, they steer their courses. 

Hudibras, Part I. DR. S. BUTLER. 

I had rather be a kitten, and cvj, mew. 

Than one of these same metre ballad-mongers ; 

I had rather hear a brazen can'stick turned. 

Or a dry wheel grate on the axle-tree ; 

And that would set my teeth nothing on edge. 

Nothing so much as mincing poetry : 

'T is like the forced gait of a shuffling nag. 

AV«^ Henry IV., Part I. Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Go boldly forth, my simple lay, 
Whose accents flow with artless ease, 
Like orient pearls at random strung. 



A Persian Song of Hafz. 



SIR w. Jones. 



One simile that solitary shines 

In the dry desert of a thousand lines. 

hjiitatio7is of Horace, Epistle I. Book ii. 



Jewels five-words long, 
That on the stretched forefinger of all time 
Sparkle forever. 

The Princess, Cant. ii. TENNYSON. 

Choice word and measured phrase above the reach 
Of ordinary men. 

Resolution and Independence. WORDSWORTH. 

A poem round and perfect as a star. 

A Life Drama. A. SMITH. 

My eyes make pictures, when they are shut. 



A Day-Drea 



S. T. COLERIDGE. 



Then feed on thoughts, that voluntary move 
Harmonious numbers ; as the wakeful bird 
Sings darkling and in shadiest covert hid 
Tunes her nocturnal note : thus with the year 
Seasons return ; but not to me returns 
Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn, 
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose, 
Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine ; 
But cloud instead, and ever-during dark 
Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men ' 
Cut ofi", and for the book of knowledge fair 
Presented with a universal blank 
Of nature's works to me expunged and rased, 
And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out. 
So much the rather thou celestial Light 
Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers 
Irradiate. 

Paradise Lost, Book iii. MiLTON. 

Still govern thou my song, 
Urania, and fit audience find, though few. 

Paradise Lost, Book vii. MiLTON. 

Thanks untraced to lips unknown 
Shall greet me like the odors blown 
From unseen meadows newly mown, 
Or lilies floating in some pond. 
Wood-fringed, the wayside gaze beyond ; 
The traveller owns the grateful sense 
Of sweetness near, he knows not whence. 
And, pausing, takes with forehead bare 
The benediction of the air. 

Sno-w-Bound. J. G. WHITTIER. 



The Mind. 

How small, of all that human hearts endure. 
That part which laws or kings can cause or cure ! 
Still to ourselves in every place consigned, 
Our own felicity we make or find. 
With secret course, which no loud storms anno)', 
Glides the smooth current of domestic jo}*. 

Lines added to Goldsmith's Traveller. DR. S.JOHNSON. 



th- 



a 



i:l 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



-Si 



Now see that noble and most sovereign reason, 
Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh. 

HamUt, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Measure your mind's height by the shade it 
casts ! 

Paracelsus. R- BROWMNG. 

He that of such a height hath built his mind, 
And reared the dwelling of his thoughts so strong, 
As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame 
Of his resolved powers ; nor all the wind 
Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong 
His settled peace, or to disturb the same ; 
What a fair seat hath lie, from whence he may 
The boundless wastes and wilds of man survey ? 

Unless above himself he can 
Erect himself, how poor a thing is man ! 

To the Countess of Cumberland. S. DANIEL. 

Were I so tall to reacb the pole, 
Or grasp the ocean with my span, 
I must be measured by my soul : 
The mind 's the standard of the man. 

Hora Lyricte, Book ii. ; False Greatness. DR. I. WATTS. 



Philosophy. 

Horatio. day and night, but this is won- 
drous strange ! 
Hamlet. And therefore as a stranger give it 
welcome. 
There are more things in heaven and earth, 

Horatio, 
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Philosophy will clip an angel's wings. 

Lamia, Part II. J. KEATS. 

Sure, He that made us with such large discourse, 
Looking before and after, gave us not 
That capability and godlike reason. 
To fust in us unused. 

Hamlet, Act iv. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Thinking is but an idle waste of thought. 
And naught is everything and everything is 
naught. 

Rejected Addresses : Cut Bono ^ H. and J. SMITH. 

When Bishop Berkeley said "there was no mat- 
ter," 
And proved it — 't was no matter what he said. 

Don Jtian, Cant. xi. BYRON. 

His cogitative faculties immersed 
In cogibundity of cogitation. 

C/iroHon, Act i. Sc. i. H. CAREY. 



Hot philosophers 
Stood banding factions, all so strongly propt ; 
I staggered, knew not which was firmer part. 
But thought, quoted, read, observed, and pried, 
Stufft noting-books : and still my spaniel slept. 
At length he waked, and yawned ; and by yon sky 
For aught I know, he knew as much as I. 

A Scholar and his Dos. J. MARSTON. 

He knew what 's what, and that 's as high 
As metaphysic wit can fly. 

Hudibras, Parti. DR. S. BUTLER. 

There is nothing either good or bad, but think- 
ing makes it so. 

Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Not so the son ; he marked this oversight. 
And then mistook reverse of wrong for right ; 
( For What to shun, will no great knowledge need, 
But What to follow, is a task indeed !) 

Moral Essays, Efistle III. PoPE, 

The intellectual pow^er, through words and things, 
Went sounding on, a dim and perilous way ! 

Tlie Excursion, Book iii. WORDSWORTH. 

In discourse more sweet, 
(For eloquence the soul, song charms the sense,) 
Others apart sat on a hill retired. 
In thoughts more elevate, and reasoned high 
Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate, 
Fixed fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute ; 
And found no end, in wand'ring mazes lost. 
Of good and evil much they argued then, 
Of happiness and final misery. 
Passion and apathy, and glory and shame ; 
Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy. 

Paradise Lost, Book iu MILTON. 

Slave to no sect, who takes no private road. 
But looks through nature up to nature's God. 

And knows where faith, law, morals, all began. 
All end, in love of God and love of man. 

Essay on Man, Efistle IV. POPE, 



Music. 

If music be the food of love, play on ; 
Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, 
The appetite may sicken, and so die. 
That strain again — it had a dying fall : 
0, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south, 
That breathes upon a bank of violets. 
Stealing, and giving odor. 

TtuclftJi NizhI, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



809 



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There is a cliarni, a power, that sways the breast ; 
Bids every passion revel or be still ; 
Inspires with rage, or all our cares dissolves ; 
Can soothe distraction, and almost despair. 

Art 0/ Preserving Health. J. ARMSTRONG. 

Music hath charms to soothe a savage breast. 
To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak. 
I 've read that things inanimate have moved, 
And, as with living souls, have been informed 
By magic numbers and persuasive sound. 

riie Mourning Bride, Ad i. Sc. i. W. CONGREVE. 

Where music dwells 
Lingering and wandering on, as loath to die, 
Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof 
That they were born for immortality. 

Ecclesiastical Sonnets, Part III. xliii. WORDSWORTH. 



Sculpture. 

As when, lady mine, 
With chiselled touch 
The stone unhewn and cold 
Becomes a living mould, 
The more the marble wastes 
The more the statue grows. 

Sonnet. Tr. oftArs. HENRY ROSCOE. M. AnGELO. 



THE PROFESSIONS. 

The Clergy and the Pulpit. 
for a forty parson power ! 

Don yuan. Cant. v. BYRON 

Wei oughte a prest ensample for to yive. 

By his clennesse, how that his sheep shulde lyve. 

To draw folk to heven by fairnesse 

By good ensample, this was his busynesse. 

Ca)i.'erbury Tales : Prologue. CHAUCER. 

What makes all doctrines plain and clear ? 
About two hundred pounds a year. 
And that which was proved true before, 
Prove false again ? Two hundred more. 

Hudibras, Part III. DR. S. BUTLER. 

Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, 
Show me the steep and thorny way to Heaven, 
Whilst, like a puffed and reckless libertine. 
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, 
And recks not his own rede. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE, 

He 'stablishes the strong, restores the weak, 
Reclaims the wanderer, binds the broken heart. 

The Timepiece : The Task, Book\\. COWPER. 



Of right and wrong he taught 
Truths as refined as ever Athens heai'd ; 
And (strange to tell !) he practised what he 
preached. 



Art 0/ Preserving Health. 



J. ARMSTROXC. 



Medicine and Doctors. 
I do remember an apothecary. 

Sharp misery had worn him to the bones : 
And in his needy shop a tortoise hung. 
An alligator stuffed, and other skins 
Of ill-shaped fishes ; and about his shelves 
A beggarly account of empty boxes. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

With us ther was a Doctour of Phisik, 
In al this world ne was ther iion him lyk 
To speke of phisik and of surgerye. 

He knew the cause of every maladye. 
Were it of hoot or colde, or moyste or drye. 
And wher engendered and of what humour ; 
He was a verrey parfight practisour. 

For gold in phisik is a cordial, 
Therfore he lovede gold in special. 

Canterbury Tales: Prologue. CHAUCER. 

"Is there no hope ? " the sick man said. 
The silent doctor shook his head 
And took his leave with signs of sorrow, 
Despairing of his fee to-morrow. 

The Sid Man and tlie Angel. J. GAY. 

But when ill indeed, 
E'en dismissing the doctor don't always succeed. 

Lodgings /or Single Gentlemen. G. COLMAN, the younger. 



Lawyers and the Law. 

So wise, so grave, of so perplexed a tongue 
And loud withal, that could not wag, nor scarce 
Lie still, without a fee. 

Valpone. B. JONSON. 

While lawyers have more sober sense 
Than t' argue at their own expense, 
But make their best advantages 
Of others' quarrels, like the Swiss. 

Hudibras. DR. S. BUTLER. 

Each wanton judge new penal statutes draw. 
Laws grind the poor, and rich men rule the law. 

T}u: Traveller. GOLDSMITil. 



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POEMS OF SENTIiMENT AND REFLECTION. 



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Laws, as we read in ancient sages, 
Have been like cobwebs in all ages. 
Cobwebs for little flies are spread. 
And laws for little folks are made ; 
But if an insect of renown, 
Hornet or beetle, wasp or drone, 
Be caught in quest of sport or plunder. 
The flimsy fetter flies in sunder. 

i J. Beattie. 

Between two hawks, which flies the higher pitch, 
Between two dogs, which hath the deeper mouth, 
Between two horses, which doth bear him best. 
Between two girls, which hath the merriest eye, 
I have, perhaps, some shallow spirit of judg- 
ment ; 
But in these nice sharp quillets of the law, 
Good faith, I am no wiser than a daw. 

King Henry VI., Part I. Aa ii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Mastering the lawless science of our law, 
That codeless myriad of precedent. 
That wilderness of single instances. 

Ayhner's Field. TENNYSON. 

For twelve honest men have decided the cause, 
Who are judges alike of the facts and the laws. 

The Honest Jtiry. W. PULTENEY. 

The hungry judges soon the sentence sign. 
And wretches hang, that jurymen may dine. 

Rape of the Lock, Cant. iii. POPE. 

Dame Justice, weighing long the doubtful right, 
Takes, opens, swallows it before their sight. 
The cause of strife removed so rarely well. 
There, take (says Justice), take ye each a shell ; 
We thrive at Westminster on fools like you ; 
'T was a fat oyster — live in peace — adieu. 

Verbatim frojn Boileav.. POPE. 



The Press. 
Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast, 
Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round, 
And while the bubbling and loud hissing urn 
Throws up a steamy column, and the cups. 
That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each. 
So let us welcome peaceful evening in. 

This folio of four pages, happy work ! 
Which not e'en critics criticise ; that holds 
Inquisitive attention while I read. 

What is it but a map of busy life. 

Its fluctuations and its vast concerns ? 

'T is pleasant, through the loop-holes of retreat. 

To peep at such a woi'ld, — to see the stir 

Of the great Babel, and not feel the crowd. 



While fancy, like the finger of a clock, 
Runs the great circuit, and is still at home. 

Winter Evening : The Task, Book iv. Co WPER. 



The Jester. 

When I did hear 
The motley fool thus moral on the time, 
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer, 
That fools should be so deep contemplative ; 
And I did laugh, sans intermission. 
An hour by his dial. — noble fool ! 
A worthy fool ! — Motley 's the only wear. 



As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 7. 



Shakespeare. 



PERSONAL AND PUBLIC OPINION. 
Praise. 

The love of praise, howe'er concealed by art, 
Reigns more or less, and glow's in every heart. 

Lo^ie of Fame, Satire i. DR. E. YOUNG. 

To things of sale a seller's praise belongs. 



Love's Labor Lost, Act iv. Sc. 3. 



Shakespeare. 



I have bought 
Golden opinions from all sorts of people. 

Macbeth, Act i. Sc- 7. 



Shakespeare. 



Who hath not owned, with rapture-smitten frame. 
The power of grace, the magic of a name ? 

Pleasures of Hope, Part II. T. CAMPBELL. 



Flattery. 

'T is an old maxim in the schools, 
That flattery 's the food of fools ; 
Yet now and then your men of wit 
Will condescend to take a bit. 

Cadenus a;td Vanessa. DEAN SWIFT. 

But flattery never seems absurd ; 
The flattered always takes your word : 
Impossibilities seem just ; 
They take the strongest praise on trust. 
Hyperboles, though ne'er so great, 
Will still come short of self-conceit. 

The Painter viho pleased Nobody and Everybody, J. GAY. 

He loves to hear 
That unicorns may be betrayed with trees, 
And bears with glasses, elephants with holes, 
Lions with toils, and men with flattei'ers. 
But when I tell him he hates flatterers, 
He says he does, being then most flattered. 

y-iilius Casar, Act ii. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE 



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FRAGMENTS. 



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Ne'er 
Was flattery lost on Poet's ear : 
A simple race ! they waste their toil 
For tlie vain tribute of a smile. 

Lay of the Last Minstrel, Cant, iv. 



Scandal and Slandek. 

There 's nothing blackens like the ink of fools. 
If true, a woful likeness ; and, if lies, 
"Praise undeserved is scandal in disguise." 

Ltnitations of Horace, Epistle L Book ii. POPE. 

And there 's a lust in man no charm can tame 
Of loudly publishing our neighbor's shame ; 
On eagles' wings immortal scandals fly, 
AVhile virtuous actions are but born and die. 

Satire ix. Trans, of S. HARVEY. JUVENAL. 

A third interprets motions, looks and eyes ; 
At every word a reputation dies. 

Rape of the Lock, Cam, iii. POPE. 

No, 't is slander. 
Whose edge is sharper than the sword ; whose 

tongue 
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile ; whose breath 
Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie 
All comers of the world. 

Cymbeline, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE, 



Reputation. 

Good name in man and woman, dear my lord. 

Is tlie immediate jewel of their souls : 

Who steals my purse, steals trash; 'tis something, 

nothing ; 
'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to 

thousands ; 
But he that filches from me my good name 
Robs me of that which not enriches him. 
And makes me poor indeed. 

Othello, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

After my death I wish no otlier herald, 
No other speaker of my living actions, 
To keep mine honor from corruption. 
But such an honest chronicler as Griffith. 

Kijtg Henry VUL, Adv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Hamlet. Horatio, I am dead ; 

Thou liv'st ; report me and my cause aright 
To the unsatisfied. 

Horatio. Never believe it : 

(Taking the cup,) 
I am more an antique Roman than a Dane : 
Here 's yet some liquor left. 

Ham. As thou 'rt a man, 



Give me the cup : let go ; by heaven I '11 have 't. — 
(Strnggling : Hamlet gets the cup.) 

God ! — Horatio, what a wounded name. 

Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind 
me ! 

If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart, 

Absent thee from felicity awhile, 

And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain, 

To tell my story. 

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Fame. 



What shall I do to be forever known, 
And make the age to come my own ? 



a. Cowley. 



By Jove ! I am not covetous for gold ; 

But, if it be a sin to covet honor, 
I am the most oflfending soul alive. 



King Henry V., Act iv. Sc. 3. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Your name is great 
In mouths of wisest censure. 

Othello, Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

It deserves with characters of brass 
A forted residence 'gainst the tooth of time 
And razui'e of oblivion. 

Measure for Measure, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

What is glory but the blaze of fame, 

The people's praise, if always praise unmixt ? 

And what delight to be by such extolled, 
To live upon their tongues and be their talk, 
Of whom to be dispraised were no small praise ? 

Paradise Regained, Book iii. MILTON. 

One touch of nature makes the whole world kin, — 
That all with one consent praise new-born gawds. 

And give to dust, that is a little gilt. 
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted. 

Troilus and Cressida, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Thrice happy he whose name has been well spelt 
In the despatch : I knew a man whose loss 
Was printed Grove, although his name was Grose. 

Lion Juan, Cant, viii. BYRON. 

What is the end of Fame ? 'T is but to fill 
A certain portion of uncertain paper. 

Don yuan. Cant. i. BYRON. 

Nor Fame I slight, nor for her favors call ; 
She comes unlooked for, if she comes at all. 

Unblemished let me live, or die unknown ; 
grant an honest fame, or gi-ant me none ! 

The Temple of Fame. POPH. 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 






Ah ! who can tell how hard it is to climb 
The steep where fame's proud temple shines 

afar ! 
Ah ! who can tell how many a soul sublime 
Has felt the influence of malignant star, 
And waged with Fortune an eternal war ; 
Checked by the scoff of pride, by envy's frown, 
And poverty's unconquerable bar. 
In life's low vale remote has pined alone. 
Then dropt into the grave, unpitied and un- 
known ! 

Tlie Minstrel, Book \. J. Beattie 

Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise 
(That last infirmity of noble mind ) 
To scorn delights, and live laborious days ; 
But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, 
And think to burst out into sudden blaze. 
Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears. 
And slits the thin-spun life. But not the praise, 
Phoebus replied, and touched ray trembling ears ; 
Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil, 

But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes 
And perfect witness of all -judging Jove. 
As he pronounces lastly iu each deed. 
Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed. 

Lvcidas. MlLTON'. 



CLASS AND CASTE. 
Aeistocracy. 

Order is Heaven's first law, and, this confest. 
Some are, and must be, greater than tlie rest. 

Essay on Man. Epistle IV. POPE. 

Whoe'er amidst the sons 
Of reason , valor, liberty, and virtue, 
Displays distinguished merit, is a noble 
Of Nature's own creating. 

Coriolnnus, Act iii. Sc. 3. J. THOMSON. 

None but himself can be his parallel. 

The Double Falsehood. I.OUIS THEOBALD. 

Ho lives to build, not boast, a generous race ; 
Fo tenth transmitter of a foolish face. 

The Bastard. R- SAVAGi:. 

Such souls, 
Whose sudden visitations daze the world, 
Vanish like lightning, but they leave behind 
A. voice that in the distance far away 
Wakens the slumbering ages. 

Philip Van Artevelde, Act i. Sc. 7. SIR II. TAYLOR. 



Snobbeey. 

Let wealth and commerce, laws and learning die, 
But leave us still our old nobility. 

England's Trust, a?id other Poems. LORD J. MANNERS. 

In men this blunder still you find, 
All think their little set mankind. 



Florio, Part I. 



Hannah More. 



Glendower. And all the courses of my life 
do show, 
I am not in the roll of common men. 

I can call spirits from the vasty deep. 

HoTSPiTPw. Why, so can I, or so can any man : 
But will they come when you do call for theni \ 

King Henry IV., Part I. Act iii. Sc. i. ShaKESPEAR i:. 

Know ye not then, said Satan, filled with scorn, — 
Know ye not me ? 

Not to know me argues yourselves unknown, 
The lowest of your throng. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON. 

And if his name be George, I '11 call him Peter; 
For new-made honor doth forget men's names. 

King John, Act\. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

What woful stuff this madrigal would be 
In some starved hackney sonneteer, or me. 
But let a lord once own the happy lines, 
How the \vit brightens ! how the style refines ! 

Essay on Criticism, Part 11. POPE. 

'T is from high life high characters are drawn ; 
A saint in crape is twice a saint in lawn. 

Moral Essays, Epistle I. POPE. 



State-ceaft. 

For just experience tells, in every soil. 

That those that think must govern those that toil. 

The Traveller. GOLDSMITH. 

'T is thus the spirit of a single mind 
Makes that of multitudes take one direction. 

Don Juan. r,VRON- 

What should it be, that thus their faith can bind ? 
The power of Thought — the magic of the Mind ! 
Linked with success, assumed and kept with skill, 
That moulds another's weakness to its will. 

The Corsair. BYRON. 

Treason doth never prosper : what 's the reason ? 
For if it prosper, none dare call it treason. 

Epigrams. " SIR J. HARRINGTON. 



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FRAGMENTS. 



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A ciitpurse of the empire and the rule, 
That from a shelf the precious diadem stole, 
And put it in his pocket ! 

Jtamle!, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Measures, not men, have always been my mark. 

Tlii Good-Natured Mail. Act\i. GOLDSMITH. 



4 



Abuse of Authority. 

Oh ! it is excellent 
To have a giant's strength ; but it is tyrannous 
To use it like a giant. 

Could great men thunder 

As Jove himself does, Jove would ne'er be quiet ; 
For every pelting, petty officer 
Would use his heaven for thundfir, — 
Nothing but thunder. Merciful Heaven ! 
Thou rather, with thy sharp and sulphui'ous bolt. 
Split' st the unwedgeable and gnarled oak. 
Than the soft myrtle : but man, proud man ! 
Drest in a little brief authority, — 
Most ignorant of what he 's most assured, 
His glassy essence, — like an angry ape. 
Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven. 
As make the angels weep ; who, with our spleens, 
Would all themselves laugh mortal. 

Measure for Measure, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE- 



The People. 

Who o'er the herd would wish to reign, 
Fantastic, fickle, fierce, and vain ! — 
Vain as the leaf upon the stream, 
And fickle as a changeful dream ; 
Fantastic as a woman's mood. 
And fierce as Frenzy's fevered blood. 
Thou many-headed monster thing, 
0, who would wish to be thy king ! 

Lady 0/ the Lake, Cant. v. ScOTT. 

He that depends 
Upon your favors swims with fins of lead. 
And hews down oaks with rushes. Hang ye ! 

Trust ye ? 
With every ininute you do change a mind ; 
And call him noble that was now your hate. 
Him vile that was your garland. 

Coi-iolamis, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

The scum 
That rises upmost when the nation boils. 

Don Sebastian. DR^'DEN. 

From lowest place when virtuous things proceed, 
The place is dignified by the doer's deed. 

All's iVell that finds Well, Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



Through all disguise, form, place or name, 
Beneath the flaunting robes of sin. 

Through poverty and squalid shame, 
Thou lookest on the man within. 

On man, as man, retaining yet, 

Howe'er debased, and soiled, and dim, 

The crown upon his forehead set — 
The immortal gift of God to him. 

Democracy. J. G. WHITTIER. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 

Solitude. 

Alone, ! — that worn-out word, 
So idly spoken, and so coldly heard ; 
Yet all that poets sing, and grief hath known, 
Of hopes laid waste, knells in that woid — Alon c! 

The New Tiiiion, Part U. E. BULWER-LVTTON. 

All heaven and earth are still, — though not in 

sleep. 
But breathless, as we grow when feeling most ; 
And silent, as we stand in thoughts too deep ; — 
All heaven and earth are still ; from the high 

host 
Of stars, to the lulled lake and mountain -coa,st, 
All is concentred in a life intense. 
Where not a beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost, 
But hath a part of being, and a sense 
Of that which is of all Creator and defence. 

Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt 
In solitude, where we are least alone. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iii. BYRON. 

Such was that happy garden-state. 
While man there walked without a mate : 
After a place so pure and sweet. 
What other help could yet be meet ! 
But 't was beyond a mortal's share 
To wander solitary there : 
Two paradises are in one, 
To live in paradise alone. 

The-Garden ( Translated). A. MARVELL. 

Pacing through the forest, 
Chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancy. 

As You Like It, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

A feeling of sadness and longing. 

That is not akin to pain. 
And resembles sorrow only 

As the mist resembles the rain. 

The Day is Done, 



Longfellow, 



That inward eye 
VVliich is the bliss of solitude. 

J -wandered lonely. WORDSWORTH. 



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814 



POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 



-n 



But if much converse perhaps 
Thee satiate, to short absence I could yield ; 
For solitude sometimes is best society, 
And short retirement urges sweet return. 

Paradise Lost, Book ix. MILTON. 



Social Pleasures. 

Here thou, great Anna ! whom three realms obey, 
Dost sometimes counsel take — and sometimes tea. 

Rape of the Lock, Cant. iii. POPE. 

She that asks 
Her dear five hundred friends, contemns them all, 
And hates their coming. 

Tlie Timepiece: The Task, Book ii. COWPER. 

The company is " mixed " (the phrase I quote is 
As much as saying, they 're below your notice). 

Beppo. BYRON. 

Hands promiscuously applied, 
Round the slight waist or down the glowing side. 

Tlie IValtz. BYRON. 

give me the sweet shady side of Pall Mall. 

Town and Country. C. MORRIS. 

We may live without poetry, music, and art ; 
We may live without conscience and live without 

heart ; 
We may live without friends ; we may live 

without books ; 
But civilized man cannot live without cooks. 
We may live without books, — what is knowledge 

but grieving ? 
We may live without hope, — what is hope but 

deceiving ? 
We may live without love, — what is passion 

but pining ? 
But where is the man that can live without 

dining ? 

Lucile, Cant. ii. R. BULWER LytTON (Owen Meredith). 

There my retreat the best companions grace, 
Chiefs out of war, and statesmen out of place ; 
There St. John mingles with my friendly bowl. 
The feast of reason and the flow of soul. 

hnMations of Horace, Satire i. Book 2. POPE. 

Across the walnuts and the wine. 

Tlic Millers Daughter. TENNYSON. 

When in the Hall of Smoke they congress hold, 
And the sage berry sunburnt Mocha bears 
Has cleared their inward eye : then, smoke- 
enrolled. 

Tlic Castle of Indolence, Cant. \. J. THOMSON. 



Sublime tobacco ! which from east to west, 
Cheers the tar's labor or the Turkman's rest, 

Divine in hookahs, glorious in a pipe, 
When tipped with amber, mellow, rich and ripe 
Like other charmers, wooing the caress 
More dazzlingly when daring in full dress ; 
Yet thy true lovers more admire by far 
Thy naked beauties — Give me a cigar ! 

The Island, Cant. ii. BYRON. 

Yes, social friend, I love thee weU, 

In learned doctors' spite ; 
Thy clouds all other clouds dispel, 

And lap me in delight. 



To my Cigar. 



C. SPRAGL'E. 



And when the smoke ascends on high. 
Then thou behcrld'st the vanity 

Of worldly stuff'. 

Gone with a" puff : 

Thus think, and smoke tobacco. 

And seest the ashes cast away, 
Then to thyself thou mayest say, 
That to the dust 
Return thou must. 

Thus think, and smoke tobacco. 

Anonymous.— Before 16 



Manners and Customs. 
Such is the custom of Branksome Hall. 

The Lay of the Last Mi7istrel, Cajit. i. SCOTT. 

But to my mind, — though I am native here, 
And to tlie manner born, — it is a custom 
More honored in the breach, than the observance. 

Hamlet, Act i, Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Manners with fortunes, humors turn with climes. 
Tenets with books, and principles with times. 

Moral Essays, Epistle /. POPE. 

Plain living and high thinking are no more. 
The homely beauty of the good old cause 
Is gone ; our peace, our fearful innocence, 
And pure religion breathing household laws. 

Written in London, September, 1802. WORDSWORTH. 



Differing Tastes. 

Different minds 
Incline to different objects : one pui'sues 
The vast alone, the wonderful, the wild ; 
Another sighs for harmony, and grace. 
And gentlest beauty. 

Such and so various are the tastes of men. 

Pleasures of the Imagination, Book IH. M. AKENSIDR 






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What 's one man's poison, signer, 
Is another's meat or drink. 

Love's Cure, Act iii. Sc. 2. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER. 

Variety 's the very spice of life, 
That gives it all its flavor. 

the Timepiece : The Task, Book n. COWPER. 

Not chaos-like together crushed and bruised, 
But, as the world, harmoniously confused. 
Where order in variety we see. 
And where, though all things diffei', all agree. 

IVitidsor Forest. POPE. 



QUAIIRELLING. 

0, shame to men ! devil with devil damned 
Firm concord holds, men only disagree 
Of creatures rational. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MiLTi 



Trifles. 

Think naught a trifle, though it small appear ; 
Small sands the mountain, moments make the 

year. 
And trifles life. 

Love of Fame, Satire vi. DR. E. YOUNG. 

Pretty ! in amber to observe the forms 
Of hair, or straws, or dirt, or grubs, or worms ! 
The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare. 
But wonder how the devil they got there ! 

Epistle to Dr. Arbitthnot : Prologue to Satires. POPE, 

What dire offence from amorous causes springs, 
What mighty contests rise from trivial things. 

The Rape of the Lock, Cant. i. POPE. 

A little fire is quickly trodden out, 

Which, being suffered, rivers cannot quench. 

King Henry yL, Part IIL Act iv. Sc. 8. SHAKESPEARE. 



Craft. 

Our better part remains 
To work in close design, by fraud or guile. 
What force effected not ; that he no less 
At length from us may find, who overcomes 
By force hath overcome but half his foe. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. MILTON. 



Temptation. 

How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds 
Makes ill deeds done ! 

l^ing John, Act iv, Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Prudent Speech. 
Let it be tenable in your silence still. 

Give it an understanding, but no tongue. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE, 

Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice ; 
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy jud^ 
ment. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

And oftentimes excusing of a fault 
Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse, 
As patches, set upon a little breach, 
Discredit more in hiding of the fault 
Than did the fault before it was so patched. 

King John, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Moderation. 
Reason's whole pleasure, all the joys of sense. 
Lie in three words, — health, peace, and compe- 
tence. 
But health consists with temperance alone, 
And peace, Virtue ! peace is all thine own. 

Essay on Man, Epistle IV. POPE, 

These violent delights have violent ends, 

And in their triumph die ; like fire and powder, 

Which as they kiss consume. 

Therefore love moderately ; long love doth so ; 
Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow. 

Romeo and yuliet. Act ii. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE, 

They surfeited with honey ; and began 

To loathe the taste of sweetness, whereof a little 

More than a little is by much too much. 

King Henry IV., Part I. Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE, 

He that holds fast the golden mean. 
And lives contentedly between 

The little and the great, 
Feels not the wants that pinch the poor, 
Nor plagues that haunt the rich man's door. 

Translation of Horace, Book ii. Ode x. COWPER. 

If then to all men happiness was meant, 
God in externals could not place content. 

Essay on Man, Epistle IV. POPE. 

Idleness and Ennui. 

'T is the voice of the sluggard ; I heard him 

complain, 
' ' You have waked me too soon, I must slumber 

again." 

The Sluggard. DR. I, Watt.S, 

Absence of occupation is not rest, 

A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed. 

Retirement. COWPKR. 



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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND llEFLECTION. 



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To sigh, yet feel no pain, 

To weep, yet scarce know why ; 
To sport an hour with Beauty's chain, 

Then throw it idly by. 

7Vk Blu€ Stocking. T. MOORE. 

The keenest pangs the wretched find 

Are rapture to the dreary void, 
The leafless desert of the mind, 

The waste of feelings unemployed. 

Tlic Giaour. BYRON. 

Their only labor was to kill the time 
(And labor dire it is, and weary woe) ; 
They sit, they loll, turn o'er some idle rhyme ; 
Then, rising sudden, to the glass they go. 
Or saunter forth, with tottering step and slow : 
This soon too rude an exercise they find ; 
Straight on the couch their limbs again they 

throw. 
Where hours on hours they sighing lie reclined. 
And court the vapory god, soft breathing in the 
wind. 

The Castle oflndolena. Cant. i. J. THOMSON. 



Hang Sorrow ! 

And this the burden of his song forever used 

to be, 
I care for nobody, no not I, if nobody cares for 

me. 

Love in a Village. Act i. Sc. 2. I. BICKERSTAFP. 

Without the door let sorrow lie ; 
And if for cold it hap to die, 
A7e '11 bury 't in a Christmas pie, 
And evermore be merry. 

And Jack shall pipe, and Gill shall dance. 
And all the town be merry. 

For Christmas comes but once a j^ear, 
And then they shall be merry. 

Though others' purses be more fat. 
Why should we pine, or grieve at that ? 
Hang sorrow ! care will kill a cat, 
And therefore let 's be merry. 

Christmas. G. WITHER- 



Night and Sleep. 

Tired nature's sweet restorer, balmy Sleep ! 
He, like the world, his ready visit paj's 
Where fortune smiles ; the wretched he forsakes : 
Swift on his downy pinions flies from M'oe, 
And lights on lids unsullied with a tear. 

Night Tlwughts, Night i. DR. E. YOUNG. 

Thou hast been called, O sleep ! the friend of 

woe ; 
But 't is the happy that have called thee so. 

Curse of Kehatna, Cant. xv. R. SOUTHEY. 

She bids you on the wanton rushes lay you down. 
And rest your gentle head upon her lap. 
And she will sing the song that pleaseth you, 
And on your eyelids crown the god of sleep, 
Charming your blood with pleasing heaviness ; 
Making such difference betwixt wake and sleep 
As is the difference betwixt day and night. 
The hour before the heavenly-harnessed team 
Begins his golden progress in the east. 

King Henry IV., Part J. Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Weariness 
Can snore upon the flint, when restive sloth 
Finds the down pillow hard. 

Cymbeline, Act iii. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE. 

Care-charming sleep, thou easer of all woes. 
Brother to Death, sweetly thyself dispose 
On this afflicted prince ; fall like a cloud 
In gentle showers ; . . . sing his pain 
Like hollow murmuring wind or silver rain. 

Valentinian. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER. 

Midnight brought on the dusky hour 
Friendliest to sleep and silence. 

Paradise Lost, Book v. .MiLTON. 

And the night shall be filled with music, 

And the cares that infest the day 
Shall fold their tents like the Arabs, 

And as silently steal away. 

T)U! Day is Done. LONGFELLOW. 

To all, to each, a fair good-night. 

And pleasing dreams, and slumbers light ! 

Marmion : V Envoy, To the Reader, SCOTT. 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



FANTASY. 

FROM "THE VISION OF DELIGHT." 

Break, Fantasy, from tliy cave of cloud. 

And spread thy purple wings, 
Now all thy figures are allowed, 

And various shapes of things ; 
Create of airy forms a stream. 
It must have blood, and naught of phlegm ; 
And though it be a waking dream. 

Yet let it like an odor rise 
To all the senses here, 

And fall like sleep upon their eyes. 

Or music in their ear. 

Ben Jonson. 



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DELIGHTS OF FANCY. 

FROM "THE PLEASURES OF IMAGINATION." 

As Memnon's marble harp renowned of old 
By fabling Nilus, to the quivering touch 
Of Titan's ray, with each repulsive string 
Consenting, sounded through the warbling air 
Unbidden strains ; e'en so did Nature's hand 
To certain species of external things 
Attune the finer organs of the mind ; 
So the glad impulse of congenial powers. 
Or of sweet sound, or fair-proportioned form, 
The grace of motion, or the bloom of light, 
Thrills through imagination's tender frame. 
From nerve to nerve ; all naked and alive 
They catch the spreading rays ; till now the soul 
At length discloses everj' tuneful spring. 
To that harmonious movement from without, 
Responsive. Then the inexpi-essive strain 
Diffuses its enchantment ; Fancy dreams 
Of sacred fountains and Elysian groves, 
And vales of bliss ; the Intellectual Power 
Bends from his awful throne a wondering ear. 
And smiles ; the passions gently soothed away. 
Sink to divine repose, and love and joy 
Alone are waking ; love and joy serene 
As airs that fan the summer. attend, 
Whoe'er thou ai-t whom these delights can touch, 



Whose candid bosom the refining love 
Of nature warms ; 0, listen to my song. 
And I will guide thee to her favorite walks, 
And teach thy solitude her voice to hear, 
And point her loveliest features to thy view. 
Mark akenside. 



FANCY. 

Ever let the Fancy roam, 

Pleasure never is at home : 

At a toiich sweet Pleasure melteth. 

Like to bubbles when rain pelteth ; 

Then let winged Fancy wander 

Through the thought still spread beyond her : 

Open wide the mind's cage-door. 

She '11 dart forth, and cloudward soar. 

sweet Fancy ! let her loose ; 

Summer's joys are spoilt by use, 

And the enjoying of the Spring 

Fades as does its blossoming : 

Autumn's red-lipped fruitage too, 

Blushing through the mist and dew. 

Cloys with tasting. What do then ? 

Sit thee by the ingle, when 

The sear fagot blazes bright, 

Spirit of a winter's night ; 

When the soundless earth is muffled, 

And the caked snow is shuffled 

From the ploughboy's heavy shoon ; 

When the Night doth meet the Noon 

In a dark conspiracy 

To banisli Even from her sky. 

— Sit thee there, and send abroad 

With a mind self-overawed 

Fancy, high-commissioned : — send her ! 

She has vassals to attend her ; 

She will bring, in spite of frost. 

Beauties that the earth hath lost ; 

She will bring thee, all together. 

All delights of sunniier weather ; 

All the buds and bells of May 

From dewy sward or thorn}' spray ; 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



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All the heaped Autumn's -wealth, 

With a still, mysterious stealth ; 

She will mix these yjleasures up 

Like three fit wines in a cup. 

And thou shalt quafl' it ; — thou shalt hear 

Distant harvest-carols clear ; 

Rustle of the reapei'. corn ; 

Sweet birds antlieming the morn ; 

And in the same moment — hark ! 

'T is the early April lark, 

Or the rooks, with busy caw, 

Foraging for sticks and straw. 

Thou shalt, at one glance, behold 

The daisy and the marigold ; 

White-plumed lilies, and the first 

Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst ; 

Shaded hyacinth, alway 

Sapphire queen of the mid-May ; 

And every leaf, and every flower 

Pearled with the self-same shower. 

Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep 

Meagre from its celled sleep ; 

And the snake all winter-thin 

Cast on sunny bank its skin ; 

Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see 

Hatching in the liawthorn tree. 

When the hen-bird's wing doth rest 

Quiet en her mossy nest ; 

Then the hurry and alarm 

When the bee-hive casts its swarm ; 

Acorns ripe down -pattering 

While the autumn breezes sing. 

sweet Fancy ! let her loose ; 

Everything is spoilt by use : 

Where 's the cheek that doth not fade. 

Too much gazed at ? Where 's the maid 

Whose lip mature is ever new ? 

Where 's the eye, however blue, 

Doth not weary ? Where 's the face 

One would meet in every place ? 

Where 's the voice, however soft, 

One would hear so very oft ? 

At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth 

Like to bubbles when rain pelteth. 

Let then winged Fancy find 

Thee a mistress to thy mind : 

Dulcet-eyed as Ceres' daughter, 

Ere the god of torment taught her 

How to frown and how to chide ; 

With a waist and with a side 

White as Hebe's, when her zone 

Slipt its golden clasp, and down 

Fell her kirtle to her feet 

While she held the goblet sweet, 

And Jove grew languid. — Break the mesh 

Of the Fancy's silken leash ; 



Quickly break her prison-string, 

And such joys as these she '11 bring : 

— Let the winged Fancj' roam, 

Pleasure never is at home. 

John Keats. 



HALLO, MY FANCY. 
[1650.] 

In melancholic fancy, 

Out of myself. 
In the vulcan dancy, 
All the world surveying, 
Nowhere staying. 
Just like a fairy elf ; 
Out o'er the tops of highest mountains skipping. 
Out o'er the hills, the trees and valleys tripping. 
Out o'er the ocean seas, without an oar or shipping. 
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

Amidst the misty vapors, 

Fain would I know 
What doth cause the tapers ; 
Why the cloiids benight us, 
And affright us 

While we travel here below. 
Fain would I know what makes the roaring 

thunder, 
And what these lightnings be that rend the 

clouds asunder. 
And what these comets are on which we gaze 
and wonder. 
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

Fain would I know the reason 

Why the little ant. 
All the summer season, 
Layeth up provision. 
On condition 

To know no winter's want ; 
And how these little fishes, that swim beneath 

salt water. 
Do never blind their eye ; methinks it is a matter 
An inch above the reach of old Erra Pater ! 
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

Fain worrld I be resolved 
How things are done ; 
And where the l>ull was calved 
Of bloody Phalaris, 
And where the tailor is 

That works to the man i' the moon ! 
Fain would I know how Cupid aims so rightly ; 
And how these little fairies do dance and leap 

so lightly ; 
And where fair Cynthia makes her ambles 
nightly. 
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 






In conceit like Phaeton, 

I '11 mount Phoebus' chair, 
HaA-ing ne'er a hat on, 
All my hair a-burning 
In my journeying. 

Hurrying through the air. 

Fair would I hear his fiery horses neighing, 

And see how they on foamy bits are playing ; 

All the stars and planets I will be surveying ! 

Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

O, from what ground of nature 

Doth the pelican, 
That self-devouring creature, 
Prove so froward 
And untoward, 

Her vitals for to strain ? 
And why the subtle fox, while in death's wounds 

is lying, 
Doth not lament his pangs by howling and by 

crying ; 
And why the milk-white swan doth sing when 
she's a-dying. 
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

Fain would I conclude this, 

At least make essa}', 
"What similitude is ; 
Why fowls of a feather 
Flock and fly together. 

And lambs know beasts of prey : 
How Nature's alchymists, these small laborious 

creatures. 
Acknowledge still a prince in ordering their 

matters, 
And suifer none to live, who slothing lose their 
features. 
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thon go ? 

I 'm rapt with admiration, 

When I do ruminate. 
Men of an occu])ation. 
How each one calls him brother, 
Yet each envieth other. 
And yet still intimate ! 
Yea, I admire to see some natures farther sun- 

d'red. 
Than antipodes to us. Is it not to be wond'red ? 
In myriads ye '11 find, of one mind scarce a hun- 
dred ? 
11 alio, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

What multitude of notions 

Doth pertuib my pate. 
Considering the motions, 
How the heavens are preserved, 
And this world served 

In moisture, light, and heat ! 



If one spirit sits the outmost circle turning, 
Or one turns another, continuing in journeying. 
If rapid circles' motion be that which they call 
burning ! 
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

Fain also would I prove this, 

By considering 
What that, which you call love, is : 
Whether it be a folly 
Or a melancholy. 

Or some heroic thing ! 
Fain I 'd have it proved, by one whom love hath 

wounded, 
And fully upon one his desire hath founded, 
Whom nothing else could please though the 
world were rounded. 
Plallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

To know this world's centre. 

Height, depth, breadth, and length, 
Fain would I adventure 
To search the hid attractions 
Of magnetic actions. 

And adamantine strength. 
Fain would I know, if in some lofty mountain, 
Where the moon sojourns, if there be trees or 

fountain ; 
If there be beasts of prey, or yet be fields to 
hunt in. 
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

Fain would I have it tried 

By experiment, 
By none can be denied ! 
If in this bulk of nature. 
There be voids less or gi'eater. 
Or all remains complete. 
Fain woulii I know if beasts have any reason ; 
If falcons killing eagles do commit a ti-eason ; 
If fear of winter's want make swallows fly the 
season. 
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ? 

Hallo, my fancy, hallo ! 

Stay, stay at home with me, 
I can thee no longer follow. 
For thou hast betrayed me. 
And bewrayed me ; 
It is too much for thee. 
Stay, stay at home with me ; leave off thy lofty 

soaring ; 
Stay thou at home with me, and on thy books 

be poring ; 
For he that goes abroad lays little uj) in storing : 
Thou 'rt welcome home, my fanc^y, welcome 

home to me. 

William Cleland. 



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POEMS OP FANCY. 



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THE CLOUD. 

I BRING fresh showers for the thirsting flowers, 

From the seas and the streams ; 
I bear light shade for the leaves when laid 

In their noonday dreams. 
From my wings are shaken the dews that waken 

The sweet birds every one, 
When rocked to rest on their mother's breast, 

As she dances abont the sun. 
I wield the flail of the lashing hail, 

And whiten the green plains under ; 
And then again I dissolve it in rain. 

And laugh as I pass in thunder. 

I sift the snow on the mountains below, 

And their great pines groan aghast ; 
And all the night 't is my pillow white, 

While I sleep in the arms of the blast. 
Sublime on the towers of my skyey bowers 

Lightning, my pilot, sits : 
In a cavern under is fettered the thunder ; 

It struggles and howls by fits. 

Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion, 

This pilot is guiding me, 
Lured by the love of the genii that move 

In the depths of the purple sea ; 
Over the rills and the crags and the hills, 

Over the lakes and plains. 
Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream, 

The spirit he loves remains ; 
And I all the while bask in heaven's blue smile, 

Whilst he is dissolving in rains. ^ 

The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes, 

And his burning plumes outspread, 
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, 

When the morning star shines dead. 
As, on the jag of a mountain crag 

Which an earthquake rocks and swings, 
An eagle, alit, one moment may sit 

In the light of its golden wings ; 
And when sunset may breathe, from the lit sea 
beneath. 

Its ardors of rest and of love, 
And the crimson pall of eve may fall 

From the depth of heaven above, 
With wings folded I rest on mine airy nest, 

As still as a brooding dove. 

That orbed maiden with white fire laden. 

Whom mortals call the moon, 
(Hides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor 

By the midnight breezes strewn ; 
And wherever the beat of her unseen feet, 

Which only the angels hear, 
May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof. 

The stars peep behind her and peer ; 



And I laugh to see them whirl and flee. 

Like a swarm of golden bees. 
When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent, 

Till the calm rivers, lakes, and seas, 
Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high, 

Are each paved with the moon and these. 

I bind the sun's throne with a burning zone, ■ 

And the moon's with a girdle of pearl ; 
The volcanoes aredim, and thestars reel and swim, 

When the whirlwinds my banner unfurl. 
From cape to cape, with a bridge-like shape, 

Over a torrent sea. 
Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof, 

The mountains its columns be. 
The triumphal arch through which I march 

With hurricane, fire, and snow. 
When the powers of the air are chained to my 
chair. 

Is the million-colored bow ; 
The sphere-fire above its soft colors wove, 

While the moist earth was laughing below. 

I am the daughter of the earth and water ; 

And the nursling of the sky ; 
I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores ; 

I change, but I cannot die. 
For after the rain, when, with never a stain, 

The pavilion of heaven is bare, 
And the Avinds and sunbeams, with their convex 
gleams. 

Build up the blue dome of air, — 
I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, 

And out of the caverns of rain, 
Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from 
the tomb, 

I rise and upbuild it again. 

Percy Bysshe Shelley. 



FANCY IN NUBIBUS. 

0, IT is pleasant, with a heart at ease, 
Just after sunset, or by moonlight skies, 
To make the shifting clouds be what you please, 
Or let the easily persuaded ej^es 
Own each quaint likeness issuing from the mould 
Of a friend's fancy ; or, with head bent low, 
And cheek aslant, see rivers flow of gold, 
'Twixt crimson banks ; and then a traveller go 
From mount to mount, through Cloudland, gor- 
geous land ! 
Or, listening to the tide with closed sight, 
Be that blind Bard, who on the Chian strand. 
By those deep sounds possessed with inward light, 
Beheld the Iliad and the Odyssey, 
Rise to the swelling of the voiceful sea. 

SAMUEL Taylor Coleridge. 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



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THE SUNSET CITY. 

There 's a city that lies in the Kingdom of Clouds, 

In the glorious country on high, 
Which an azure and silvery curtain enshrouds, 

To screen it from mortal eye ; 

A city of temples and turrets of gold, 

That gleam by a sapphire sea. 
Like jewels more splendid than earth may behold, 

Or are dreamed of by you and by me. 

And about it are highlands of amber that reach 
Far away till they melt in the gloom ; 

And waters that hem an immaculate beach 
With fringes of luminous foam. 

Aerial bridges of pearl there are, 

And belfries of marvellous shapes, 
And lighthouses lit by the evening star, 

That sparkle on violet capes ; 

And hanging gardens that far away 

Enchantedly float aloof ; 
Rainbow pavilions in avenues gay, 

And banners of glorious woof ! 

When the Summer sunset's crimsoning fires 

Are aglow in the western sky. 
The pilgrim discovers the domes and spires 

Of this wonderful city on high ; 

And gazing enrapt as the gathering shade 

Creeps over the twilight lea, 
Sees palace and pinnacle totter and fade, 

And sink in the sapphire sea ; 

Till the Tision loses by slow degrees 

The magical splendor it wore ; 
The silvery curtain is drawn, and he sees 

The beautiful city no more ! 

Henry Sylvester Cornwell. 



THE CASTLE IN THE AIR. 

ADDRESSED TO A LADY WHO DATED HER LETTERS FROM 
"THE LIITLE CORNER OF THE WORLD." 

Ix the region of clouds, where the whirlwinds 
arise, 

My castle of fancy was built. 
The turrets reflected the blue of the skies. 

And the windows with sunbeams were gilt. 

The rainbow sometimes in its beautiful state 

Enamelled the mansion around ; 
And the figures that fancy in clouds can create 

Supplied me with gardens and ground. 



I had grottos and fountains and orange-tree 
groves ; 
I had all that enchantment has told ; 
I had sweet shady walks for the gods and their 
loves ; 
I had mountains of coral and gold. 

But a storm that I felt not had risen and rolled, 
While wrapped in a slumber I lay ; 

And when I awoke in the morning, behold. 
My castle was carried away ! 

It passed over rivers and valleys and groves ; 

The world, it was all in my view ; 
I thought of my friends, of their fates, of their 
loves. 

And often, full often, of you. 

At length it came over a beaiitiful scene. 
Which Nature in silence had made ; 

The place was but small, but 'twas sweetly serene, 
And checkered with sunshine and shade. 

I gazed and I envied, with painful good- will, 
And grew tired of my seat in the air, 

When all of a sudden my castle stood still 
As if some attraction was there. 

Like a lark in the sky it came fluttering down. 

And placed me exactly in view. 
When, whom should I meet in this charming 
retreat, 

This corner of calmness, but you ? 

Delighted to find you in honor and ease, 

I felt no more sorrow nor pain. 
But, the wind coming fair, I ascended the Dreeze, 

And went back to my castle again. 

THOMAS PAINE. 



IN THE MIST. 

Sitting all day in a silver mist, 
In silver silence all the day. 
Save for the low, soft kiss of spray 

And the lisp of sands by waters kissed, 
As tlie tide draws up the bay. 

Little I hear and nothing I see. 

Wrapped in that veil by fairies spun ; 
The solid earth is vanished for me, 

And the shining hours speed noiselessly, 
A woof of shadow and sun. 

Suddenly out of the shifting veil 

A magical bark, by the sunbeams lit, 
Flits like a dream — or seems to flit — 

With a golden prow and a gossamer sail 
And the waves make room for it. 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



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A fair, swift bark from some radiant realm, — 
Its diamond cordage cuts the sky- 
In glittering lines ; all silently 

A seeming spirit holds the helm. 
And steers. Will he pass me by ! 

Ah ! not for me is the vessel here ; 

Noiseless and swift as a sea-bird's flight 
She swerves and vanishes from the sight ; 

No flap of sail, no parting cheer, — 
She has passed into the light. 

Sitting some day in a deeper mist, 

Silent, alone, some other day, 

An unknown bark, from an unknown bay, 
By unknown waters lapped and kissed. 

Shall near me through the spray. 

No flap of sail, no scraping of keel, 
Shadowy, dim, with a banner dark, 
It will hover, will pause, and I shall feel 

A hand which grasps me, and shivering steal 
To the cold strand, and embark, — 

Embark for that far, mysterious realm 

Where the fathomless, trackless waters flow. 
Shall I feel a Presence dim, and know 

Thy dear hand. Lord, upon the helm. 
Nor be afraid to go ? 

And through black v/aves and stormy blast 
And out of the fog-wreaths, dense and dun, 
Guided by thee, shall the vessel run. 

Gain one fair haven, night being past. 
And anchor in the sun ? 

Sarah WoolSEY {Susan Coolidge\ 



THE BLESSED DAMOZEL. 

The blessed damozel leaned out 
From the gold bar of heaven ; 

Her eyes were deeper than the depth 
Of watei-s stilled at even ; 

She had three lilies in her hand. 

And the stars in her hair were seven. 

Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem. 
No wrought flowers did adorn, 

But a white rose of Mary's gift, 
For service neatly worn ; 

Her hair that lay along her back 
Was yellow like ripe corn. 

Her seemed she scarce had been a day 

One of God's choristers ; 
TLie wonder was not yet quite gone 

From that still look of hers ; 



Albeit, to them she left, her day 
Had counted as ten years. 

It was the rampart of God's house 

That she was standing on ; 
By God built over the sheer depth 

The which is space begun ; 
So high, that looking dovviiward thence 

She scarce could see the sun. 

It lies in heaven, across the flood 

Of ether, as a bridge. 
Beneath, the tides of day and night 

W^ith flame and darkness ridge 
The void, as low as where this earth 

Spins like a fretful midge. 

Heard hardly, some of her new friends 

Amid their loving games 
Spake evermore among themselves 

Their virginal chaste names ; 
And the souls momiting up to God 

Went by her like thin flames. 

And still she bowed herself and stopped 

Out of the circling charm ; 
Until her bosom must have made 

The bar she leaned on warm, 
And the lilies lay as if asleep 

Along her bended arm. 

From the fixed place of heaven she saw 

Time like a pulse shake fierce 
Through all the worlds. Her gaze still strove 

Within the gulf to pierce 
The path ; and now she spoke as when 

The stars sang in their spheres. 

"I wish that he were come to me, 

For he will come," she said. 
" Have I not prayed in heaven ? — on earth. 

Lord, Lord, has he not prayed ? 
Are not two prayers a perfect strength ? 

And shall I feel afraid ? " 

She gazed and listened, and then said, 

Less sad of speech than mild, — 
"All this is when he comes." She ceased. 

The light thrilled toward her, filled 
With angels in strong level flight. 

Her eyes prayed, and she smiled. 

(I saw her smile.) But soon their path 

Was vague in distant spheres ; 
And then she cast her arms along 

The golden barriers. 
And laid her face between her hands, 

And wept. (I heard her tears.) 

DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTZ. 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



825 



a 



THE SUNKEN 1.1 



-^k, 



Hark ! tlie faint bells of the sunken city 
Peal once more their wonted^ evening chime ! 

From the deep ahysses floats a ditty, 
Wild and wondrous, of the olden time. 

Temples, towers, and domes of many stories 
There lie buried in an ocean grave, — 

Undescried, save when their golden glories 
Gleam, at sunset, through the lighted wave. 

And the mariner who had seen them glisten, 
In whose ears those magic bells do sound. 

Night by night bides there to watch and listen, 
Though death lurks behind each dark rock 
round. 

So the bells of memory's wonder-city 
Peal for me their old melodious chime ; 

So my heart pours forth a changeful ditty, 
Sad and pleasant, from the bygone time. 

Domes and towers and castles, fancy-builded, 
There lie lost to daylight's garish beams, — 

There lie hidden till unveiled and gilded, 
Glory-gilded, by my nightly dreams ! 

And then hear I music sweet upknelling 
From many a well-known phantom band. 

And, through tears, can see my natural dwelling 
Far off in the spirit's luminous land ! 

From the German of WiLHEI.M Mueller. Trans- 
lation of JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN. 



THE LORE-LEI. 

I KNOW not whence it rises, 
This thought so full of woe ; — 

But a tale of the times departed 
Haunts me — and will not go. 

The air is cool, and it darkens. 
And calmly flows the Rhine ; 

The mountain peaks are sparkling 
In the sunny evening-shine. 

And yonder sits a maiden. 

The fairest of the fair ; 
With gold is her garment glittering, 

And she combs her golden hair. 

With a golden comb she combs it, 
And a wild song singeth she. 

That melts the heart Avith a wondrous 
And powerful melody. 



The boatman feels his bosom 
With a nameless longing move ; 

He sees not the gulfs before him, 
His gaze is fixed above, 

Till over boat and boatman 
The Rhine's deep waters run ; 

And this with her magic singing 
The Lore-Lei hath done ! 

From the German of HEINRICH HEINE. 



THE FISHER. 

The waters purled, the waters swelled, — 

A fisher sat near by. 
And earnestly his line beheld 

With tranquil heart and eye ; 
And while he sits and watches there. 

He sees the waves divide. 
And, lo ! a maid, with glistening hair, 

Springs from the troubled tide. 

She sang to him, she spake to him, — 

"Why lur'st thou from below. 
In cruel mood, my tender brood. 

To die in day's fierce glow ? 
Ah ! didst thou know how sweetly there 

The little fishes dwell. 
Thou wouldst come down their lot to share, 

And be forever well. 

" Bathes not the smiling sun at night — 

The moon too — in the waves ? 
Comes he not forth more fresh and bright 

From ocean's cooling caves ? 
Canst thou unmoved that deep world see. 

That heaven of tranquil blue, 
Where thine own face is beckoning thee 

Down to the eternal dew ? " 

The waters purled, the waters swelled, — 

They kissed his naked feet ; 
His heart a nameless transport held. 

As if his love did greet. 
She spake to him, she sang to him ; 

Then all with him was o'er, — • 
Half drew she him, half sank he in, — 

He sank to rise no more. 

From the German of Goethe. Trans- 
lation of CHARLES T. BROOKS. 



THE SIRENS' SONG. 

FROM THE " INNER TEMPLE MASQUE." 

Steer hither, steer your winged pines, 

All beaten mariners : 
Here lie undiscovered mines, 

A prey to passengers ; 



^ 



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826 



POEMS OF FANCY. 



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Perfumes far sweeter tlian the best 
That make the phoenix urn and nest : 

Fear not your ships, 
Nor any to oppose you save our lips ; 

But come on shore, 
"Where no joy dies till love has gotten more. 

For swelling waves our panting breasts, 

Where never storms arise. 
Exchange ; and be awhile our guests : 

For stars, gaze on our eyes. 
The compass, love shall hourly sing ; 
And, as he goes about the ring, 

We will not miss 
To tell each point he nameth with a kiss. 

William Browne. 



t 



THE FORSAKEN MERMAN. 

Come, dear children, let us away ; 

Down and away below. 
Now my brothers call from the bay ; 
Now the great winds shorewards blow ; 
Now the salt tides seaward flow ; 
Now the wild white horses play. 
Champ and chafe and toss in the spray. 

Children dear, let us away. 
This way, this way. 

Call her once before you go. 

Call once yet, 
In a voice that she will know : 

" Margaret ! Margaret ! " 
Children's voices should be dear 
(Call once more) to a mother's ear : 
Children's voices wild with pain. 

Surely she will come again. 
Call her once, and come away, 

This way, this way. 
" Mother dear, we cannot stay ! 
The wild white horses foam and fret, 

Margaret ! Margaret ! " 

Come, dear children, come away down. 

Call no more. 
One last look at the white-walled town. 
And the little gray church on the windy shore. 

Then come down. 
She will not come, though you call all day. 

Come away, come away. 

Children dear, was it yesterday 
We heard the sweet bells over the bay ? 
In the caverns where we lay, 
Through the surf and through the swell, 
The far-off sound of a silver bell ? 



Sand-stre^^ shfje.ns cool and deep, 
Where tWed,/inds tre all asleep ; 
Where the sj^ent lights quiver and gleam ; 
Where the salt .veed sways in the stream ; 
Where the sea-beasts, rangtKi all round, 
Feed in the ooze of their pasture-ground ; 
Where the sea-snakes coil and twine. 
Dry their mail and bask in the brine ; 
Where great whales come sailing by. 
Sail and sail, with unshut eye. 
Round the world forever and aye ? 

When did music come this way ? 

Children dear, was it yesterday ? 

Children dear, was it yesterday 

(Call yet once) that she went away ? 

Once she sat with you and me. 

On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea. 
And the youngest sat on her knee. 

She combed its bright hair, and she tended it well, 

When down swung the sound of the far-off bell, 

She sighed, she looked up through tlie clear 
green sea. 

She said, "I must go, for my kinsfolk pray 

In the little gray church on the shore to-day. 

'T will be Easter-time in the world, — ah me ! 

And I lose my poor soul. Merman, here with 
thee." 

I said : "Go up, dear heart, through the waves : 

Say thy prayer, and come back to the kind sea- 
caves." 

She smiled, she went up through the surf in the 
bay. 
Children dear, was it yesterday ? 

Children dear, were we long alone ? 
" The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan ; 
Long prayers," I said, "in the world they say." 
" Come," I said, and we rose through the surf in 

the bay. 
We went up the beach in the sandy down 
Where the sea-stocks bloom, to the white-walled 

town, 
Through the narrow paved streets, where all was 

still. 
To the little gray church on the windy hill. 
From the church came a murmur of folk at 

their prayers. 
But we stood without in the cold blowing airs. 
We climbed on the graves, on the stones worn 

with rains, 
And we gazed up the aisle through the small 
leaded panes. 
She sat by the pillar ; we saw her clear ; 
" Margaret, hist ! come quick, we are here. 
Dear heart," I said, "we are here alone. 
The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan." 



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But, ah, she gave me never a look, 

For her eyes were sealed to the holy book. 

"Loud prays the priest; shut stands the 

door." 
Come away, children, call no more, 
Come away, come down, call no more. 

Down, down, down, 

Down to the depths of the sea- 
She sits at her wheel in the humming town, 

Singing most joyfully. 
Hark what she sings : "0 joy, joy. 
From the humming street, and the child with 

its toy, 
From the priest and the bell, and the holy well, 

From the wheel where I spun, 

And the blessed light of the sun." 

And so she sings her fill. 

Singing most joyfully, 

Till the shuttle falls from her hand, 

And the whizzing wheel stands still. 
She steals to the window, and looks at the sand, 

And over the sand at the sea ; 

And her eyes are set in a stare ; 

And anon there breaks a sigh. 

And anon there drops a tear, 

From a sorrow-clouded eye. 

And a heart sorrow-laden, 
A long, long sigh. 
For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden, 
And the gleam of her golden hair. 

Come away, away, children. 
Come, children, come down. 
The hoarse wind blows colder. 
Lights shine in the town. 
She will start from her slumber 
When gusts shake the door ; 
She will hear the winds howling, 
Will hear the waves roar. 
We shall see, while above us 
The waves roar and whirl, 
A ceiling of amber, 
A pavement of pearl, — 
Singing, " Here came a mortal, 
But faithless was she. 
And alone dwell forever 
The kings of the sea." 

But, children, at midnight. 
When soft the winds blow. 
When clear falls the moonlight, 
When spring-tides are low ; 
When sweet airs come seaward 
From heaths starred with broom ; 
And high rocks throw mildly 
On the blanched sands a gloom : 



Up the still, glistening beaches. 
Up the creeks we will hie ; 
Over banks of bright seaweed 
The ebb-tide leaves dry. 
We will gaze from the sand-hills, 
At the white sleeping town ; 
At the church on the hillside — 
And then come back, down. 
Singing, " There dwells a loved one. 
But cruel is she : 
She left lonely forever 
The kings of the sea." 

MATTHEW Arnold. 



UNA AND THE RED CROSSE KNIGHT. 

FROM "THE FAERIE QUEENE," BOOK I. CANTO I. 

A GENTLE Knight was pricking on the plainc, 
Ycladd in mightie armes and silver shielde, 
Wherein old dints of deepe woundes did re- 
main e. 
The cruell markes of many a bloody fielde ; 
Yet armes till that time did he never wield : 
His angry steede did chide his foming bitt, 
As much disdayning to the curbe to yield : 
Full iolly knight he seemd, and faire did sitt, 
As one for knightly giusts and fierce encounters 
fitt. 

And on his brest a bloodie crosse he bore, 
The deare remembrance of his dying Lord, 
For whose sweete sake that glorious badge he 

wore, 
And dead, as living ever, him ador'd : 
Upon his shield the like was also scor'd. 
For soveraine hope, which in his helpe he had, 
Right, faithfuU, true he was in deede and word ; 
But of his cheere,* did seeme too solemne sad ; 
Yet nothing did he dread, but ever was j-^drad.! 

Upon a great adventure he was bond. 
That greatest Gloriana to him gave. 
That greatest glorious queene of Faery lond. 
To winne him worshippe, and her grace to have, 
Which of all earthly thinges he most did crave : 
And ever, as he rode, his hart did earne 
To prove his puissance in battell brave 
Upon his foe, and his new force to learne ; 
Upon his foe, a Dragon horrible and stearne. 

A lovely Ladie rode him faire beside, 
Upon a lowly asse more white then snow ; 
Yet she much whiter ; but the same did hide 
Under a vele, that wimpled was full low ; 



* countenance. 



t dreaded. 



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And over all a blacke stole shee did throw : 
As one that inly mournd, so was she sad, 
And heavie sate upon her jjalfrey slow ; 
Seemed in heart some hidden care she had ; 
And by her in a line a milke-white lambe she lad. 

So pure and innocent as that same lambe 
She was in life and every vertuous lore ; 
And by descent from royall lynage came 
Of ancient kinges and queenes, that had of yore 
Their scepters stretcht from east to westerne 

shore, 
And all the world in their subiection held ; 
Till that infernall feend with foule uprore 
Forwasted * all their land, and then expeld ; 
Whom to avenge, she had this Knight from far 

compeld. 

Behind her faiTe away a Dwarfe did lag, 
That lasie seemd, in being ever last, 
Or wearied with bearing of lier bag 
Of needments at his backe. Thus as they past. 
The day with cloudes was suddeine overcast. 
And angry love an hideous storme of raine 
Did poure into his lemans lap so fast, 
That everie wight to shrowd it did constrain ; 
And this faire couple eke to shroud themselves 
were fain. 

Enforst to seeke some covert nigh at hand, 
A shadie grove not farr away they spide, 
That promist ayde the tempest to withstand ; 
Whose loftie trees, yclad with sommers pride, 
Did spred so broad, that heavens light did hide, 
Not perceable with power of any starr : 
And all within were pathes and alleles wide. 
With footing worne, and leading inward farr : 
Faire harbour that them seemes ; so in they 

entred ar. 

Edmund Spenser. 



THE CAVE OF SLEEP. 

FROM THE "FAERIE QUEENE," BOOK I. CANTO I. 

He, making speedy way through spersed i ayre, 
And through the world of waters wideanddeepe, 
To Morpheus house doth hastily repaire, 
Amid the bowels of the earth full steepe. 
And low, where dawning day doth never peepe, 
His dwelling is ; there Tethys his wet bed 
Doth ever wash, and Cynthia still doth steepe 
In silver deaw his ever-drouping hed, 
Whiles sad Night over him her mantle black doth 
spred. 



And, more to lulle him in his slumber soft, 
A trickling streame from high rock tumbling 

downe, 
And ever-drizling raine upon the loft, 
Mixt with a murmuring winde, much like the 

sowne * 
Of swarming bees, did cast him in a swowne.t 
No other noyse, nor peoples troublous cryes. 
As still are wont t' annoy the walled towne, 
Might there be heard ; but carelesse Quiet lyes 
Wrapt in eternall silence, faiTe from enimyes. 
Edmund Spenser. 



UKA AND THE LION. 

FROM THE "FAERIE QUEENE," BOOK I. CANTO III. 

One day, nigh wearie of the yrkesome way, 
From her unhastie beast she did alight ; 
And on the grasse her dainty limbs did lay 
In secrete shadow, far from all mens sight ; 
From her fayre head her fillet she undight. 
And layd her stole aside. Her angels face. 
As the great eye of heaven, shyned bright, 
And made a sunshine in the shady place ; 
Did never mortall eye behold such heavenly grace. 

It fortuned, out of the thickest wood 
A ramping lyon rushed suddeinly. 
Hunting full greedy after salvage blood : J 
Soone as the royall virgin he did spy. 
With gaping mouth at her ran greedily, 
To have attonce devoured her tender corse ; 
But to the pray whenas he drew more ny. 
His bloody rage as waged with remorse, § 
And, with the sight amazd, forgat his furious 
forse. 

Instead thereof, he kist her wearie feet, 
And lickt her lilly hands with fawning tong ; 
As he her wronged innocence did weet. || 
how can beautie maister the most strong. 
And simple truth subdue avenging wrong ! 
Whose yielded pryde and proud submission. 
Still dreading death, when she had marked long. 
Her hart gan melt in great compassion ; 
And drizling teares did shed for pure affection. 

" The lyon, lord of everie beast in field," 
Quoth she, ' ' his princely puissance doth abate, 
And mightie proud to humble weake does yield, 
Forgetfull of the hungry rage, which late 
Him prickt, in pittie of my sad estate : — 
But he, my lyon, and my noble lord, 
How does he find in cruell hart to hate 
Her, that him lovd, and ever most adord 
As the god of my life ? why hath he me abhord ?" 



* For is here intensiye. 



t dispersed 



• sound. 
/ I blood of wild animals. 



t swoon — deep sleep. 

§ pity. II understand. 



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Redoundingtears did choke th' end of her plaint, 
Which softly ecchoed from the neighbour wood ; 
And, sad to see her sorrowfull constraint, 
The kingly beast upon her gazing stood ; 
With pittie calmd, downe fell his angry mood. 
At last, in close hart shutting up her payne. 
Arose the virgin borne of heavenly brood. 
And to her snowy palfrey got agayne. 
To seeke her strayed champion if she might at- 
tayne. 

The lyon would not leave her desolate, 
But with her went along, as a strong gard 
Of her chast person, and a faythfull mate 
Of her sad troubles and misfortunes hard : 
Still, when she slept, he kept both watch and 

ward ; 
And, when she wakt, he wayted diligent, 
With humble service to her will prepard ; 
From her fayre eyes he took commandment. 
And ever by her lookes conceived her intent. 

EDMUND SPENSER. 



THE BOWER OF BLISS. 

FROM THE "FAERIE QUEENE," BOOK II. CANTO XII. 

There the most daintie paradise on gi-ound 
Itselfe doth oflfer to his sober eye, 
In which all pleasures plenteously abownd. 
And none does others happinesse envye ; 
The painted flowres ; the trees upshooting hye ; 
The dales for shade ; the hilles for breathing 

space ; 
The trembling groves; the christall running by; 
And, that which all faire workes doth most 

aggrace, * 
The art, which all that wi'ought, appeared in no 

place. 

Onewouldhave thought (so cunningly the rude 
And scorned partes were mingled with the tine) 
That Nature had for wantonesse ensude t 
Art, and that Art at Nature did repine ; 
So striving each th' other to undermine. 
Each did the others worke more beautify ; 
So diff' ring both in willes agreed in tine : 
So all agreed, through sweete diversity, 
This gardin to adorne with all variety. 

And in the midst of all a fountaine stood. 
Of richest substance that on earth might bee, 
So pure and shiny that the silver flood 
Through every channell running one might see ; 
Most goodly it with curious ymageree 



• give grace to. 



t imitated. 



Was over wrought, and shapes of naked boyes. 
Of which some seemed with lively ioUitee 
To fly about, playing their wanton toyes, 
Whylest others did themselves embay * in liquid 
ioyes. 

And over all, of purest gold, was spred 
A trayle of yvie in his native hew ; 
For the rich metall was so coloured, 
That wight, who did not well avisedt it vew, 
Would surely deeme it to bee yvie trew : 
Low his lascivious armes adown did creepe, 
That, themselves dipping in the silver dew. 
Their fleecy flowres they fearefully did steepe. 
Which drops of christall seemed for wantones to 
weep. 

Intinit streames continually did well 

Out of this fountaine, sweet and faire to see. 

The which into an ample laver fell, 

And shortly grew to so great quantitie, 

That like a little lake it seemed to bee ; 

Whose depth exceeded not three cubits hight, 

That through the waves on^ might the bottom 

see. 
All pav'd beneath with iaspar shining bright. 
That seemd the fountaine in that sea did sayle 

upright. 

Eftsoons J they heard a most melodious sound, 
Of all that mote delight a daintie eare, 
Such as attonce might not on living ground. 
Save in this paradise, be heard elsewhere. 
Right hard it was for wight which did it heare. 
To read what manner musicke that mote bee ; 
For all that pleasing is to living eare 
Was there consorted in one harmonee ; 
Birdes, voices, instruments, windes, waters, all 
agi'ee : 

The ioyous birdes, shrouded in chearefuU shade. 
Their notes unto the voice attempred sweet ; 
Th' angelicall soft trembling voyces made 
To th' instruments divine respondence meet ; 
The silver-sounding instruments did meet 
With the base murnmre of the waters fall ; 
The waters fall, with diff'erence discreet, 
Now soft, now loud, unto the wind did call ; 
The gentle warbling wind low answered to all. 

EDMUND SPENSER. 



THE LADY LOST IN THE WOOD. 



FROM "COMUS." 



This way the noise was, if mine ear be true. 
My best guide now ; methought it was the sound 
Of riot and ill-managed merriment. 
Such as the jocund flute or gamesome pipe 



i with attention. 



J immediately. 



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Stirs up amongst the loose, unlettered hinds, 

When for their teeming flocks and granges full 

In wanton dance they praise the bounteous Pan, 

And thank the gods amiss. I should be loath 

To meet the rudeness and swilled insolence 

Of such late wassailers ; yet 0, where else 

Shall I inform my unacquainted feet 

In the blind mazes of this tangled wood ? 

My brothers, when they saw me wearied out 

With this long way, resolving here to lodge 

Under the spreading favor of these pines. 

Stepped, as thej"^ said, to the next thicket side 

To bring me berries, or such cooling fruit 

As the kind, hospitable woods provide. 

They left me then, when the gray-hooded even. 

Like a sad votarist in palmer's weed, 

Rose from the hindmost wheels of Phoebus' wain. 

But where they are, and why they came not 

back, 
Is now the labor of my thoughts : 't is likeliest 
They had engaged their wandering steps too far. 
And envious darkness, ere-they could return, 
Had stole them from me ; else, thievish night, 
Why shouldst thou, but for some felonious end. 
In thy dark lantern thus close up the stars. 
That nature hung in heaven, and filled their 

lamps 
With everlasting oil, to give due light 
To the misled and lonely traveller ? 
This is the place, as well as I may guess. 
Whence even now the tumult of loud mirth 
Was rife, and perfect in my listening ear, 
Yet naught but single darkness do I find. 
What might this be ? A thousand fantasies 
Begin to throng into my memory, 
Of calling shapes, and beckoning shadows dire. 
And aiiy tongues, that syllable men's names 
On sands and shores and desert wildernesses. 
These thoughts may startle well, but not astound 
The virtuous mind, that ever walks attended 
By a strong-siding champion. Conscience. 

welcome, pure-eyed Faith, white-handed Hope, 
Thou hovering angel girt with golden wings, 
And thou unblemished form of Chastity ; 

1 see you visibly, and now believe 

That he, the Supreme Good, to whom all things ill 
Are but as slavish officers of vengeance. 
Would send a glistering guardian, if need were. 
To keep my life and honor unassailed. 



THE :NYMPH of the SEVERN". 

FROM " COMUS." 

Theee is a gentle nymph not far from hence 
That with moist curb sways the smooth Severn 

stream. 
Sabrina is her name, a virgin pure ; 



Whilom she was the daughter of Locrine, 
That had the sceptre from his father Brute. 
She, guiltless damsel, flying the mad pursuit 
Of her enraged stepdame Guendolen, 
Commended her fair innocence to the flood, 
That stayed her flight with his cross-flowing 

course. 
The water-nymphs that in the bottom played. 
Held up their pearled wrists, and took her in, 
Bearing her straight to aged Nereus' hall. 
Who, piteous of her woes, reared her lank head. 
And gave her to his daughters to imbathe 
In nectared lavers strewed with asphodel. 
And through the porch and inlet of each sense 
Dropped in ambrosial oils, till she revived, 
And underwent a quick immortal change, 
Made Goddess of the river : still she retains 
Her maiden gentleness, and oft at eve 
Visits the herds along the tAvilight meadows, 
Helping all urchin blasts, and ill-luck signs 
That the shrewd meddling elf delights to make. 
Which she with precious vialed liquors heals ; 
For which the shepherds at their festivals 
Carol her goodness loud in rustic lays. 
And throw sweet garland wreaths into her stream 
Of pausies pinks, and gaudy daflbdils. 



THE HAUNT OF THE SORCERER. 



FROM "COMUS.' 



Within the navel of this hideous wood, 

Immured in cypress shades a sorcerer dwells, 

Of Bacchus and of Circe born, great Comus, 

Deep skilled in all his mother's witcheries ; 

And here to every thirsty wanderer 

By sly enticement gives his baneful cup. 

With many murmurs mixed, whose pleasing 

poison 
The visage quite transforms of him that drinks. 
And the inglorious likeness of a beast 
Fixes instead, unmoulding reason's mintage 
Charactered in the face : this I have learnt 
Tending my flocks hard by i' the hilly crofts, 
That brow this bottom-glade, whence night by 

night. 
He and his monstrous rout are heard to howl, 
Like stabled wolves, or tigers at their prey. 
Doing abhorred rites to Hecate 
In their obscured haunts of inmost bowers. 
Yet have they many baits, and guileful spells, 
T' inveigle and invite the unwary sense 
Of them that pass unweeting by the way. 
This evening late, by them the chewing flocks 
Had ta'en their supper on the savory herb 
Of knot-grass dew-besprent, and Avere in fold. 



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831 



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I sat me down to watch upon a bank 
With ivy canopied, and interwove 
With iiaunting honeysuckle, and began, 
Wrapt in a pleasing fit of melancholy, 
To meditate my rural minstrelsy, 
Till fancy had her fill, but ere a close, 
The wonted roar was up amidst the woods, 
And filled the air with barbarous dissonance ; 
At which I ceased, and listened them awhile, 
Till an unusual stop of sudden silence 
Gave respite to the drowsy frighted steeds, 
That draw the litter of close-curtained sleep ; 
At last a soft and solemn-breathing sound 
Kose like a stream of rich distilled perfumes, 
And stole upon the aii", that even Silence 
Was took ere she was ware, and wished she might 
Deny her nature, and be never more, 
Still to be so displaced. I was all ear. 
And took in strains that might create a soul 
Under the ribs of death : but 0, ere long 
Too well I did perceive it was the voice 
Of my most honored Lady, your dear sister. 
Amazed I stood, harrowed with grief and fear. 
And 0, poor hapless nightingale, thought 1, 
How sweet thou sing'st, how near the deadly 
snare ! 



h 



THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE. 

FROM CANTO I. 

The castle hight of Indolence, 

And its false luxury ; 
Where for a little time, alas ! 

We lived right jollily. 

MORTAL man, who livest here by toil. 
Do not complain of this thy hard estate ; 
That like an emmet thou must ever moil. 
Is a sad sentence of an ancient date ; 
And, certes, there is for it reason great ; 
For, though sometimes it makes thee weep and 

wail. 
And curse thy star, and early drudge and late ; 
Withouten that would come a heavier bale. 
Loose life, unruly passions, and diseases pale. 

In lowly dale, fast by a river's side. 

With woody hill o'er hill encompassed round 

A most enchanting wizard did abide, 

Than whom a fiend more fell is nowhere found. 

It was, I vceen , a lovely spot of ground ; 

And there a season atween June and May, 

Half prankt with spring, with summer half 

embrowned, 
A listless climate made, where, sooth to say, 
ISTo living wight could work, ne cared even for 

play. 



Was naught around but images of rest : 

Sleep-soothing groves, and quiet lawns be- 
tween ; 

And flowery beds that slumbrous influence kest. 

From poppies breathed ; and beds of pleasant 
green. 

Where never yet was creeping creature seen. 

Meantime, unnumbered glittering streamlets 
played. 

And hurled everywhere their waters sheen ; 

That, as they bickered through the sunny glade, 
Though restless still themselves, a lulling mur- 
mur made. 

Joined to the prattle of the purling rills 
Were heard the lowing herds along the vale. 
And flocks loud beating from the distant hills. 
And vacant shepherds piping in the dale : 
And, now and then, sweet Philomel would wail. 
Or stockdoves plain amid the forest deep. 
That drowsy rustled to the sighing gale ; 
And still a coil the grasshopper did keep ; 
Yet all these sounds yblent inclined all to sleep. 

Full in the passage of the vale, above, 

A sable, silent, solemn forest stood ; 

Where naught but shadowy forms was seen to 

move. 
As Idless fancied in her dreaming mood : 
And up the hills, on either side, a wood 
Of blackening pines, aye waving to and fro. 
Sent forth a sleepy horror through the blood ; 
And where this valley winded out, below. 
The murmuring main was heard, and scarcely 

heard, to flow. 

A pleasing land of drowsyhed it was, 
Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye ; 
And of gay castles in the clouds that pass. 
Forever flushing round a summer sky : 
There eke the soft delights, that witchingly 
Instil a wanton sweetness through the breast. 
And the calm pleasures always hovered nigh ; 
But whate'er smacked of noyance or unrest 
Was far, far ofl^ expelled from this delicious nest. 

The landscape such, inspiring perfect ease, 
Where Indolence (for so the wizard hight) 
Close-hid his castle mid embowering trees. 
That half shut out the beams of Phoebus bright, 
And made a kind of checkered day and night ; 
Meanwhile, unceasing at the massy gate. 
Beneath a spacious palm, the wicked wight 
Was placed ; and to his lute, of cruel fate 
And labor harsh, complained, lamenting man's 
estate. 



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Thither continual pilgrims crowded still, 
From all the roads of earth that pass there by : 
For, as they chanced to breathe on neighbor- 
ing hill, 
The freshness of this valley smote their eye, 
And drew them ever and anon more nigh ; 
TUl clustering round the enchanter false they 

hung, 
Ymolten with his siren melody ; 
While o'er the enfeebling lute his hand he 
flung. 
And to the trembling chords these tempting 
verses sung : 

" Behold ! ye pilgrims of this earth, behold ! 
See all, but man, with unearned pleasure gay : 
See her bright robes the butterfly unfold. 
Broke from her wintry tomb in prime of May ! 
What youthful bride can equal her array ? 
Who can with her for easy pleasure vie ? 
From mead to mead with gentle wing to stray, 
From flower to flower on balmy gales to fly, 
Is all she has to do beneath the radiant sky. 

" Behold the merry minstrels of the morn, 
The swarming songsters of the careless grove, 
Ten thousand throats ! that, from the flower- 
ing thorn, 
Hymn their good God, and carol sweet of love, 
Such grateful kindly raptures them emove : 
They neither plough nor sow ; ne, fit for flail. 
E'er to the barn the nodden sheaves they 

drove : 
Yet theirs each harvest dancing in the gale. 
Whatever crowns the hill, or smiles along the 
vale. 

*' Outcast of nature, man ! the wretched thrall 
Of bitter dropping sweat, of sweltry pain. 
Of cares that eat away the heart with gall, 
And of the vices, an inhuman train, 
That all proceed from savage thirst of gain : 
For when hard-hearted interest first began 
To poison earth, Astrsea left the plain ; 
Guile, violence, and murder seized on man. 
And, for soft milky streams, with blood the 
rivers ran. 

" Come, ye who still the cumbrous load of life 
Push hard up hill ; but as the furthest steep 
You trust to gain, and put an end to stiife, 
Down thunders back the stone with mighty 

sweep. 
And hurls your labors to the valley deep, 
Forever vain : come, and withouten fee, 
I in oblivion will your sorrows steep. 
Your cares, your toils ; will steep you in a sea 
Of full delight : 0, come, ye weary wights, to me ! 



" With me, you need not rise at early dawn, 
To pass the joyless day in various stounds ; 
Or, louting low, on upstart fortune fawn, 
And sell fair honor for some paltry pounds ; 
Or through the city take your dirty rounds, 
To cheat, and dun, and lie, and visit pay, 
Now flattering base, now giving secret wounds ; 
Or prowl in courts of law for human prey, 
In venal senate thieve, or rob on broad highway. 

" No cocks, with me, to rustic labor call, 
From village on to village sounding clear ; 
To tardy swain no shrill-voiced matrons squall ; 
No dogs, no babes, no wives, to stun your ear ; 
No hammers thump ; no horrid blacksmith 

sear, 
Ne noisy tradesman your sweet slumbers start, 
With sounds that are a misery to hear : 
But all is calm, as would delight the heart 
Of Sybarite of old, all nature, and all art. 

" Here naught but candor reigns, indulgent 

ease. 
Good-natured lounging, sauntering up and 

down : 
They who are pleased themselves must always 

please ; 
On others' waj^s they never squint a frown. 
Nor heed what haps in hamlet or in town : 
Thus, from the source of tender Indolence, 
With milky blood the heart is overflown. 
Is soothed and sweetened by the social sense ; 
For interest, envy, pride, and strife are banished 

hence. 

" What, what is virtue, but repose of mind, 
A pure ethereal calm, that knows no storm ; 
Above the reach of wild ambition's wind. 
Above those passions that this world deform. 
And torture man, a proud malignant worm ? 
But here, instead, soft gales of passion play. 
And gently stir the heart, thereby to form 
A quicker sense of joy ; as breezes stray 
Across the enlivened skies, and make them still 
more gay. 

" The best of men have ever loved repose : 
They hate to mingle in the filthy fray ; 
Where the soul sours, and gradual rancor 

grows, 
Imbittered more from peevish day to day. 
E'en those whom fame has lent her fairest ray, 
The most renowned of worthy wights of yore. 
From a base world at last have stolen away : 
So Scipio, to the soft Cumtean shore 
Retiring, tasted joy he never knew before. 



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" But if a little exercise you choose, 
Some zest for ease, 't is not forbidden here : 
Amid the groves you may indulge the Muse, 
Or tend the blooms, and deck the vernal year ; 
Or softly stealing, with your watery gear. 
Along the brooks, the ci'imson-spotted fry 
You may delude : the whilst, amused, you hear 
Now the hoarse stream, and now the zephyr's 
sigh, 
Attuned to the birds, and woodland melody. 

" grievous folly ! to heap up estate. 
Losing the days you see beneath the sun ; 
When, sudden, comes blind unrelenting fate. 
And gives the untasted portion you have won 
With mthless toil, and many a wretch undone. 
To those who mock you, gone to Pluto's reign. 
There with sad ghosts to pine, and shadows 

dun : 
But sure it is of vanities most vain, 
To toil for what you here untoiling may obtain." 

He ceased. But still their trembling ears re- 
tained 
The deep vibrations of his witching song ; 
That, by a kind of magic power, constrained 
To enter in, pell-mell, the listening throng. 
Heaps poured on heaps, and yet they slipt 

along. 
In silent ease ; as when beneath the beam 
Of summer moons, the distant woods among. 
Or by some flood all silvered with the gleam. 
The soft-embodied fays through airy portal 
stream ; 

By the smooth demon so it ordered was. 
And here his baneful bounty first began : 
Though some there were who would not fur- 
ther pass. 
And his alluring baits suspected ban. 
The wise distrust the too fair-spoken man. 
Yet through the gate they cast a wishful eye : 
Not to move on, perdie, is all they can : 
For do their very best they cannot fly. 
But often each way look, and often sorely sigh. 

When this the watchful wicked wizard saw. 
With sudden spring he leaped upon them 

straight ; 
And soon as touched by his unhallowed paw. 
They found themselves within the cursed gate : 
Full hard to be repassed, like that of fate. 
Not stronger were of old the giant crew. 
Who sought to pull high Jove from regal state ; 
Though feeble wretch he seemed, of sallow hue : 
Certes, who bides his grasp, will that encounter 

rue. 



Ye gods of quiet, and of sleep profound ! 
Whose soft dominion o'er this castle sways. 
And all the widely silent places round. 
Forgive me, if my trembling pen displays 
What never yet was sung in mortal lays. 
But how shall I attempt such arduous string ? 
I who have spent my nights and nightly days 
In this soul-deadening place loose-loitering : 
Ah! how shall I for this uprear my moulted wing ? 

Come on, my Muse, nor stoop to low despair. 
Thou imp of Jove, touched by celestial fire ! 
Thou yet shalt sing of war, and actions fair. 
Which the bold sons of Britain will inspire : 
Of ancient bards thou yet shalt sweep the lyre ; 
Thou yet shalt tread in tragic pall the stage, 
Paint love's enchanting woes, the hero's ire, 
The sage's calm, the patriot's noble rage. 
Dashing corruption down through every worth- 
less age. 

The doors, that knew no shrill alarming bell 
Ne cursed knocker plied by villain's hand. 
Self-opened into halls, where who can tell 
What elegance and grandeur wide expand ; 
The pride of Turkey and of Persia land ? 
Soft quilts on quilts, on carpets carpets spread, 
And couches stretched around in seemly band ; 
And endless pillows rise to prop the head ; 
So that each spacious room was one full-swelling 
bed ; 

And everywhere huge covered tables stood. 
With wines high -flavored and rich viands 

crowned ; 
Whatever sprightly juice or tasteful food 
On the green bosom of this earth are found, 
And all old ocean 'genders in his round : 
Some hand unseen these silently displayed. 
Even undemanded by a sign or sound ; 
You need but wish, and instantly obeyed, 
Fair ranged the dishes rose, and thick the glasses 

played. 

Here freedom reigned, without the least alloy ; 
Nor gossip's tale, nor ancient maiden's gall. 
Nor saintly spleen durst murmur at our joy, 
And with envenomed tongue our pleasures pall. 
For why ? there was but one great rule for all ; 
To wit, that each should work his own desire. 
And eat, drink, study, sleep, as it maj"- fall. 
Or melt the time in love, or wake the lyre. 
And carol what, unhid, the Muses might in- 
spire. 

The rooms with costly tapestry were hung. 
Where was inwoven many a gentle tale ; 
Such as of old the rural poets sung. 
Or of Arcadian or Sicilian vale : 



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Reclining lovers, in the lonely dale, 

Poured forth at large the sweetly tortured 

heart ; 
Or, sighing tender passion, swelled the gale. 
And taught charmed echo to resound their 

smart ; 
While flocks, woods, streams around, repose and 

peace impart. 

Each sound too here to languishment inclined, 
Lulled the weak bosom, and induced ease ; 
Aerial music in the warbling wind, 
At distance rising oft, by small degrees, 
Nearer and nearer came, till o'er the trees 
It hung, and breathed such soul-dissolving airs, 
As did, alas ! with soft perdition please : 
Entangled dee]) in its enchanting snares, 
The listening heart forgot all duties and all cares. 

A certain music, never known before, 
Here lulled the pensive, melancholy mind ; 
Full easily obtained. Behooves no more, 
But sidelong, to the gently waving wind, 
To lay the well-tuned instrument reclined ; 
From which, with airy flying fingers light, 
Beyond each mortal touch the most refined, 
The god of winds drew sounds of deep delight : 
Whence, with just cause, the harp of iEolus it 
hight. 

Ah me ! what hand can touch the string so fine ? 
Who up the lofty diapason roll 
Such sweet, such sad, such solemn airs divine. 
Then let them down again into the soul : 
Now rising love they fanned ; now pleasing dole 
They breathed, in tender musings, through the 

heart ; 
And now a graver sacred strain they stole. 
As when seraphic hands a hymn impart : 
Wild warbling nature all, above the reach of art ! 

James Thomson. 



KUBLA KHAN.* 

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan 
A stately pleasure-dome decree 
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran. 
Through caverns measureless to man, 
Down to a sunless sea. 

* " In the summer of the year 1797 the author, then in ill-health, 
had retired to a lonely farm-house between Porlock and Linton, on 
the Exmoor confines of Somerset and Devonshire. In consequence 
of a slight indisposition, an anodyne had been prescribed, from the 
effect of which he fell asleep in hia chair at the moment he was read- 
ing the following sentence, or words of the same substance, in 
Purchas's Pilgrimage : ' Here the Khan Kubla commanded a pal- 
ace to be built, and a stately garden thereunto : and thus ten miles 
of fertile ground were enclosed with a wah.' The author continued 
far about three hours in a profound sleep, at least of the external 



So twice five miles of fertile ground 
With walls and towers were girdled round ; 
And there were gardens, bright with sinuous rills. 
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree ; 
And here were forests ancient as the hills, 
Infolding sunny spots of greenery. 

But that deep romantic chasm, which slanted 

Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover ! 

A savage place ! as holy and enchanted 

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted 

By woman wailing for her demon-lover ! 

And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil 

seething, 
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing, 
A mighty fountain momently was forced, 
Amid whose swift, half-intermitted burst 
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail. 
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail ; 
And mid these dancing rocks at once and ever 
It flung up momently the sacred river. 
Five miles, meandering with a mazy motion 
Through wood and dale, the sacred river ran, — 
Then reached the caverns measureless to man, 
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean. 
And mid this tumult Kubla heard from far 
Ancestral voices prophesying war. 

The shadow of the dome of pleasure 
Floated midway on the waves 
Where was heard the mingled measure 
From the fountain and the caves. 

It was a miracle of rare device, — 

A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice ! 
A damsel with a dulcimer 
In a vision once I saw ; 

It was an Abyssinian maid. 

And on her dulcimer she played, 

Singing of Mount Abora. 

Could I revive within me 

Her symphony and song. 

To such a deep delight 'twould win me 

That, with music loud and long, 

I would build that dome in air, — 

That sunny dome ! those caves of ice ! 

senses, during which time he has the most vivid confidence that he 
could not have composed less than from two to three hundred lines ; 
if that indeed can be called composition in which all the images rose 
up before him as things, with a parallel production of the corre- 
spondent expressions, without any sensation or consciousness of 
effort. On awaking he appeared to himself to have a distinct recol- 
lection of the whole, and, taking his pen, ink, and paper, instantly 
and eagerly wrote down the lines that are here preserved. At this 
moment he was unfortunately called out by a person on business 
from Porlock, and detained by him above an hour, and on his return 
to his room found, to his no small surprise and mortification, that 
though he still retained some vague and dim recollection of the 
general purport of the vision, yet, with the exception of some eight 
or ten scattered lines and images, all the rest had passed away, 
like the images on the surface of a stream into which a stone had 
been cast, but, alas ! without the after restoration of the latter."— 

The Author, 1816. 



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And all who heard should see them there, 
And all should cry, Beware ! beware 
His flashing eyes, his floating hair ! 
Weave a circle round him thrice, 
And close your eyes with holy dread, 
For he on honey-dew hath fed, 
And drunk the milk of Paradise. 

SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. 



SONG OF WOOD-NYMPHS. 

Come here, come here, and dwell 

In forest deep ! 

Come here, come here, and tell 

Why thou dost weep ! 

Is it for love (sweet j)ain !) 

That thus thou dar'st complain 

Unto our pleasant shades, our summer leaves, 

Where naught else grieves ? 

Come here, come here, and lie 

By whispering stream ! 

Here no one dares to die 

For love's sweet dream ; 

But health all seek, and joy, 

And shun perverse annoy, 

And race along green paths till close of day, 

And laugh — alvvay ! 

Or else, through half the year, 

On rushy floor, 

We lie by waters clear, 

While skylarks pour 

Their songs into the sun ! 

And when bright day is done. 

We hide 'neatli bells of flowers or nodding corn 

And dream — till morn ! 

BRYAN WALLER PROCTER {Bairy Cornwall). 



THE FAIRIES' LULLABY. 

FROM "MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM," ACT II. SC. 3. 

Enter Titania, luith her train. 

TiTANlA. Come, now a roundel, and a fairy 

song ; 
Then, for the third part of a minute, hence ; — 
Some, to kill cankers in the musk-rose buds ; 
Some war with rear-mice for their leathern wings, 
To make my small elves coats ; and some keej) 

back 
The clamorous owl, that nightly hoots, and 

wonders 
At our quaint spirits. Sing me now asleep ; 
Then to your offices, and let me rest. 



1 Fairy. Yoii spotted snakes, xoith double tongue, 

Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen ; 

Neivts and blind-worms, do no ivrong: 

Come not near our fairy qiteen. 

Chorus. Philomel, with melody. 

Sing in oxvr sweet lullaby ; 
Lvilla, lulla, lullaby ; lulla, lulla, lullaby: 
Never harm. 
Nor spell nor charm. 
Come our lovely lady nigh ; 
So, good-night, with lullaby. 

2 Fairy. Weaving spiders, come not here, 

Hence, you long-legged spinners, 
hence ! 
Beetles black, approach not near ; 
Worm, nor snail, do no offence. 

Chorus. Philomel, with melody, etc. 

1 Fairy. Hence away ; now all is well : 
One, aloof, stand sentinel. 

[_Exeunt Fcdries. Titania sleeps. 

SHAKESPEARE. 
« 

FAIRIES' SONG. 

We the fairies blithe and antic, 
Of dimensions not gigantic, 
Though the moonshine mostly keep us, 
Oft in orchards frisk and peep us. 

Stolen sweets are always sweeter ; 
Stolen kisses much completer ; 
Stolen looks are nice in chapels ; 
Stolen, stolen be your apples. 

When to bed the world are bobbing, 
Then 's the time for orchard-robbing ; 
Yet the fruit were scarce worth peeling 
Were it not for stealing, stealing. 

From the Latin of THOMAS RANDOLPH.* 
Translation of LEIGH HUNT. 



COMPLIMENT TO QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

FROM " MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM," ACT II. SC. 2. 

Oberon. My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou 
remember'st 
Since once I sat upon a promontory, 
And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin's back, 
Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath, 

* Randolph was a masterly scholar, and a profound student of 
the Greek and Latin poets, whose writings he imitated in those lan- 
gTjages, and whose influence was marked in his English writings. 
He died (1634) at the age of twenty-nine, not fulfilling the fame 
promised by his early years. 



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That the rude sea grew civil at her song, 

And certain stars shot madly from their spheres, 

To hear the sea-maid's music. 

Puck. I remember. 

Obe. That very time I saw (but thou couldst 
not), 
Flying between the cold moon and the earth, 
Cupid all armed : a certain aim he took 
At a fair vestal throned by the west. 
And loosed his love-shaft smartly from his bow. 
As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts : 
But I might see young Cupid's fiery shaft 
Quenched in the chaste beams of the watery moon, 
And the imperial votaress passed on, 
In maiden meditation, fancy free. 
Yet marked I where the bolt of Cupid fell : 
It fell upon a little western flower 
Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound, 
And maidens call it Love-in-idleness. 
Fetch me that flower. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



QUEEN MAB. 

FROM " ROMEO AND JULIET," ACT I. SC. 4. 

0, THEN, I see. Queen Mab hath been with you. 
She is the fairies' midwife ; and she comes 
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone 
On the foi'e-finger of an alderman. 
Drawn with a team of little atomies 
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep : 
Her wagon-spokes made of long spinners' legs ; 
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppei'S ; 
The traces, of the smallest spider's web ; 
The collars, of the moonshine's watery beams ; 
Her whip, of cricket's bone ; the lash, of film ; 
Her wagoner, a small gray-coated gnat. 
Not half so big as a round little worm 
Pricked from the lazy finger of a maid : 
Her cliariot is an empty hazel-nut, 
Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub, 
Time out of mind the fairies' coach-makers. 
And in this state she gallops night by night 
Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of 

love ; 
On courtiers' knees, that dream on court'sies 

straight ; 
O'er lawyers' fingers, who straight dream on fees ; 
O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream, — 
Which oft the angry Mab -with blisters plagues, 
Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are : 
Sometime she gallops o'er a courtier's nose, 
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit ; 
And sometime comes she with a tithe-pig's tail, 
Tickling a parson's nose as 'a lies asleep, 
Then dreams he of another benefice : 



Sometime she driveth o'er a soldier's neck. 
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats. 
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades. 
Of healths five fathom deep ; and then anon 
Drums in his ear, at which he starts, and wakes ; 
And, being thus frighted, swears a prayer or two, 
And sleeps again. This is that very Mab 
That })lats the manes of horses in the night ; 
And bakes the elf-locks in foul sluttish hairs, 
Which, once untangled, much misfortune bodes : 
This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs, 
That presses them, and learns them first to bear. 
Making them women of good carriage. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



THE FAIKIES. 

Up the airy mountain, 

Down the rushy glen, 
We dare n't go a hunting 

For fear of little men ; 
Wee folk, good folk. 

Trooping all together ; 
Green jacket, red cap, 

And white owl's feather ! 

Down along the rocky shore 

Some make their home, — 
They live on crispy pancakes 

Of yellow tide-foam ; 
Some in the reeds 

Of the black mountain-lake. 
With frogs for their watch-dogs, 

All night awake. 

High on the hill-top 

The old King sits ; 
He is now so old and gray 

He 's nigh lost his wits. 
With a bridge of white mist 

Columbkill he crosses. 
On his stately journeys 

From Slieveleague to Rosses ; 
Or going up with music 

On cold starry nights, 
To sup with the queen 

Of the gay Northern Lights. 

They stole little Bridget 

For seven years long ; 
When she came down again 

Her friends were all gone. 
They took her lightly back. 

Between the night and morrow ; 
They thought that she was fast asleep. 

But she was dead with sorrow. 



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They have kept her ever since 

Deep within the lakes, 
On a bed of flag-leaves, 

Watching till she wakes. 

By the craggy hillside, 

Through the mosses bare, 
They have planted thorn-trees 

For pleasure here and there. 
Is any man so daring 

To dig one up in spite. 
He shall find the thornies set 

In his bed at night. 

Up the airy mountain, 

Down the rushy glen. 
We dare n't go a hunting 

For fear of little men ; 
Wee folk, good folk, 

Trooping all together ; 
Green jacket, red cap, 

And white owl's feather ! 

WIILLIAM ALLINGHAM. 



KILMENY. 

FROM "THE QUEEN'S WAKE." 

Bonny Kilmeny gaed up the glen ; 
But it wasna to meet Duneira's men, 
Nor the rosy monk of the isle to see, 
For Kilmeny was pure as pure could be. 
It was only to hear the yorlin sing, 
And pu' the cress-flower round the spring, — 
The scarlet hypp, and the hindberrye. 
And the nut that hung frae the hazel-tree ; 
For Kilmeny was pure as pure could be. 
But lang may her niinny look o'er the wa', 
And lang may she seek i' the green-wood shaw ; 
Lang the laird of Duneira blame, 
And lang, lang greet or Kilmeny come hame. 

When many a day had come and fled, 
When grief grew calm, and hope was dead, 
When mass for Kilmeny's soul had been sung. 
When the bedesman had prayed, and the dead- 
bell rung ; 
Late, late in a gloamin, when all was still, 
When the fringe was red on the westlin hill. 
The wood was sear, the moon i' the wane. 
The reek o' the cot hung over the plain, — 
Like a little wee cloud in the world its lane ; 
When the ingle lowed with an eiry leme. 
Late, late in the gloamin Kilmeny came hame ! 

" Kilmeny, Kilmeny, where have you been ? 
Lang hae we sought baith holt and den, — 
By linn, by ford, and green-wood tree ; 
Yet you are halesome and fair to see. 



Where got you that joup o' the lily sheen ? 
That bonny snood of the birk sae green ? 
And these roses, the fairest that ever was seen ? 
Kilmeny, Kilmeny, where have you been ? " 

Kilmeny looked up with a lovely grace, 
But nae smile was seen on Kilmeny's face ; 
As still was her look, and as still was her ee. 
As the stillness that lay on the emerant lea. 
Or the mist that sleeps on a waveless sea. 
For Kilmeny had been she knew not where, 
And Kilmeny had seen what she could not 

declare. 
Kilmeny had been where the cock never crew. 
Where the rain never fell, and the wind never 

blew ; 
But it seemed as the harp of the sky had rung, 
And the airs of heaven played round her tongue. 
When she spake of the lovely forms she had seen, 
And a land where sin had never been, — 
A land of love, and a land of light, 
Withouten sun or moon or night ; 
Where the river swa'd a living stream, 
And the light a pure celestial beam : 
The land of vision it would seem, 
A still, an everlasting dream. 

In yon green-wood there is a walk, 
And in that walk there is a wene. 
And in that wene there is a maike, 
That neither has flesh, blood, nor bane ; 
And down in yon green-wood he walks his lane. 

In that green wene Kilmeny lay. 
Her bosom happed wi' the flowerets gay ; 
But the air was soft, and the silence deep, 
And bonny Kilmeny fell sound asleep ; 
She kend nae mair, nor opened her ee. 
Till waked by the hymns of a far countrye. 

She awaked on a couch of the silk sae slim, 
All striped wi' the bars of the rainbow's rim ; 
And lovely beings ai-ound were rife, 
Who erst had travelled mortal life ; 
And aye they smiled, and 'gan to speer : 
" What spirit has brought this mortal here ? " 

" Lang have I journeyed the world wide," 
A meek and reverend fere replied ; 
" Baith night and day I have watched the fair 
Eident a thousand years and mair. 
Yes, I have watched o'er ilk degree. 
Wherever blooms femenitye ; 
But sinless virgin,, free of stain, 
In mind and body, fand I nane. 
Never, since the banquet of time, 
Found I a virgin in her prime, 
Till late this bonny maiden I saw, 
As spotless as the morning snaw. 



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838 



POEMS OF FANCY. 



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Full twenty years she has lived as free 

As the spirits that sojourn in this countrye. 

I have brought her away frae the snares of men, 

That sin or death she may never ken." 

They clasped her waist and her hands sae fair ; 
They kissed her cheek, and they kemed her hair ; 
And round came many a blooming fere, 
Saying, " Bonny Kilmeny, ye 're welcome here ; 
Women are freed of the littand scorn ; 
0, blest be the day Kilmeny was born ! 
Now shall the land of the spirits see, 
Now shall it ken, what a woman may be ! 
Many a lang year in sorrow and pain, 
Many a lang year through the world we 've gane. 
Commissioned to watch fair womankind. 
For it 's they who nurice the immortal mind. 
We have watched their steps as the dawning 

shone, 
And deep in the greenwood walks alone ; 
By lily bower and silken bed 
The viewless tears have o'er them shed ; 
Have soothed their ardent minds to sleep, 
Or left the couch of love to weep. 
We have seen ! we have seen ! but the time must 

come. 
And the angels will weep at the day of doom ! 

" 0, would the fairest of mortal kind 
Aye keep the holy truths in mind, 
That kindred spirits their motions see. 
Who watch their ways with anxious e'e. 
And grieve for the guilt of humanitye ! 
0, sweet to Heaven the maiden's prayer, 
And the sigh that heaves a bosom sae fair ! 
And dear to Heaven the words of truth 
And the praise of virtue frae beauty's mouth ! 
And dear to the viewless forms of air 
The minds that kythe as the body fair ! 

" bonny Kilmeny ! free frae stain. 
If ever you seek the world again, — 
That world of sin, of sorrow and fear, — 
0, tell of the joys that are waiting here ; 
And tell of the signs you shall shortly see ; 
Of the times that are now, and the times that 
shall be." 

They lifted Kilmeny, they led her away, 
And she walked in the light of a sunless day ; 
The sky was a dome of crystal bright, 
The fountain of vision, and fountain of light ; 
The emerald fields were of dazzling glow. 
And the flowers of everlasting blow. 
Then deep in the stream her body they laid, 
That her youth and beauty never might fade ; 
And they smiled on heaven, when they saw her lie 

In the stream of life that wandered by. 



And she heard a song, — she heard it sung, 
She kend not where ; but sae sweetly it rung, 
It fell on her ear like a dream of the morn, — 
" 0, blest be the day Kilmeny was born ! 
Now shall the land of the spirits see, 
Now shall it ken, what a woman may be ! 
The sun that shines on the world sae bright, 
A borrowed gleid frae the fountain of light ; 
And the moon that sleeks the sky sae dun, 
Like a gouden bow, or a beamless sun. 
Shall wear away, and be seen uae mair ; 
And the angels shall miss them, travelling the air. 
But lang, lang after baith night and day. 
When the sun and the world have edyed away. 
When the sinner has gane to his waesome doom, 
Kilmeny shall smile in eternal bloom ! " 

They bore her away, she wist not how. 
For she felt not arm nor rest below ; 
But so swift they wained her through the light, 
'T was like the motion of sound or sight ; 
They seemed to split the gales of air, 
And yet nor gale nor breeze was there. 
Unnumbered groves below them grew ; 
They came, the}^ past, and backward flew. 
Like floods of blossoms gliding on. 
In moment seen, in moment gone. 
0, never vales to mortal view 
Appeared like those o'er which they flew, 
That land to human spirits given. 
The lowermost vales of the storied heaven ; 
From whence they can view the world below. 
And heaven's blue gates with sapphires glow, — 
More glory yet unmeet to know. 

They bore her far to a mountain green. 
To see what mortal never had seen ; 
And they seated her high on a purple sward, 
And bade her heed what she saw and heard. 
And note the changes the spirits wrought ; 
For now she lived in the land of thought. — 
She looked, and she saw nor sun nor skies, 
But a crystal dome of a thousand dyes ; 
She looked, and she saw nae land aright. 
But an endless whirl of glory and light ; 
And radiant beings went and came. 
Far swifter than wind or the linked flame ; 
She hid her een frae the dazzling view ; 
She looked again, and the scene was new. 

She saw a sun on a summer sky. 
And clouds of amber sailing by ; 
A lovely land beneath her lay, 
And that land had glens and mountains gray ; 
And that land had valleys and hoary piles, 
And marled seas, and a thousand isles ; 
Its fields were speckled, its forests green. 
And its lakes were all of the dazzling sheen. 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



839 



a 



Like magic mirrors, where slumbering lay 

The sun and the sky and the cloudlet gray, 

Which heaved and ti-embled, and gently swung ; 

On every shore they seemed to be hung ; 

For there they were seen on their downward plain 

A thousand times and a thousand again ; 

In winding lake and placid firth, — 

Little peaceful heavens in the bosom of earth. 

Kilmeny sighed and seemed to grieve, 
For she found her heart to that land did cleave ; 
She saw the corn wave on the vale ; 
She saw the deer run down the dale ; 
She saw the plaid and the broad claymore, 
And the brows that the badge of freedom bore ; 
And she thought she had seen the land before. 

She saw a lady sit on a throne, 
The fairest that ever the sun shone on : 
A lion licked her hand of milk. 
And she held him in a leish of silk ; 
And a leifu' maiden stood at her knee, 
"With a silver wand and melting ee ; 
Her sovereign shield till love stole in, 
And poisoned all the fount within. 

Then a gruff untoward bedesman came, 
And hundit the lion on his dame ; 
And the guardian maid wi' the dauntless ee. 
She dropped a tear, and left her knee ; 
And she saw till the queen frae the lion fled. 
Till the bonniest flower of the world lay dead ; 
A coffin was set on a distant plain, 
And she saw the red blood fall like rain : 
Then bonny Kilmeny's heart grew sair. 
And she turned away, and could look nae mair. 

Then the gruff" gi'im carle girned amain. 
And they trampled him down, but he rose again ; 
And he baited the lion to deeds of weir. 
Till he lapped the blood to the kingdom dear ; 
And weening his head was danger-preef. 
When crowned with the rose and clover leaf, 
He gowled at tho carle, and chased him away 
To feed wi' the deer on the mountain gray. 
He gowled at the carle, and he gecked at Heaven ; 
But his mark was set, and his arles given. 
Kilmeny a while her een withdrew ; 
She looked again, and the scene was new. 

She saw below her fair unfurled 
One half of all the glowing world. 
Where oceans rolled, and rivers ran, 
To bound the aims of sinful man. 
She saw a people, fierce and fell. 
Burst frae their bounds like fiends of hell ; 
There lilies grew, and the eagle flew. 
And she herked on her ravening crew. 



Till the cities and towers were wrapt in a blaze. 
And the thunder it roared o'er the lands and the 

seas. 
The widows they wailed, and the red blood ran, 
And she threatened an end to the race of man : 
She never lened, nor stood in awe. 
Till caught by the lion's deadly paw. 
Oh ! then the eagle swinked for life. 
And brainzelled up a mortal strife ; 
But flew she north, or flew she south, 
She met wi' the gowl of the lion's mouth. 

With a mooted wing and waefu' maen. 
The eagle sought her eiry again ; 
But lang may she cower in her bloody nest. 
And lang, lang sleek her wounded breast, 
Before she sey another flight, 
To play wi' the norland lion's might. 

But to sing the sights Kilmeny saw, 
So far surpassing nature's law. 
The singer's voice wad sink away. 
And the string of his harp wad cease to play..i 
But she saw till the sorrows of man were by. 
And all was love and harmony ; — 
Till the stars of heaven fell calmly away. 
Like the flakes of snaw on a winter's day. 

Then Kilmeny begged again to see 
The friends she had left in her own countrye, 
To tell the place where she had been. 
And the glories that lay in the land unseen ; 
To warn the living maidens fair. 
The loved of heaven, the spirits' care. 
That all whose minds unmeled remain 
Shall bloom in beauty when time is gane. 

With distant music, soft and deep. 
They lulled Kilmeny sound asleep ; 
And when she awakened, she lay her lane. 
All happed with flowers in the green-wood wene. 
When seven long j^ears had come and fled ; 
When grief was calm, and hope was dead ; 
When scarce was remembered Kilmeny's name. 
Late, late in a gloamin, Kilmeny came hame ! 
And 0, her beauty was fair to see. 
But still and steadfast was her ee ! 
Such beauty bard may never declare. 
For there was no pride nor passion there ; 
And the soft desire of maidens' een 
In that mild face could never be seen. 
Her seymar was the lily flower. 
And her cheek the moss-rose in the shower ; 
And her voice like the distant melodye 
That floats along the twilight sea. 
But she loved to ra.ike the lanely glen. 
And keeped afar frae the haunts of men ; 



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840 



POEMS or FANCY. 



-Qi 



Her holy hymns unheard to sing, 

To suck the flowers and drink the spring. 

But wherever her peaceful form appeared, 

The wild beasts of the hills were cheered ; 

The wolf played blythely round the field ; 

The lordly byson lowed and kneeled ; 

The dun deer wooed with manner bland, 

And cowered aneath her lily hand. 

And when at even the woodlands rung, 

When hymns of other worlds she sung 

In ecstasy of sweet devotion, 

O, then the glen was all in motion ! 

The wild beasts of the forest came, 

Broke from their bughts and faulds the tame. 

And goved around, charmed and amazed ; 

Even the dull cattle crooned, and gazed. 

And murmured, and looked with anxious pain 

For something the mystery to explain. 

The buzzard came with the throstle-cock, 

The corby left her houf in the rock ; 

The blackbird alang wi' the eagle flew ; 

The hind came tripping o'er the dew ; 

The wolf and the kid their raike began ; 

And the tod, and the lamb, and the leveret ran ; 

The hawk and the hern attour them hung, 

And the merl and the mavis forhooyed their 

young ; 
And all in a peaceful ring were hurled : 
It was like an eve in a sinless world ! 

"When a month and day had come and gane, 
Kilmeny sought the green-wood wene ; 
There laid her down on the leaves sae green, 
And Kilmeny on earth was never mair seen. 
But the words that fell from her mouth 
Were words of wonder, and words of truth ! 
But all the land were in fear and dread. 
For they kend na whether she was living or dead. 
It wasna her hame, and she couldna remain ; 
She left this world of sorrow and pain, 
And returned to the land of thought again. 

James Hogg. 



THE FAIEY CHILD. 

The summer sun was sinking 

With a mild light, calm and mellow ; 

It shone on my little boy's bonnie cheeks. 
And his loose locks of yellow. 

The robin was singing sweetly. 
And his song was sad and tender ; 

And my little boy's eyes, while he heard the song. 
Smiled with a sweet, soft splendor. 

My little boy lay on my bosom 
AVhile his soul the song was quafiBng ; 



The joy of his soul had tinged his cheek. 
And his heart and his eye were laughing. 

I sate alone in my cottage. 

The midnight needle plying ; 
I feared for my child, for the rush's light 

In the socket now was dying ; 

There came a hand to my lonely latch. 
Like the wind at midnight moaning ; 

I knelt to pray, but rose again, 

For I heard my little boy groaning. 

I crossed my brow and I crossed my breast. 
But that night my child departed, — 

They left a weakling in his stead, 
And I am broken-hearted ! 

0, it cannot be my own sweet boy. 
For his eyes are dim and hollow ; 

My little boy is gone — is gone, 
And his mother soon will follow. 

The dirge for the dead will be sung for me. 
And the mass be chanted meetly. 

And I shall sleep with my little boy, 
In the moonlight churchyard sweetly. 

JOHN ANSTER. 



THE CULPRIT FAY. 

** My visual orbs are purged from film, and, lo I 
Instead of Anster's turnip-bearing vales, 
I see old fairy land 's miraculous show ! 

Her trees of tinsel kissed by freakish galee, 
Her ouphs that, cloaked in leaf-gold, skim the breeze. 

And fairies, swarming — ." 

TENNANT'S ANSTER FAIR. 

'T IS the middle watch of a summer's night, — 
The earth is dark, but the heavens are bright ; 
Naught is seen in the vault on high 
But the moon, and the stars, and the cloudless 

sky. 
And the flood which rolls its milky hue, 
A river of light on the welkin blue. 
The moon looks down on old Cro'nest ; 
She mellows the shades on his shaggy breast. 
And seems his huge gray form to throw 
In a silver cone on the wave below. 
His sides are broken by spots of shade. 
By the walnut bough and the cedar made ; 
And through their clustering branches dark 
Glimmers and dies the firefly's spark, — 
Like starry twinkles that momently break 
Through the rifts of the gathering tempest's rack 

The stars are on the moving stream, 
And fling, as its ripples gently flow, 

A burnished length of wavy beam 
In an eel-like, spiral line below ; 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



841 



^1 



The winds are whist, and the owl is still ; 

The bat in the slielvy rock is hid ; 
And naught is heard on tlie lonely hill 
But the cricket's chirp, and the answer shrill 

Of the gauze-winged katydid ; 
And the plaint of the wailing whippoorwill, 

Who moans unseen, and ceaseless sings 
Ever a note of wail and woe. 

Till morning spreads her rosy wings, 
And earth and sky in her glances glow. 

'T is the hour of fairy ban and spell : 
The wood-tick has kept the minutes well ; 
He has counted them all with click and stroke 
Deep in the heart of the mountain-oak, 
And he has awakened the sentry elve 

Who sleeps with him in the haunted tree, 
To bid him ring the hour of twelve. 

And call the fays to their revelry ; 
Twelve small strokes on his tinkling bell 
('T was made of the white snail's pearly shell) : 
" Midnight comes, and all is well ! 
Hither, hither wing your way ! 
'T is the dawn of the fairy-day." 

They come from beds of lichen green. 

They creep from the mullein's velvet screen ; 

Some on the backs of beetles fly 
From the silver tops of moon-touched trees, 

Where they swung in their cobweb hammocks 
high. 
And rocked about in the evening breeze ; 

Some from the hum-bird's downy nest, — ■ 
They had driven him out by elfin power. 

And, pillowed on plumes of his rainbow breast, 
Had slumbered there till the charmed hour ; 

Some had lain in the scoop of the rock, 
With glittering ising-stars inlaid ; 

And some had opened the four-o'clock, 
And stole within its purple shade. 

And now they throng the moonlight glade, 
Above, belov/, on every side, — 

Tlieir little minim forms arrayed 
In the tricksy pomp of fairy pride ! 

They come not now to print the lea, 
In freak and dance around the tree, 
Or at the mushroom board to sup. 
And drink the dew from the buttercup : 
A scene of sorrow waits them now, 
For an ouphe has broken his vestal vow ; 
He has loved an earthly maid. 
And left for her his woodland shade ; 
He has lain upon her lip of dew, 
And sunned him in her eye of blue, 
Fanned her cheek with his wing of air, 
Played in the ringlets of her hair, 



And, nestling on her snowy breast, 
Forgot the lily-king's behest. 
For this the shadowy tribes of air 

To the elfin court must haste away : 
And now the}' stand expectant there, 

To hear the doom of the culprit fay. 

The throne was reared upon the grass, 
Of spice-wood and of sassafras ; 
On pillars of mottled tortoise-shell 

Hung the burnished canopy, — 
And o'er it gorgeous curtains fell 

Of the tulip's crimson drapery. 
The monarch sat on his judgment-seat, 

On his brow the crown imperial shone, 
The prisoner fay was at his feet. 

And his peers were ranged around the throne. 
He waved his sceptre in the air. 

He looked around and calmly spoke ; 
His bi'ow was gi-ave and his eye severe, 

But his voice in a softened accent broke : 

" Faiiy ! fairy ! list and mark : 

Thou hast broke thine elfin chain ; 

Thy flame-wood lamp is quenched and dark, 

And thy wings are dyed with a deadly stain, — 
Thou hast sullied thine elfin purity 

In the glance of a mortal maiden's eye ; 
Thou hast scorned our dread decree. 

And thou shouldst pay the forfeit high. 
But well I know her sinless mind 

Is pure as the angel forms above. 
Gentle and meek, and chaste and kind, 

Such as a spirit ■well might love. 
Fairy ! had she spot or taint, 
Bitter had been thy punishment : 
Tied to the hornet's shardy wings ; 
Tossed on the pricks of nettles' stings ; 
Or seven long ages doomed to dwell 
With the lazy worm in the walnut-shell 
Or every night to writhe and bleed 
Beneath the tread of the centipede ; 
Or bound in a cobweb-dungeon dim, 
Your jailer a spider, huge and grim, 
Amid the carrion bodies to lie 
Of the worm, and the bug, and the murdered fly : 
These it had been your lot to bear. 
Had a stain been formd on the earthly fair. 
Now list, and mark our mild decree, — 
Fairy, this your doom must be : 

"Thou shalt seek the beach of sand 

Where the water bounds the elfiu laad ; 

Thou shalt watch the oozy brine 

Till the sturgeon leaps in the bright moonshine, 

Then dart the glistening arch below. 

And catch a drop from his silver bow. 



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842 



POEMS OF FANCY. 



"Bl 



The water-sprites will wield their arms 
And dash around, with roar and rave, 

And vain are the woodland spirits' charms ; 
They are the imps that rule the wave. 

Yet trust thee in thj' single might : 

If thy heart be pure and tliy spirit right, 

Thou shalt win the warlock fight. 

" If the spray -bead gem be won, 
The stain of thy wing is washed away ; 

But another errand must be done 
Ere thy crime be lost for aye : 

Thy ilame-wood lamp is quenched and dark, 

Thou must re-illume its spark. 

Mount thy steed, and spur him high 

To the heaven's blue canopy ; 

And when thou seest a shooting star, 

Follow it fast, and follow it far, — 

The last faint spark of its burning train 

Shall light the elfin lamp again. 

Thou hast heard our sentence, fay ; 

Hence ! to the water-side, away ! " 

The goblin marked his monarch well ; 

He spake not, but he bowed him low. 
Then plucked a crimson colen-bell. 

And turned him round in act to go. 
The way is long, he cannot fly. 

His soiled wing has lost its power, 
And he winds adown the mountain high, 

For many a sore and weary hour. 
Through dreary beds of tangled fern. 
Through groves of nightshade dark and dern, 
Over the grass and through the brake. 
Where toils the ant and sleeps the snake ; 

Now o'er the violet's azure flush 
He skips along in lightsome mood ; 

And now he thrids the bramble-bush, 
Till its points are dyed in fairy blood. 
He has leaped the bog, he has pierced the brier, 
He has swum the brook, and waded the mii-e. 
Till his spirits sank, and his limbs grew weak. 
And the red waxed fainter in his cheek. 
He had fallen to the ground outright. 

For rugged and dim was his onward track. 
But there came a spotted toad in sight, 

And he laughed as he jumped upon her 
back ; 
He bridled her mouth with a silkweed twist, 

He lashed her sides with an osier thong ; 
And now, through evening's dewy mist, 

AVith leap and spring they bound along, 
Till the mountain's magic verge is past. 
And the beach of sand is reached at last. 

Soft and pale is the moony beam. 
Moveless still the glassy stream ; 



The wave is clear, the beach is bright 

With snowy shells and sparkling stones ; 
The shore-surge comes in ripples light. 

In murmurings faint and distant moans ; 
And ever afar in the silence deep 
Is heard the splash of the sturgeon's leap. 
And the bend of his graceful bow is seen, — 
A glittering arch of silver sheen, 
Spanning the wave of burnished blue, 
And dripping with gems of the river-dew. 

The elfin cast a glance around. 

As he lighted down from his courser toad, 
Then round his breast his wings he wound. 

And close to the river's brink he strode ; 
He sprang on a I'ock, he breathed a prayer. 

Above his head his arms he threw. 
Then tossed a tiny curve in air, 

And headlong plunged in the waters blue. 

Up sprung the spirits of the waves 

From the sea-silk beds in their coral caves ; 

With snail-plate armor, snatched in haste. 

They speed their way through the liquid waste ; 

Some are rapidly borne along 

On the mailed shrimp or the prickly prong ; 

Some on the blood-red leeches glide, 

Some on the stony star-fish ride, 

Some on the back of the lancing squab. 

Some on the sideling soldier-crab ; 

And some on the jellied quarl, that flings 

At once a thousand streamy stings ; 

They cut the wave with the living oar. 

And hurry on to the moonlight shore. 

To guard their realms and chase away 

The footsteps of the invading fay. 

Fearlessly he skims along. 
His hope is high, and his limbs are strong ; 
He spreads his arms like the swallow's wing, 
And throws his feet with a frog-like fling ; 
His locks of gold on the waters shine. 

At his breast the tiny foam-bees rise, 
His back gleams bright above the brine. 

And the wake-line foam behind him lies. 
But the water-sprites are gathering near 

To check his course along the tide ; 
Their warriors come in swift career 

And hem him round on every side ; 
On his thigh the leech has fixed his hold, 
The quarl's long arms are round him rolled. 
The prickly prong has pierced his skin, 
And the squab has thrown his javelin ; 
The gritty star has rubbed him raw. 
And the crab has struck with his giant claw ; 
He howls with rage, and he shrieks with pain ; 
He strikes around, but his blows are vain ; 



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I& 



POEMS OF FANCY. 



843 



-Q 



Hopeless is the unequal fight, 
Fairy ! naught is left but flight. 

He turned him round, and fled amain, 
With hurry and dash, to the beach again ; 
He twisted over from side to side, 
And laid his cheek to the cleaving tide ; 
The strokes of his plunging arms are fleet, 
And with all his might he flings his feet. 
But the water-sprites are round him still. 
To cross his path and work him ill. 
They bade the wave before him rise ; 
They flung the sea-fire in his ej^es ; 
And they stunned his ears with the scallop-stroke, 
"With the porpoise heave and the drum-fish croak. 
0, but a weary wight was he 
When he reached the foot of the dogwood-tree. 
Gashed and wounded, and stiff" and sore. 
He laid him down on the sandy shore ; 
He blessed the force of the charmed line. 

And he banned the water-goblins' spite. 
For he saw around in the sweet moonshine 
Their little wee faces above the brine. 

Giggling and laughing with all their might 

At the piteous hap of the fairy wight. 

Soon he gathered the balsam dew 

From the sorrel-leaf and the henbane bud ; 

Over each wound the balm he drew, 

And with cobweb lint he stanched the blood. 

The mild west-wind was soft and low, 

It cooled the heat of his burning brow ; 

And he felt new life in his sinews shoot, 

As he drank the juice of the calamus-root ; 

And now he treads the fatal shore 

As fresh and vigorous as before. 

Wrapped in musing stands the sprite ; 
'T is the middle wane of night ; 

His task is hard, his way is far. 
But he must do his errand right 

Ere dawning mounts her beamy car, 
And rolls her chariot wheels of light ; 
And vain are the spells of fairy-land, — 
He must work with a human hand. 

He cast a saddened look around ; 

But he felt new joy his bosom swell. 
When, glittering on the shadowed ground, 

He saw a purple muscle-shell ; 
Thither he ran, and he bent him low, 
He heaved at the stern and he heaved at the bow. 
And he pushed her over the yielding sand 
Till he came to the verge of the haunted land. 
She was as lovely a pleasure-boat 

As ever fairy had paddled in, 
For she glowed with purple paint without, 

And shone with silvery pearl within ; 



A sculler's notch in the stern he made, 
An oar he shaped of the bootle-blade ; 
Then sprung to his seat with a lightsome leap, 
And launched afar on the calm, blue deep. 

The imps of the river yell and rave. 

They had no power above the wave ; 

But they heaved the billow before the prow, 

And they dashed the surge against her side, 
And they struck her keel with jerk and blow, 

Till the gunwale bent to the rocking tide. 
She wimpled about to the pale moonbeam. 
Like a feather that floats on a wind-tossed stream ; 
And momently athwart her track 
The quarl upreared his island back, 
And the fluttering scallop behind would float. 
And patter the water about the boat ; 
But he bailed her out with his colen-bell, 

And he kept her trimmed with a wary tread, 
While on every side, like lightning, fell 

The heavy strokes of his bootle-blade. 

Onward still he held his way, 

Till he came where the column of mooi\shine lay. 

And saw beneath the surface dim 

The brown-backed sturgeon slowly swim ; 

Around him were the goblin train, — 

But he sculled with all his might and main. 

And followed wherever the sturgeon led, 

Till he saw him upward ponit his head ; 

Then he dropped his paddle-blade, 

And held his colen-goblet up 

To catch the drop in its crimson cup. 

With sweeping tail and quivering fin 

Through the wave the sturgeon flew, 
And, like the heaven-shot javelin, 

He sprung above the waters blue. 
Instant as the star-fall light 

He plunged him in the deep again. 
But he left an arch of silver bright, 

The rainbow of the moony main. 
It was a strange and lovely sight 

To see the puny goblin there ; 
He seemed an angel form of light, 

With azure wing and sunny hair. 

Throned on a cloud of purple fair. 
Circled with blue and edged with white, 
And sitting, at the fall of even, 
Beneath the bow of summer heaven. 

A moment, and its lustre fell ; 

But ere it met the billow blue 
He caught within his crimson bell 

A droplet of its sparkling dew ! — 
Joy to thee, fay ! thy task is done, 
Thy wings are pure, for the gem is won, — 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



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Cheeily ply thy dripping oar, 
And liaste away to tlie elfin shore. 

He turns, and, lo ! on either side 

The ripples on his path divide ; 

And the track o'er which his boat must pass 

Is smooth as a sheet of polished glass. 

Around, their limbs the sea-nyniphs lave, 

AVitli snowjr arms half swelling out, 
While on the glossed and gleaniy wave 

Their sea-green ringlets loosely float. 
They swim around with smile and song ; 

Tliey press the b.irk with pearly hand, 
And gently urge her course along 

Toward the beach of speckled sand. 

And, as he lightly leaped to land, 
They bade adieu with nod and bow ; 

Then gayly kissed each little hand. 
And dropped in the crystal deep below. 

A moment stayed the fairy there ; 

He kissed the beach and breathed a praj^er ; 

Then spread his wings of gilded blue. 

And on to the elfin court he flew. 

As ever ye saw a bubble rise. 

And shine with a thousand changing dyes. 

Till, lessening far, through ether driven, 

It mingles with the hues of heaven ; 

As, at the glimpse of morning pale, 

The lance-fly spreads his silken sail, 

And gleams with blendings soft and bright 

Till lost in the shades of fading night, — 

So I'ose from earth the lovely fay ; 

So vanished, far in heaven away ! 

* -K- ft •;;- * 

Up, fairy ! quit th}'^ chickweed bower, 
The cricket has called the second hour ; 
Twice again, and the lark will rise 
To kiss the streaking of the skies, — 
Up ! thy charmed armor don, 
Thou 'It need it ere the night be gone. 

He put his acorn helmet on ; 

It was plumed of the silk of the thistle-down ; 

The corselet plate that guarded his breast 

Was (mce the wild bee's golden vest ; 

His cloak, of a thousand mingled dyes. 

Was formed of the wings of butterflies ; 

His shield was the shell of a lady-bug queen, 

Studs of gold on a ground of green ; 

And the quivering lance which he brandished 

bright 
Was the sting of a wasp he had slain in fight. 
Swift he bestrode his firefly steed ; 

?Ie bared his blade of the bent-grass blue ; 
He drove his spurs of the cockle-seed, 

And away like a glance of thought he flew 



To skim the heavens, and follow far 
The fiery trail of the rocket-star. 

The moth-fly, as he shot in air. 

Crept under the leaf, and hid her there ; 

The katydid forgot its lay. 

The prowling gnat fled fast away. 

The fell mosquito checked his drone 

And folded his wings till the fay was gone. 

And the wily beetle dropped his head, 

And fell on the ground as if he were dead ; 

They crouched them close in the darksome shade, 

They quaked all o'er with awe and fear, 
For they had felt the blue-bent blade, 

And w-rithed at the prick of the elfin spear. 
Many a time, on a summer's night. 
When the sky was clear, and the moon was bright, 
They had been roused from the haunted ground 
By the yelp and bay of the fairy hound ; 

They had heard the tiny bugle-horn. 
They had heard the twang of the maize-silk string, 
When the vine-twig bows were tightly drawn, 

And the needle-shaft through air was borne, 
Feathered with down of the hum-bird's wing. ; 
And now they deemed the courier ouphe 

Some hunter-sprite of the elfin ground. 
And they watched till they saw him mount the roof 

That canopies the world around ; 
Then glad they left their covert lair, 
And freaked about in the midnight air. 

Up to the vaulted firmament 

His path the firefly courser bent, 

And at every gallop on the wind 

He flung a glittering spark behind ; 

He flies like a feather in the blast 

Till the first light cloud in heaven is past. 

But the shapes of air have begun their work. 
And a drizzly mist is round him cast ; 

He cannot see through the mantle murk ; 
He shivers with cold, but he urges fast ; 

Thi-ough storm and darkness, sleet and shade, 
He lashes his steed, and spurs amain, — 
For shadowy hands have twitched the rein. 

And flame-shot tongues around him played, 
And near him many a fiendish eye 
Glared with a fell malignity. 
And yells of rage, and shrieks of fear, 
Came screaming on his startled ear. 

His wings are wet around his breast. 
The plume hangs dripping from his crest, 
His eyes are blurred with the lightning's glare, 
And his ears are stunned with the thunder's blare. 
But he gave a shout, and his blade he drew, 

He thrust before and he struck behind, 
Till he pierced their cloudy bodies through, 

And gashed their shailowy limbs of wind : 



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845 



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Howling the misty spectres flew, 

They rend the air with frightful cries ; . 

For he has gained the welkin blue, 

And the land of clouds beneath him lies. 

Up to the cope careering swift, 

In breathless motion fast, 
Fleet as the swallow cuts the drift, 

Or the sea-roc rides the blast. 
The sapphire sheet of eve is shot, 

The sphered moon is past, 
The. earth but seems a tiny blot 

On a sheet of azure cast. 
0, it was sweet, in the clear moonlight. 

To tread the starry plain of even ! 
To meet the thousand eyes of night. 

And i'eel the cooling breath of heaven ! 
But the elfin made no stop or stay 
Till he came to the bank of the Milky "Way ; 
Then he checked his courser's foot, 
And watched for the glimpse of the planet-shoot. 

Sudden along the snow}'' tide 

That swelled to meet their footsteps' fall, 
The sylphs of heaven were seen to glide, 

Attired in sunset's crimson pall ; 
Around the fay they weave the dance. 

They skip before him on the plain. 
And one has taken his wasp-sting lance, 

And one upholds his bridle-rein ; 
With warblings wild they lead him on 
To where, through clouds of amber seen. 
Studded with stars, resplendent shone 

The palace of the S5'lphid queen. 
Its spiral columns, gleaming bright. 
Were streamers of the northern light ; 
Its curtain's light and lovely flush 
Was of the morning's rosy blush ; 
And the ceiling fair that rose aboon. 
The white and feathery fleece of noon. 

But, 0, how fair the shape that lay 

Beneath a rainbow bending bright ! 
She seemed to the entranced fay 

The loveliest of the forms of light ; 
Her mantle was the purple rolled 

At twilight in the west afar ; 
'T was tied with threads of dawning gold, 

And buttoned with a sparkling star. 
Her face was like the lily roon 

That veils the .vestal planet's hue ; 
Her eyes, two beamlets from the moon. 

Set floating in the welkin blue. 
Her hair is like the sunn)' beam. 
And the diamond gems which round it gleam 
Are the pure drops of dewy even 
That ne'er have left their native heaven. 



She raised her eyes to the wondering sprite. 

And they leaped with smiles ; for well I ween 
Never before in the bowers of light 

Had the form of an earthly fay been seen. 
Long she looked in his tiny face ; 

Long with his butterfly cloak she played ; 
She smoothed his wings of azure lace, 

And handled the tassel of his blade ; 
And as he told, in accents low, 
The story of his love and woe. 
She felt new pains in her bosom rise, 
And the tear-drop steirted in her eyes. 
And "0, sweet spirit of earth," she cried, 

" Return no more to your woodlan<l height, 
But ever here with me abide 

In the land of everlasting light ! 
Within the fleecy drift we '11 lie, 

We '11 hang upon the rainbow's rim ; 
And all the jewels of the sky 

Around thy brow shall brightly beam ! 
And thou shalt bathe thee in the stream 

That rolls its whitening foam aboon. 
And ride upon the lightning's gleam, 

And dance upon the orbed moon ! 
We'll sit within the Pleiad ring. 

We '11 rest on Orion's starry belt. 
And I will bid my sylphs to sing 

The song that makes the dew-mist melt ; 
Their hai'ps are of the umber shade 

That hides the blush of waking day. 
And every gleamy string is made 

Of silvery moonshine's lengthened ray ; 
And thou shalt j^illow on my breast, 

While heavenly breathings float around, 
And, with the sylphs of ether blest. 

Forget the joys of fairy ground." 

She was lovely and fair to see. 

And the elfin's heart beat fitfully ; 

But lovelier far, and still more fair. 

The earthly form imprinted there ; 

Naught he saw in the heavens above 

Was half so dear as his mortal love, 

For he thought upon her looks so meek, 

And he thought of the light flush on her cheok. 

Never again might he bask and lie 

On that sweet cheek and moonlight eye ; 

But in his dreams her form to see. 

To clasp her in his revery, 

To think upon his virgin bride, 

W<is worth all heaven, and earth beside. 

" Lady," he cried, " I have sworn to-night. 

On the word of a fairy knight, 

To do my sentence-task aright ; 

My honor scarce is free from stain, — 

I may not soil its snows again ; 



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Betide me weal, betide me woe, 
Its mandate must be answered now." 
Her bosom heaved with many a sigh, 
The tear was in her drooping eye ; 
But she led him to the palace gate, 

And called the sylphs who hovered there, 
And bade them fly and bring him straight, 

Of clouds condensed, a sable car. 
With charm and spell she blessed it there, 
Fi'om all the fiends of upper air ; 
Then round him cast the shadowy shroud, 
And tied his steed behind the cloud ; 
And pressed his hand as she bade him fly 
Far to the verge of the northern sky. 
For by its wane and wavering light 
There was a star would fall to-night. 

Borne afar on the wings of the blast, 
Northward away he speeds him fast, 
And his courser follows the cloudy wain 
Till the hoof-strokes fall like pattering rain. 
The clouds roll backward as he flies, 
Each flickering star behind him lies, 
And he has reached the northern plain. 
And backed his firefly steed again. 
Ready to follow in its flight 
The streaming of the rocket-liglit. 

The star is yet in the vault of heaven, 

But it rocks in the summer gale ; 
And now 't is fitful and uneven, 

And now 't is deadly pale ; 
And now 't is wrapped in sulphur-smoke. 

And quenched is its rayless beam ; 
And now with a rattling thunder-stroke 

It bursts in flash and flame. 
As swift as the glance of the aiTowy lance 

That the storm-sj)irit flings from high. 
The star-shot flew o'er the welkin blue. 

As it fell fi'om the sheeted sky. 
As swift as the wind in its train behind 

The elfin gallops along : 
The fiends of the clouds are bellowing loud, 

But the sylphid charm is strong ; 
He gallops unhurt in the shower of fire, 

While the cloud-fiends fly from the blaze ; 
He watches each flake till its sparks expire. 

And rides in the light of its rays. 
But he drove his steed to the lightning's speed, 

And caught a glimmering spark ; 
Then wheeled around to the fairy ground. 

And sped through the midnight dark. 
***** 

Ou[)he and goblin ! imp and sprite ! 

Elf of eve ! and starry fay ! 
Ye that love the moon's soft light, 

Hither, — hither wend your way ; 



Twine ye in a jocund ring, 

Sing and trip it merrily, 
Hand to hand, and wing to wing, 

Round the wild witch-hazel tree. 

Hail the wanderer again 

With dance and song, and lute and lyre ; 
Pure his wing and strong his chain, 

And doubly bright his fairy fire. 
Twine ye in an airy round. 

Brush the dew and print the lea ; 
Skip and gambol, hop and bound, 

Round the wild witch-hazel tree. 

The beetle guards our holy ground, 

He flies about the haunted place. 
And if mortal there be found. 

He hums in his ears and flaps his face ; 
The leaf-harp sounds our roundelay, 

The owlet's eyes our lanterns be ; 
Thus we sing and dance and play 

Round the wild witch-hazel tree. 

But hark ! from tower to tree-top high. 

The sentry-elf his call has made ; 
A streak is in the eastern sky. 

Shapes of moonlight ! flit and fade ! 
The hill-tops gleam in morning's spring, 
The skylark shakes his dappled wing, 
The day -glimpse glimmers on the lawn, 
The cock has crowed, and the fays are gone. 

Joseph Rodman Drake. 



FAIRY SONG. 

Shed no tear ! 0, shed no tear ! 
The flower will bloom another year. 
Weep no more ! 0, weep no more ! 
Young buds sleep in the root's white core. 
Dry your eyes ! 0, dry your eyes ! 
For I was taught in Paradise 
To ease my breast of melodies, — 

Shed HO tear. 

Overhead ! look overhead ! 
'Mong the blossoms white and red, — 
Look up, look up ! I flutter now 
On this fresh pomegranate bough. 
See me ! 't is tliis silvery bill 
Ever cures the good man's ill, 
Shed no tear ! 0, shed no tear ! 
The flower will bloom another year. 
Adieu, adieu — I fly — adieu ! 
I vanish in the heaven's blue, — 

Adieu, adieu ! 

JOHN KEATa 



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847 



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FAREWELL TO THE FAIRIES. 

Farewell rewards and fairies, 

Good housewifes now may say, 
For now foul sluts in dairies 

Do fare as well as they. 
And though they sweep their hearths no less 

Than maids were wont to do, 
Yet who of late, for cleanliness, 

Finds sixpence in her shoe ? 

Lament, lament, old Abbeys, 

The fairies' lost command : 
They did but change priests' babies. 

But some have changed your land ; 
And all your children sprung from thence 

Are now grown Puritans, 
Who live as changelings ever since, 

For love of your domains. 

At morning and at evening both, 

You merry were and glad. 
So little care of sleep or sloth 

These pretty ladies had ; 
When Tom came home from labor, 

Or Cis to milking rose. 
Then merrily went their tabor. 

And nimbly went their toes. 

Witness those rings and roundelays 

Of theirs, which yet remain. 
Were footed in Queen Mary's days 

On many a grassy plain ; 
But since of late Elizabeth, 

And later, James came in. 
They never danced on any heath 

As when the time hath been. 

By which we note the fairies 

Were of the old profession. 
Their songs were Ave- Maries, 

Their dances were procession : 
But now, alas ! they all are dead, 

Or gone beyond the seas ; 
Or farther for religion fled. 

Or else they take their ease. 

A tell-tale in their company 

They never could endure. 
And whoso kept not secretly 

Their mirth, was punished sure ; 
It was a just and Christian deed, 

To pinch such black and blue : 

0, how the commonwealth doth need 

Such justices as you ! 

Richard Corbet. 



TAM O'SHANTER. 



" Of Brownyis and of Bogilis full is this Buke." 

Gawin Douglass. 

When chapman billies leave the street, 
And drouthy neebors neebors meet, 
As market-days are wearing late. 
An' folk begin to tak the gate ; 
While we sit bousing at the nappy. 
An' getting fou and unco happy, 
We think na on the lang Scots miles. 
The nlosses, waters, slaps, and styles. 
That lie between us and our hame, 
Whare sits our sulky, sullen dame. 
Gathering her brows like gathering storm, 
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm. 

This truth fand honest Tarn O'Shanter, 
As he frae Ayr ae night did canter 
(Auld Ayr, wham ne'er a town surpasses. 
For honest men and bonnie lasses). 

Tam ! hadst thou been but sae wise 
As taen thy ain wife Kate's advice ! 
She tauld thee weel thou was a skellum, 
A blethering, blustering, drunken blellum: 
That frae November till October, 
Ae market-day thou was na sober ; 
That ilka nielder, wi' the miller, 
Thou sat as lang as thou had siller ; 
That every naig was ca'd a shoe on. 
The smith and thee gat roaring fou on ; 
That at the L — d's house, ev'n on Sunday, 
Thou -drank wi' Kirton Jean till Monday. 
She prophesied that, late or soon. 
Thou would be found deep drowned in Doon ; 
Or catched wi' warlocks in the mirk. 
By AUoway's auld haunted kirk. 

Ah, gentle dames ! it gars me greet 
To think how monie counsels sweet. 
How monie lengthened sage advices. 
The husband frae the wife despises ! 
But to our tale : Ae market night 
Tam had got planted unco right, 
Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely, 
Wi' reaming swats, that drank divinely ; 
And at his elbow souter Johnny, 
His ancient, trusty, drouth}'- crony. 
Tam lo'ed him like a vera brither ; 
They had been fou for weeks thegither. 
The night drave on wi' sangs and clatter. 
And aye the ale was growing better ; 
The landlady and Tam grew gracious, 
Wi' favors secret, sweet, and precious ; 
The souter tauld his queerest stories ; 
The landlord's laugh was ready chorus ; 
The storm without might rair and rustle, 
Tam did na mind the storm a Avhistle. 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



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Care, mad to see a man sae happy, 
E'en drowned himself amang the nappy ; 
As bees flee hame wi' lades o' treasure, 
The minutes winged their way wi' pleasure ; 
Kings may be blest, but Tain was glorious. 
O'er a' the ills o' life victorious. 

But pleasures are like poppies spread ; 
You seize the flower, its bloom is shed ; 
Or like the snow-fall in the river, 
A moment white, — then melts forever ; 
Or like the borealis race, 
That flit ere you can point their place ; 
Or like the rainbow's lovely form 
Evanishing amid the storm. 
Nae man can tether time or tide ; 
The hour approaches Tarn maun ride ; 
That hour o' night's black arch the keystane. 
That dreary hour he mounts his beast in ; 
And sic a night he takes the road in 
As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in. 

The wind blew as 't wad blawn its last ; 
The rattling showers rose on the blast ; 
The speedy gleams the darkness swallowed ; 
Loud, deep, and lang the thunder bellowed ; 
That night a child might understand 
The Deil had business on his hand. 

Weel mounted on his gray mare, Meg, 
(A better never lifted leg,) 
Tam skelpit on thro' dub and mire, 
Despising wind a.nd rain and fire, — 
Whyles holding fast his guid blue bonnet, 
"Whyles crooning o'er some auld Scots sonnet, 
"Whyles glowering round wi' prudent cares. 
Lest bogles catch him unawares ; 
Kirk-Alloway was drawing nigh, 
Whare ghaists and houlets nightly cry. 

By this time he was cross the ford, 
Whare in the snaw the chapman smoored ; 
And past the birks and meikle stane, 
Whare drunken Charlie brak 's neck-bane ; 
And through the whins, and by the cairn, 
Whare hunters fand the murdered bairn ; 
And near the thorn, aboon the well, 
Whare Mungo's mither hanged hersel'. 
Before him Doon pours all his floods ; 
The doubling storm roars through the woods ; 
The lightnings flash from pole to pole ; 
Near and more near the thunders roll ; 
When, glimmering through the groaning trees, 
Kirk-Alloway seemed in a bleeze 1 
Through ilka bore the beams were glancing, 
And loud resounded mirth and dancing. 

Inspiring bold John Barleycorn ! 
What dangers thou canst make us scorn I 
Wi' tippenny we fear nae evil ; 
Wi' usquebae we '11 fiice the Devil ! — 
The swats sae reamed in Tammie's noddle, 



Fair play, he cared na Deils a bodle. 

But Maggie stood right sair astonished. 

Till, by the heel and hand admonished, 

She ventured forward on the light ; 

And, wow ! Tam saw an unco sight ! 

Warlocks and witches in a dance : 

Nae cotillon brent new frae France, 

But hornpipes, jigs, strathspeys, and reels 

Put life and mettle in their heels. 

A winnock-bunker in the east. 

There sat auld Nick, in shape o' beast, — 

A towzie tyke, black, grim, and large, — 

To gie them nmsic was his charge ; 

He screwed the pipes and gart them skirl 

Till roof an' rafters a' did dirl. 

Coffins stood round like open presses. 

That shawed the dead in their last dresses ; 

And by some devilish cantrip sleight. 

Each in its cauld hand held a light, — ■ 

By which heroic Tam was able 

To note, upoa the haly table, 

A murderer's banes, in gibbet aims ; 

Twa span-lang, wee, unchristened bairns ; 

A thief, new cutted frae a rape, 

Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape ; 

Five tomahawks, wi' bluid red rusted ; 

Five scymitars, wi' murder crusted ; 

A garter, which a babe had strangled ; 

A knife, a father's throat had mangled, 

Whom his ain son o' life bereft, • — 

The gray hairs yet stack to the heft ; 

Three lawyers' tongues turned iirside out, 

Wi' lies seamed like a beggar's clout ; 

And priests' hearts, rotten, black as nmck, 

Lay stinking, vile, in every neuk : 

Wi' mair o' horrible and awfu' 

Which even to name wad be unlawfu'. 

As Tammie glowered, amazed and curious, 
The mirth and fun grew fast and furious ; 
The piper loud and louder blew ; 
The dancers quick and quicker flew ; 
They reeled, they set, they crossed, they cleekit. 
Till ilka carlin swat and reekit. 
And coost her duddies to the wark, 
And linket at it in her sark ! 

Now Tam, Tam ! had they been queans, 
A' plump and strapping in their teens : 
Their sarks, instead of creeshie flannen, 
Been snaw-white seventeen-hunder linen ; 
Thir breeks o' mine, my only pair. 
That ance were plush, o' guid blue hair, 
I wad hae gi'en them aff' my hurdles 
For ae blink o' the bonnie burdies ! 

But withered beldams, auld and droll, 
Rigwoodie hags wad spean a foal, 
Lowping an' flinging on a crnmmock, — 
I wonder didna turn thy stomach. 



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But Tarn keiin'd what was what fu' brawlie. 
There was ae winsome wench and walie. 
That night inlisted in the core 
( Lang after kenn'd on Cai-rick shore ; 
For nionie a beast to dead she shot, 
And perished nionie a bonnie boat, 
And shook baith meikle corn and beai', 
And kept the country-side in fear). 
Her cutty-sark o' Paisley harn, 
That while a lassie she had worn, 
In longitude though sorely scanty, 
It was her best, and she was vaunty. — 
Ah ! little kenned thy reverend grannie 
That sark she coft for her wee Nannie 
Wi' tAva pund Scots ('t was a' her riches) 
"Wad ever graced a dance o' witches ! 

But here my Muse her wing maun cower, 
Sic flights are far beyond her power ; 
To sing how Nannie lap and Hang 
(A souple jade she was and Strang), 
And how Tam stood like ane bewitched, 
And thought his very een enriched. 
Ev'n Satan glowered, and fidged fu' fain, 
And hotehcd and blew wi' might and main ; 
Till first ae caper, syne anither, — 
Tain tint his reason a' thegither. 
And roars out, " Weel done, Cutty-sark ! " 
And iu an instant a' was dark ; 
And scarcely had he Maggie rallied. 
When out the hellish legion sallied. 

As bees bizz out wi' angry fyke. 
When plundering herds assail their byke ; 
As open pussie's mortal foes. 
When, pop ! she starts before their nose ; 
As eager runs the market-crowd, 
When Catch the thief/ resounds aloud ; 
So Maggie runs, — the witches follow, 
Wi' nionie an eldritch skreech and hollow. 

Ah, Tam ! ah, Tam ! thou '11 get thy fairin' ! 
In hell they '11 roast thee like a herrin ! 
In vain thy Kate awaits thy comin' — 
Kate soon will be a woefu' woman ! 
Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg, 
And win the key-stane of the brig ; 
There at them thou thy tail may toss, — 
A running stream they dare na cross. 
But ere the key-stane she could make, 
The lient a tail she had to shake ; 
For Nannie, far before the rest. 
Hard upon noble Maggie prest. 
And flew at Tam wi' furious ettle : 
But little wist she Maggie's mettle, — 
Ae spring brought afif her master hale. 
But left behind her ain gray tail : 
The caiiin claught her by the rump. 
And left poor Maggie scarce a stump. 



Now, wha this tale o' truth shall read, 
Ilk man and mother's son take heed ; 
Whene'er to drink you are inclined. 
Or cutty-sarks run iu your mind. 
Think, ye may buy the joys o'er dear, 
Eeniember Tam O'Shanter's mare. 

ROBERT BUR.NS, 



THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN. 

Hamelin Town 's in Brunswick, 
By famous Hanover City ; 

The river Weser, deep and wide. 

Washes its wall on the southern side ; 
A pleasanter spot you never spied ; 
But when begins my ditty. 

Almost five hundred years ago, 

To see the townsfolk suffer so 
From vermin was a pity. 

Eats! 
They fought the dogs, and killed the cats, 

And bit the babies in the cradles. 
And ate the cheeses out of the vats. 

And licked the soup from the cook's own ladles. 
Split open the kegs of salted sprats. 
Made nests inside men's Sunday hats. 
And even spoiled the women's chats, 
By drowning their speaking 
With shrieking and squeaking 
In fifty different sharps and flats. 

At last the people in a body 

To the Town Hall came flocking : 
" 'T is clear," cried they, "our Mayor 's a noddy ; 

And as for our Corporation, — shocking 
To think we buy gowns lined with ermine 
For dolts that can't or won't determine 
What 's best to rid us of our vermin ! " 
At this the Mayor and Corporation 
Quaked with a mighty consternation. 

An hour they sate in counsel, — 
At length the Mayor broke silence : 

" For a guilder I 'd my ermine gown sell ; 
I wish I were a mile hence ! 

It 's easy to bid one rack one's brain, — 

I 'm sure my poor head aches again. 

I 've scratched it so, and all in vain. 

for a trap, a trap, a trap ! " 

Just as he said this, what should hap 

At the chamber door but a gentle tap ? 

" Bless us," cried the Mayor, "what 's tliat ? " 

" Come in ! " — the Mayor cried, looking bigger ; 

And in did come the strangest figure ; 

He advanced to the council-table : 

And, " Please your honors," said he, " 1 'm able, 



^ 



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850 



POEMS OF FANCY. 



-Si 



By means of a secret cliarm, to draw 
All creatures living beneath the sun, 
That creep or swim or fly or run, 
After me so as you never saw ! 

Yet," said he, "poor piper as I am, 
In Tartary I freed the Cham, 
Last June, from his huge swarm of gnats ; 
I eased in Asia the Nizam 
Of a monstrous brood of vampire-bats ; 
And as for what your brain bewilders, — 
If I can rid your town of rats, 
Will you give me a thousand guilders '! " 
" One ? fifty thousand ! " was the exclamation 
Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation. 

Into the street the piper stept, 

Smiling first a little smile. 
As if he knew what magic slept 

In his quiet pipe the while ; 
Then, like a musical adept, 
To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled, 
And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled. 
Like a candle flame where salt is sprinkled ; 
And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered, 
You heard as if an army muttered ; 
And the muttering grew to a grumbling ; 
And the grumbling grew to a mighty rumbling ; 
And out of the houses the rats came tumbling. 
Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats, 
Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny rats, 
Gi'ave old plodders, gay young friskers. 

Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins, 
Coclving tales and pricking whiskers ; 

Families by tens and dozens. 
Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives, — 
Followed the piper for their lives. 
From street to street he piped advancing, 
And step for step they followed dancing. 
Until they came to the river Weser, 
Wherein all plunged and })erished 
■ Save one who, stout as Julius Ca3sar, 
Swam across and lived to carry 
(As he the manuscript he cherished) 
To Eat-land home his commentary. 
Which was : " At the first shrill notes of the pipe, 
I heard a sound as of scraping tripe, 
And putting apples, wondrous ripe. 
Into a cider-press's gripe, — ■ 
And a moving away of piekle-tub-boards. 
And a leaving ajar of conserve-cupboards. 
And a drawing the corks of train-oil-flasks. 
And a breaking the hoops of butter-casks ; 
And it seemed as if a voice 
(Sweeter far than by hai'j) or by psaltery 
Is breathed) called out, rats, rejoice ! 
The world is grown to one vast diysaltery ! 
So munch on, crunch on, take your imncheon, 



Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon ! 

And JKst as a bulky sugar-puncheon, 

Already staved, like a great sun shone 

Glorious scarce an inch before me, 

Just as methought it said. Come, bore me ! — 

I found the Weser rolling o'er me." 

You should have heard the Hainelin people 
Ringing the bells till they rocked the steeple ; 
' 'Go," cried the Mayor, " and get long poles ! 
Poke out the nests and block uj) the holes ! 
Consult with carpenters and builders, 
And leave in our town not even a trace 
Of the rats ! " — when suddenly, up the face 
Of the piper perked in the market-place. 
With a " First, if you please, my thousand guil- 
ders ! " 

A thousand guilders ! the Mayor looked blue; 

So did the Corpoiation too. 

For council-dinners made rare havoc 

With Claret, Moselle, Vin-de-Grave, Hock ; 

And half the money would replenish 

Their cellar's biggest butt with Rhenish. 

To pay this sum to a wandering fellow 

With a gypsy coat of red and yellow ! 

"Beside," quoth the Mayor, with a knowing 

wink, 
"Our business was done at the river's brink ; 
We saw with our eyes the vermin sink, 
And what 's dead can't come to life, I think. 
So, friend, we 're not the folks to shrink 
From the duty of giving you something to drink, 
And a matter of money to put in your poke ; 
But as for the guilders, what we spoke 
Of them, as you very well know, was in joke. 
Beside, our losses have made us thrifty ; 
A thousand guilders ! Come, take fifty ! " 

The piper's face fell, and he cried, 
"No trifling ! I can't wait ! beside, 
I 've promised to visit by dinner time 
Bagdat, and accept the prime 
Of the head cook's pottage, all he 's rich in. 
For having left, in the Caliph's kitchen. 
Of a nest of scorpions no survivor, — 
With him I proved no bargain-driver ; 
With you, don't think I '11 bate a stiver ! 
And folks who put me in a passion 
May find me pipe to another fashion." 

"How?" cried the Mayor, "d'ye think I'll 

brook 
Being worse treated than a cook ? 
Insulted by a lazy ribald 
With idle pipe and vesture piebald ? 
You threaten us, fellow ? Do your worst, 
Blow your pipe there till you burst ! " 



u 



a^ 



POEMS OF FANCY. 



i51 '— ' 



Once more he 3tept into the street ; 

And to his lips again 
Laid his long pipe of smooth straight cane ; 

And ere he blew three notes (such sweet 
Soft notes as j'et musician's cunning 

Never gave the enraptured air) 
There was a rustling that seemed like a bustling 
Of merry crowds justling at pitching and hustling; 
Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes clatter- 
ing. 
Little hands clapping, and little tongues chat- 
tering ; 
And, like fowls in a farm-yard when barley is 

scattering, 
Out came the children running : 
All the little boys and girls. 
With rosy csheeks and flaxen curls, 
And sparkling eyes and teeth like pearls, 
Tripping and skipping, ran merrily after 
The wonderful music with shouting and laughter. 

The Mayor was dumb, and the Council stood 
As if they were changed into blocks of wood, 
Unable to move a step, or cry 
To the children merrily skipping by, — 
And could only follow with the eye 
That joyous crowd at the piper's back. 
But how the Mayor was on the rack, 
And the wretched Council's bosoms beat, 
As the piper turned from the High Street 
To where the Weser rolled its waters 
Eight in the way of their sons and daughters ! 
However, he turned from south to west. 
And to Koppelberg Hill his steps addressed, 
And after him the children pressed ; 
Great was the joy in every breast. 
" He never can cross that mighty top ! 
He 's forced to let the piping drop, 
And we shall see our children stop ! " 
When, lo, as they reached the mountain's side, 
A wondrous portal opened wide, 
As if a cavern was suddenly hollowed ; 
And the jiiperadvanced and the children followed; 
And when all were in, to the very last. 
The door in the mountain-side shut fast. 
Did I say all ? No ! One was lame, 
And could not dance the whole of the way ; 
And in after years, if you would blame 
His sadness, he was used to sa3^ — 
"It's dull iu our town since my playmates left ! 
I can't forget that I 'm bereft. 
Of all the pleasant sights they see. 
Which the piper also promised me ; 
• For he led us, he said, to a joyous land, 
Joining the town and just at hand, 
Where waters gushed, and fruit-trees grew, 
And flowers put forth a fairer hue. 
And everything was strange and new ; 



The sparrows were brighter than peacocks here, 

And their dogs outran our fallow deer. 

And honey-bees had lost their stings. 

And horses were born with eagles' wings ; 

And just as I became assured 

My lame foot would be speedily cured, 

The music stopped and I stood still. 

And found myself outside the Hill, 

Left alone against my will. 

To go now limping as before. 

And never hear of that country more ! " 

ROBERT BROWNING. 



THE TOAD'S JOURNAL. 

[It is said that Belzoni, the traveller in Esjypt, discovered a liv- 
ing toad in a temple, which had been for ages buried in the sand.] 

In a land for antiquities greatly renowned 
A traveller had dug wide and deep under ground, 
A temple, for ages entombed, to disclose, — 
When, lo ! he disturbed, in its secret repose, 
A toad, from whose journal it plainly ai)pears 
It had lodged iu that mansion some thousands 

of years. 
The roll which this reptile's long history records, 
A treat to the sage antiquarian affords : 
The sense by obscure hieroglyphics concealed. 
Deep learning at length, with long labor, revealed. 
The first thousand years as a specimen take, — 
The dates are omitted for brevity's sake : 
" Crawled forth from some rubbish, and winked 

with one eye ; 
Half opened the other, but could not tell why ; 
Stretched out my left leg, as it felt rather queer, 
Then drew all together and slept for a year. 
Awakened, felt chilly, — crept uittler a stone ; 
Was vastly contented with living alone. 
One toe became wedged in the stone like a peg. 
Could not get it away, — had the cramp in my leg. 
Began half to wish for a neighbor at hand 
To loosen the stone, which was fast in the sand ; 
Pulled harder, then dozed, as I found 't was no 

use ; — 
Awoke the next summer, and lo ! it was loose. 
Crawled forth from the stone when completely 

awake ; 
Crept into a corner and grinned at a snake. 
Retreated, and found that I needed repose ; 
Curled up my damp limbs and prepared for a doze; 
Fell sounder to sleep than was usual before, 
And did not awake for a century or more ; 
But had a sweet dream, as I rather believe : 
Methought it was light, and a fine summer's eve; 
And I in some garden delieiously fed 
In the pleasant moist shade of a strawberry-bed. 
There fine speckled creatures claimed kindred 

with me. 
And others that hopped, most enchanting to see. 



t&^ 



^ 



cS-: 



852 



POEMS OP FANCY. 



-Qi 



Here long I regaled witli emotion extreme ; — 
Awoke, — disconcerted to find it a dream ; 
Grew pensive, — discovered that life is a load ; 
Began to get weaiy of being a toad ; 
Was fretful at first, and then shed a few tears " — 
Here ends the account of the first thousand years. 

MORAL. 

It seems that life is all a void, 
On selfish thoughts alone employed ; 
That length of days is not a good, 
Unless their use be understood. 

Jane Taylor. 



THE EAVEN, 

OxcE upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, 
weak and weary. 

Over many a cpiaint and curious volume of for- 
gotten loi'e, — 

Wliile I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there 
came a tapping. 

As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my 
chamber door. 

"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at 
my chamber door ; 
Only this, and nothing more." 

Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak 

December, 
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost 

upon the floor. 
Eagerly I wished the morrow ; vainly I had 

sought to borrow 
From my books surcease of sorrow, — sorrow for 

the lost Lenore, — 
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels 

named Lenore, — 
Nameless here forevermore. 

And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each 

]")urple curtain 
Thrilled me, — filled me with fantastic terrors 

never felt before ; 
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I 

stood repeating, 
" 'T is some visitor entreating entrance at my 

chamber door, — 
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my 

chamber door ; 
That it is, and nothing more." 

Presently my soul grew stronger ; hesitating then 
no longer, 

"Sir," said I, "or madam, truly your forgive- 
ness I implore ; 

But the fact is, I was napping, and so gently you 
came rapping, 



And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my 

chamber door. 
That I scarce was sure I heard you " — Here I 

opened wide the door ; 
Darkness there, and nothing more. 

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood 
there, wondering, fearing. 

Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared 
to dream before ; 

But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness 
gave no token. 

And the only word there spoken was the whis- 
pered word " Lenore ! " 

This I whispered, and an echo murmured back 
• the word ' ' Lenore ! " 
Merely this, and nothing more. 

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within 
me burning. 

Soon again I heard a tapping, something louder 
than before : 

"Surely," said J, "surely that is something at 
my window-lattice ; 

Let me see then what thereat is, and this mys- 
tery explore, — • 

Let my heart be still a moment, and this mj^stery 
explore ; — 
'Tis the wind, and nothing more." 

Open then I fiung the shutter, when, with many 

a flirt and flutter. 
In there step[)ed a stately raven of the saintly 

days of yore. 
Not the least obeisance made he ; not an instant 

stojiped or stayed he ; 
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above 

my chamber door, — ■ 
Perched upon a bust of Pallas, just above my 

chamber door, — ■ 
Perched, and sat, and nothing more. 

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into 
smiling. 

By the grave and stern decorum of the counte- 
nance it wore, 

"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," 
I said, "art sure no craven ; 

Ghastly, grim, and ancient raven, wandering 
from the nightly shore. 

Tell me what tliy lordly name is on the night's 
Plutonian shore ? " 
Quoth the raven, "Nevermore ! " 

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear 
discourse so plainly. 

Though its answer little meaning, little rele- 
vancy bore ; 



^ 



^ 



[&* 



POEMS OF FANCY. 



85 



KO ' — -» 



For we cannot help agreeing tliat no living hu- 
man being 

Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his 
chamber door, 

Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his 
chamber door, 
"With such name as " Nevermore ! " 

F)ut the raven, sitting lonel}' on the placid bust, 

spoke only 
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he 

did outpour. 
Nothing further then lie uttered, — not a feather 

then he Huttered, — 
Till I scarcely more than muttered, " Other 

friends have flown before, — 
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes 

have flown before." 
Then the bird said, '' Nevermore ! " 

Startled at the stillness, broken by reply so aptly 
spoken, 

"Doubtless," said T, "what it utters is its only 
stock and store. 

Caught from some unhappy master, whom un- 
merciful disaster 

Fo'lowed fast and followed faster, till his song 
one burden bore. 

Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy bur- 
den bore, — 
Of ' Nevermore, — nevermore ! ' " 

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into 

smiling, 
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of 

bird and bust and door. 
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself 

to linking 
Fancy imto fancy, thinking what this ominous 

bird of yore — ■ 
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and 

ominous bird of yore — ■ 
Meant in croaking " Nevermore ! " 

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable 
expressing 

To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into 
my bosom's core ; 

This and more I sat divining, with my head at 
ease reclining 

On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp- 
light gloated o'er. 

But whose velvet violet lining, with the lamp- 
light gloating o'er, 
Slie shall press — ah ! nevermore ! 

Then methought the air grew denser, perfumed 
from an unseen censer, 



Swung by seraphim, whose footfalls tinkled on 
the tufted floor. 

" Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee, — 
by these angels he hath sent thee 

Respite, — respite and nepenthe from the memo- 
ries of Lenore ! 

Quaff, 0, quaft' this kind nepenthe, and forget 
this lost Lenore ! " 
Quoth the raven, " Nevermore ! " 

"Prophet !" said I, "thing of evil ! — prophet 

still, if bird or devil ! 
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest 

tossed thee here ashore. 
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land 

enchanted, — 
On this home by horror haunted, — tell me truly, 

1 implore, — 
Is there — is there balm in Gilead ? — tell me, — 

tell me, I implore ! " 
Quoth the raven, "Nevermore ! " 

" Prophet ! " .said I, "thing of evil ! — prophet 

still, if bird or devil ! 
By that heaven that bends above us, — by that 

God we both adore. 
Tell this soul with sorrow laden, if, within the 

distant Aidenn, 
It shall clasp a sainted maiden, whom the angels 

name Lenore, 
Clasp a fair and radiant maiden, whom the angels 

name Lenore ! " 
Quoth tlie raven, "Nevermore !" 

"Be that word our sign of parting, bird or 

fiend ! " I shrieked, upstarting, — 
" Get thee back into the tempest and the night's 

Plutonian shore ! 
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thj' 

soul hath spoken ! 
Leave my loneliness unbroken ! — quit the bust 

above my door ! 
Take thy beak I'rom out my heart, and take thy 

form fiom off my door ! " 
Quoth the raven, "Nevermore !" 

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, 

still is sitting 
On the pallid bust of Pallas, just above my 

chamlier door ; 
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon 

that is dreaming, 
And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws 

his shadow on the floor ; 
And my soul from out that shadow that lies 

floatiuEC on the floor 



Shall be lifted — nevermore 



Edgar Allan Poe. 



^ 



fi" 



854 



POEMS OF FANCY. 



"Bj 



RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 



ding feast, 
and detain- 
eth one. 



An Ancient Jx is at! Ancieiit Manner, 

Mariner , ^ , 

meeteth And he stoppeth one oi three. 
lants'^Sidden '' By thy long gray beard and glittering 

to a wed- 

eye, 
Now wherefore stopp'st thou me ? 
The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide, 
And I am next of kin ; 
The guests are met, the feast is set, — 
Mayst hear the merry din." 

He holds him with his skinny hand : 

" There was a ship," quotir he. 

" Hold off ! unhand me, grayheard 

loon ! " — • 
Eftsoons his hand dropt he. 



The Wed- 
dini»-Guest 
is spell- 
bound by 
the eye of 
the old sea- 
faring man, 
and con- 
strained to 
hear his 
tale. 



He holds him with his glittering eye, — 
The Wedding-Guest stood still ; 
He listens like a three years' child ; 
The Mariner hath his will. 

The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone, — 
He cannot choose but hear ; 
And thus spake on that ancient man, 
The bright-eyed Mariner : 

** The ship was cheered, the harbor 

cleai'ed ; 
Merrily did we drop 
Below the kirk, below the hill, 
Below the light-house top. 



The Mari- The suH cams np npon the left, 

ner tells ■■ ^ 

how the Out of the sca came he ; 

somhwLni, And he shone bright, and on the right 

windlincT'^ Went down into the sea ; 

fair weather, 

reached the Higher and higher every day, 
hne. rpjji ^^^^, ^^le mast at noon — " 

TheWedding-Guest here beat his breast, 
For he heard the loud bassoon. 



The Wed- The Bride hath paced into the hall — 

ding-Guest . '■ 

heareth Red as a rosc is she ; 

music ; but Nodding their heads before her goes 

the Mariner r^, • i. i 

continueth Hie merry minstrelsy. 

his tale. 

The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast, 
Yet he cannot choose but hear ; 
And thus spake on that ancient man, 
The bright-eyed Mariner : 



With sloping masts and dipping prow — 
As who pursued with yell and blow 
Still treads the shadow of his foe, 
And forward bends his head — 
The ship drove fast ; loud roared the 

blast. 
And southward aye we fled. 

And now there came both mist and snow. 
And it grew wondrous cold ; 
And ice, mast-high, came floating by, 
As green as emerald. 

And through the drifts the snowy cliffs 1^^]^^%°^ 
Did send a disihal sheen ; fearful 

sounds, 

Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken — where no 

living thing 

The ice was all between. was to be 

seen. 

The ice was here, the ice was there. 

The ice was all around ; 

It cracked and growled, and roared and 

howled. 
Like noises in a swound ! 



The ship 
drawn by a 



ward the 
south pole. 



"And now the Storm-blast came, and he 
AVas tyrannous and strong ; 
He .struck with liis o'ertaking wings, 
And chased us south along. 



Til! a ^eat 
sea-bird, 
called the 
Albatross, 
came 
tliroufjh 
the snow- 
fog, and was 
received 
■with great 
joy and hos- 
pitality. 



Albatross 
proveth a 
bird of good 
omen, and 
followeth 
the ship as it 
returned 
northward 
through fog 
and floating 



At length did cross an Albatross — 
Thorough the fog it came ; 
As if it had been a Christian soul. 
We hailed it in God's name. 

It ate the food it ne'er had eat. 
And round and round it flew. 
The ice did split with a thunder-fit ; 
The helmsman steered us through ! 

And a good south wind sprung up be- •^;{^1,|'°„'„*^ 

hind ; 
The Albatross did follow, 
And every day, for food or play. 
Came to the mariners' hollo ! 

In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud. 

It perched for vespers nine ; 

Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke 

white, 
Glimmered the white moonshine." 

"God save thee, Ancient Mariner ! MaHne"r1n"' 
From the fiends, that plague thee thus! — jiospiwwy 

' "^ ° killeth the 

Why look'st thou so?" — "With my pious bird of 

■' good omen. 

cross-bow 
I shot the Albatross. 

PAKT II. 

The Sun now rose upon the right : 
Out of the sea came he. 
Still hid in mist, and on the left 
Went down into the sea. 

And the good south wind still blew 

behind, 
But no sweet bird did follow, 



©-- 



^ 



Nor an}' day, foi- food or play, 
Came to the mariners' hollo ! 



And I had done an hellish thing, 



His ship- 
mates cry 

°he xSJIe nt ^^^ ^^ wouM worlc 'em woe : 
minflhl" ^°^' ^^^ averred, I had killed the bird 
bird of good That made the breeze to blow. 



^luck 



Ah wretch ! said they, the bird to slay. 
That made the breeze to blow ! 



Nor dim nor red, like God's own head 



But when 
the fotr 

they ju'stlf; "^^^^ glorious Suu iipnst : 

^ci'thus' ^^^*^" ^^^ averred, I had killed the bird 

maive them- That brought the fog and mist. 

selves ac- ,„ . , ■ -, ■, 

complices in i was right,said the}', such birdsto slav. 

tao crime. mi . i • , i /. , . '' 

ihat bring the .fog and mist. 

br'lelfcon- The fairbreezeblew, the whitefoam flew, 
ship'lriterl '^^^ ^""'o^'^ followed free ; 

Oc^ea^n.'and ^^^ ^'^"'^ ^^'^° ^^'^^ ^^1^* ^Ver burst 

sails iiirtii- Into that silent sea. 

ward, even 

till it reaches the line. 



The ship- 
mates, in 
their sore 
distress, 
would fain 
throw the 
whole guilt 
on the An- 
cient Mari- 
ner : in sign 
whereof 
they hang 
the dead 
sea-bird 
round his 
neck. 



The Ancient 
Mariner be- 
holdeth a 
sign in the 
element afar 
off. 



The ship 
hath been 
suddenly 
becalmed : 



Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt 

down, — 
'T was sad as sad could be ; 
And we did speak only to break 
The silence of the sea. 

All in a hot and copper sky 
The bloody Sun, at noon, 
Right up above the mast did stand, 
No bigger than the Moon. 

Day after day, day after day. 

We stuck, — nor breath nor motion ; 

As idle as a painted ship 

Upon a painted ocean. 

Water, water everywhere, 

belvenged. ^"^^ "^^ *^^*' ^o'^^''^^ '^^'-^ shrink ; 
Water, water everywhere, 
Nor any drop to drink. 

The very deep did rot : Christ ! 
That ever this should be ! 
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs 
Upon the slimy sea ! 

About, about, in reel and rout. 
The death-lires danced at night ; 
The water, like a witch's oils. 
Burnt green, and blue, and white. 



and the 
Albatross 



A Spirit 
had fol- 
lowed tliem 
one of 
tlie invisi- 
ble inhabit- 
ants of this 
planet, 

Tew^''n.lT^"=na?l"'^V°; ^"-^^^' -^""cerning whom the learned 
Jew osephus and the Platonic Constantinopolitan, Michael Psellus 
I!i?Jl „*" consulted, rhey are very numerous, and there is no cli- 
mate or element without one or more. 



And some in dreams asisured were 
: Of the Spirit that plagued us so ; 
Nine fathom deep he had followed us 
From the land of mist and snow. 



And every tongue, through utter 

drought. 
Was withered at the root ; 
We could not speak, no more than if 
We had been choked with soot. 

Ah ! well-a-day ! what evil looks 
Had I from old and young ! 
Instead of the cross the Albatross 
About my neck was hung. 

PART III. 

There passed a weary time. Each 

throat 
Was parched, and glazed each eye — 
A weary time ! a weary time ! 

How glazed each Aveary eye ! 

When, looking westward, I beheld 
A something in the sky. 

At first it seemed a little speck, 
And then it seemed a mist ; 
It moved and moved, and took at last 
A certain shape, I wist — 

A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist ! 
And still it neared and neared ; 
As if it dodged a water-sprite. 
It plunged and tacked and veered. 

With throats unslaked, with black lips At its near- 
baked er approach 
'-''^'^"-'^> itscemeth 

We could nor laugh nor wail ; shi^!, fand at 

Through utter drought all dumb we Lm ie""" 

stood ! freeth his 

T 1 -i T 11, speech from 

1 bit my arm, I sucked the blood, "ic bonds of 

And cried, ' A sail ! a sail ! ' 

With throats unslaked, with black lips 

baked. 
Agape they heard me call ; 
Gramercy ! they for joy did grin. 
And all at once their breath drew in, A flash of 
As they were drinking all. ^°^' 

'See ! see !' I cried, 'she tacks no more ! And horror 
Hither to work us weal — canTbe a°' 

sliip that 
comes on- 
ward with- 
out wind or 
tide? 



^ 



Without a breeze, without a tide. 
She steadies with upright keel ! ' 

The western wave was all a-flame 
The day was well nigh done ; 
Almost uyion the western Avave 
Rested the broad bright sun, 
When that strange shnpe drove suddenly 
Betwixt us and the Sun. 



And straight the Sun was flecked with it seemcth 

linvo him but the 

-^''^■^> skeleton of 

(Heaven's Mother ,send us gi-ace ! ) "^'"p- 



^ 



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856 



POEMS OF FANCY. 



"*~B] 



As if tlirougli a dungeon-gi-ate he peered 
With broad and burning face. 

Alas ! thought I — and my heart beat 

loud — 
How fast she nears and nears ! 
Are those her sails thatglanceinthe sun, 
Like restless gossameres ? 

And its ribs ^ye those her ribs through which the Sun 

nra seen as i i o 

bars on the Did peer, as through a grate ? 

face of the , , . ,i , n i n 

setting sun. And IS that woman all her crew i 
tTe-woman Is that a death ? and are there two ? 
deatiwnate. Is Death that woman's mate ? 

and no otlier 

on board the skeleton ship. 

Her lips were red, her looks were free, 

HkecrTwf'' I^^^" ^°'='^^ ^^^''^ yellow as gold ; 

Her skin was as white as leprosy : 
The night-mare, Life-in-Dcath, was she. 
Who thicks man's blood with cold. 



Fffe.hv"'' The naked hulk alongside came, 
Death have ^,^^| i\iq twaiu Were Casting dice : 

diced for the ^ ^ 

ship's crew, ' The game is done. I 've won ! I ve 

and she (the *" , 

latter) win- WOn ! 

cient ivfari- Quoth shc, and whistles thrice. 



No twilight rpj g^^jj'g pjjjj Jipg . ll^Q g^fi,.g j.^^sl^ 0^1; . 

withni the -r ' ' 

courts of the At One Stride comes the dark ; 

With far-heard whisper, o'er the sea, 
Off shot the spectre-bark. 

A-' I'^VJ^'"' We listened and looked sideways up ! 

of the Moon, •' ^ 

Fear at ray heart, as at a cup ; 

My life-blood seemed to sip ! 

The stars were dim, and thick the night. 

The steersman's face by his lamp 

gleamed white ; 
From the sails the dew did drip — 
Till clombe above the eastern bar. 
The horned Moon, with one bright star 
Within the nether tip. 

one after q^q f^f(;p^. Q,-,g -[jy ^\^q star-doggcd Moon, 

anoihcr, ' -' _ ^o ' 

Too quick for groan or sigh, 

Each turned his face with a ghastly pang. 

And cursed me with his eye. 

his ship- Four times fifty living men 

mates drop i • i \ 

down dead. (And 1 heard nor sigh nor groan), 
With heavy tluiirip, a lifeless lump, 
Tliey dropped down one by one. 



But ufe-in- The souls did from their bodies fly, 

Death be- •' ' 

fjins her They fled to bliss or woe ! 

work on the ■ 

Ancient And every soul, it passed me by, 
Like the whizz of my cross-bow ! " 



Mariner. 



but the An- 
cient Mari- 
ner assureth 
liiinoftiis , 
bodily life, 
and pro- 
ceederh to 
relate his 
liorrible 
penance. 



He despis- 
etli the 
creatures of 
the calm ; 



and envieth 
that they 
should live, 
and so many 
lie dead. 



PAUT IV. 

"I FKAR thee. Ancient Mariner ! Jin^-oifett 

I fear thy skinny hand ! ["sffri't is'"" 

And thou art long, and lank, and talking to 

brown. 
As is the ribbed sea-sand. 

I fear thee and thy glittering eye, 
And thy skinny hand so brown." — 
"Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding- 
Guest ! 
This body dropt not down. 

Alone, alone, all, all alone. 
Alone on a wide, wide sea ! 
And never a saint took pity on 
My soul in agony. 

The many men so beautiful ! 

And they all dead did lie : 

And a thousand thousand slimy things 

Lived on ; and so did 1. 

I looked upon the rotting sea, 
And drew my eyes away ; 
I looked upon the rotting deck. 
And there the dead men lay. 

I looked to heaven, and tried to pray ; 
But, or ever a prayer had gusht, 
A wicked whisper came, and made 
My heart as dry as dust. 

I closed my lids, and kept them close, 

And the balls like pulses beat ; 

For the sky and the sea, and the sea 

and the sky, 
Lay like a load on my weary eye. 
And the dead were at my feet. 

' curse liveth 

Nor rot nor reek did they : [he eye of 

The look with which they looked on me the dead 

^ men. 

Had never passed away. 

An orphan's curse would drag to hell 

A spirit from on high ; 

But oh ! more horrible than that 

Is a curse in a dead man's eye ! 

Seven days, seven nights, I saw that 

curse, 
And vet I could not die. 



loneliness 
and fixed- 
ness he 
Softly she was going up, yeameth 

J n rt k ' towariis the 

journeying 
Moon, and 
ywhere 
_ __ blue sky brlongs to thein, and is their appointed rest, and their 
native country, and their own natural homes, whicli they enter 
unannounced, as lords tliat are certainly expected, and ye; there 
is a silent joy at their arrival. 



And nowhere did abide : 
she was going up. 
And a star or two beside — 

tlie stars that still sojourn, yet still move onward ; and 



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a 



Her beams bemocked the sultry main, 
Like April hoar-frost spread ; 
But where the ship's huge shadow lay 
The charmed water burnt alvvay, 
A still and awful red. 

"By the light Bevond the shadow of the ship 

of the Moon -^ 

he behold- I watched the water-snakes ; 
creatures of They moved iu tracks of shining white ; 
la\m!^^'^ And when they reared, the elfish light 
Fell off in hoary flakes. 

Within the shadow of the ship 

I watched their rich attire — 

Blue, glossy green, and velvet black. 

They coiled and swam ; and every track 

Was a flash of golden fire. 

J\fd Aek ^^VVJ living things ! no tongue 
happiness. Their bcauty might declare ; 

A spring of love gushed from my heart, 
t"em'fn te' Aud I blessed them unaware — 
heart. gui-g ^ly kind Saint took pity on me, 

And I blessed them unaware. 



The spell 
begins to 
break. 



The selfsame moment I could pray ; 
And from my neck so free 
The Albatross fell off, and sank 
Like lead into the sea. 



SLEEP ! it is a gentle thing. 
Beloved from pole to pole ! 
To Mary Queen the praise be given ! 
She sent the gentle sleep from heaven 
That slid into my soul. 

t^fe!Sr°^ The silly buckets on the deck, 
Mother the That had so long remained, 



Ancient 
Mariner i: 
refreshed 

with rain. And wlieu I awoke, it rained. 



I dreamt that they were filled with dew ; 



My lips were wet, my throat was cold. 
My garments all were dank ; 
Sure I had drunken in my dreams, 
And still my body drank. 

I moved, and could not feel my limbs 
I was so light — almost 
I thought that I had died in sleep, 
And was a blessed ghost. 

He heareth And soon I heard a roaring wind — • 

sounds and t^ j • i ^ 

seeth It Qitt uot come aucar ; 

sightKnd But with its sound it shook the sails, 

inZ°ky"' That were so thin and sere. 

and the ele- 

""^" ■ The upper air burst into life ; 

And a hundred fire-flags sheen. 
To and fro they were hurried about ; 



spired, and 
the ship 
moves on ; 



And to and fro, and in and out, 
The wan stars danced between. 

And the coming wind did roar more loud. 
And the sails did sigh like sedge ; 
And the rain poured down from one 

black cloud — 
The Moon was at its edge. 

The thick black cloud was cleft, and 

still 
The Moon was at its side ; 
Like waters shot from some high crag. 
The lightning fell with never a jag — - 
A river steep and wide. 

The loud wind never reached the ship, J/^^e shh 
Yet now the ship moved on ! 
Beneath the lightning and the Moon 
The dead men gave a groan. 

They groaned, they stirred, they all 

uprose — • 
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes ; 
It had been strange, even in a dream, 
To have seen those dead men rise. 

The helmsman steered, the ship moved 

on ; 
Yet never a breeze up blew ; 
The mariners all 'gan work the ropes. 
Where they were wont to do ; 
They raised their limbs like lifeless 

tools — 
We were a ghastly crew. 

The Body of my brother's son 
Stood by me, knee to knee : 
The Body and I pulled at one rope. 
But he said naught to me." 



" I fear thee. Ancient Mariner ! " 
" Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest ! 
'T was not those souls that fled in pain, 
Which to their corses came again, 
But a troop of spirits blest : 

For when it dawned — they dropped 

their arms. 
And clustered round the mast ; 
Sweet sounds rose slowly through their 

mouths, 
And from their bodies passed. 

Around, around, flew each sweet sound, 
Then darted to the Sun ; 
Slowly the sounds came back again, 
Now mixed, now one by one. 



but not by 
the souls of 
the men, nor 
by daemons 
of earth or 
middle air, 
but by a 
blessed 
troop of 
angelic spir- 
itsisent 
down by the 
invocation 
of the guar- 
dian saint. 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



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Sometimes a-dropping from the sky, 
I heard the skylark sing ; 
Sometimes all little birds that are, 
How they seemed to fill the sea and air 
With their sweet jargoning ! 

And now 't was like all instruments, 
Now like a lonely flute ; 
And now it is an angel's song 
That makes the heavens be mute. 

It ceased ; yet still the sails made on 

A pleasant noise till noon, 

A noise like of a hidden brook 

In the leafy month of June, 

That to the sleeping woods all night 

Singeth a quiet tune. 

Till noon we quietly sailed on, 
Yet never a breeze did breathe : 
Slowly and smoothly went the ship, 
Moved onward from beneath. 



The lone- Under the keel nine fathom deep, 

some spirit , , i /. ■ , i 

from the From the land ot mist and snow, 

carries'^oif The Spirit slid : and it was he 

the ship as 



op, but 



The Polar 
Spirit's fel- 
low-dae- 
mons, the 
invisible in- 
habitants of 
the element, 
take part in 
his wrongs ; 
and two of 
them relate, 
one to the 
other, that 

f)enance 
on gaud 
heavy for 
the Ancient 
Marinerhath 
been accord- 
ed to the 
Polar Spirit, 
who return- 
eth south- 
ward. 



And the ship stood still also. 

The Sun, right up above the mast, 
Had fixed her to the ocean : 
But in a minute she 'gan stir, 
With a short uneasy motion — 
Backwards and forwards half her length 
With a short uneasy motion. 

Then like a pawing horse let go. 
She made a sudden bound : 
It flung the blood into my head 
And I fell down in a swound. 

How long in that same fit I lay, 
I have not to declare ; 
But ere my living life returned, 
I heard, and in my soul discerned 
Two voices in the air. 

' Is it he ? ' quoth one, ' Is this the man? 
By Him who died on cross, 
With his cruel bow he laid full low 
The harmless Albatross ! 

The Spirit who bideth by himself 
In the land of mist and snow, 
He loved the bird that loved the man 
Who shot him with his bow. ' 



The other was a softer voice, 

As soft as honey-dew : 

Quoth he, ' The man hath penance done, 

And penance more will do.' 



FIRST VOICE. 

* But tell me, tell me ! speak again, 
Thy soft response renewing — ■ 
What makes that ship drive on so fast ? 
AVhat is the ocean doing ?' 

SECOND VOICE. 

' Still as a slave before his lord, 
The ocean hath no blast ; 
His great bright eye most silently 
Up to the Moon is cast — 

If he may know which way to go ; 
For she guides him smooth or grim. 
See, brother, see ! how graciously 
She looketh down on him.' 

FIRST VOICE. 

' But why drives on that ship so fast, 
Without or Avave or wind ? ' 

SECOND VOICE. 

' The air is cut away before. 
And closes from behind. 



Fly, brother, fly ! more high, more high 
Or we shall be belated ; 
For slow and slow that ship will go, 
When the Mariner's trance is abated.' 



TheMa..-., 
hath been 
cast into a 
trance ; for 
the aui^elic 
power caus- 
eth the ves- 
sel to drive 
northward 
faster than 
human life 
could en- 
dure. 



I woke, and we were sailing on 

As in a gentle weather ; 

'T was night, calm night — 

was high ; 
The dead men stood together 



The super- 
natural mo- 
tion is re- 
tarded ; the 
the moon Mariner 

awakes, and 
his penance 
begins 



All stood together on the deck, 
For a charnel-dungeon fitter ; 
All fixed on me their stony eyes. 
That in the Moon did glitter. 

The pang, the curse, with which they 

died. 
Had never passed away ; 
I could not draw my eyes from theirs, 
Nor turn them up to pray. 

And now this spell was snapt; once more J^^i^y" 
I viewed the ocean green, '"'=''• 

And looked far forth, yet little saw 
Of what had else been seen — 

Like one that on a lonesome road 
Doth walk in fear and dread, 



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859 



a 



Ajid, having once turned round, walks 

on, 
And turns no more his head ; 
Because he knows a frightful fiend 
Doth close behind him tread. 

But soon there hreathed a wind on me, 
Nor sound nor motion made ; 
Its path was not upon the sea, 
In ripple or in shade. 

It raised my hair, it fanned my cheek, 
Like a meadow-gale of Spring — 
It mingled strangely with my fears. 
Yet it felt like a welcoming. 

Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship. 
Yet she sailed softly too ; 
Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze — 
On me alone it blew. 

dream of joy ! is this indeed 
And the An- The light-house top I see ? 

cient Man- ^ ^ 

ner behold- la this the hill ? is this the kirk ? 

eth his na- t i • 

live country. Is this mine owu couutrce ? 

We drifted o'er the harbor-bar, 
And I with sobs did pray — 

let me be awake, my God ! 
Or let me sleep alway. 

The harbor-bay was clear as glass. 
So smoothly it was strewn ! 
And on the bay the moonlight lay. 
And the shadow of the moon. 

The rock shone bright, the kirk no less 
That stands above the rock ; 
The moonlight steeped in silentness 
The steady weathercock. 

And the bay was white with silent light, 
Till rising from the same. 
The angelic Full iiiany shapes, that shadows were, 

spirits leave -^ . , 

the dead In crimsou colors came. 

bodies, 

and appear A little distance from the prow 

in their own . ^ 

forms of 1 hose crimsou shadows were : 

1 turned my eyes upon the deck — 
Christ ! what saw I there ! 

Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat. 
And, by the holy rood ! 
A man all light, a seraph man. 
On every corse there stood. 

This seraph-band, each waved his hand : 
It was a heavenly sight ! 



They stood as signals to the land, 
Each one a lovely light ; 

This seraph-band, each waved his hand, 
No voice did they impart — 
No voice ; but oh ! the silence sank 
Like music on my heart. 

But soon I heard the dash of oars, 
I heard the pilot's cheer ; 
My head was turned perforce away, 
And I saw a boat appear. 

The pilot and the pilot's boy, 

I heard them coming fast : 

Dear Lord in Heaven ! it was a joy ![ 

The dead men could not blast. 

I saw a third — I heard his voice : 

It is the hermit good ! 

He singe th loud his godly hymns 

That he makes in the wood. 

He '11 slirieve my soul, he '11 wash away 

The Albatross's blood. 



PART VII. 

This hermit good lives in that wood The hermit 

Which slopes down to the sea. 

How loudly his sweet voice he rears ! 

He loves to talk with marineres 

That come from a far countree. 

He kneels at morn, and noon, and eve — 
He hath a cushion plump : 
It is the moss that wholly hides 
The rotted old oak-stump. 

The skiff-boat neared : I heard them 

talk, 
' Why, this is strange, I trow ! 
Where are those lights so many and fair. 
That signal made but now ? ' 

' Strange, by my faith ! ' the hermit ^fh^j^^'^^j 
said — ■w't'^ won- 

' And they answered not our cheer ! 

The planks look'd warped ! and see 
those sails 

How thill they are and sere ! 

I never saw aught like to them, 

Unless perchance it were 

Brown skeletons of leaves that lag 

My forest-brook along ; 

When the ivy-tod is heavy with snow. 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



a 



The ship 
suddenly 
sinketh. 



And the owlet whoops to the wolf below, 
That eats the she-wolf's young.' 

' Dear Lord ! it hath a fiendish look 
(The pilot made reply) — 
I am a-feared.' — ' Push on, push on ! ' 
Said the hermit cheerily. 

The boat came closer to the ship, 
But I nor spake nor stirred ; 
The boat came close beneath the ship, 
And straight a sound was heard. 

Under the water it rumbled on. 
Still louder and more dread : 
It reached the ship, it split the bay ; 
The ship went down like lead. 



The Ancient Stuuncd by that loud and dreadful 

Mariner is , 

saved in the SOUnd, 

piots at. -^j^-pjj g]jy jij-j^ ocean smote. 

Like one that hath been seven days 

drowned 
My body lay afloat ; 
But swift as dreams, myself I found 
Within the pilot's boat. 

Upon the whirl where sank the ship 
The boat span round and round ; 
And all was still, save that the hill 
Was telling of the sound. 

I moved my lips — the pilot shrieked 
And fell down in a fit ; 
The holy hermit raised his eyes. 
And prayed where he did sit. 

I took the oars ; the pilot's boy. 

Who now doth crazy go, 

Laughed loud and long; and all the while 

His eyes went to and fro : 

' Ha ! ha ! ' qi;oth he, ' full plain I see. 

The Devil knows how to row.' 

And now, all in my own countree, 
I stood on the firm land ! 
The hermit stepped forth from the boat. 
And scarcely he could stand. 



shrieve me, holy 



The Ancient 'O shrievc me 

Mariner ear- 
nestly en- man ! — 

hermit to The hermit crossed his brow : 

^iKUhepai- 'Say quick,' quoth he, 'I bid thee 

say — 

What manner of man art thou ?' 



ance of life 
fads oil htm. 



Forthwith this frame 

wrenched 
With a woful agony, 



of mine was 



Which forced me to begin my tale ■ 
And then it left me free. 

Since then, at an \incertain hour, 
That agony returns ; 
And till my ghastly tale is told 
This heart within me burns. 

I pass, like night, from land to land ; 
I have strange power of speech ; 
That moment that his face I see 
I know the man that must hear me — 
To him my tale I teach. 

What loud uproar biirsts from that 

door ! 
The wedding-guests are there ; 
But in the garden-bower the Bride 
And bride-maids singing are ; 
And hark the little vesper bell, 
Which biddeth me to prayer ! 

Wedding-Guest ! this soul hath been 
Alone on a wide, wide sea — 
So lonely 't was, that God himself 
Scarce seemed there to be. 

sweeter than the marriage-feast, 
'T is sweeter far to me. 
To walk together to the kirk 
With a goodly company ! — ■ 

To walk together to the kirk. 

And all together pray, 

While each to his great Father bends — 

Old men, and babes, and loving friends. 

And youths and maidens gay ! 

Farewell ! farewell ! but this I tell 
To thee, thou Wedding-Guest ! 
He prayeth well who loveth well 
Both man and bird and beast. 

He prayeth best who loveth best 
All things both great and small ; 
For the dear God who loveth us, 
He made and loveth all." 

The Mariner, whose eye is bright. 
Whose beard with age is hoar, 
Is gone. And now the Wedding-Guest 
Turned from the Bridegroom's door. 



And ever 
and anon 
throuE^liout 
h!s future 
life an ai^ony 
constrain- 
eth him to 
travel from 
land to land: 



and to teach 
by his own 
example, 
love and 
reverence to 
all things, 
that God 
made and 
loveth. 



He 



that hath Ijeen 



went like one 
stunned. 
And is of sense forlorn ; 
A sadder and a wiser man 
He rose the morrow morn. 

Samuel Taylor Coleridg-e. 



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POEMS OP FANCY. 



861 



^ 



ALONZO THE BRAVE AND THE FAIR 
IMOGINE. 

A WARRIOR SO bold, and a virgin so bright, 

Conversed as thej^ sat on the green ; 
They gazed on eacli other with tender delight : 
Alonzo the Brave Avas the name of the knight, — 
The maiden's, the Fair Imogine. 

"And 0," said the youth, "since to-morrow I go 

To fight in a far distant land, 
Your tears for my absence soon ceasing to flow. 
Some other will court you, and you will bestow 

On a wealthier suitor your hand ! " 

"0, hush these suspicions," Fair Imogine said, 

" Offensive to love and to me ; 
For, if you be living, or if you be dead, 
I swear by the Virgin that none in your stead 

Shall husband of Imogine be. 

" If e'er I, by lust or by wealth led aside, 

Forget my Alonzo the Brave, 
God grant that, to punish my falsehood and pride, 
Your ghost at the marriage may sit by mj' side, 
May tax me with perjury, claim me as bi'ide, 

And bear me away to the grave ! " 

To Palestine hastened the hero so bold, 

His love she lamented him sore ; 
But scarce had a twelvemonth elapsed when, be- 
hold ! 
A baron, all covered with jewels and gold. 

Arrived at Fair Imogine's door. 

His treasures, his presents, his spacious domain, 
Soon made her untrue to her vows ; 

He dazzled her eyes, he bewildered her brain ; 

He caught her affections, so light and so vain. 
And carried her home as his spouse. 

And now had the marriage been blest by the 
priest ; 
The revelry now was begun ; 
The tables they groaned with the weight of the 

feast. 
Nor yet had the laughter and merriment ceased. 
When the bell at the castle tolled — one. 

Then first with amazement Fair Imogine found 

A stranger was placed by her side : 
His air was terrific ; he uttered no sound, — 
He spake not, he moved not, he looked not 
around, — 
But earnestly gazed on the bride. 

His visor was closed, and gigantic his height. 

His armor was sable to view ; 
All pleasure and laughter were hushed at his 
sight ; 



The dogs, as they eyed him, drew back in affright ; 
The lights in the chamber burned blue ! 

His presence all bosoms appeared to dismay ; 

The guests sat in silence and fear ; 
At length spake the bride, — while she trembled, 

— " I pray. 
Sir knight, that your helmet aside you would lay, 

And deign to partake of our cheer." 

The lady is silent ; the stranger complies — ■ 

His visor he slowly unclosed ; 
God ! what a sight met Fair Imogine's eyes ! 
What words can express her dismay and surprise, 

When a skeleton's head was exposed ! 

All present then uttered a terrified shout, 
All turned with disgust from the scene ; 

The worms they crept in, and the worms they 
crept out, 

And sported his eyes and his temples about, 
While the spectre addressed Imogine : 

"Behold me, thou false one, behold me!" he 
cried, 

" Remember Alonzo the Brave ! 
God grants that, to punish thy falsehood and pride, 
My ghost at thy marriage should sit by thy side ; 
Should tax thee with perjury, claim thee as bride. 

And bear thee away to the grave ! " 

Thus saying his arms round the lady he wound, 
While loudly she shrieked in dismay ; 

Then sunk with his prey through the wide- 
yawning ground. 

Nor ever again was Fair Imogine found, 
Or the spectre that bore her away. 

Not long lived the baron ; and none, since that 
time, 

To inhabit the castle presume ; 
For chronicles tell that, by order sublime. 
There Imogine suffers the pain of her crime, 

And mourns her deplorable doom. 

At midnight, four times in each year, does her 
sprite, 

When mortals in slumber are bound, 
Arrayed in her bridal apparel of white. 
Appear in the hall with the skeleton knight, 

And shriek as he whirls her around ! 

While they drink out of skulls newly torn from 
the grave. 
Dancing round them the spectres are seen ; 
Their liquor is blood, and this horrible stave 
They howl : " To the health of Alonzo the Brave, 
And his consort, the Fair Imogine ! " 

MATTHEW Gregory Lewis. 



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POEMS OF FANCY. 



-a. 



THE KING OF THULE. 

MARGARET'S SONG IN "FAUST." 

There was a king in Thule, 
Was faithful till the grave, — 
To whom his mistress, dying, 
A golden goblet gave. 

Naught was to him more precious ; 
He drained it at every bout : 
His eyes with tears ran over, 
As oft as he drank thereout. 

When came his time of dying, 
The towns in his land he told, 
Naught else to his heir denying 
Except the goblet of gold. 

He sat at the royal banquet 
With his knights of higli degree, 
In the lofty hall of his fathers, 
In the Castle by the Sea. 

There stood the old carouser, 
And drank the last life-glow ; 
And hurled the hallowed goblet 
Into the tide below. 

He saw it plunging and filling, 
And sinking deep in the sea, — ■ 
Then fell his eyelids forever, 
And never more drank he. 

From the German of GOETHE. Trans- 
lation of Bayard Taylor. 



THE PHILOSOPHER'S SCALES. 

A MONK, when his rites sacerdotal were o'er. 
In the depth of his cell with its stone-covered 

floor, 
Piesigning to thought his chimerical brain. 
Once formed the contrivance we now shall explain; 
But whether by magic's or alchemy's powers 
We know not ; indeed, 't is no business of ours. 

Perhaps it vsras only by patience and care, 
At last, that he brought his invention to bear. 
In youth 'twas projected, but years stole away. 
And ere 'twas complete he was wrinkled and 

gray ; 

But success is secure, iinless enei-gy fails ; 

And at length he produced the Philosopher's 

Scales. 

" What were they ?'' you ask. You shall pres- 
ently see ; 
These scales were not made to weigh sugar and tea. 



no ; for such properties wondrous had they, 
That qualities, feelings, and thoughts they could 

weigh. 
Together with articles small or immense, 
From mountains or planets to atoms of sense. 

Naught was there so bulky but there it would lay. 
And naught so ethereal but there it would stay. 
And naught so reluctant but in it must go : 
All which some examples more clearly will show. 

Tlie first thing he weighed was the head of Vol- 
taire, 
Which retained all the wit that had ever been 

there ; 
As a weight, he threw in the torn scrap of a leaf 
Containing the prayer of the penitent thief ; 
When the skull rose aloft with so sudden a spell 
That it bounced like a ball on the roof of the cell. 

One time he put in Alexander the Great, 

With the garment that Dorcas had nrade, for a 

weight ; 
And though clad in armor from sandals to crown, 
The hei'o rose up, and the garment went down. 

A long row of almshouses, amply endowed 
By a well-esteemed Pharisee, busy and proud. 
Next loaded one scale ; while the other was 

pressed 
B)'- those mites the poor •widow dropped into the 

chest : 
Up flew the endowment, not weighing an ounce, 
And down, down the farthing-worth came with 

a bounce. 

By further experiments (no matter how) 

He found that ten cliariots weighed less than one 

plough ; 
A sword with gilt trapping rose up in the scale, 
Though balanced by only a ten-penny nail ; 
A shield and a helmet, a buckler and spear, 
Weighed less than a widow's uncrystallized tear. 
A lord and a lady went up at full sail. 
When a bee chanced to light on the opposite 

scale ; 
Ten doctors, ten lawyers, two courtiers, one earl. 
Ten counsellors' wigs, full of powder and curl. 
All heaped in one balance and swinging from 

thence. 
Weighed less than a few grains of candor and 

sense ; 
A first-water diamond, with brilliants begirt. 
Than one good potato just washed from the dirt ; 
Yet not mountains of silver and gold could suffice 
One pearl to outweigh, — 't was THE pearl of 

GREAT PRICE. 



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Last of all, the whole world was bowled in at the 
grate, 

With the soul of a beggar to serve for a weight, 

When the former sprang up with so strong a re- 
buff 

That it made a vast rent and escaped at the roof ! 

When balanced in air, it ascended on high, 

And sailed up aloft, a balloon in the sky ; 

While the scale with the soul in 't so mightily 
fell 

That it jerked the philosopher out of his cell. 

Jane Taylor. 



THE NIGHTINGALE AND GLOW-WORM. 

A NIGHTINGALE, that all day long 
Had cheered the village with his song. 
Nor yet at eve his note suspended, 
Nor yet when eventide was ended, 
Began to feel — as well he might — 
The keen demands of appetite ; 
When, looking eagerly around. 
He spied, far off, upon the ground, 
A something shining in the dark, 
And knew the glow-worm by his spark ; 
So, stooping down from hawthorn top, 
He thought to [lut liim in his crop. 
The worm, aware of his intent. 
Harangued him thus, quite eloquent, — 

"Did you admire my lamp," quoth he, 
" As much as I your minstrelsy. 
You wovxld abhor to do me wrong. 
As much as I to spoil your song ; 
For 't was the self-same Power divine 
Taught you to sing, and ine to shine ; 
That you with music, I with light. 
Might beautify and cheer the night." 
The songster heard his short oration, 
And, warbling out his approbation, 
Eeleased him, as my story tells. 
And found a supper somewhere else. 

William Cowper. 



THE PETRIFIED FERN. 

In a valley, centuries ago. 

Grew a little fern-leaf, green and slender, 
Veining delicate and fibres tender ; 

Waving wlien the wind crept down so low. 
Rushes tall, and moss, and grass grew round it. 
Playful sunbeams darted in and found it. 
Drops of dew stole in by night, and crowned it, 
But no foot of man e'er trod that way ; 
Earth was young, and keeping holiday . 



Monster fishes swam the silent main. 

Stately forests waved their giant branches. 
Mountains hurled their snowy avalanches. 

Mammoth creatures stalked across the plain ; 
Nature revelled in grand mysteries. 
But the little fern was not of these, 
Did not number with the hills and trees ; 
Only grew and waved its wild sweet waj"^. 
No one came to note it day by day. 

Earth, one time, put on a frolic mood. 

Heaved the rocks and changed the mighty 
motion 

Of the deep, strong currents of the ocean ; 
Moved the plain and shook the haughty wood. 

Crushed the little fern in soft moist clay, — 

Covered it, and hid it safe away. 

0, the long, long centuries since that day ! 

0, the changes ! 0, life's bitter cost. 

Since that useless little fern was lost ! 

Useless ? Lost ? There came a thoughtful man 
Searching Nature's secrets, far and deep ; 
From a fissure in a rocky steep 

He withdrew a stone, o'er which there ran 
Fairy pencillings, a quaint design, 
Veinings, leafage, fibres clear and fine. 
And the fern's life lay in every line ! 
So, I think, God hides some souls away. 
Sweetly to surprise us, the last day. 

Mary l. bolles Branch. 



THE COMET. 



OCTOBER, l8 



Erratic Soul of some great Purpose, doomed 
To track the wild illimitable space. 
Till sure propitiation has been made 
For the divine commission unperformed ! 
What was thy crime ? Ahasuerus' curse 
Were not more stern on earth than thine in 
heaven ! 

Art thou the Spii'it of some Angel World, 
For grave rebellion banished from thy jieers, 
Compelled to watch the calm, immortal stars 
Circling in rapture the celestial void. 
While the avenger follows in thy train 
To spur thee on to wretchedness eterne ? 

Or one of Nature's wildest fantasies. 
From which she files in terror so profound. 
And with such whirl of torment in her breast, 
That mighty earthquakes yawn where'er she 

treads ; 
While War makes red its terrible right hand, 
And Famine stalks abroad all lean and wan ? 



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To us thoii art as exquisitely fair 
As the ideal visions of the seer, 
Or gentlest fancy that e'er floated down 
Imagination's bright, unruffled stream, 
Wedding the thought that was too deep for words 
To the low breathings of inspired song. 

When the stars sang together o'er the birth 
Of the poor Babe at Bethlehem, that lay 
In the coarse manger at the crowded Inn, 
Didst thou, perhaps a bright exalted star, 
Refuse to swell the grand, harmonious la}"-, 
Jealous as Herod of the birth divine ? 

Or when the crown of thorns on Calvary 
Pierced the Redeemer's brow, didst thou disdain 
To weep, when all the planetary worlds 
Were blinded by the fulness of their tears ? 
E'en to the flaming sun, that hid his face 
At the loud cry, " Lama Sabachthani ! " 

No rest ! No rest ! the ver}'^ damned have that 
In the dark councils of remotest Hell, 
Where the dread scheme was perfected that sealed 
Thy disobedience and accruing doom. 
Like Adam's sons, hast thou, too, forfeited 
The blest repose that never pillowed Sin ? 

No ! none can tell thy fate, thou wandering 
Sphinx ! 
Pale Science, searching by the midnight lamp 
Through the vexed mazes of the human brain, 
Still fails to read the secret of its soul 
As the superb enigma flashes by, 
A loosed Prometheus burning with disdain. 

CHARLES SANGSTER. 



SONG OF THE LIGHTNING. 

" Puck. I 'II put a girdle round about the earth 
In forty minutes." 

Midsummer's Night Dream- 

Away ! away ! through the sightless air 

Stretch forth your iron thread ! 
For I would not dim ni}"^ sandals fair 

With the dust ye tamely tread ! 
Ay, I'ear it up on its million piers. 

Let it circle the world around, 
And the journey ye make in a hundred years 

I '11 clear at a single bound ! 

Though I cannot toil, like the groaning slave 

Ye have fettered with iron skill 
To ferry you over the boundless wave. 

Or grind in the noisy mill, 
Let him sing his giant strength and speed ! 

Why, a single shaft of mine 



Would give that monster a flight indeed, — 
To the depths of the ocean's brine ! 

No ! no ! I 'm the spirit of light and love ! 

To my unseen hand 't is given 
To pencil the ambient clouds above 

And polish the stars of heaven ! 
I scatter the golden rays of fire 

On the horizon far below, 
And deck the sky where storms expire 

With my red and dazzling glow. 

With a glance I cleave the sky in twain ; 

I light it with a glare. 
When fall the boding drops of rain 

Through the darkly curtained air ! 
The rock-built towers, the turrets gray. 

The piles of a thousand years, 
Have not the strength of potter's clay 

Beneath my glittering spears. 

From the Alps' or the Andes' highest crag, 

From the peaks of eternal snow, 
The blazing folds of my fiery flag 

Illume the world below. 
The earthquake heralds my coming power, 

The avalanche bounds away. 
And howling storms at midnight's hour 

Proclaim mj' kingly sway. 

Ye tremble when my legions come, — 

When my quivering sword leaps out 
O'er the hills that echo ni}' thunder down, 

And rend with my joyous shout. 
Ye quail on the land, or upon the sea 

Ye stand in your fear aghast. 
To see me burn the stalworth trees, 

Or shiver the stately mast. 

The hieroglyphs on the Persian wall, — 

The letters of high command, — 
Where the prophet read the tyrant's fall, 

Wej-e traced by my burning hand. 
And oft in fire have I wrote since then 

What angry Heaven decreed ; 
But the sealed eyes of sinful men 

Were all too blind to read. 

At length the hour of light is here, 

And kings no more shall bind, 
Nor bigots crush with craven fear 

The forward mar(?h of mind. 
The words of Truth and Freedom's rays 

Are from my pinions hurled ; 
And soon the light of better days 

Shall rise upon the world. 

George W. Cutter. 



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ORIGm OF THE OPAL. 

A DEW-DROP came, with a spark of flame 
He had caught from the sun's last ray, 

To a violet's breast, where he lay at rest 
Till the hours brought back the day. 

The rose looked down, with a blush and frown ; 

But she smiled all at once, to view 
Her own bright form, with its coloring warm, 

Reflected back by the dew. 

Then the stranger took a stolen look 

At the sky, so soft and blue ; 
And a leaflet green, with its silver sheen, 

Was seen by the idler too. 

A cold north-wind, as he thus reclined, 

Of a sudden raged around ; 

And a maiden fair, who was walking there, 

Next morning, an opal found. 

Anonymous. 



THE OPJGIN OF THE HARP. 

'T IS believed that this harp, which I wake now 

for thee. 
Was a Siren of old, who sung under the sea ; 
And who often, at eve, through the bright billow 

roved. 
To meet, on the green shore, a youth whom she 

loved. 

But she loved him in vain, for he left her to 

weep. 
And in tears, all the night, her gold ringlets to 

steep. 
Till Heaven looked with pity on true-love so 

warm. 
And changed to this soft harp the sea-maiden's 

form. 

Still her bosom rose fair — still her cheek smiled 

the same — 
While her sea-beauties gi'acefully curled round 

the frame ; 
And her hair, shedding tear-drops from all its 

bright rings. 
Fell o'er her white arm, to make the gold strings ! 

Hence it came, that this soft harp so long hath 

been known 
To mingle love's language with soiTow's sad tone ; 
Till tliou didst divide them, and teach the fond 

lay 
To be love when I 'm near thee, and grief when 

away ! 



THOMAS MOORE. 



ECHO AND SILENCE.* 

In eddying course when leaves began to fly, 
And Autumn in her lap the store to strew. 
As mid wild scenes I chanced the Muse to woo. 
Through glens untrod, and woods that frowned 

on high, 
Two sleeping nymphs with wonder mute I spy ! 
And, lo, she 's gone ! — In robe of dark-green hue, 
'T was Echo from her sister Silence flew. 
For quick the hunter's horn resounded to the sky ! 
In shade afl"righted Silence melts awaj'-. 
Not so her sister. Hark ! for onward still, 
With far-heard step, she takes her listening way. 
Bounding from rock to rock, and hill to hill. 
Ah, mark the merry maid in mockful play 
With thousand mimic tones the laughing forest 

fill! 

Sir Samuel Egerton Brydces. 



A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT. 

What was he doing, the great god Pan, 

Down in the reeds by the river ? 
Spreading ruin and scattering ban, 
Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat, 
And bi'eaking the golden lilies afloat 

With the dragon-fly on the river ? 

He tore out a reed, the great god Pan, 
From the deep, cool bed of the river. 

The limpid water turbidly ran. 

And the broken lilies a-dying lay. 

And the drat>"on-fly had fled away. 
Ere he brought it out of the river. 

High on the shore sat the great god Pan, 

While turbidly flowed the river. 
And hacked and hewed as a great god can 
With his hard, bleak steel at the patient reed. 
Till there was not a sign of a leaf indeed 

To prove it fresh from the river. 

He cut it short, did the great god Pan, 

(How tall it stood in the river !) 
Then drew the pith like the heait of a man. 
Steadily from the outside ring. 
Then notched the poor dry empty thing 

In holes, as he sate by the river. 

"This is the waj'^," laughed the great god Pan, 

(Laughed while he sate by the river !) 
" The only way since gods began 
To make sweet music, they could succeed." 
Then dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed. 
He blew in power by the river. 

* Declared by Wordsworth lo be the best Sonnet in the Engflish 
language. 



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Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan, 

Piercing sweet by the river ! 
Blinding sweet, great god Pan ! 
The sun on the hill forgot to die. 
And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly 

Came back to dream on the river. 

Yet half a beast is the great god Pan, 

To laugh, as he sits by the river, 
Making a poet out of a man. 
The true gods sigh for the cost and the pain, — 
For the reed that grows nevermore again 

As a reed with the reeds of the river. 

ELIZABETH Barrett Browning. 



THE CALIPH AND SATAN. 

VERSIFIED FROM THOLUCK'S TRANSLATION OUT OF THE 
PERSIAN. 

In heavy sleep the Caliph lay. 

When some one called, "Arise, and psay ! " 

The angry Caliph cried, " Who dare 
Rebuke his king for slighted prayer ? " 

Then, from the corner of the room, 

A voice cut sharply through the gloom : 

' ' My name is Satan. Rise ! obey 
Mohammed's law ; awake, and pray ! " 

" Thy words are good," the Caliph said, 
" But their intent I somewhat dread. 

For matters cannot well be worse 

Than when the thief says, ' Guard your purse ! ' 

I cannot trust your counsel, friend, 
It surely hides some wicked end." 

Said Satan, " Near the throne of God, 
In ages past, we devils trod ; 

Angels of light, to us 't was given 

To guide each wandering foot to heaven. 

Not wholly lost is that first love, 
Nor those pure tastes we knew above. 

Roaming across a continent. 

The Tartar moves his shifting tent. 

But never quite forgets the day 
When in his father's arms he lay ; 

So we, once batlied in love divine, 
Recall the taste of that rich wine. 



God's finger rested on my brow, — 
That magic touch, I feel it now ! 

I fell, 't is true — 0, ask not why, 
For still to God I turn my eye. 

It was a chance by which I fell. 
Another takes me back from hell. 

'T was but my envy of mankind, 
The envy of a loving mind. 

Jealous of men, I could not bear 
God's love with this new race to share. 

But yet God's tables open stand. 
His guests flock in from every land ; 

Some kind act toward the race of men 
May toss us into heaven again. 

A game of chess is all we see, — 
And God the player, pieces we. 

White, black — queen, pawn, — 't is all the same, 
For on both sides he plays the game. 

Moved to and fro, from good to ill, 
We rise and fall as suits his will." 

The Caliph said, " If this be so, 
I know not, but thy guile I know ; 

For how can I thy words believe, 
When even God thou didst deceive ? 

A sea of lies art thou, — our sin 
Only a drop that sea within." 

" Not so," said Satan, " I serve God, 
His angel now, and now his rod. 

In tempting I both bless and curse, 
Make good men better, bad men worse. 

Good coin is mixed with bad, my brother, 
I but distinguish one from the other." 

" Granted," the Caliph said, "but still 
You never tempt to good, but ill. 

Tell then the truth, for well I know 
You come as my most deadly foe." 

Loud laughed the fiend. "You know me well, 
Therefore my purpose I will tell. 

If you had missed your prayer, I knew 
A swift repentance would ensue ; 

And such repentance would have been 
A good, outweighing far the sin. 



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I chose this humbleness divine, 

Borne out of fault, should not be thine, 

Preferring prayers elate with pride 
To sin with penitence allied." 

James freeman Clarke. 



AIRY NOTHINGS. 

FROM " THE TEMPEST," ACT IV. SC. I. 

Our revels now are ended. These our actors, 
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and 
Are melted into air, into thin air ; 
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision. 
The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces. 
The solemn temples, the great globe itself. 
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, 
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded. 
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff 
As dreams are made on, and our little life 
Is rounded with a sleep. 

SHAKESPEARE. 



PEAGMENTS. 

Imagination. 

Within the soul a faculty abides, 
That with interpositions, which would hide 
And darken, so can deal that they become 
Contingencies of pomp ; and serve to exalt 
Her native brightness. As the ample moon, 
In the deep stillness of a summer even 
Rising behind a thick and lofty grove. 
Burns, like an unconsuming fire of light, 
In the green trees ; and, kindling on all sides 
Their leafy umbrage, turns the dusky veil 
Into a substance glorious as her own. 

The Excursion, Book iv. WORDSWORTH. 

And, as imagination bodies forth 
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen 
Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing 
A local habitation and a name. 

Midsufnmer Night's Dream, Act v.Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

for a muse of fire, that would ascend 
The brightest heaven of invention ! 

Kins He>iry V., Chorus. SHAKESPEARE. 

Hark, his hands the lyre exploi'e ! 
Briglit-eyed Fancy, hovering o'er, 
Scatters from her pictured urn 
Thoughts that breathe and words that burn. 

Progress oj Poesy^ T. GRAY. 



Conception and Execution. 

We figure to ourselves 
The thing we like, and then we build it up 
As chance will have it, on the rock or sand ; 
For thought is tired of wandering o'er the world. 
And home-bound Fancj' runs her bark ashore. 

Philif Van Artevelde, Part 1. Act i. Sc. 5. SIR H. TAYLOR. 

Of its own beauty is the mind diseased. 
And fevers into false creation : — where, 
Where are the forms the sculptor's soul hath 

seized ? 
In him alone. Can Nature show so fair ? 
Where are the charms and virtues which we 

dare 
Conceive in boyhood and pur.sue as men, 
The unreached Paradise of our despair. 
Which o'er-informs the pencil and the pen. 
And overpowers the page where it would bloom 

again ? 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON. 



Cloud-Visions. 

A step, 
A single step, that freed me from the skirts 
Of the blind vapor, opened to my view 
Glory beyond all glory ever seen 
By waking sense or by the dreaming soul ! 
The appearance, instantaneously disclosed. 
Was of a mighty city, — boldly say 
A wilderness of building, sinking far 
And self-withdrawn into a boundless depth, 
Far sinking into splendor, — without end ! 
Fabric it seemed of diamond and of gold, 
With alabaster domes, and silver spires. 
And blazing terrace upon terrace, high 
Uplifted ; here, serene pavilions bright, 
In avenues disposed ; there, towers begirt 
With battlements that on their restless fronts 
Bore stars, — illumination of all gems ! 

The Excursion, Book ii. WORDSWORTH. 



The Mind's Eye. 

Hamlet. My father, — methinks I see my 

father. 
Horatio. ! where, my lord ! 
Ham. In my mind's eye, Horatio. 



Hamlet, Act\. Sc. 2. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



On man, on nature, and on human life, 
Musing in solitude, I oft perceive 
Fair trains of imagery before me rise, 
Accompanied by feelings of delight. 
Pure, or with no unpleasing sadness mixed. 

The Excursion : Prelude. WORDSWORTH, 



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But 0, what solemn scenes on Snowdon's height 
Descending slow their glittering skirts unroll ? 

Visions of glory, spai-e my aching sight ! 
Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul ! 

The Bard. T. GRAY. 



Spirits. 

Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth 
Unseen, both when we wake, and when we sleep. 

Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON. 

Spirits when they please 
Can either sex assume, or both, 

Can execute their airy purposes, 
And works of love or enmity fulfil. 

Paradise Lost, Book i. . MiLTON. 

Worse 
Than fables yet have feigned, or fear conceived, 
Gorgons, and Hydras, and Chiraaeras dire. 

Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON. 

'T is the djinns' wild-streaming swai'm 
Whistling in their tempest-flight ; 
Snap the tall yews 'neath the storm, 
Like a pine-flame crackling bright ; 
Swift and heavy, low, their crowd 
Through the heavens rushing loud ! — 
Like a lurid thunder-cloud 
With its bolt of fiery night ! 

The Djinns. Trans, o/]. 'L.O'SUL.l.lVAN. V.HUGO. 

But shapes that come not at an earthly call 
Will not depart when mortal voices bid ; 
Lords of the visionary eye, whose lid, 
Once raised, remains aghast, and will not fall ! 

Dion. WORDSWORTH. 



Ghosts of the Dead. 

Macbeth. Thou canst not say I did it ; never 
shake thy gory locks at me. 

Lady Macbeth. proper stuff" ! 

This is the very painting of your fear ; 
This is the air-drawn dagger which, you said. 
Led you to Duncan. 

Macbeth. Pr'ythee, see there ! behold ! look ! 
lo ! how say you ? 

The times have been, 
That, when the brains were out, the man would 

die. 
And there an end ; but now they rise again. 
With twenty mortal murders on their crowns, 
And push us from our stools. 



Avaunt ! and quit my sight. Let the earth hide 

thee! 
Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold ; 
Thou hast no speculation in those eyes, 
Which thou dost glare with ! 

Hence, horrible shadow ! 
Unreal mockery, hence ! 



Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. 4. 



Shakespeare. 



And then it started, like a guilty thing 
Upon a fearful summons. I have heard, 
The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn, 
Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat 
Awake the god of day ; and at his warning. 
Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air, 
The extravagant and erring spirit hies 
To his confine. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

This is the very coinage of your brain. 

Ha7nUi Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

By the apostle Paul, shadows to-night 
Have struck more terror to the soul of Richard 
Than can the substance of ten thousand soldiers. 

King Richard III , Act\. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



Witches. 

Baistquo. What are these. 

So withered, and so wild in their attire ; 
That look not like the inhabitants o' the earth, 
And yet are on 't ? 

The earth hath bubbles, as the water has, 

And these are of them. — Whither have they 

vanished ? 
Macbeth. Into the air, and what seemed 

corporal melted 
As breath into the wind. 

Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 

Show his eyes, and grieve his heart ; 
Come like shadows, so depart. 



Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Fairies. 

They're fairies ! he that speaks to them shall die: 
I '11 wink and couch ; no man their sports must 
eye. 

Merry Wives of Windsor, Act v. Sc. 5, SHAKESPEARE. 



This is the fairy land : 0, spite of spites ! 
We talk with goblins, owls, and elvish sprites. 

Comedy of Errors, Act li. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



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I took it for a faery vision 
Of some gay creatures of the element, 
That in the colors of the rainbow live 
And play i' th' plighted clouds. 

^ Coimis. Milton. 

Ariel. "Where the bee sucks, there suck I : 
In a cowslip's bell I lie ; 
There I couch when owls do cry. 
On the bat's back I do fly 
After summer, merrily. 
Merrily, merrily, shall I live now, 
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough. 

The Temfest, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Puck. How now, spirit, whither wander you ? 

Fairy. Over hill, over dale, 
Thorough bush, thorough brier, 
Over park, over pale, 
Thorough flood, thorough fire, 
I do wander everywhere, 
Swifter than the moon's sphere ; 
And I serve the fairy queen, 
To dew her orbs upon the green : 
The cowslips tall her pensioners be ; 
In their gold coats spots you see ; 
Those be rubies, fairy favors. 
In those freckles live their savors : 
I must go seek some dewdrops here, 
And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear. 

Midsummer iXight's Dream, Act ii. Sc. x. SHAKESPEARE. 

Fairies use flowers for their charactery. 

Merry Wives 0/ Windsor, Act v. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 



"Water Sprites. 

Come unto these yellow sands. 

And then take hands ; 
Court'sied when you have, and kissed 

The wild waves whist. 
Foot it featly here and there ; 
And, sweet sprites, the burden bear. 
Hark, hark ! 

Bo%vgh, wowgh. 
The watch-dogs bark : 
Boivgh, wowgh. 
Hark, hark ! I hear 
The strain of strutting chanticleer 
Cry, Cock-a-doodle-doo. 

Full fathom five thy father lies 
Of his bones are coral made : 



Those are pearls that were his eyes : 

Nothing of him that doth fade. 
But doth suffei a sea-change 
Into something rich and strange. 
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his kuell : 

[Burden] Ding-dong. 
Hark ! now I hear them, — Ding-dong, bell. 

The Temfest, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE; 

Sabrina fair. 

Listen where thou art sitting. 
Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave, 

In twisted braids of lilies knitting 
The loose train of thy amber-dropping hair. 

Listen for dear honor's sake. 

Goddess of the silver lake, 
Listen and save. 
Comus. Milton. 



"Wood-Nymphs. 

Egeria ! sweet creation of some heart 
"Which found no mortal resting-place so fair 
As thine ideal breast ; whate'er thou art 
Or wert, — a young Aurora of the air, 
The nympholepsy of some fond despair ; 
Or, it might be, a beauty of the earth, 
"Who found a more than common votary there 
Too much adoring ; whatsoe'er thy birth, 
Thou wert a beautiful thought, and softly bodied 
forth. 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. BVRON. 

Quite spent and out of breath he reached the 

tree. 
And, listening fearfully, he heard once more 
The low voice murmur " Rhcecus ! " close at hand: 
Whereat he looked around him, but could see 
Naught but the deepening glooms beneath the 

oak. 
Then sighed the voice, " Ehoecus ! nevermore 
Shalt thou behold me or by day or night. 
Me, who would fain have blessed thee with a love 
More ripe and bounteous than ever yet 
Filled up with nectar any mortal heart ; 
But thou didst scorn my humble messenger, 
And sent'st him back to me with bruised wings. 
"We spirits only show to gentle eyes, 
"We ever ask an undivided love. 
And he who scorns the least of Nature's works 
Is thenceforth exiled and shut out from all. 
Farewell ! for thou canst never see me more." 

Rhcecus. J. R. LOWELU 



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POEMS OF TRAGEDY. 



IPHIGENEIA AND AGAMEMNON. 

Iphigeneia, when she heard her doom 
At Aulis, and when all beside the king 
Had gone aAvay, took his right hand, and said : 
" fatlier ! I am young and very happy. 
I do not think the pious Calchas heard 
Distinctly what the goddess spake ; old age 
Obscures the senses. If my nurse, who knew 
My voice so well, sometimes misunderstood, 
While I was resting on her knee both arms. 
And hitting it to make her mind my words, 
And looking in her face, and she in mine, 
Might not he, also, hear one word amiss. 
Spoken from so far off, even from Olympus ? " 
The father placed his cheek upon her head. 
And tears drojit down it ; but the king of men 
Eeplied not. Then the maiden spake once more : 
" father ! sayest thou nothing ? Hearest thou 

not 
Me, whom thou ever hast, until this hour, 
Listened to fondly, and awakened me 
To hear my voice amid the voice of birds. 
When it was inarticulate as theirs. 
And the down deadened it within the nest ? ' 
He m6ved her gently from him, silent still ; 
And this, and this alone, brought tears from her. 
Although she saw fate nearer. Then with sighs : 
" I thought to have laid down my hair before 
Benignant Artemis, and not dimmed 
Her polished altar with my virgin blood ; 
I thought to have selected the white flowers 
To please the nymphs, and to have asked of each 
By name, and with no sorrowful regret. 
Whether, since both my parents willed the change, 
1 7night at Hymen's feet bend my dipt brow ; 
And (after these who mind us girls the most) 
Adore our own Athene, that she would 
Eegard me mildly with her azure eyes, — 
But, father, to see you no more, and see 
Your love, father ! go ere I am gone ! " 
Gently he moved her off, and drew her back, 
Bending his lofty head far over hers ; 
And the dark depths of nature heaved and burst. 
He turned away, — not far, but silent still. 



She now first shuddered ; for in him, so nigh, 
So long a silence seemed the approach of death, 
And like it. Once again she raised her voice : 
" lather ! if the ships are now detained, 
And all your vows move not the gods above. 
When the knife strikes me there will be one prayer 
The less to them ; and purer can there be 
Any, or more fervent, than the daughter's prayer 
For her dear father's safety and success ? " 
A groan that shook him shook not his resolve. 
An aged man now entered, and witholit 
One word stepped slowl}'' on, and took the wrist 
Of the pale maiden. She looked up, and saw 
The fillet of the priest and calm, cold eyes. 
Then turned she where her parent stood, and cried : 
" father ! grieve no more ; the ships can sail." 
Walter Savage Landor. 



THE ROMAN FATHER'S SACRIFICE. 

FROM " VIRGI.N'IA." 

Straightway Virginius led the maid 

A little space aside. 
To where the reeking shambles stood. 

Piled up with horn and hide ; 
Close to yon low dark archway. 

Where, in a crimson flood. 
Leaps down to the great sewer 

The gurgling stream of blood. 

Hard by, a flesher on a block 

Had laid his whittle down : 
Virginius caught the whittle up. 

And hid it in his gown. 
And then his eyes gi'ew very dim, 

And his throat began to swell. 
And in a hoarse, changed voice he spake, 

"Farewell, sweet child ! Farewell ! 

"0, how I loved my darling I 
Though stern I sometimes be. 

To thee, thou know'st, T was not so, — 
Who could be so to thee ? 



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POEMS OF TRAGEDY. 



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And how my darling loved me ! 

How glad she was to hear 
My footstep on the threshold 

When I came back last year ! 

" And how she danced with pleasure 

To see my civic crown, 
And took my sword, and hung it np, 

And brought me forth my gown ! 
Now, all those things are over, — 

Yes, all thy pretty ways, 
Thy needlework, thy prattle, 

Thy snatches of old lays ; 

" And none will grieve when I go forth, 

Or smile when 1 return. 
Or watch beside the old man's bed. 

Or weep upon his urn. 
The house that was the happiest 

Within the Roman walls, 
The house that envied not the wealth 

Of Capua's marble halls, 

"Now, for the brightness of thy smile, 

Must liave eternal gloom, 
And for the music of th}^ voice, 

The silence of the tomb. 
The time is come ! See how he points 

His eager hand this way ! 
See how his eyes gloat on thy grief. 

Like a kite's upon the prey ! 

"With all his wit, he little deems 

That, spurned, betrayed, bereft. 
Thy father hath, in his despair. 

One fearful refuge left. 
He little deems that in this hand 

I clutch what still can save 
Thy gentle youth from taunts and blows, 

The portion of the slave ; 

"Yea, and from nameless evil,' 

That passeth taunt and blow, — 
Foul outrage which thou knowest not. 

Which thou shalt never know. 
Then clasp me round the neck once more, 

And give me one more kiss ; 
And now, mine own dear little girl, 

There is no way but this." 

With that he lifted high the steel, 

And smote her in the side, 
And in her blood she sank to earth, 

And with one sob she died. 
Then, for a little moment. 

All peoj)le held their breath ; 
And through the crowded forum 

Was stillness as of death ; 



And in another moment 

Brake forth, from one and all, 
A cry as if the Volscians 

"Were coming o'er the wall. 
Some with averted faces 

Shrieking Hed home amain ; 
Some ran to call a leech ; and some 

Ean to lift up the slain. 

Some felt her lips and little wrist, 

If life might there be found ; 
And some tore up their garments fast. 

And strove to stanch the wound. 
In vain they ran, and felt, and stanched ; 

For never truer blow 
That good right arm had dealt in fight 

Against a Volscian foe. 

When Appius Claudius saw that deed. 

He shuddered and sank down. 
And hid his face some little space 

With the corner of his gown ; 
Till, with white lips and bloodshot eyes, 

Virginius tottered nigh. 
And stood before the judgment-seat, 

And held the knife on high. 

" dwellers in the nether gloom, 

Avengers of the slain. 
By this dear blood I cry to you 

Do right between us twain ; 
And even as Appius Claudius 

Hath dealt by me and mine, 
Deal you by Appius Claudius, 

And all the Claudia n line ! " 

So spake the slayer of his child. 

And turned and went his way ; 
But iirst he cast one haggard glance 

To where the body lay. 
And writhed, and groaned a fearful groan. 

And then, with steadfast feet. 
Strode right across the market-place 

Unto the Sacred Street. 

Then up sprang Appius Claudius : 

"Stop him ; alive or dead ! 
Ten thousand pounds of copper 

To the man who brings his head." 
He looked upon his clients ; 

But none would work his will. 
He looked upon his lictors ; 

But they trembled, and stood still. 

And as Virginius through the press 

His way in silence cleft, 
Ever the mighty multitude 

Fell back to right and left. 



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875 



a 



And he hath passed in safety 

Unto his woful home, 
And there ta'en horse to tell the camp 

What deeds are done in Konie. 

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY. 



LUCIUS JUNIUS BRUTUS OVER THE 
BODY OF LUCRETIA. 

FROM "BRUTUS." 

Would yon know why I summoned you together ? 
Ask ye what brings me here ? Behold this dagger, 
Clotted with gore ! Behold that frozen corse ! 
See where the lost Lucretia sleeps in death ! 
She was the mark and model of the time, 
The mould in which each female face was formed, 
The very shrine and sacristy of virtue ! 
Fairer than ever was a form created 
By youthful fancy when the blood strays wild. 
And never-resting thought is all on fire ! 
The worthiest of the worthy ! Not the nymph 
Who met old Numa in his hallowed walks, 
And whispered in his ear her strains divine. 
Can I conceive beyond her ; — the young choir 
Of vestal virgins bent to her. 'T is wonderful 
Amid the darnel, hemlock, and base weeds, 
Which now spring rife from the luxurious com- 
post 
Spread o'er the realm, how this sweet lily rose, — 
How from the shade of those ill-neighboring 

plants 
Her father sheltered her, that not a leaf 
AVas blighted, but, arrayed in purest grace. 
She bloomed unsullied beauty. Such perfections 
Might have called back the torpid breast of age 
To long-forgotten rapture ; such a mind 
Might have abashed the boldest libertine 
And turned desire to reverinitial love 
And holiest affection ! my countrymen ! 
You all can witness when that she went forth 
It was a holiday in Rome ; old age 
Foi'got its ci'utch, labor its task, — all ran. 
And mothers, turning to their daughters, cried, 
" There, there 's Lucretia ! " Now look ye where 

she lies ! 
That Ijeauteous flower, that innocent sweet rose, 
Torn up by ruthless violence, — gone ! gone ! gone ! 
Say, would you seek instruction ? would ye ask 
What ye should do ? Ask ye yon conscious walls, 
Which saw his poisoned brother, — 
Ask yon deserted street, where Tnllia drove 
O'er her dead father's corse, 't will cry, Revenge ! 
Ask yonder senate-house, whose stones are purple 
With human blood, and it will cry, Revenge ! 
Go to the tomb where lies his murdered wife. 



And the poor queen, who loved him as her son. 
Their unappeased ghosts will shriek. Revenge ! 
The temples of the gods, the all- viewing heavens, 
The gods themselves, shall justify the cry, 
And swell the genei'al sound, Revenge ! Revenge ! 

And we will be revenged, my countrymen ! 
Brutus shall lead you on ; Brutus, a name 
Which will, when you 're revenged, be dearer to 

him 
Than all the noblest titles earth can boast. 

Brutus your king ! — No, fellow-citizens ! 
If mad ambition in this guilty frame 
Had strung one kingly fibre, yea, but one, — 
By all the gods, this dagger which I hold 
Should rip it out, though it intwined my heart. 

Now take the body up. Bear it before us 

To Tarquin's palace ; there we '11 light our torches, 

And in the blazing conflagration rear 

A pile, for these chaste relics, that shall send 

Her soul amongst the stars. On ! Brutus leads 

you ! 

John Howard Payne. 



ANTONY'S ORATION OVER THE BODY 
OF CyESAR. 

FROM "JULIUS C.BSAR," ACT IM. SO. 2. 

Antony. mighty Csesar! dost thou lie so low? 
Are all thy conquests, glories, triumphs, spoils. 
Shrunk to this little measui'e ? — Fare thee well. — 

{To the 'people..') 
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your 
ears ; 
I come to bury Ctesar, not to praise him. 
The evil that men do lives after them ; 
The good is oft interred with their bones ; 
So let it be with Cssar. The noble Brutus 
Hath told you Ciesar was ambitious : 
If it were so, it was a grievous fault ; 
And grievously hath Cresar answered it. 
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest, 
(For Brutus is an honorable man ; 
So are they all, all honorable men,) 
Come I to speak in Cajsar's funeral. 
He was my friend, faithful and just to me : 
But Brutus says he was ambitious ; 
And Brutus is an honorable man. 
He hath brought many captives home to Rome, 
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill : 
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious ? 
When that the poor have cried, Csesar hath wept : 
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff : 
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious ; 
And Brutus is an honorable man. 
You all did see that on the Lupercal 



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POEMS or TRAGEDY. 



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I thrice presented him a kingly crown, 

Which he did thrice refuse : was this ambition ? 

Yet Brutus says he was ambitious ; 

And, sure, he is an honorable man. 

I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke. 

But here I am to speak what I do know. 

You all did love him once, — not without cause • 

What cause withholds you, then, to mourn for 

him ? 
judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts, 
And men have lost their reason ! — Bear with me ; 
]\Iy heart is in the coffin there with Ctesai', 
And I must pause till it come back to me. 

But yesterday, the word of Ctesar might 
Have stood against the world ■ now lies he there, 
And none so poor to do him reverence. 

masters ! if I were disposed to stir 
Your hearts and minds to mutiny and rage, 

1 should do Brutus wrong, and Cassius wrong, 
Wlio, you all know, are honorable men : 

[ will not do them wrong ; I rather choose 

To wrong the dead, to wrong myself, and you, 

Than I will wrong such honorable men. 

!')ut here 's a parchment, with the seal of Cresar, — 

I found it in his closet, — 't is his will . 

Let but the commons hear this testament, 

(Which, pardon me, I do not mean to read,) 

And they would go and kiss dead Caesar's wounds. 

And dip their napkins in his sacred blood : 

Yea, beg a hair of him for memory. 

And, dying, mention it within their wills, 

l)CM]ueathing it, as a rich legacy. 

Unto their issue. 

4 Citizen. We '11 hear the will : read it, Mark 
Antony. 

Citizens. The will, the will ! we will hear 
Csesar's will. 

Ant. Have patience, gentle friends, I must 
not read it ; 
It is not meet you know how Ctesar loved you. 
You are not wood, you are not stones, but men ; 
And, being men, hearing the will of Caesar, 
It will inflame you, it will make you mad : 
'T is good you know not that you are his heirs, 
For if you should, 0, what would come of it ! 

4 CiT. ' Read the will ; we '11 hear it, Antony ; 
You shall read us the will, — Caesar's will. 

Ant. Will you be patient ? Will you stay 
awhile ? 
I have o'ershot myself to tell yoii of it. 
1 fear I wrong the honorable men 
\\'hose daggers have stabbed Caesar ; I do fear it. 

4 Cit. They were traitors : honorable men ! 

CiT. The will ! the testament ! 

2 ('it. They were villains, mui'derers : the 
will ! read the will ! 



Ant. You will compel me, then, to read the 
will ? 
Then make a ring about the corse of Caesar, 
And let me show you him that made the will. 
Shall I descend ? and will you give me leave ? 

Citizens. Come down. 

Ant. Nay, press not so upon me ; stand far off. 

Citizens. Stand back ; room ; bear back. 

Ant. If you have tears, prepare to shed them 
now. 
You all do know this mantle : I remember 
The first time ever Caesar put it on ; 
'T was on a summer's evening, in his tent ; 
That day he overcame the Nervii : — 
Look, in this place ran Cassius' dagger through : 
See what a rent the envious Casca made : 
Through this the well-beloved Brutus stabbed ; 
And, as he plucked his cursed steel away, 
Mark how the blood of Ciesar followed it, 
As rushing out of doors, to be resolved 
If Brutus so unkindly knocked, or no ; 
For Brutus, as you know, was CiBsav's angel : 
Judge, you gods, how dearly Caesar loved him ! 
This was the most unkindest cut of all ; 
For when the noble Caesar saw him stab, 
Ingratitude, more strong than traitors' arms. 
Quite vanquished him : then burst his mighty 

heart ; 
And, in his mantle muffling up his face, 
Even at the base of Pompey's statua. 
Which all the while ran blood, great Caesar fell. 
0, what a fall was there, ni}^ countrymen ! 
Then I, and you, and all of us fell down. 
Whilst bloody treason flourished over us. 
0, now you weep ; and, I perceive, you feel 
The dint of pity : these are gracious drops. 
Kind souls, what, weep you when j'ou but behold 
Our Caesar's vesture wounded ? Look you here, 
Here is himself, marred, as you see, with traitors. 

Good friends, sweet friends, let me not stir 

you up 
To such a sudden flood of mutiny. 
They that have done this deed are honorable ; — 
What private griefs they have, alas, I know not, 
That made them do it ; — they are wise and 

honorable. 
And w'ill, no doubt, with reasons answer you. 
I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts ; 
I am no orator, as Brutus is ; 
But, as you know me all, a plain blunt man, 
That love my friend ; and that they know full 

well 
That gave me public leave to speak of him ; 
For I have neither wit, nor words, nor worth, 
Action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech. 
To stir men's blood : I only speak right on ; 



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877 



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I tell you that which you yourselves do know ; 
Show you sweet Caesar's wounds, poor, poor 

dumb mouths, 
And bid them speak for me : but were I Brutus, 
And Brutus Antony, there were an Antony 
Would ruffle up your spirits, and put a tongue 
In every wound of Ca?sar, that should move 
The stones of Rome to rise in nuitiny. 

Here is the will, and under Caesar's seal : — 
To every Roman citizen he gives, 
To every several man, seventy- five drachmas. 

2 CiT. Most noble Cajsar ! — we '11 revenge 

his death. 

3 CiT. royal Caesar ! 
Ant. Hear me with patience. 
Citizens. Peace, ho ! 

Ant. Moreover, he hath left you all his walks, 
His private arbors, and new-planted orchards. 
On this side Tiber ; he hath left them you. 
And to your heirs forever, — common pleasures. 
To walk abroad, and recreate yourselves. 
Here was a Caesar ! when comes such another ? 

1 CiT. Never, never ! — Come away, away ! 

We '11 burn his body in the holy place, 

And with the brands fire the traitors' houses. 

Take up the body. 

Shakespeare. 



OTHELLO'S REMORSE. 

FROM " OTHELLO," ACT V. SC. 2. 

Behold, I have a weapon ; 
A better never did itself sustain 
Upon a soldier's thigh : I have seen the day. 
That, with this little arm and this good sword, 
1 have made my way through more impediments 
Than twenty times your stop : — but, vain 

boast ! 
Who can control his fate ? 't is not so now. — 
Be not afraid, though you do see me weaponed ; 
Here is my journey's end, here is my butt, 
And very sea-mark of my utmost sail. 
Do you go back dismayed ? 't is a lost fear ; 
Man but a rush against Othello's breast, 
And he retires : — where should Othello go ? — 
Now, how dost thou look now? ill-starred 

wench ! 
Pale as thy smock ! when we shall meet at compt. 
This look of thine will hurl my soul from heaven. 
And fiends will snatch at it. Cold, cold, my girl? 
Even like thy chastity — 0, cursed slave ! — 
Whip me, ye devils. 

From the possession of this heavenly sight ! 
Blow me about in winds ! roast me in sulphur ! 
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire ! — 
Desdemona ! Desdemona ! dead ? ! ! 

Shakespeare. 



THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE. 

[James Graham, Marquis of Montrose, was executed in Edii 
burgh. May 21, 1650, for an attempt to overthrow the Co 
wealth, and restore Charles II.] 

Come hither, Evan Cameron ! 

Come, stand behind my knee — 
I hear the river loaring down 

Toward the wintry sea. 
There 's shouting on the mountain-side, 

There 's war within the blast — 
Old faces look upon me. 

Old forms go trooping past. 
I hear the pibroch wailing 

Amidst the din of fight. 
And my dim spirit wakes again 

Upon the verge of night. 

'T was 1 that led the Highland host 

Through wild Lochaber's snows. 
What time the plaided clans came down 

To battle with Montrose. 
I 've told thee how the Southrons fell 

Beneath the broad claymore, 
And how we smote the Campbell clan 

By Inverlochy's shore. 
I 've told thee how we swept Dundee, 

And tamed the Lindsays' pride ; 
But never have I told thee yet 

How the great Mai-quis died. 

A traitor sold him to his foes ; — 

deed of deathless shame ! 
I charge thee, boy, if e'er thou meet 

With one of Assynt's name — 
Be it upon the mountain's side, 

Or yet within the glen. 
Stand he in martial gear alone, 

Or backed by armed men — 
Face him as thou wouldst face the man 

Who wronged thy sire's renown ; 
Remember of what blood thou art, 

And strike the caitiif down ! 

" They brought him to the Watergate, 

Hard bound with hempen span, 
As though they held a lion there, 

And not a 'fenceless man. 
They set him high upon a cart — 

The hangman rode below — 
They drew his hands behind his back, 

And bared his noble brow. 
Then, as a hound is slipped from leash. 

They cheered the common throng. 
And blew the note with yell and shout, 

And bade him pass along. 



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POEMS OF TRAGEDY. 



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It would have made a brave man's heart 

Grow sad and sick that day, 
To watch the keen, malignant eyes 

Bent down on that array. 
There stood the Whig west-country lords 

In balcony and bow ; 
Thei-e sat their gaunt and withered dames, 

And their daughters all a-row. 
And every open window 

Was full as full might be 
With black-robed Covenanting carles, 

That goodly sport to see ! 

But when he came, though pale and wan, 

He looked so great and high, 
So noble was his manly front. 

So calm his steadfast eye ; — 
The rabble rout forbore to shout. 

And each man held his breath, 
For well they knew the hero's soul 

Was face to face with death. 
And then a mournful shudder 

Through all the people crept, 
And some that came to scoff at him 

Now turned aside and wept. 

But onward — always onward, 

In silence and in gloom. 
The dreary pageant labored. 

Till it readied the house of doom. 
Then first a woman's voice was lieard 

In jeer and laughter loud, 
And an angiy cry and a hiss arose 

From the heart of the tossing crowd : 
Then, as the Graeme looked upward. 

He saw the ugly smile 
Of him who sold his king for gold — 

The master-fiend Argyle ! 

The Marquis gazed a moment, 

And nothing did he say, 
But the cheek of Argyle grew ghastly pale, 

And he turned his eyes away. 
The painted harlot by his side, 

She shook through every limb. 
For a roar like thunder swept the street, 

And hands were clenched at him ; 
And a Saxon soldier cried aloud, 

" Back, coward, from thy ijlace ! 
For seven long years thou hast not dai'ed 

To look him in the face." 

Had I been there with sword in hand, 

And fifty Camerons by, 
That day through high Dunedin's streets 

Had pealetl the slogan-cry. 



Not all their troops of trampling horse. 

Nor might of mailed men — ■ 
Not all the rebels iu the south 

Had borne us backward then ! 
Once more his foot on Highland heath 

Had trod as free as air. 
Or I, and all who bore my name, 

Been laid around him there ! 

It might not be. They placed him next 

Within the solemn hall. 
Where once the Scottish Icings were throned 

Amidst their nobles all. 
But there was dust of vulgar feet 

On that polluted floor. 
And perjured traitors filled the place 

Where good men sate before. 
With savage glee came Warriston 

To read the murderous doom ; 
And then uprose the great Montrose 

In the middle of the room : 



" Now, by mj'^ faith as belted knight 

And by the name I bear. 
And by the bright St. Andrew's cross 

That waves above us there — 
Yea, by a greater, mightier oath — 

And that such should be ! — 
By that dark stream of royal blood 

That lies 'twixt you and me — 
I have not sought in battle-field 

A wreath of such renown. 
Nor dared I hope on my dying day 

To win the martyr's crown ! 

" There is a chamber far away 

Where sleep the good and brave. 
But a better place ye have named for me 

Than by my fathers' grave. 
For truth and right, 'gainst treason's might, 

This hand hath always striven, 
And ye raise it up for a witness still 

In the eye of earth and heaven. 
Then nail my head on yonder tower — 

Give every town a limb — 
And God whS made shall gather them : 

I go from you to Him ! " 

The morning dawned full darkly, 

The rain came flashing down. 
And the jagged streak of the levin-bolt 

Lit up the gloomy town. 
The thunder crashed across the lieaveu, 

The fatal hour was come ; 
Yet aye broke in, with muffled beat, 

The 'larum of the drum. 



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POEMS OF TRAGEDY. 



879 



•a 



There was madness on the earth below 

And anger in the sky, 
And 5'oung and old, and rich and poor, 

Came forth to see him die. 

Ah God ! that ghastly gibbet ! 

■How dismal 't is to see 
The great tall spectral skeleton. 

The ladder and the tree ! 
Hark ! hark ! it is the clash of arms, — 

The bells begin to toll, — 
" He is coming ! he is coming ! 

God's mercy on his soul ! " 
One last long peal of thunder, — 

The clouds are cleared away. 
And the glorious sun once more looks down 

Amidst the dazzling day. 

" He IS coming ! he is coming ! " 

Like a bridegroom from his room 
Came the hero from his prison 

To the scaffold and the doom. 
There was glory on his forehead, 

There was lustre in his eye, 
And he never walked to battle 

More proudly than to die. 
Thei'e was color in his visage, 

Though the cheeks of all were wan ; 
And they marvelled as they saw him pass, 

That great and goodly man ! 

He mounted up the scaffold. 

And he turned him to the crowd ; 
But they dared not trust the people, 

So he might not speak aloud. 
But he looked upon the heavens. 

And they were clear and blue, 
And in the liquid ether 

The eye of God shone through : 
Yet a black and murky battlement 

Lay resting on the hill, 
As though the thunder slept within, — 

All else was calm and still. 

The grim Geneva ministers 

"With anxious scowl drew near, 
As you have seen the ravens flock 

Around the dying deer. 
He would not deign them word nor sign. 

But alone he bent the knee • 
And veiled his face for Christ's dear grace 

Beneath the gallows-tree. 
Then, radiant and serene, he rose, 

And cast his cloak away ; 
For he had ta'en his latest look 

Of earth and sun and day. 



A beam of light fell o'er him, 

Like a glory round the shriven. 
And he climbed the lofty ladder 

As it were the path to heaven. 
Then came a flash from out the cloud. 

And a stunning thunder-roll ; 
And no man dared to look aloft, — • 

Fear was on every soul. 
There was another heavy sound, 

A hush, and then a groan ; 
And darkness swept across the sky, — 

The work of death was done ! 

William Ed.mondstoune Aytoun. 



GOD'S JUDGMENT ON A WICKED 
BISHOP. 

[Hatto, Arclibisliop of Mentz, in the year 914, barbarously mur- 
dered a number of poor people to prevent their consuiiiintj a por- 
tion of the food during that year of famine. He was afterwards 
devoured by rats .in his tower on an island in the Rhine. — Oid 
Legends^ 

The summer and autumn had been so wet, 
That in winter the corn was growing yet : 
'T was a piteous sight to see all around 
The grain lie rotting on the ground. 

Every day the starving poor 
Crowded around Bishop Hatto's door ; 
For he had a plentiful last-year's store, 
And all the neighborhood could tell 
His granaries were furnished well. 

At last Bishop Hatto appointed a day 

To quiet the poor without delay ; 

He bade them to his great barn repair, 

And they should have food for the winter there. 

Rejoiced the tidings good to hear. 
The poor folks flocked from far and near,* 
The great barn was full as it could hold 
Of women and children, and young and old. 

Then, when he saw it could hold no more, 
Bishop Hatto he made fast the door ; 
And whilst for mercy on Christ they call, 
He set fire to the barn, and burnt them all. 

" r faith 't is an excellent bonfire ! " quoth he ; 
" And the country is greatly obliged to me 
For ridding it, in these times forlorn. 
Of rats that only consume the corn." 

So then to his palace returned he, 

And he sate down to supper merrily. 

And he slept that night like an innocent man ; 

But Bishop Hatto never slept again. 



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In the morning, as he entered the hall, 
Where his picture hung against the wall, 
A sweat like death all over him came, 
For the rats had eaten it out of the frame. 

As he looked, there came a man from his farm, — 
He had a countenance white with alarm : 
" My lord, I opened your granaries this morn. 
And the rats had eaten all your corn." 

Another came running presently, 

And he was pale as pale could be. 

" Fly ! my lord bishop, fly ! " quoth he, 

' ' Ten thousand rats are coming this way, — 

The Lord forgive you for yesterday ! " 

" I '11 go to my tower in the Rhine," replied he ; 
" 'T is the safest place in Germany, — 
The walls are high, and the shores are steep. 
And the tide is strong, and the water deep." 

Bishop Hatto fearfully hastened away ; 
And he crossed the Rhine without delay. 
And reached his tower, and barred with care 
All the windows, doors, and loop-holes there. 

He laid him down and closed his eyes, 

But soon a scream made him arise ; 

He started, and saw tvvo eyes of flame 

On his pillow, from whence the screaming came. 

He listened and looked, — it was only the cat ; 
But the bishop he grew more fearful for that. 
For she sate screaming, mad with fear. 
At the army of rats that were drawing near. 

For they have swum over the river so deep. 
And they have climbed the shores so steep, 
And now by thousands up they crawl 
To the holes and the windows in the wall. 

Down on his knees the bishop fell, 

And faster and faster his beads did he tell. 

As lovider and louder, drawing near. 

The saw of their teeth without he could hear. 

And in at the windows, and in at the door. 

And through the walls, by thousands they pour ; 

And down from the ceiling and up through the 
floor, 

From the right and the left, from behind and 
before. 

From within and without, from above and be- 
low, — 

And all at once to the bishop they go. 

They have whetted their teeth against the stones. 
And now they pick the bishop's bones ; 
They gnawed the flesh from every limb, 
For they were sent to do judgment on him ! 

ROBERT SOUTHEY. 



THE SACK OF BALTIMORE. 

[Baltimore is a small seaport in the barony of Carbery, in South 
Munster. It ^rew up around a castle of O'DriscoU's, and was, after 
his ruin, colonized by the Enojlish. On the 20th of June, 1631, the 
crews of two Algerine galleys landed in the dead of the night, 
sacked the town, and bore oft' into slavery all who were not too old, 
or too young, or too fierce, for their purpose. The pirates were 
steered up the intricate channel by one Hackett, a Dungarvan fish- 
erman, whom they had taken at sea for the purpose. Two years 
after, he was convicted of the crime and executed. Baltimore never 
recovered from this.] 

The summer sun is falling soft on Carbery's 

hundred isles, 
The summer sun is gleaming still through 

Gabriel's rough defiles, — 
Old Inisherkin's crumbled fane looks like a 

moulting bird ; 
And in a calm and sleepy swell the ocean tide is 

heard : 
The hookers lie upon the beach ; the children 

cease their play ; 
The gossips leave the little inn ; the households 

kneel to pray ; 
And full of love and peace and rest, — its daily 

labor o'er, — 
Upon that cosy creek there lay the town of Balti- 
more. 

A deeper rest, a starry trance, has come with 

midnight there ; 
No sound, except that throbbing wave, in earth 

or sea or air. 
The massive capes and ruined towers seem con- 
scious of the calm ; 
The fibrous sod and stunted trees are breathing 

heavy balm. 
So still the night, these two long barks round 

Dunashad that glide 
Must trust their oars — methinks not few — 

against the ebbing tide. 
0, some sweet mission of true love must urge 

them to the shore, — 
They bring some lover to his bride, who sighs in 

Baltimore ! 

All, all asleep within each roof along that rocky 
street, 

And these must be the lover's friends, with gen- 
tly gliding feet. 

A stifled gasp ! a dreamy noise ! The roof is in 
a flame ! 

From out their beds, and to their doors, rush 
maid and sire and dame. 

And meet, upon the threshold stone, the gleam- 
ing sabre's fall. 

And o'er each black and bearded face the white 
or crimson shawl. 

The yell of " Allah ! " breaks above the prayer 
and shriek and 'roar — 

blessed God ! the Algerine is lord of Baltimore ! 



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Then Hung the youth his naked hand against the 

shearing sword ; 
Then sprung the mother on the brand with which 

her son was gored ; 
Then sunk the grandsire on the floor, liis grand- 
babes clutching wild ; 
Then fled the maiden moaning faint, and nestled 

with the child. 
But see, yon pirate strangling lies, and crushed 

with splashing heel. 
While o'er him in an Irish hand there sweeps his 

Syrian steel ; 
Though virtue sink, and courage tail, and misei's 

yield their store. 
There 's one hearth well avenged in the sack of 

Baltimore ! 

Midsummer morn, in woodland nigh, the birds 
begin to sing ; 

They see not now the milking-maids, deserted is 
the spring ! 

Midsummer day, this gallant rides from distant 
Bandon's town. 

These hookers crossed from stormy Skull, that 
skifl' from Ad'adown. 

They only found the smoking walls with neigh- 
bors' blood besprent, 

And on the strewed and trampled beach awhile 
they wildly went, 

Then dashed to sea, and passed Cape Clear, and 
saw, Ave leagues before. 

The pirate-galleys vanishing that ravaged Balti- 
more. 

0, some must tug the galley's oar, and some 

must tend the steed, — 
This boy will bear a Scheik's chibouk, and that 

a Bey's jerreed. 
0, some are for the arsenals by beauteous Darda- 
nelles, 
And some are in the caravan to Mecca's sandy 

dells. 
The maid that Bandon gallant sought is chosen 

for the Dey, 
She 's safe, — she 's dead, — she stabbed him in 

the midst of his Serai ; 
And when to die a death of fire that noble maid 

they bore, 
She only smiled, — O'Driscoll's child, — she 

thought of Baltimore. 

'T is two long years since sunk the town beneath 

that bloody band. 
And all around its trampled hearths a larger 

concourse stand, 
"Where high upon a gallows-tree a yelling w-retch 

is seen, — 



'T is Hackett of Dungarvan, — he who steered 

the Algerine ! 

He fell amid a sullen shout, with scarce a passing 
prayer. 

For he had slain the kith and kin of many a 
hundred there : 

Some muttered of MacMorrogh, who had brought 
the Korman o'er. 

Some cursed him with Iseariot, that day in Bal- 
timore. 

Thomas Davis. 



PARRHASIUS. 

Pariihasius stood, gazing forgetfully 
Upon the canvas. There Prometheus lay. 
Chained to the cold rocks of Mount Caucasus, 
The vulture at his vitals, and the links 
Of the lame Lenmian festering in his flesh ; 
And, as the painter's mind felt through the dim 
Rapt mystery, and plucked the shadows forth 
With its far-reaching fancj'^, and with form 
And color clad them, his fine, earnest eye 
Flashed with a passionate fire, and the quick curl 
Of his thin nostril, and his quivering lip. 
Were like the winged god's breathing from his 
flights. 

" Bring me the captive now ! 
My hand feels skilful, and the shadows lift 
From my w^aked spirit airily and swift ; 

And I could paint the bow 
Upon the bended heavens, — around me play 
Colors of such divinity to-day. 

" Ha ! bind him on his back ! 
Look ! as Prometheus in my picture here ; 
Quick, — or he faints ! — stand with the cordial 
near ! 

Now, — bend him to the rack ! 
Press down the poisoned links into his flesh ! 
And tear agape that healing wound afresh ! 

"So, — let him writhe ! How long 
Will he live thus ? Quick, my good pencil, now ! 
What a fine agony works upon his brow ! 

Ha ! gray-haired, and so strong ! 
How fearfully he stifles that short moan ! 
Gods ! if I could but paint a dying groan ! 

"Pity thee ! so 1 do ! 
I pity the dumb victim at the altar. 
But does the robed priest for his pity falter ? 

1 'd rack thee, though I knew 
A thousand lives weie perishing in thine ; 
What were ten thousand to a fame like mine ? 



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t 



" All ! tliere 's a deathless name ! — 
A spirit that the smothering vanlts shall spurn, 
And, like a steadfast planet, mount and burn ; 

And though its crown of flame 
Consumed my brain to ashes as it shone, 
By all the tiery stars, I 'd bind it on ! 

" Ay ! though it bid me rifle 
My heart's last fount for its insatiate thirst, — 
Though every life-strung nerve be maddened 
first, — 

Though it should bid me stifle 
The yearnings in my heart for my sweet child, 
And taunt its mother till my brain went wild, — 

" All, — I would do it all, — 
Sooner than die, like a dull worm, to rot 
Thrust foully in the earth to be forgot. 

O Heavens ! — but I appall 
Your heart, old man ! — forgive — ha ! on your 

lives 
Let him not faint ! rack him till he revives ! 

" Vain, — vain, — give o'er. His eye 
Glazes apace. He does not feel you now, — 
Stand back ! I '11 paint the death-dew on his brow ! 

Gods ! if he do not die. 
But for one moment — one — till I eclipse 
Conception with the scorn of those calm lips ! 

"Shivering! Hark! he mutters 
Brokenly now, — that was a difficult breath, — 
Another ? Wilt thou never come, Death ? 

Look ! how his temple flutters ! 
Is his heart still ? Aha ! lift up his head ! 
He shudders, — gasps, — Jove help him ! — so, 
• — he 's dead I " 

How like a mounting devil in the heart 
Rules the unreined ambition ! Let it once 
But play the monarch, and its haughty brow 
Glows with a beauty that bewilders thought 
And unthrones peace forever. Putting on 
The very pomp of Lucifer, it turns 
The heart to ashes, and with not a spring 
Left in the bosom for the spirit's lip, 
AVe look upon our splendor, and forget 
The thirst of which we peri.sh ! 

NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS. 



A DAGGER OF THE MIND. 

FROM "MACBETH," ACT II. SC, I. 

[Macbeth before the murder of Duncan, meditating alone, sees 
the image of a dagger in the air, and thus soHloquizes :J 

Is this a dagger which I see before me, 
The handle toward my hand ? Come, let me 

clutch thee : — 
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still. 



Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible 

To feeling as to sight ? or art thou but 

A dagger of the mind, a false creation. 

Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain ? 

I see thee yet, in form as palpable 

As this which now I draw. 

Thou marshal'st me the way that I was going ; 

And such an instrument I was to use. 

Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses, 

Or else worth all the rest : 1 see thee still ; 

And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood, 

Which was not so before. — There 's no such 

thing : 
It is the bloody business, which informs 
Thus to mine eyes. — Now o'er the one half 

world 
Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse 
The curtained sleep ; witchcraft celebrates 
Pale Hecate's ofl'erings ; and withered murder, 
Alarumed by his sentinel, the wolf. 
Whose howl 's his watch, thus with his stealthy 

pace. 
With Tartjuin's ravishing strides, towards his 

design 
Moves like a ghost. — Thou sure and firm-set 

earth. 
Hear not my steps, -which way they walk, for 

fear 
The very stones prate of my whereabout. 
And take the present horror from the time. 
Which now suits with it. — Whiles I threat, he 

lives : 
Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives. 

(A bell rings.) 
I go, and it is done ; the bell invites me. 
Hear it not, Duncan ; for it is a knell 
That summons thee to heaven or to hell. 

Shakespeare. 



THE MURDER. 

FROM " MACBETH,'" ACT 11. SC- 2. 

Scene in the Castle. Enter Lady Macbeth. 

Lady Macbeth. That which hath made them 

drunk hath made me bold , 
What hath quenched them hath given me fire. 

Hark ! — Peace ! 
It M'as the owl that shrieked, the fatal bellman. 
Which gives the stern'st good night. He is 

about it : 
The doors are open ; and the surfeited grooms 
Do mark their charge with snores ; I have 

drugged their possets. 
That death and nature do contend about them, 
Whether they live or die. 
Macbeth {within). Who 's there ? What, ho ! 



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Lady M. Alack, I am afraid they have 
awaked 
And 'tis not done ; — the attempt and not the 

deed 
Confounds us. — Hark ! — I laid their daggers 

ready ; 
He could not miss them. — Had he not resembled 
My father, as he slept, I had done 't. — My hus- 
band ! 
Macb. I have done the deed. Didst thou 

not hear a noise ? 
Lady M. I heard the owl scream, and the 
crickets cry. 
Did not you speak ? 
Macb. AVhen ? 

Lady M. Now. 

Macb. As I descended ? 

Lady M. Ay. 
Macb. Hark ! — 
Who lies i' the second chamber ? 

Lady M. Donalbain. 

Macb. ( looking on his hands). This is a sorry 

sight. 
Lady M. A foolish thought, to say a sorry 

sight. 
Macb. There's one did laugh in's sleep, and 
one cried, ' ' Murder ! " 
That they did wake each other : I stood and 

heard them : 
But they did say their prayers, and addressed 

them 
Again to sleep. 

Lady M. There are two lodged together. 

Macb. One cried, " God bless us ! " and, 
"Amen," the other ; 
As they had seen me with these hangman's 

hands. 
Listening their fear, I could not saj', "Amen," 
When they did say, " God bless us." 

Lady M. Consider it not so deeply. 

Macb. But wherefore could not 1 pronounce 
" Amen " ? 
I had most need of blessing, and " Amen" 
Stuck in my throat. 

Lady M. These deeds must not be thought 
After these ways ; so, it will make us mad. 
Macb. Methought I heard a voice cry, "Sleep 
no more ! 
Macbeth does murder sleep," — the innocent 

sleep. 
Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleave of care, 
The death of each day's life, sore labor's bath. 
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course, 
Chief nourisher in life's feast, — 

Lady M. What do you mean ? 

Mace. Still it cried, "Sleep no more I " to 
all the house : 



" Glamis hath murdered sleep ; and therefore 

Cawdor 
Shall sleep no more, — Macbeth shall sleep no 

more ! " 
Lady' M. Who was it that thus cried ? Why, 

worthy thane, 
You do unbend your noble strength, to think 
So brainsickly of things. — Go, get some water, 
And wash this filthj' witness from your hand. 
Why did you bring these daggers from the place ? 
They must lie there : go carry them ; and smear 
The sleepy grooms with blood. 

Macb. I '11 go no more ! 

I am afraid to think what I have done ; 
Look on 't again, I dare not. 

Lady" M. Infirm of purpose ! 

Give me the daggers : the sleeping, and the 

dead, 
Are but as pictures : 't is the eye of childhood 
That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed, 
I '11 gild the faces of the grooms withal ; 
For it must seem their guilt. 

[Exit. Knocking within. 

Macb. Whence is that knocking ? 

How is 't with me, when every noise apjialls me? 

What hands are here ! Ha ! they pluck out 

mine eyes ! 
Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood 
Clojan from my hand ? No ; this my hand will 

rather 
The multitudinous seas incarnadine. 
Making the green — one red. 

(Re-enter Lady Macbeth.) 
Lady M. My hands are of your color ; but I 

shame 
To wear a heart so white. (Knocking.) I hear 

a knocking 
At the south entry : — retire we to our chamber: 
A little water clears us of this deed : 
How easy is it, then ! Your constancy 
Hath left you unattended. (Knocking.) Hark, 

more knocking. 
Get on your nightgown, lest occasion call us, 
And show us to be Avatchei's : — be not lost 
So poorly in your thoughts. 

Macb. To know my deed, 't were best not 

know mj'self. (Knocking.) 
Wake Duncan with thy knocking ! I would thou 

couldst. 

Shakespeare. 



RIDING TOGETHER. 

For many, many days together 

The wind blew steady from the east ; 

For many days liot grew tlie W(>ather, 
About the time of our Ladv's i'east. 



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For many days we rode together, 
Yet met we neither friend nor foe ; 

Hotter and clearer grew the weather, 
Steadily did the east-wind blow. 

We saw the trees in the hot, bright weather, 
Clear-cut, with shadows very black, 

As fceely we rode on together 

With helms unlaced and bridles slack. 

And often as we rode together. 

We, looking down the green-banked stream. 
Saw flowers in the sunny weather. 

And saw the bubble-making bream. 

And in the night lay down together. 
And hung above our heads the rood, 

Or watched night-long in the dewy weather, 
The while the moon did watch the wood. 

Our spears stood bright and thick together. 
Straight out the banners streamed behind, 

As we galloped on in the sunny weather, 
With faces turned towards the wind. 

Down sank our threescore spears together. 

As thick we saw the pagans ride ; 
His eager face in the clear fresh weather 

Shone out that last time by my side. 

Up the sweep of the bridge we dashed together, 
It rocked to the crash of the meeting spears, 

Down rained the buds of the dear spring weather. 
The elm-tree flowers fell like tears. 

There, as we rolled and writhed together, 

I threw my arms above my head. 
For close by my side, in the lovely weather, 

I saw him reel and fall back dead. 

I and the slayer met together. 

He waited the death-stroke there in his place. 
With thoughts of death, in the lovely weather 

Gapingl}' mazed at my maddened face. 

Madly I fought as we fought together ; 

In vain : the little Christian band 
The pagans drowned, as in stormy weather, 

The river drowns low-lying land. 

They bound my blood-stained hands together, 
They bound his corpse to nod by my side : 

Then on we rode, in the bright March weather, 
With clash of cymbals did we ride. 

We ride no more, no more together ; 

My prison-bars are thick and strong, 
I take no heed of any weather. 

The sweet Saints grant I live not long. 

WILLIAM MORRIS. 



THE ROSE AND THE GAUNTLET. 

Low spake the knight to the peasant maid, 
"0, be not thus of my suit afraid ! 
Fly with me from this garden small. 
And. thou shalt sit in my castle hall. 

" Thou shalt have pomp and wealth and pleasure, 
Joys beyond thy fancy's measure ; 
Here with my sword and horse I stand, 
To bear thee away to my distant land. 

' ' Take, thou fairest ! this full-blown rose 

A token of love that as ripely blows." 

With his glove of steel he plucked the token. 

And it fell from the gauntlet crushed and broken. 

The maiden exclaimed, " Thou seest, Sir Knight, 
Thy fingers of iron can only smite ; 
And, like the rose thou hast torn and scattered, 
I in thy grasp should be wrecked and shattered ! " 

She trembled and blushed, and her glances fell. 
But she turned from the knight, and said, " Fare- 
well." 
" Not so," he- cried, " will I lose my prize ; 
I heed not thy words, but I read thine eyes." 

He lifted her up in his grasp of steel. 
And he mounted and spurred with fiery heel ; 
But her cry drew forth her hoary sire. 
Who snatched his bow from above the fire. 

Swift from the valley the warrior fled. 
But swifter the bolt of the cross-bow sped ; 
And the weight that pressed on the fleet-foot 

horse 
Was the living man and the woman's corse. 

That morning the rose was bright of hue. 
That morning the maiden was sweet to view ; 
But the evening sun its beauty shed 
On the withered leaves and the maiden dead. 

JOHN WILSON (Christoplier North). 



THE KING IS COLD. 

Rake the embers, blow the coals, 

Kindle at once a roaring fire ; 

Here 's some paper — 't is nothing, sir — 
Light it (they've saved a thousand souls). 
Run for fagots, ye scurvy knaves. 

There are plenty out in the public square. 

You know they fry the heretics there. 
( But God I'emember their nameless graves ! ) 
Fly, fly, or the king may die ! 



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ra 



Ugh ! his royal feet are like snow, 
And the cold is mounting np to his heart. 

( But that was frozen long ago ! ) 
Rascals, varlets, do as you are told, — 
The king is cold. 

His bed of state is a grand affair. 

With sheets of satin and pillows of down. 
And close beside it stands the crown, — 

But that won't keep him from dying there ! 

His hands are wrinkled, his hair is gray, 
And his ancient blood is sluggish and thin ; 
When he was young it was hot with sin, — 

But that is over this many a day ! 

Under these sheets of satin and lace 
He slept in the arms of his concubines ; 

Now they carouse with the prince instead, 
Drinking the maddest, merriest wines ; 

It 's pleasant to hear such catches trolled, 
Now the king is cold ! 

What shall I do with His Majesty now ? 

For, thanks to my potion, the man is dead ; 

Suppose I bolster him up in bed. 
And fix the crown again on his brow ? 
That would be merry ! but then the prince 

Would tumble it down, I know, in a trice ; 

'T would puzzle the Devil to name a vice 
That would make his Excellent Higlmess wince ! 

Hark ! he 's coming, I know his step ; 

He 's stealing to see if his wishes are true ; 
Sire, may your father's end be yours ! 

( With j ust such a son to murder you ! ) 

Peace to the dead ! Let the bells be tolled — 

The king is cold ! 

Robert browning. 



FRA GIACOMO. 

Alas, Fra Giacomo, 

Too late ! — but follow me ; 
Hush ! draw the curtain, — so ! — 

She is dead, quite dead, you see. 
Poor little lady ! she lies 
With the light gone out of her eyes. 
But her features still wear that soft 

Gi'ay meditative expression, 
Which you must have noticed oft, 

And admired too, at confession. 
How saintly she looks, and how meek ! 

Though this be the chamber of death, 

I fancy I feel her breath 
As I kiss her on the cheek. 
With that pensive religious face, 
She has gone to a holier jjlace ! 
And I hardly appreciated her, — 

Her praying, fasting, confessing, 
Poorly, I own, I mated her ; 



I thought her too cold, and rated her 
For her endless image-caressing. 

Too saintly for me by far. 

As pure and as cold as a star. 

Not fashioned for kissing and pressing, — 

But made for a heavenly crown. 

Aj% father, let us go down, — 

But first, if you please, your blessing. 

Wine ? No ? Come, come, you must ! 

You '11 bless it with your prayers. 
And quaff a cup, I trust, 

To the health of the saint up stairs ? 
My heart is aching so ! 

And I feel so weary and sad. 

Through the blow that I have had, — 
You '11 sit, Fra Giacomo ? 
My friend ! (and a friend I rank you 

For tlie sake of that saint,) — nay, nay ! 

Here 's the wine, — as you love me, stay ! - 
'T is Montepulciano ! — Thank you. 

Heigh-ho ! 'T is now six summers 

Since I won that angel and married her : 

I was rich, not old, and carried her 
Off in the face of all comers. 
So fresh, yet so brimming with soul ! 

A tenderer morsel, I swear. 
Never made the dull black coal 

Of a monk's eye glitter and glare. 

Your pardon ! — nay, keep your chair ! 
I wander a little, but mean 
No offence to the gray gaberdine ; 
Of the church, Fra Giacomo, 
I 'm a faithful upholder, you know, 
But (humor me !) she was as sweet 

As the saints in your convent windows, 
So gentle, so meek, so discreet. 

She knew not what lust does or sin does. 
I '11 confess, though, before we were one, 

I deemed her less saintly, and thought 

The blood in her veins had caught 
Some natural warmth from the sun. 
I was wrong, — I was blind as a bat, — 

Brute that I was, how I blundered ! 
Though such a mistake as that 
Might have occurred as pat 

To ninety-nine men in a hundred. 
Yourself, for example ? you 've seen her ? 
Spite her modest and pious demeanor, 
And the manners so nice and precise. 

Seemed there not color and light, 

Bright motion and appetite. 
That were scarcely consistent with ice ? 
Externals implying, you see. 

Internals less saintly than human ? — 
Pray speak, for between you and me 

You 're not a bad judge of a woman ! 



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A jest, — but a jest ! — Very true : 

'T is hardly becoming to jest, 

And that saint up stairs at rest, — 
Her soul may be listening, too ! 
I was always a brute of a fellow ! 
Well may your visage turn yellow, — 
To think how I doubted and doubted, 
Suspected, grumbled at, flouted 
That golden-haired angel, — and solely 
Because she was zealous and holy ! 
Noon and night and morn 

She devoted herself to piety ; 
Not that she seemed to scorn 

Or dislike her husband's society ; 
But the claims of her soid superseded 
All that I asked for or needed. 
And her thoughts were far away 
From the level of sinful clay. 
And she trembled if earthly matters 
Interfered with her avcs and paters. 
Poor dove, she so fluttered in flying 

Above the dim vapors of hell — 
Bent on self-sanctifying — 
That she never thought of trying 

To save her husband as well. 
And while she was duly elected 

For place in the heavenly roll, 
I (brute that I was !) suspected 

Her manner of saving her soul. 
So, half for the fun of the thing. 
What did I (blasphemer !) but fling 
On my shoulders the gown of a, monk — 

Whom I managed for that very day 

To get safely out of the way — 
And seat me, hfilf sober, half drunk, 
With the cowl thrown over my face. 
In the father confessor's place. 
Ehcn ! henedicite ! 
In her orthodox sweet simplicity, 
With that pensive gray expression, 
She sighfully knelt at confession, 
While I bit my lips till they bled. 

And dug my nails in my hand. 
And heard with averted head 

What I 'd guessed and could understand. 
Each word was a serpent's sting. 

But, wrapt in my gloomy gown, 
I sat, like a marble thing, 

As she told me all ! — Sit down. 

More wine, Fra Giacomo ! 

One cup, — if j^ou love me ! No ? 

What, have these dry lips drank 
So deep of the sweets of pleasure — 
Suh rosa, but quite without measure — - 

That Montepulciano tastes rank ? 

Come, drink ! 't will bring the streaks 



Of crimson back to your cheeks ; 
Come, drink again to the saint 
Whose virtues you loved to paint, 
Who, stretched on her wifely bed, 

With the tender, grave expression 

You used to admire at confession. 
Lies poisoned, overhead ! 

Sit still, — or by heaven, you die ! 
Face to face, soul to soul, you and I 
Have settled accounts, in a fine 
Pleasant fashion, over our wine. 
Stir not, and seek not to fly, — ■ 
Nay, whether or not, you are mine ! 
Thank Montepulciano for giving 

You death in such delicate sips ; 
'T is not every monk ceases living 

With so pleasant a tnste on his lips ; 
But, lest Montepulciano unsurely should kiss, 

Take this ! and this ! and this ! 

Cover him over, Pietro, 
And bury him in the court below, — 
You can be secret, lad, I know ! 
And, hark j^ou, then to the convent go, — 
Bid every bell of the convent toll, 
And the monks say mass for your mistress' soul. 
Robert Buchanan. 



COUNTESS LAURA. 

It was a di'eary day in Padua. 

The Countess Laura, for a single year 

Fernando's wife, upon her bridal bed, 

Like an uprooted lily on the snow. 

The withered outcast of a festival. 

Lay dead. She died of some uncertain ill, 

That struck her almost on her wedding day, 

And clung to her, and dragged her slowly down. 

Thinning her cheeks and pinching her full lips. 

Till, in her chance, it seemed that with a year 

Full half a century was overpast. 

In vain had Paracelsus taxed his art. 

And feigned a knowledge of her malady ; 

In vain had all the doctors, far and near. 

Gathered around the mystery of her bed, 

Draining her veins, her husband's treasury. 

And physic's jargon, in a fruitless quest 

For causes equal to the dread result. 

The Countess only smiled when they were gone. 

Hugged her fair body with her little hands, 

And turned upon her pillows wearily. 

As though she fain would sleep no common sleep. 

But the long, breathless slumber of the grave. 

She hinted nothing. Feeble as she was. 

The rack could not have wrung her secret out. 

The Bishop, when he shrived her, coming forth. 



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Cried, in a voice of lieavenly ecstasy, 
" blessed soul ! with nothing to confess 
Save virtues and good deeds, which she mis- 
takes — 
So humble is she — for our human sins ! " 
Praying for death, she tossed upon her bed 
Day after day ; as might a shipwrecked bark 
That rocks upon one billow, and can make 
No onward motion towards her port of hope. 
At length, one morn, when those around her said, 
" Surely the Countess mends, so fresh a light 
Beams from her eyes and beautifies her face," — 
One morn in spring, when every llower of earth 
Was opening to the sun, and breathing up 
Its votive incense, her impatient soul 
Opened itself, and so exhaled to heaven. 
When the Count heard it, he reeled back a pace ; 
Then turned with anger on the messenger ; 
Then craved his pardon, and wept out his heart 
Before the menial ; tears, ah me ! such tears 
As love sheds only, and love only once. 
Then he bethought him, " Shall this wonder die. 
And leave behind no shadow ? not a trace 
Of all the glory that environed her, 
That mellow nimbus circling round my star ?" 
So, with his sorrow glooming in his face. 
He paced along his gallery of art. 
And strode among the painters, where they stood, 
"With Carlo, the Venetian, at tlieir head. 
Studying the Masters by the dawning light 
Of his transcendent genius. Through the groups 
Of gayly vestured artists moved the Count, 
As some lone cloud of thick and leaden hue. 
Packed with the secret of a coming storm. 
Moves through the gold aiul ciimson evening 

mists. 
Deadening their splendor. In a moment still 
Was Carlo's voice, and still the prattling crowd ; 
And a great shadow overwhelmed them all. 
As their white faces and their anxious eyes 
Pursued Fernando in his moody walk. 
He paused, as one who balances a doubt, 
Weighing two courses, then burst out with this : 
' ' Ye all have seen the tidings in my face ; 
Or has the dial ceased to register 
The workings of my heart ? Then hear the bell, 
That almost cracks its frame in utterance ; 
The Countess, — she is dead ! " " Dead ! " Carlo 

groaned. 
And if a bolt from middle heaven had struck 
His splendid featun?s full upon the brow. 
He could not have appeared more scathed and 

blanched. 
" Dead ! — dead ! " He staggered to his easel- 
frame. 
And clung around it, bufieting the air 
With one wild arm, as though a drowning man 



Hung to a spar and fought against the waves. 

The Count resumed : " I came not here to grieve. 

Nor see my sorrow in another's eyes. 

Who '11 paint the Countess, as she lies to-night 

In state within the chapel ? Shall it be 

That earth must lose her wholly ? that no hint 

Of her gold tresses, beaming eyes, and lips 

That talked in silence, and the eager soul 

That ever seemed outbreaking through her clay, 

And scattering glory round it, — shall all these 

Be dull corruption's heritage, and we, 

Poor beggars, have no legacy to show 

That love she bore us ? That were shame to love. 

And shame to you, my masters." Carlo stalked 

Forth from his easel stilfly as a thing 

Moved by mechanic impulse. His thin lips, 

And sharpened nostrils, and wan, sunken cheeks, 

And the cold glimmer in his dusky eyes, 

Made him a ghastly sight. The throng drew 

back 
As thougli they let a spectre through. Then he. 
Fronting the Count,, and speaking in a voice 
Sounding remote and hollow, made reply : 
" Count, I shall paint the Countess. 'T is my 

fate, — 
Not pleasure, — no, nor duty." But the Count, 
Astray in woe, but understood assent. 
Not the strange words that bore it ; and he flung 
His arm round Carlo, drew him to his breast, 
And kissed his forehead. At which Carlo shrank; 
Perhaps 'twas at the honor. Then the Count, 
A little reddening at his public state, — 
Unseemly to his near and recent loss, — 
Withdrew in haste between the downcast eyes 
That did him reverence as he rustled by. 

Night fell on Padua. In the chapel lay 

The Countess Laura at the altar's foot. 

Her coronet glittered on her pallid brows ; 

A crimson pall, weighed down with golden work. 

Sown thick with pearls, and heaped with early 

flowers, 
Draped her still body almost to the chin ; 
And over all a thousand candles flamed 
Against the winking jewels, or streamed down 
The marble aisle, and flashed along the guard 
Of men-at-arms that slowly wove their turns. 
Backward and forward, through the distant 

gloom. 
When Carlo entered, his unsteady feet 
Scarce bore him to the altar, and his head 
Drooped down so low that all his shining curls 
Poured on his breast, and veiled his countenance. 
Upon his easel a half-finished work, 
The secret labor of his studio. 
Said from the canvas, so that none might err, 
" I am the Countess Laura." Carlo kneeled, 



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And gazed upon the picture ; as if thus, 
Through tliose clear eyes, he saw the way to 

heaven. 
Then he arose ; and as a swimmer comes 
Forth from the waves, he shook his locks aside, 
Emerging from his dream, and standing firm 
Upon a purpose with his sovereign will. 
He took his palette, murmuring, " Not yet !" 
Confidingly and softly to the corpse , 
And as the veriest drudge, who plies his art 
Against his fancy, he addressed himself 
With stolid resolution to his task, 
Turning his vision on his memory, 
And shutting out the present, till the dead. 
The gilded pall, the lights, the pacing guard. 
And all the meaning of that solemn scene 
Became as nothing, and creative Art 
Eesolved the whole to chaos, and reformed 
The elements according to her law : 
So Carlo wrought, as though his eye and hand 
Were Heaven's unconscious instruments, and 

worked 
The settled purpose of Omnipotence. 
And it was wondrous how the red, the white, 
The ochre, and the umber, and the blue. 
From mottled blotches, liazy and opaque, 
Crew into rounded forms and sensuous lines ; ^ 
How just beneath the lucid skin the blood 
Glimmered with warmth ; the scarlet lips apart 
Ijloomed with the moisture of the dews of life ; 
How the light glittered through and underneath 
Tlie golden tresses, and the deep, soft eyes 
Became intelligent with conscious thought. 
And somewhat troubled underneath the arch 
Of eyebrows but a little too intense 
For perfect beauty ; how the pose and poise 
Of the lithe figure on its tiny foot 
Suggested life just ceased from motion ; so 
Tliat any one might cry, in marvelling joy, 
" That creature lives, — has senses, mind, a soul 
To win God's love or dare hell's subtleties ! " 
The artist paused. The ratifying " Good ! ' 
Trembled upon his lips. He saw no touch 
To give or soften. " It is done," he cried, — 
" My task, my duty ! Nothing now on earth 
Can taunt me with a work left unfnllilled ! " 
The lofty flame, which bore him up so long, 
Died in the ashes of humanity ; 
And the mere man rocked to and fro again 
Upon the centre of his wavering heart. 
He put aside his palette, as if thus 
He stepped from sacred vestments, and assumed 
A mortal function in the common world. 
" Now for my rights ! " lie muttered, and ap- 
proached 
The noble liody. " lily of the world ! 
So withered, yet so lovely ! wliat wast thou 



To those who came thus near thee — for I stood 
Without the pale of thy half-royal rank — 
When thou wast budding, and the streams of life 
Made eager struggles to maintain th}' bloom. 
And gladdened heaven dropped down in gracious 

dews 
On its transplanted darling ? Hear me now ! 
I say this but in justice, not in pride. 
Not to insult thy high nobility, 
But that the poise of things in God's own sight 
May be adjusted ; and hereafter I 
May urge" a claim tliat all the powers of heaven 
Shall sanction, and with clarions blow abroad. — 
Laura, you loved me ! Look not so severe. 
With your cold brows, and deadly, close-drawn 

lips ! 
You proved it. Countess, when j^ou died for it, — 
Let it consume you in the weaiing strife 
It fought ^^■ith duty in your ravaged heart. 
I knew it ever since that summer day 
I painted lAUa, the pale beggar's child. 
At rest beside the fountain ; when I felt — 

Heaven ! — the warmth and moisture of your 

breath 
Blow through my hair, as with your eager soul — 
Forgetting soul and body go as one — 
You leaned across my easel till our cheeks — 
Ah me ! 't was not your purpose — touched, and 

clung ! 
Well, grant 't was genius ; and is genius naught ? 

1 ween it wears as proud a diadem — 
Here, in this very world — as that you wear. 
A king has held my palette, a grand-duke 

Has picked my brusli up, and a pope has begged 
The favor of my ]iresence in his Kome. 
I did not go ; I i)ut my fortune by. 
I need not ask you why : you knew too well. 
It was but natural, it was no way strange, 
That I should love you. Everything that saw, 
Or had its other senses, loved you, sweet, 
And I among them. Martyr, holy saint, — 
I see the halo curving round your head, — 
I loved you once ; but now I worship you. 
For the great deed that held my love aloof, 
And killed you in the action ! I absolve 
Your soul from any taint. For from the day 
Of that encounter by the fountain-side 
Until this moment, never turned on me 
Those tender eyes, unless they did a M'rong 
To nature by the cold, defiant glare 
With which they chilled me. Never heard I word 
Of softness spoken by those gentle lips ; 
Never received a bounty from that hand 
Which gave to all the world. I know the cause. 
Yon did your duty, ■ — not for honor's sake. 
Nor to save sin, or suffering, or remorse, 
Or ail the ghosts that haunt a woman's shame, 



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But for the sake of that pure, loyal love 

Your husband bore you. Queen, by grace of God, 

I bow before the lustre of your throne ! 

I kiss the edges of your garment-hem, 

And hold myself ennobled ! Answer me, — 

If 1 had wronged you, you would answer me 

Out of the dusty porches of the tomb : — 

Is this a dream, a falsehood ? or have I 

Spoken the very truth ? " "The very truth ! " 

A voice replied ; and at his side he saw 

A fornj, half shadow and half substance, stand, 

Or, rather, rest ; for on the solid earth 

It had no footing, more than some dense mist 

That wavers o'er the surface of the ground 

It scarcely touches. With a reverent look 

The shadow's waste and wretched face was bent 

Above the picture ; as though greater awe 

Subdued its awful being, and appalled, 

AVith memories of terrible delight 

And fearful wonder, its devouring gaze. 

"You make what God malies, — beauty," said 

the shape. 
" And might not this, this second Eve, console 
The emptiest heart ? Will not this thing outlast 
The fairest creature fashioned in the flesh ? 
Before tliat figure, Time, and Death himself. 
Stand baffled and disarmed. What would you 

ask 
More than God's power, from nothing to create ? " 
The artist gazed upon the boding form. 
And answei-ed : "Goblin, if you had a heart. 
That were an idle question. What to me 
Is my creative power, bereft of love ? 
Or what to God would be that self-same power, 
If so bereaved ? " " And yet the love, thus 

mourned, 
You calmly forfeited. For had you said 
To living Laura — in her burning ears — 
One half that you professed to Laura dead, 
She would have been your own. These contraries 
Sort not with my intelligence. But speak, 
Were Laura living, would the same stale play 
Of raging passion tearing out its heart 
Upon the rock of duty be performed ? " 
" The same, phantom, while the heart I boar 
Trembled, but turned not its magnetic faith 
From God's fii"''! centre." " If I wake for you 
This Laura, — give her all the bloom and glow 
Of that midsummer day you hold so dear, — 
The smile, the motion, the impulsive soul, 
The love of genius, — yea, the very love, 
The mortal, hungry, passionate, hot love. 
She bore you, flesh to flesh, — would you receive 
That gift, in all its glory, at my hands ? " 
A smile of malice cuj'led the tempter's lips. 
And glittered in the caverns of his eyes, 
Mocking the answer. Carlo paled and shook ; 



A woful spasm went shuddering through his 

frame. 
Curdling his blood, and twisting his fair face 
With nameless torture. But he cried aloud, 
Out of the clouds of anguish, from the smoke 
Of very martyrdom, " God, she is thine ! 
Do with her at thy pleasure ! " Something grand. 
And radiant as a sunbeam, touched the head 
He bent in awful sorrow. " Mortal, see — " 
"Dare not ! As Christ was sinless, I abjure 
These vile abominations ! Shall she bear 
Life's burden twice, and life's temptations tvt'ice. 
While God is justice ?" " Who has made you 

judge 
Of what you call God's good, and what you think 
God's evil ? One to him, the source of both. 
The God of good and of permitted ill. 
Have you no dream of days that might have been. 
Had you and Laura filled another fate ? — 
Some cottage on the sloping Apennines, 
Roses and lilies, and the rest all love ? 
I tell you that this tranquil dream may be 
Filled to repletion. Speak, and in the shade 
Of my dark pinions I shall bear you hence. 
And land you where the mountain-goat himself 
Struggles for footing." He outspread his wings. 
And all the chapel darkened, as though hell 
Had swallowed up the tapers ; and the air 
Grew thick, and, like a current sensible,. 
Flowed round the person, with a wash and dash. 
As of the waters of a nether sea. 
Slowly and calmly through the dense obscure, 
Dove-like and gentle, rose the artist's A^oice : 
" I dare not bring her spirit to that shame ! 
Know my full meaning, — I who neither fear 
Your mystic person nor your dreadful power. 
Nor shall I now invoke God's potent name 
For my deliverance from your toils. I stand 
Upon the founded structure of his law. 
Established from the first, and thence defy 
Your arts, reposing all my trust in that ! " 
The darkness eddied off" ; and Carlo saw 
The figure gathering, as from outer space, 
Brightness on brightness ; and his former shape 
Fell from him, like the ashes that fall ofiT, 
And show a core of mellow fire within. 
Adown his wings there poured a lambent flood. 
That seemed as molten gold, which plashing fell 
Upon the floor, enringing him wdth flame ; 
And o'er the tresses of his beaming head 
Arose a stream of many-colored light, 
Like that which crowns the morning. Carlo stoocl 
Steadfast, for all the splendor, reaching up 
The outstretched palms of his untainted soul 
Towards heaven for strength. A moment thus ; 

then asked. 
With reverential wonder quivering through 



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His sinking voice, " Who, spirit, and what, art 

tliou ? " 
" I am that blessing which men fly from, — 

Death." 
" Tlieu take my hand, if so God orders it ; 
For Lanra waits me." " But, bethink thee, man, 
What the world loses in the loss of thee ! 
What wondrous art will suffer with eclipse ! 
What unwon glories are in store for thee ! 
"What fame, outreaching time and temporal shocks. 
Would shine upon the letters of thy name 
Graven in marble, or the brazen height 
Of columns wise with memories of thee ! " 
' ' Take me ! If I outlived the Patriarchs, 
I could but paint those features o'er and o'er : 
Lo ! that is done." A smile of pity lit 
The seraph's features, as he looked to heaven, 
With deep inquiry in his tender eyes. 
The mandate came. He touched with downy wing 
The sufferer lightly on his aching heart ; 
And gently, as the skylark settles down 
Upon the clustered treasures of her nest, 
So Carlo softly slid along the prop 
Of his tall easel, nestling at the foot 
As though he slumbered ; and the morning broke 
In silver whiteness over Padua. 

George Henry Boker. 



GINEVRA. 

If thou shouldst ever come by choice or chance 
To Modena, where still religiously 
Among her ancient trophies is preserved 
Bologna's bucket (in its chain it hangs 
Within that reverend tower, the Guirlandina), 
Stop at a palace near the Reggio gate, 
Dwelt in of old ])y one of the Orsini. 
Its noble gardens, terrace above terrace. 
And rich in fountains, statues, cypresses. 
Will long detain thee ; through their arched 

walks. 
Dim at noonday, discovering many a glimpse 
Of knights and dames, such as in old romance, 
And lovers, such as in heroic song, 
Pei'haps the two, for groves were their delight. 
That in the spring-time, as alone they sat, 
Venturing together on a tale of love. 
Read only part that day. — A summer sun 
Sets ere one half is seen ; but ere thou go, 
Enter the house — ■ prythee, forget it not — 
And look awhile upon a picture there. 

'T is of a Lady in her earliest youth. 
The last of that illustrious race ; 
Done by Zampieri — but I care not whom. 
He who observes it, ere he passes on, 



Gazes his fill, and comes and comes again. 
That he may call it up when far away. 

She sits inclining forward as to speak. 
Her lips half open, and her finger up. 
As though she said " Beware ! " her vest of gold 
Broidered with flowers, and clasped from head to 

foot. 
An emerald stone in every golden clasp ; 
And on her brow, fairer than alabaster, 
A coronet of pearls. But then her face, 
So lovely, yet so arch, so full of mirth, 
The overflowings of an innocent heart, — ■ 
It haunts me still, though many a year has fled, 
Like some wild melody ! 

Alone it hangs 
Over a mouldering heirloom, its companion, 
An oaken cdiest, half eaten by the worm, 
But richly carved by Antony of Trent 
With Scripture stories from the life of Christ ; 
A chest that came from Venice, and had held 
The ducal robes of some old Ancestor, 
That, by the way — it may be true or false — 
But don't forget the picture ; and thou wilt not 
When thou hast heard the tale they told me there. 

She was an only child ; from infancy 
The joy, the pride, of an indulgent Sire ; 
Her Mother dying of the gift she gave, 
That precious gift, what else remained to him ? 
The young Ginevra was his all in life. 
Still as she grew, for ever in his sight ; 
And in her fifteenth year became a bride. 
Marrying an only son, Francesco Doiia, 
Her playmate from her birth, and her first love. 

Just as she looks there in her bridal dress. 
She was all gentleness, all gayety, 
Her pranks the favorite theme of every tongue. 
But now the day was come, the day, the hour ; 
Now, frowning, smiling, for the hundredth time. 
The nurse, that ancient lady, preached decorum ; 
And, in the lustre of her j^outh, she gave 
Her hand, with her heart in it, to Francesco. 

Great was the joy ; but at the Bridal-feast, 
When all sate down, the- bride was wanting 

there, 
N"or was she to be found ! Her Father cried, 
" 'T is but to make a trial of our love ! " 
And filled his glass to all ; but his hand shook. 
And soon from guest to guest the panic spread. 
'T was but that instant she had left Francesco, 
Laughing and looking back, and flying still, 
Her ivory tooth imprinted on his finger. 
But now, alas, she was not to be found ; 
Nor from that hour could anything be guessed. 
But that she was not ! 



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"Weary of his life, 
Francesco flew to Venice, and, forthwith, 
Fhuig it away in battle with the Turk. 
Orsini lived, — and long mightst thou have seen 
An old man wandering as in quest of something. 
Something he could not find, he knew not what. 
When he was gone, the house remained awhile 
Silent and tenantless, — then went to strangers. 

Full fifty years were past, and all forgot, 
When, on an idle day, a day of search 
Mid the old lumber in the Gallery, 
That mouldering chest was noticed ; and 't was 

said 
By one as young, as thoughtless as Ginevra, 
" Why not remove it from its lurking-place ? " 
'T was done as soon as said ; but on the way 
It burst, it fell ; and lo, a skeleton, 
With here and there a pearl, an emerald stouL', 
A golden clasp, clasping a shred of gold ! 
All else had perished, — save a nuptial-ring. 
And a small seal, her mother's legacy, 
Engraven with a name, the name of both, 

"GlNEVKA." 

There then had she found a grave ! 

Within that chest had she concealed herself. 

Fluttering with joy, the happiest of the happy ; 

When a spring-lock, that lay in ambush there. 

Fastened her down for ever ! 

Samuel Rogers. 



THE MISTLETOE BOUGH. 

The mistletoe hung in the castle hall, 
The holly branch shone on the old oak wall ; 
And the baron's retainers were blithe and gay, 
And keeping their Christmas holiday. 
The baron beheld with a father's pride 
His beautiful child, young Lovell's bride ; 
While she with her bright eyes seemed to be 
The star of the goodly company. 

" I 'm weary of dancing now," she cried ; 

" Here tarry a moment, — I '11 hide, I '11 hide ! 

And, Lovell, be sure thou 'rt first to trace 

The clew to my secret lurking-place." 

Away she ran, — and her friends began 

Each tower to search, and each nook to scan ; 

And young Lovell cried, " 0, where dost thou 

hide ? 
I 'm lonesome without thee, my own dear bride." 

They sought her that night, and they sought her 

next day. 
And they sought her in vain when a week passed 

away : 
In the highest, the lowest, the loneliest spot, 
Young Lovell sought wildly, — but found lier not. 



And years flew by, and their grief at last 
Was told as a sorrowful tale long past ; 
And when Lovell appeared, the children cried, 
"See ! the old man weeps for his fairy bride." 

At length an oak chest, that had long lain hid. 
Was found in the castle, — they raised the lid. 
And a skeleton form lay mouldering there 
In the bridal wreath of that lady fair ! 
0, sad was her fate ! • — in sportive jest 
She hid from her lord in the old oak chest. 
It closed with a spring ! — and, dreadful doom. 
The bride lay clasped in her living tomb ! 

THOMAS Haynes Bayly. 



THE YOUNG GRAY HEAD. 

Grief hath been known to turn the young head 

gray, — 
To silver over in a single day 
The bright locks of the beautiful, their prime 
Scarcely o'erpast ; as in the fearful time 
Of Gallia's madness, that discrowned head 
Serene, that on the accursed altar bled 
Miscalled of Liberty. martyred Queen ! 
What must the sufferings of that night have 

been — • 
That one — that sprinkled thy fair tresses o'er 
With time's untimely snow ! But now no more, 
Lovely, august, unhappy one ! of thee — ■ 
I have to tell a humbler history ; 
A village tale, whose only charm, in sooth 
(If any), will be sad and simple truth. 

" Mother," quoth Ambrose to his thrifty dame, — 
So oft our peasant's use his wife to name, 
" Father " and " Master" to himself applied. 
As life's gi'ave duties matronize the bride, — 
" Mother," quoth Ambrose, as he faced the north 
With hard-set teeth, before he issued forth 
To his day labor, from the cottage door, — • 
" I 'm thinking that, to-night, if not before, 
There '11 be wild work. Dost hear old Chewton * 

roar ? 
It 's brewing up, down westward ; and look there. 
One of those sea-gulls ! ay, there goes a pair ; 
And such a sudden thaw ! If rain comes on. 
As threats, the waters will be out anon. 
That path by the ford 's a nasty bit of way, — 
Best let the young ones bide from school to-day." 

"Do, mother, do ! " the quick-eared urchins cried ; 
Two little lasses to the father's side 



* A fresh-water spring; rushing into the sea, called Chewton 
Bunny. 



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Close clinging, as they looked from him, to spy 
The answering language of the mother's eye. 
There was denial, and she shook her head : 
"Nay, nay, — no harm will come to them," she 

said, 
" The mistress lets them off these short dark days 
An hour the earlier ; and our Liz, she says, 
May quite be trusted — and I know 't is true • — 
To take care of herself and Jenny too. 
And so she ought, — she 's seven come first of 

May, — 
Two years the oldest ; and they give away 
The Christmas bounty at the school to-day." 

The mother's will was law (alas, for her 
That hapless day, poor soul !) — she could not err, 
Thought Ambrose ; and his little fair-haired Jane 
(Her namesake) to his heart he hugged again. 
When each had had her turn ; she clinging so 
As if that day she could not let him go. 
But Labor's sons must snatch a hasty bliss 
In nature's tenderest mood. One last fond kiss, 
" God bless my little maids ! " the father said, 
And cheerly went his way to win their bread. 
Then might be seen, the playmate parent gone, 
What looks demure the sister pair put on, — 
Not of the mother as afraid, or shy. 
Or questioning the love that could deny ; 
But simply, as their simple training taught. 
In quiet, plain straightforwardness of thought 
(Submissively resigned the hope of play) 
Towards the serious business of the day. 

To me there 's something touching, I confess. 
In the grave look of early thouglitfulness, 
Seen often in some little childish face 
Among the poor. Not that wherein we trace 
(Shame to our land, our rulers, and our race !) 
The unnatural sufferings of the factory child. 
But a staid quietness, reflective, mild, - 
Betokening, in the depths of those young eyes, 
Sense of life's cares, without its miseries. 

So to the mother's charge, with thoughtful brow, 

The docile Lizzy stood attentive now, 

Proud of her years and of imputed sense. 

And pnidence justifying confidence, — 

And little Jenny, more demurely still, 

Beside her waited the maternal will. 

So standing hand in hand, a lovelier twain 

Gainsborough ne'er painted : no — nor he of 

Spain, 
Glorious Murillo ! — and by contrast shown 
More beautiful. The younger little one. 
With lai-ge blue eyes and silken ringlets fair. 
By nut-brown Lizzy, with smooth parted hair. 
Sable and glossy as the raven's wing, 
And lustrous eyes as dark. 



' ' Now, mind and bring 
Jenny safe home," the mother said, — "don't 

stay 
To pull a bough or berry by the way : 
And when you come to cross the ford, hold fast 
Your little sister's hand, till you're quite past, — 
That plank 's so crazy, and so slippery 
(If not o'erflowed) the stepping-stones will be. 
But you 're good children — steady as old folk — 
I 'd trust ye anywhere." Then Lizzy's cloak, 
A good gray duffle, lovingly she tied. 
And amply little Jenny's lack supplied 
With her own warmest shawl. " Be sure," said 

she, 
" To wrap it round and knot it carefully 
(Like this), when you come home, just leaving 

free 
One hand to hold by. Now, make haste away — ■ 
Good will to school, and then good right to play.'' 

Was there no sinking at the mother's heart 
When, all equipt, they turned them to depart ? 
When down the lane she watched them as they 

went 
Till out of sight, was no forefeeling sent 
Of coming ill ? In truth I cannot tell : 
Su(;h warnings have been sent, we know full well 
And must believe — believing that they are ■ — ■ 
In mercy then — to rouse, restrain, prepare. 

And now I mind me, something of the kind 

Did surely haunt that day the mother's mind. 

Making it irksome to bide all alone 

By her own quiet hearth. Though never known 

For idle gossipry was Jenny Gv&j, 

Yet so it Avas, that morn she could not stay 

At home with her own thoughts, but took her 

way 
To her next neighbor's, half a loaf to borrow, — 
Yet might her store have lasted out the mor- 
row, — 
And with the loan obtained, she lingered still. 
Said she, " My master, if he 'd had his will, 
Would have kept back our little ones from school 
This dreadful morning ; and I 'm such a fool, 
Since they 've been gone, I 've wished them back. 

But then 
It won't do in such things to humor men, — 
Our Ambrose specially. If let alone 
He 'd spoil those wenches. But it 's coming on, 
That storm he said was brewing, sure enough, — 
Well ! what of that ? To think what idle stuff 
Will come into one's head ! And here with you 
I stop, as if I 'd nothing else to do — 
And they '11 come home, drowned rats. I must 

be gone 
To get dry things, and set the kettle on." 



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a 



Plis day's work done, three mortal miles, and 

more, 
Lay between Ambrose and his cottage-door. 
A weary way, God wot, for weary wight ! 
But yet far off the curling smoke in sight 
From his own chimne}^ and his heart felt light. 
How pleasantly the humble homestead stood, 
Down the green lane, by sheltering Shirley wood! 
How sweet the wafting of the evening breeze. 
In spring-time, from his two old cherry-trees. 
Sheeted with blossom ! And in hot July, 
From the brown moor-track, shadowless and dry. 
How grateful the cool covert to regain 
Of his own avenue, — that shady lane, 
With the wliite cottage, in a slanting glow 
Of sunset glory, gleaming bright below, 
And jasmine porch, his rustic portico ! 

With what a thankful gladness in his face, 
(Silent heart-homage, — plant of special grace !) 
At the lane's entrance, slackening oft his pace. 
Would Ambrose send a loving look before. 
Conceiting the caged blackbird at the door ; 
The very blackbird strained its little throat. 
In welcome, with a more rejoicing note ; 
And honest Tinker, dog of doubtful breed. 
All bristle, back, and tail, but "good at need," 
Pleasant his gi'ceting to the accustomed ear ; 
But of all welcomes pleasantest, most dear, 
Tlie ringing voices, like sweet silver bells. 
Of his two little ones. How fondly swells 
The father's heart, as, dancing up the lane. 
Each clasps a hand in her small hand again. 
And each must tell her tale and " say her say," 
Impieding as she leads with sweet delay 
(Childhood's blest thoughtlessness !) his onward 
way. 

And when the winter day closed in so fast ; 
Scarce for his task would dreary daylight last ; 
And in all weathers — driving sleet and snow — 
Home by that bare, bleak moor-track must he go, 
Darkling and lonely. 0, the blessed sight 
(His polestar) of that little twinkling light 
From one small window, through the leafless 

trees, — 
Glimmering so fitfully ; no eye but his 
Had spied it so far oH'. And sure was he, 
Entering the lane, a steadier beam to see, 
Puddy and broad as peat-fed hearth could pour. 
Streaming to meet him from the open door. 
Then, though the blackbird's welcome was un- 
heard, — - 
Silenced by Avinter, — note of summer bird 
Still hailed him from no mortal fowl alive, 
But from the cuckoo clock just striking five. 
And Tinker's ear and Tinker's nose were keen, — 
Otf started he, and then a form was seen 



Darkening the doorway ; and a smaller sprite, 
And then another, peered into the night, 
Ready to follow free on Tinker's track. 
But for the mother's hand that held her back : 
And yet a moment — a few steps — and there. 
Pulled o'er the tlireshold by that eager pair, 
He sits by his own hearth, in his own chair ; 
Tinker takes post beside with eyes that say, 
"Master, we've done our business for the daJ^" 
The kettle sings, the cat in chorus purrs. 
The busy housewife with her tea-things stirs ; 
The door 's made fast, the old stuff curtain 

drawn ; 
How the hail clatters ! Let it clatter on ! 
How the wind raves and rattles ! What cares he ? 
Safe housed and warm beneath his own roof-tree, 
With a wee lassie prattling on each knee. 

Such was the hour — hour sacred and apart — 
Warmed in expectancy the poor man's heart. 
Summer and winter, as his toil he plied. 
To him and his the literal doom ap[)lied. 
Pronounced on Adam. But the bread was sweet 
So earned, for such dear mouths. The weary feet, 
Hope-shod, stept lightly on the homeward way ; 
So specially it fared with Ambrose Gray 
That time I tell of. He had worked all day 
At a great clearing ; vigorous stroke on stroke 
Strilving, till, when he stopt, his back seemed 

broke. 
And the strong arms dropt nerveless. What of 

that ? 
There was a treasure hidden in his hat, — 
A plaything for the young ones. He had found 
A dormouse nest ; the living ball coiled round 
For its long winter sleep ; and all his thought. 
As he trudged stoutly homeward, was of naught 
But the glad wonderment in Jenny's eyes. 
And graver Lizzy's quieter surprise. 
When he should yield, by guess and kiss and 

prayer 
Hard won, the frozen captive to their care. 

'T was a wild evening, — wild and rough. " I 

knew," » 

Thought Ambrose, "those unlucky gulls spoke 

ti'ue, — 
And Gaffer Chewton never growls for naught, — 
I should be moital 'mazed now if I thought 
My little maids were not safe housed before 
That blinding hail-storm, — ay, this hour and 

more, — 
Unless by that old crazy bit of board, 
They 've not passed dry-foot over Shallow ford. 
That I '11 be bound for, — swollen as it nuist 

be — 
Well ! if my mistress had been ruled by me — " 
But, checking the half-thought as iieresy. 



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POEMS OF TRAGEDY. 



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He looked out for tim Home Star. There it 

shone, 
And with a gladdened heart he hastened on. 

He 's in the lane again, — and there below, 
Streams from the open doorway that red glow, 
Which warms him but to look at. For his prize 
Cautious he feels, — all safe and snug it lies. — 
" Down, Tinker ! down, old boy ! — not quite so 

free, — 
The thing thou sniffest is no game for thee. — 
But what 's the meaning ? no lookout to-night ! 
No living soul astir ! Pray God, all 's right ! 
Who 's flittering round the peat-stack in such 

weather ? 
Mother ! '•' you might have felled him with a 

feather, 
When the short answer to his loud " Hillo ! " 
And hurried question, "Are they come?" M'as 

"No." 

To throw his tools down, hastily unhook 
Tlie old cracked lantern from its dusty nook, 
And, while he lit it, speak a cheering word. 
That almost choked him, and was scarcely heai'd, 
AVas but a moment's act, and he was gone 
To where a fearful foresight led him on. 
Passing a neighbor's cottage in his way, — 
Mark Fenton's, — him he took with short delay 
To bear him company, — for who could say 
What need might be ? They struck into the track 
The children should have taken coming back 
From school that day ; and many a call and shout 
Into the pitchy darkness they sent out. 
And, by the lantern light, peered all about. 
In every roadside thicket, hole, and nook. 
Till suddenly — as nearing now the brook — 
Something brushed past them. That was Tink- 
er's bark, — 
Unheeded, he had followed in the dark. 
Close at his master's heels ; but, swift as light. 
Darted before them now. " Be sure he 's right, — 
He 's on the track," cried Ambrose. " Hold the 

light 
Low down, — he 's making for the water. Hark ! 
I know that whine, — the old dog 's found them, 

Mark." 
So speaking, breathlessly he hurried on 
To\vard the old crazy foot-bridge. It was gone ! 
And all his dull contracted light could show 
Was the black void and dark swollen stream below. 
" Yet there 's life somewhere, — more than Tink- 
er's whine, — 
That's sure," said Mark. "So, let the lantern 

shine 
Down yonder. There 's the dog, — and, hark t " 

"0 deaTl" 
And a low sob came faintly on the ear, 



Mocked by the sobbing gust. Dowti, quick as 

thought, 
Into the stream leapt Ambrose, where he caught 
Fast hold of something, — a dark huddled heap, — 
Half in the water, where 't was scarce knee-deep 
For a tall man, and half above it, propped 
By some old ragged side-piles, that had stopt 
Endways the broken plank, when it gave way 
With the two little ones that luckless day I 
" My babes ! — my lambkins ! " was the father's 

cry. 
One little voice made answer, " Here am I ! " 
'T was Lizzy's. There she crouched with face as 

white, 
More ghastly by the flickering lantern -light 
Than sheeted corpse. The pale blue lips drawn 

tight, 
Wide parted, showing all the pearly teeth. 
And eyes on some dark object underneath. 
Washed by the turbid water, iixed as stone, — 
One arm and hand stretched out, and rigid 

grown, 
Grasping, as in the death-gripe, Jenny's frock. 
There she lay drowned. Could he sustain that 

shock. 
The doting father ? Where 's the unriven rock 
Can bide such blasting in its flintiest part 
As that soft sentient thing, — the human heart ? 

They lifted her from out her watery bed, — 
Its covering gone, the lovely little head 
Hung like a broken snowdrop all aside ; 
And one small hand, — the mother's shawl was 

tied, 
Leaving that free, about the child's small form, 
As was her last injunction — "fast and warm " — 
Too well obeyed, — too fast ! A fatal hold 
Aff'ording to the scrag by a thick fold 
That caught and pinned her in the river's bed. 
While through the reckless water overhead 
Her life-breath bubbled up. 

"She might have lived, 
Struggling like Lizzy," was the thought that 

rived 
The wretched mother's heart, when she knew all, 
" But for nry foolishness about that shawl ! 
And Master would have kept them back the day ; 
But I was wilful, — drivhig them away 
In such wild weather ! " 

Thus the tortured heart 
Unnaturally against itself takes part, 
Driving the sharp edge deeper of a woe 
Too deep already. They had raised her now. 
And parting the wet ringlets from her brow, 
To tliat, and the cold cheek, and lips as cold, 
The father glued his warm ones, ore they rolled 
Once more the fatal shawl — her winding-slieet — 
About the precious clay. One heart still beat. 



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POEMS OF TRAGEDY. 



895 



n 



Warmed by Jiis heart's blood. To his only child 
He turned him, but her piteous nioaniug mild 
Pierced him afresh, — and now she knew him not. 
"Mother ! " she murmured, "who says I forgot ? 
Mother ! indeed, indeed, I kept fast hold. 
And tied the shawl quite close — she can't be cold — 
But she won't move — we slipt — I don't know 

how — 
But T held on — and I 'm so weary now — 
And it 's so dark and cold ! dear ! dear ! — 
And she won't move ; — if daddy was but here ! " 

Poor lamb ! she wandered in her mind, 't was 

clear ; 
But soon the piteous murmur died away, 
And quiet in her father's arms she lay, — 
They their dead burden had resigned, to take 
The living, so near lost. For her dear sake, 
And one at home, he armed himself to bear 
His misery like a man, — with tender care 
Doffing his coat her shivering form to fold 
(His neighbor bearing that which felt no cold). 
He clasped her close, and so, with little said, 
Homeward they bore the living and the dead. 

From Ambrose Gray's poor cottage all that night 

Shone fitfully a little shifting light. 

Above, below, — for all were watchers there. 

Save one sound sleeper. He?; parental care. 

Parental watchfulness, availed not now. 

But in the young survivor's throbbing brow. 

And wandering eyes, delirious fever burned ; 

And all night long from side to side she turned, 

Piteously plaining like a wounded dove, 

With now and then the murmur, "She won't 

move." 
And lo ! when morning, as in mockery, bright 
Shone on that pillow, passing strange the sight, — 
That young head's raven hair was streaked with 

white ! 
ISTo idle fiction this. Such things have been, 
We know. And now / tell lohat I have seen. 

Life struggled long with death in that small fiame. 
But it was strong, and conquered. All became 
As it had been with the poor family, — 
All, saving that wliich nevermore might be ; 
There was an empty place, — they were but three. 
Caroline Bowles Southey. 



THE DREAM OF EUGENE AEAM. 

'TwAS in the prime of summer time, 

An evening calm and cool, 
And four-and-twenty happy boys 

Came bounding out of school ; 



There were some that ran, and some that leapt 
Like troutlets in a pool. 

Away they sped with gamesome minds 

And souls untouched by sin ; 
To a level mead they came, and there 

They drave the wickets in : 
Pleasantly shone the setting sun 

Over the town of Lynn. 

Like sportive deer they coursed about, 

And sliouted as they ran, 
Turning to mirth all things of earth 

As only boyhood can ; 
But the usher sat remote from all, 

A melancholy man ! 

His hat was off, his vest apart, 
To catch heaven's blessed breeze ; 

For a burning thought was in his brow, 
And his bosom ill at ease ; 

So he leaned his head on his hands, and read 
The book between his knees. 

Leaf after leaf he turned it o'er, 

Nor ever glanced aside, — • 
For the peace of his soul he read that book 

In the golden eventide ; 
Much study had made him very lean, 

And pale, and leaden-eyed. 

At last he shut the ponderous tome : 

With a fast and fervent grasp 
He strained the dusky covers close. 

And fixed the brazen hasp : 
" God ! could I so close my mind, 

And clasp it with a clasp ! " 

Then leaping on his feet upright, 

Some moody turns he took, — 
Now up the mead, then down the mead, 

And past a shady nook, — 
And, lo ! he saw a little boy 

That pored upon a book. 

" My gentle lad, what is 't you read, — 

Romance or fairy fable ? 
Or is it some historic page. 

Of kings and crowns unstable ?" 
The young boy gave an upward glance, — 

"It is 'The Death of AbeL'" 

The usher took six hasty strides. 

As smit with smlden pain, — 
Six hasty strides beyond the place, 

Then slowly back again ; 
And down he sat beside the lad, 

And talked with him of Cain ; 



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POEMS OF TRAGEDY. 



"""Bi 



And, long since then, of bloody men, 

Whose deeds tradition saves ; 
And lonely folk cnt off unseen. 

And hid in sudden gi-aves ; 
And horrid stabs, in groves forlorn ; 

And murders done in caves ; 

And how the sprites of injured men 

Sliriek upward from the sod ; 
Ay, how the ghostly hand will point 

To show the burial clod ; 
And unknown facts of guilty acts 

Are seen in dreams from God. 

He told how murderers walk the earth 

Beneath the curse of Cain, — 
With crimson clouds before their eyes. 

And flames about their brain ; 
For blood has left upon their souls 

Its everlasting stain ! 

"And well," quoth he, "I know for truth 
Their pangs must be extreme — ■ 

Woe, woe, unutterable woe ! — 
Who spill life's sacred stream. 

For why ? Methought, last night I wrought 
A murder, in a dream ! 

"One that had never done me wrong, — 

A feeble man and old ; 
I led him to a lonely field, — 

The moon shone clear and cold : 
Now here, said I, this man shall die. 

And I will have his gold ! 

' ' Two sudden blows with a ragged stick. 

And one with a heavy stone. 
One hurried gash with a hasty knife, — 

And then the deed was done : 
There was nothing lying at my feet 

But lifeless flesh and bone ! 

" Nothing but lifeless flesh and bone. 

That could not do me ill ; 
And yet I feared him all the more 

For lying there so still : 
There was a manhood in his look 

That murder could not kill ! 

" And, lo ! the universal air 
Seemed lit with ghastly flame, — 

Ten thousand thousand dreadful eyes 
Were looking down in blame ; 

I took the dead man by his hand, 
And called upon his name. 

"0 God ! it made me quake to see 
Such sense within the slain ; 



But, when I touched the lifeless clay, 

The blood gushed out amain ! 
For every clot a burning spot 

Was scorching in my brain ! 

"My head was like an ardent coal, 

My heart as solid ice ; 
My wretched, wretched soul, I knew, 

Was at the Devil's price. 
A dozen times I groaned, — the dead 

Had never groaned but twice. 

"And now, from forth the frowning sky, 
From the heaven's topmost height, 

I heard a voice, — the awful voice 
Of the blood-avenging sprite : 

' Thou guilty man ! take up thy dead, 
And hide it from my sight ! ' 

' ' And I took the dreai-y body up. 

And cast it in a stream, — 
The sluggish water black as ink, 

The deptli was so extreme : — 
My gentle boy, remember, this 

Is nothing but a dream ! 

" Down went the corse with a hollow plunge, 

And vanished in the pool ; 
Anon I cleansed my bloody hands, 

And washed my forehead cool. 
And sat among the urchins young, 

That evening, in the school. 

' ' Heaven ! to think of their white souls. 

And mine so black and grim ! 
I could not share in childish prayer, 

Nor join in evening hymn ; 
Like a devil of the pit I seemed. 

Mid holy cherubim ! 

"And Peace went with them, one and all, 

And each calm pillow spread ; 
But Guilt was my grim chambeiiain, 

That lighted me to bed, 
And drew my midnight curtains round 

With fingers bloody red ! 

" All night I lay in agony, 

In anguish dark and deep ; 
My fevered eyes 1 dared not close. 

But stared aghast at Sleep ; 
For Sin had rendered unto her 

Tlie keys of hell to keep ! 

"All night I lay in agony. 

From weary chime to chime ; 
With one besetting horrid hint 

That racked me all the time, — 



tk 



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POEMS OF TRAGEDY. 



897 



rft 



A mighty 3'^earning, like the first 
Fierce impulse imto crime, — 

" One stern tyrannic thought, that made 

All other thoughts its slave ! 
Stronger and stronger every pulse 

Did that temptation crave, — 
Stiil urging me to go and see 

The dead man in his grave ! 

" Heavily I rose up, as soon 

As light was in the sky. 
And sought the black accursed pool 

With a wild, misgiving eye ; 
And I saw the dead in the rivei'-bed, 

For the faithless stream was dry. 

" Merrily rose the lark, and shook 

The dew-drop from its wing; 
But I never marked its morning flight, 

I never heard it sing, * 

For I was stooping once again 

Under the horrid thing. 

" With breathless speed, like a soul in chase, 

I took him up and ran ; 
There was no time to dig a grave 

Before the day began, — 
In a lonesome wood, with heaps of leaves, 

I hid the murdered man ! 

*' And all that day I read in school. 
But my thought was otherwhere ; 

As soon as the midday task was done, 
In secret I was there, — 

And a mighty wind had swept the leaves. 
And still the corse was bare ! 

*' Then down I cast me on my face. 

And first began to weep. 
For I knew my secret then was one 

That earth refused to keep, — 
Or land or sea, though he should be 

Ten thousand fathoms deep. 

" So wills the fierce avenging»sprite, 

Till blood for blood atones ! 
Ay, though he's buried in a cave. 

And trodden down with stones, 
And years have rotted oft' his flesh, — 

The world shall see his bones ! 

" God ! that horrid, horrid di'eam 

Besets me now awake ! 
Again — again, with dizzy brain, 

The human life I take ; 
And my red right hand grows raging hot. 

Like Cranmer's at the stake. 



"And still no peace for the restless clay 

Will wave or mould allow ; 
The horrid thing pursues my soul, — 

It stands before me now ! " 
The fearful boy looked up, and saw 

Huge drops upon his brow. 

That very night, while gentle sleep 

The urchin's eyelids kissed. 
Two stern-faced men set out from Lynn 

Through the cold and heavy mist ; 

And Eugene Ai-am walked between. 

With gyves upon his wrist. 

Thomas Hood. 



RAMON". 



REFUGIO MINE, NORTHERN MEXICO. 

Drunk and senseless in his place, 
Prone and sprawling on his face, 
More like brute than any man 
Alive or dead, — 
By his great pump out of gear, 
Lay the peon engineer. 
Waking only just to hear, 

Overhead, 
Angry tones that called his name. 
Oaths and cries of bitter blame, — 
Woke to hear all this, and waking, turned and 
fled! 

" To the man who '11 bring to me," 

Cried Intendant Harry Lee, — 
Harry Lee, the English foreman of the mine, — 

" Bring the sot alive or dead, 

I will give to him," he said, 

" Fifteen hundred ^'esos down. 

Just to set the rascal's crown 
Underneath this heel of mine : 
Since but death 

Deserves the man whose deed. 

Be it vice or want of heed. 

Stops the pumps that give us breath, — 

Stops the pumps that suck the death 
From the poisoned lower levels of the mine ! " 

No one answered, for a cry 
From the shaft rose up on high ; 
And shuffling, scranibling, tumbling from below, 
Came the miners each, the bolder 
Mounting on the weaker's shoulder. 
Grappling, clinging to their hold or 

Letting go. 
As the weaker gasped and fell 
From the ladder to the well, — 
To the poisoned pit of hell 

Down below ! 



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POEMS OF TRAGEDY. 



-Si 



" To the man who sets them free," 
Cried the foreman, Harry Lee, — 

Harry Lee, the English foreman of the mine, — • 
" Brings them ont and sets them free, 
I will give that man," said he, 
" Twice that sum, who with a rope 
Face to face with death shall cope : 
Let him come who dares to hope ! " 
" Hold your peace ! " some one I'ejjlied, 
Standing by the foreman's side ; 

" There has one already gone, whoe'er he be ! " 

Then they held their breath with awe. 

Pulling on the rope, and saw 

Fainting figures reappear. 

On the black rope swinging clear, 
Fastened by some skilful hand from below ; 

Till a score the level gained. 

And but one alone remained, — 

He the hero and the last. 

He whose skilful hand made fast 
The long line that brought them back to hope 
aTid cheer ! 

Plaggard, gasping, down dropped he 
At the feet of Harry Lee, — 
Harry Lee, the English foreman of the mine ; 
" I have come," he gasped, " to claim 
Both rewards, Senor, — my name 

Is Ramon ! 
I 'm the drunken engineer, — 
I 'm the coward, Senor — " Here 
He fell over, by that sign 

Dead as stone ! 

BRET HARTE. 



REVELRY OF THE DYING. 

[Supposed to be written in India, while the plague was raging, 
and playing havoc among the British residents and troops stationed 
there. This lias been attributed to Alfred Domett and to Bar- 
tholomew Dowling, but was written by neither of them. It first 
appeared in the uVcw York Albioti, but the author is absolutely un- 
knoun.] 

We meet 'neath the sounding rafter, 

And the walls around are bai'e ; 
As they shout to our peals of laughter. 

It seems that the dead are there. 
But stand to your glasses, steady ! 

"We drink to our comrades' eyes ; 
Quaff a cup to the dead already — 

And hurrah for the next that dies ! 

Not here are the goblets glowing. 

Not here is the vintage sweet ; 
'T is cold, as our hearts are growing, 

And dark as the doom we meet. 



But stand to your glasses, steady ! 

And soon shall our pulses rise ; 
A cup to the dead already — 

Hurrah for the next that dies ! 

Not a sigh for the lot that darkles. 

Not a tear for the friends that sink ; 
We 'U fall, midst the wine-cup's .sparkles. 

As mute as the wine we drink. 
So stand to your glasses, steady ! 

'T is this that the respite buys ; 
One cup to the dead already — 

Hurrah for the next that dies ! 

.Time was when we frowned at others ; 

We thought we were wiser then ; 
Ha ! ha ! let those think of their mothers. 

Who hope to see them again. 
No ! stand to your glasses, steady ! 

The thoughtless are here the wise ; 
A cup to th<? dead already — 

Hurrah for the next that dies ! 

There 's many a hand that 's shaking. 

There 's many a cheek that 's sunk ; 
But soon, though our hearts are breaking. 

They '11 burn with the wine we 've drunk. 
So stand to your glasses, steady ! 

'T is here the revival lies ; 
A cup to the dead already — 

Hurrah for the next that dies ! 

There 's a mist on the glass congealing, 

'T is the hurricane's fiery breath ; 
And thus does the warmth of feeling 

Turn ice in the grasp of Death. 
Ho ! stand to your glasses, steady ! 

For a moment the vapor flies ; 
A cup to the dead ali-eady — 

Hurrah for the next that dies ! 

Who dreads to the dust returning ? 

Who shrinks from the sable shore, 
AVhere the high and haughty yearning 

Of the soul shall sting no more ! 
Ho ! stand to your glasses, steady ! 

The world is a world of lies ; 
A cup to the dead already — 

Hurrah for the next that dies ! 

Cut off from the land that bore us. 

Betrayed by the land we find, 
Where the brightest have gone before us, 

And the dullest remain behind — 
Stand, .stand to your glasses, steady ! 

'T is all we have left to prize ; 
A cup to the dead already — 

And hurrah for the next that dies ! 



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FRAGMENTS. 

The First Tragedy. 

So saying, her rash hand in evil hour 
Forth reaching to the fruit, she phicked, she eat : 
Earth felt the wound ; and Nature from her seat, 
Sighing through all her works, gave signs of woe, 
That all was lost. 

Paradise Lost, Book ix. MiLTON. 

He scrupled not to eat 
Against his better knowledge, not deceived, 
But fondly overcome with female charm. 
Earth trembled from her entrails, as again 
In pangs, and Nature gave a second groan. 

Paradise Lost, Book ix. MlLTO>f. 

Death 

Grinned horrible a ghastly smile, to hear 

His famine should be filled, and blessed his maw 

Destined to that good hour. 

Pazadise Lost, Book i\. MILTON. 



Effects of Crime and Grief. 

The stings of Falsehood those shall try, 
And hard TJnkindness' altered eye, 

That mocks the tear it forced to flow ; 
And keen Keraorse with blood defiled, 
And moody Madness laughing wild 

Amid severest woe. 

On a Distant Prospect of Eton College. T. GRAY. 

My heart is as an anvil unto sorrow, 
Which beats upon it like a Cyclop's hammer, 
And with the noise turns up my giddj brain 
And makes me frantic ! 

Ed-ward II. C. MARLOWE. 

Every sense 
Had been o'erstrung by pangs intense ; 
And each frail fibre of her brain 
(As bowstrings, Avhen relaxed by rain, 
The erring arrow launch aside) 
Sent forth her thoughts all wild and wide. 

Parisina. BYRON'. 

I am not mad ; — I would to heaven I were ! 
For then, 't is like I should forget myself ; 
0, if I could, what grief I should forget ! 

f^ing John, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 



Portents and Fears. 

CjESAR. Speak ! Csesar is turned to hear. 

Soothsayer. Beware the Ides of March ! 

Jiihus Casar, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 



Fierce fiery warriors fought upon the clouds, 
In ranks and squadrons, and right form of war, 
Which drizzled blood upon the Capitol. 
Csesar ! these things are beyond all use, 
And I do fear them. 

When beggars die there are no comets seen ; 
The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of 



princes. 

Julius Cizsar, Act ii. .S"^:. 2. 



Shakespeare. 



Danger knows full v/ell 
That Csesar is more dangerous than he. 
We are two lions littered in one day, 
And I the elder and more terrible. 

Julius Ccesar, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

AVhat is danger 
More than the weakness of our apprehensions ? 
A poor cold part o' th' blood ; who takes it hold of? 
Cowards and wicked livers : valiant minds 
Were made the masters of it. 

Chaiices. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER. 

CiESAR. The Ides of March are come. 
Soothsayer. Ay, Ccesar ; but not gone. 

Julius Cizsar, Act iii. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 

Eyes, look your last : 
Arms, take your last embrace ; and lips, 

! you. 
The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss 
A dateless bargain to engrossing death. 

Romeo and Juliet, Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



The King's Enemy. 

Thou art a traitor. — 
Off with his head ! —now by Saint Paul I swear 
I will not dine until I see the same. 

Kittg Richard III., Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 

Off with his head ! so much for Buckingham ! 

Shakespeare's Richard III. [Altered), Activ. Sc. 3. 

C Gibber. 



PiEVENGE. 
And if we do but watch the hour. 
There never yet was human power 
Which could evade, if unforgiven. 
The patient search and vigil long 
Of him who treasures up a wrong. 

Mazeppa. BVRON. 

I will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him. 

Merchant 0/ Venice, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

If it will feed nothing else, it will feed my re- 
venge. 

Merchant of Venice, Act Hi. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

Vengeance to God alone belongs ; 
But when I think on all my wrongs, 
My blood is liquid flame. 

Marmion, Cant. vi. SCOTT. 



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Forethought of Murder. 

There shall be done 
A deed of dreadful note. 



MiicbetA, Act iii. Sc. 2. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Between the acting of a dreadful thing, 
And the first motion, all the interim is 
Like a phantasm a, or a hideous dream : 
The Genius, and the mortal instruments, 
Are then in council ; and the state of man, 
Like to a little kingdom, suffers then 
The nature of an insurrection. 

yii/iiis Casat; Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 

If it were done, when 't is done, then 't were well 
It \vere done quickly : if the assassination 
Could trammel up the consequence, and catch 
With his surcease, success ; that but this blow 
Might be the be-all and the end-all here, 
But here, upon this bank and shoal of time, — • 
We 'd jump the life to come. 

Besides, this Duncan 
Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been 
So clear in his great office, that his virtues 
Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against 
The deep damnation of his taking-off. 

Macbeth, Act i. Sc- 7. SHAKESPEARE. 

Put out the light, and then — put out the light. 

If I quench thee, thou flaming minister, 

I can again thy former light restore, 

Should 1 repent me ; but once put out thy light. 

Thou cuuning'st pattern of excelling nature, 

I know not where is that Promethean heat. 

That can thy light relume. When I have plucked 

thy rose 
I cannot give it vital growth again, 
It needs must wither. 

Othello, Act V. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

Stop up th' access and passage to remorse, 
That no compunctious visitings of nature 
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between 
Th' effect and it. 

Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. 

Let 's kill him boldly, but not wrathfully ; 
Let 's carve him as a dish fit for the gods. 
Not hew him as a carcase fit for hounds. 

Julius Ccesar, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



AFTERVi'ARDS. 

0, my oft'ence is rank, it smells to heaven ; 
It hath the primal eldest curse upon 't, 
A brother's murder. 

Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



horror ! horror ! horror ! Tongue nor heart 
Cannot conceive nor name thee. 

Confusion now hath made his master-piece. 
Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope 
The Lord's anointed temple, and stole thence 
The life o' the buildine. 



Macbeth, Act ii. Sc. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



Blood, though it sleep a time, yet never dies : 
The gods on murderers fix revengeful eyes. 

mdow's Tears. CHAPMAN. 

Foul deeds will rise. 
Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's 
eyes. 

Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. 

blisful God, that art so just and trewe ! 
Lo, howe that thou biwreyest mordre alway ! 
Mordre wol out, that se we day by day. 

The Nonnes Preestes Tale. CHAUCER. 

For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak 
With most miraculous organ. 

Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE. 



The Hardened Criminal. 

I have almost forgot the taste of fear. 
The time has been, my senses would have quailed 
To hear a night-shriek ; and my fell of hair 
Would at a dismal treatise rouse, and stir. 
As life were in 't. I have supped full with hor- 
rors : 
Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts. 
Cannot once start me. 

Macbeth, Act v. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE. 



Suicide. 
All mankind 

Is one of the.se two cowards ; 
Either to wish to die 
When he should live, or live when he should die. 

The Blind Lady. SIR R. HOWARD. 

Our enemies have beat us to the hip : 
It is more worthy to leap in ourselves 
Than tarr}' till they push us. 



Jtcliits Ccesar, Act v. Sc. 5. 



SHAKESPEARE. 



He 



That kills himself t' avoid misery, fears it, 
And at the best shows but a bastard valor : 
This life 's a fort committed to my trust. 
Which I must not yield up, till it be forced ; 
Nor will I : he 's not valiant that dares die. 
But he that boldly bears calamity. 



The Maid of Honor. 



P. MASSIKCER. 



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PERSONAL POEMS, 



PRAXITELES. 

FROM THE GREEK. 

Venus (loquitur). Paris, Anchises, and Adonis 
— three, 
Three only, did me ever naked see ; 
But this Praxiteles — when, where, did he ? 



DIRGE OF ALARIC THE VISIGOTH. 

[Alaric stormed and spoiled the city of Rome, and was afterwards 
)uried in the channel of the river Busentius. the water of which 
lad been diverted from its course that the body might be interred.] 

When I am dead, no pageant train 
Shall waste their sorrows at my bier, 

Nor worthless pomp of homage vain 
Stain it with hypocritic tear ; 

For I will die as I did live. 

Nor take the boon I cannot give. 

Ye shall not raise a marble bust 

Upon the spot where I repose ; 
Ye shall not fawn before my dust. 

In hollow circumstance of woes ; 
Nor sculptured clay, with lying breath, 
Insult the clay that moulds beneath. 

Ye shall not pile with servile toil 
Your monuments upon my breast, 

Nor yet within the common soil 

Lay down the wreck of power to rest ; 

Where man can boast that he has trod 

On him that was "the scourge of God." 

But ye the mountain-stream .shall turn, 

And lay its secret channel bare 
And hollow, for your sovereign's urn 

A resting-place forever there ; 
Then bid its eveiia sting springs 
Flow back upon the king of kings ; 
And never be the secret said, 
Until the deep give up his dead. 



My gold and silver ye shall fling 

Back to the clods that gave them birth ; 

The captured crowns of many a king. 
The ransom of a conquered earth ; 

For e'en though dead will I control 

The trophies of the capitol. 

But when, beneath the mountain-tide. 
Ye 've laid your monarch down to rot, 

Ye shall not rear upon its side 

Pillar or mound to mark the spot ; 

For long enough the world has shook 

Beneath the terrors of my look ; 

And now, that I have run my race. 

The astonished realms shall rest a sj)ace. 

My course was like a river deep. 

And from the northern hills I burst. 

Across the world in wrath to sweep. 
And where I went the spot was cursed, 

Nor blade of grass again was seen 

Where Alaric and his hosts had been. 

See how their haughty barriers fail 
Beneath the terror of the Goth, 

Their iron-breasted legions quail 
Before my ruthless sabaoth, 

And low the queen of empires kneels. 

And grovels at my chariot-wheels. 

Not for myself did I ascend 

In judgment my triumphal car ; 

'T was God alone, on high, did send 
The avenging Scythian to the war, 

To shake abroad, with iron hand. 

The appointed scourge of his command. 

With iron hand that scourge I reared 
O'er guilty king and guilty realm ; 
Destruction was the ship I steered. 

And Vengeance sat upon the helm, 
When, launched in fury on the flood, 
I ploughed my way through seas of blood, 
And, in the stream their hearts had spilt. 
Washed out the long arrears of guilt. 



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Across the everlasting Alp 

I poured the torrent of my powers, 

And feeble Ciesars shrieked for help, 

111 vain, within their seven-hilled towers ! 

I quenched in blood the brightest gem 

That glittered in their diadem, 

And struck a darker, deeper dye 

In the purple of their majesty, 

And bade my Northern banners shine 

Upon the conquered Palatine. 

Itly course is run, my errand done ; 

I go to Him from whom I came ; 
But never yet shall set the sun 

Of glory that adorns my name ; 
And Roman hearts shall long be sick, 
When men shall think of Alaric. 

My course is run, my errand done ; 

But darker ministers of fate, 
Impatient, round the eternal throne, 

And in the caves of vengeance, wait ; 
And soon mankhid shall blench away 
Before the name of Attila. 

Edward Everett, 



THE COMPLEYNTE OF CHAUCER TO 
HIS PURSE.* 

To you, my purse, and to noon other wight 
Compleyn I, for ye be my lady dere ! 

I am so sorry now that ye been lyght. 

For certes, but-yf ye make me hevy chere. 
Me were as leaf be layde upon my here. 

For whiche unto your mercy thus I crye, — 

Beeth hevy ageyne, or elles mote I dye ! 

Now voucheth sauf this day, or it be nyghte. 
That I of you the blissful soune may here, 

Or see your colour lyke the sonne biyghte, 
That of yelownesse hadde never pere. 
Ye be my lyfe ! ye be myn hertys stere ! t 

Queue of comfort and good corn pan j'e ! 

Beth hevy ageyne, or elles mote I dye. 

Now, purse, that ben to me my lyves lyght 
And saveour, as doun in this worlde here, 
Oute of this toune helpe me thurgh your myght, 

* " From this unique petition," says Mr. Gilman in his "River- 
side" Chaucer, " there seems to have resulted an additional pension 
of forty marlcs ayear, on tlie strength o( which Cliaucer took a lease 
of a house in the garden of St. Mary's Cliapel, Westminster, for 
fifty-three years, at an annual rent of two pounds thirteen shilling's 
and fourpence, the lease to be void on the poet's death." So that 
the practical results of this poetical plaint show that Chaucer well 
described one of his own characteristics in his description of the 
March ANT, among his Canterbury Pilgrims, — 

" This worthy man ful wel his wit blsette [used]. " 

\ guide. 



Syn that ye wole not ben my tresorere ; 

For I am shave as nye as is a frere. 
But I praye unto your curtesye 
Beth hevy ageyn, or elles moote I dye ! 

l'eNVOYE DE CHAUCER. 

conquerour of Brutes Albyoun,* 
Whiche that by lygne and free eleccioun 

Been verray Kynge,t this song to you I sende, 
And ye that mowen J alle myn harme amende. 
Have mynde upon my stipplicacioun ! 

Geoffrey Chaucer. 



SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 

FROM "AN ELEGY ON A FRIEND'S PASSION FOR HIS 
ASTROPHILL." 

WiTHiM these woods of Arcadie 
He chiefe delight and jileasure tooke, 
And on the mountaine Parthenie, 
Upon the chrystall liquid brooke, 
The Muses met him ev'ry day, 
That taught him sing, to write, and say. 

When he descended downe to the mount, 
His personage seemed most divine, 
A thousand graces one might count 
Ujion his lovel}', cheerfull eine ; 

To heare him speake and sweetly smile. 

You were in Paradise the while. 

A sweet attractive kinde of grace, 

A full assurance given by lookes, 

Continuall comfort in a face. 

The lineaments of Gospell bookes ; 
I trowe that countenance cannot lie. 
Whose thoughts are legible in the eie. 

Was never eie did see that face. 
Was never eare did heare that tong, 
Was never minde did minde his grace, 
That ever thought the travell long ; 
But eies, and eares, and ev'ry thouglit, 
Were with his sweete perfections caught. 

Matthew Royden. 



ANNE HATHAWAY. 

TO THE IDOL OF MY EYE AND DELIGHT OF MY HEART, 
ANNE HATHAWAY. 

Woui,D ye be taught, ye feathered throng, 
With love's sweet notes to grace your song, 
To pierce the heart with thrilling lay. 
Listen to mine Anne Hathaway ! 

* The Albion of Brutus, a descendant of Eneas. 

t King Henry IV. seems to be meant. J may. 



IS 



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PERSONAL POEMS. 



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She hath a way to sing so clear, 
Phoebus might wondering stop to hear. 
To melt the sad, make blithe the gay, 
And nature charm, Anne hath a way ; 

She hath a way, 

Anne Hathaway ; 
To breathe delight Anne hath a way. 

When Envy's breath and rancorous tooth 

Do soil and bite fair worth and truth, 

And merit to distress betray. 

To soothe the heart Anne hath a way ; 

She hath a way to chase despair. 

To heal all grief, to cure all care, 

Turn foulest night to fairest day. 

Thou know'st, fond heart, Anne hath a way ; 

She hath a way, 

Anne Hathaway ; 
To make grief bliss, Anne hath a way. 

Talk not of gems, the orient list. 
The diamond, topaz, amethyst. 
The emerald mild, the ruby gay ; 
Talk of my gem, Anne Hathaway ! 
She hath a way, with her bright eye, 
Their various lustres to defy, — 
The jewels she, and the foil they. 
So sweet to look Anne hath a way ; 

She hath a way, 

Anne Hathaway ; 
To shame bright gems, Anne hath a way. 

But were it to my fancy given 
To rate her charms, I 'd call them heaven ; 
For, though a mortal made of cla}% 
Angels must love Anne Hathaway ; 
She hath a way so to control. 
To rapture, the imprisoned soul, 
And sweetest heaven on earth display. 
That to be heaven Anne hath a way ; 

She hath a way, 

Anne Hathaway ; 
To be heaven's self, Anne hath a way. 

ANONYMOUS* 



ON THE PORTRAIT t OF SHAKESPEARE. 

This figure, that thou here seest put, 
It was lor gentle Shakespeare cut ; 
Wherein the Graver had a strife 
With Nature to outdo the life : 
0, could he but have di-awu his wit 
As well in brass, as he hath hit 

• This poem has sometimes, but without much reason, been 
attributed to Shakespeare. 
i The engraving by Martin Droeshout. 



His face ; the Print would then surpass 
All that was ever writ in brass. 
But since he cannot, Reader, look 
Not at his picture, but his book. 

Ben Jonson. 



SHAKESPEAKE. 

FROM " PROLOGUE " SPOKEN BY MR. GARRICK AT THE OPEN- 
ING OF THE THEATRE IN DRURY LANE, IN 1747. 

When Learning's triumph o'er her barbarous 
foes 
First reared the stage, immortal Shakespeare rose; 
Each change of many-colored life he drew, 
Exhausted worlds, and then imagined new : 
Existence saw him spurn her bounded reign. 
And panting Time toiled after him in vain : 
His powerful strokes presiding Truth impressed, 
And unresisted Passion stormed the breast. 

DR Samuel Johnson. 



TO THE MEMORY OF MY BELOVED 
MASTER, WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, 
AND WHAT HE HATH LEFT US. 

To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name. 
Am I thus ample to thy book and fame ; 
While I confess thy writings to be such 
As neither man nor Muse can praise too much. 
'T is true, and all men's suffrage. But these ways 
Were not the paths I meant unto thy praise ; 
For silliest ignorance on these would light. 
Which, when it sounds at best, but echoes right ; 
Or blind affection, which doth ne'er advance 
The tnith, but gropes, and urges all by chance ; 
Or crafty malice might pretend this praise, 
And think to ruin, where it seemed to raise. 

But thou art proof against them, and, indeed, 
Above the ill fortune of thern, or the need. 
I therefore will begin : Soul of the age ! 
The applause, deliglit, the wonder of our stage ! 
My Shakespeare, rise ! I will not lodge thee by 
Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lie 
A little further oif, to make thee room : 
Thou art a monument without a tomb. 
And art alive still, while thy book doth live. 
And we have wits to read, and praise to give. 
That I not mix thee so, ray brain excuses, 
I mean with great but disproportion ed Muses : 
For if I thought my judgment were of years, 
1 should commit thee surely with thy peers, 
And tell how far thou didst our Lyly outshine, . 
Or sporting Kyd or Marlowe's mighty line. 
And though thou had small Latin and less Greek,. 
From thence to honour thee I will not seek 
For names ; but call forth thundering Eschylus, 
Euripides, and Sophocles to us, 



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906 



•PERSONAL POEMS. 



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Pacuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead, 

To live again, to hear thy buskin tread, 

And shake a stage : or when thy socks were on. 

Leave thee alone for the domxjarison 

Of all, that insolent Greece or haughty Kome 

Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come. 

Triumph, my Britain, thou hast one to show, 

To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe. 

He was not of an age, but for all time ! 

And all the Muses still were in their prime. 

When, like Apollo, he came forth to warm 

Our ears, or like a Jlercury, to charm ! 

Nature herself was proud of his designs, 

And joyed t.o wear the dressing of his lines ! 

Which were so richly spun, and woven so fit, 

As, since, she will vouchsafe no other wit. 

The merry Greek, tart Aristophanes, 

Neat Terence, witty Plautus, now not please : 

But antiquated and deserted lie. 

As they were not of nature's family. 

Yet must I not give nature all ; thy art. 

My gentle Shakespeare, must enjoy a part. 

For though the poet's matter nature be. 

His art doth give the fashion ; and, that he 

Who casts to write a living line, must sweat 

(Such as thine are) and strike the second heat 

Upon the Muses' anvil ; turn the same, 

And himself with it, that he thinks to frame ; 

Or for the laurel, he may gain a scorn ; 

For a good poet 's made as well as born. 

And such wert thou ! Look how the father's face 

Lives in his issue, even so the race 

Of Shakespeare's mind and manners brightly 

shines 
In his well turned and true filed lines : 
In each of which he seems to shake a lance. 
As brandished at the eyes of ignorance. 
Sweet Swan of Avon ! what a sight it were 
To see thee in our water yet appear. 
And make those flights upon the banks of Thames 
That so did take Eliza and our James ! 
But stay, I see thee in the hemisphere 
Advanced, and made a constellation there ! 
Shine forth, thou Star of Poets, and with rage. 
Or influence, chide, or cheer the drooping stage 
Which since thy flight from hence hath mourned 

like night, 
And despairs day, but for thy volume's light ! 

BnN JONSON. 



SHAKESPEAEE. 

The soul of man is larger than the sky, 
Deeper than ocean, or the abysmal dark 
Of the unfathomed centre. Like that ark, 
Which in its sacred hold uplifted high. 
O'er the drowned hills, the human family, 



And stock reserved of every living kind, 
So, in the compass of the single mind. 
The seeds and pregnant forms in essence lie. 
That make all worlds. Great poet, 'twas thy 

art 
To know thyself, and in thyself to be 
Whate'er love, hate, ambition, destiny. 
Or the firm fatal purpose of the heart 
Can make of man. Yet thou wert still the 

same, 
Serene of thought, unhurt by thy own flame. 

Hartley Coleridge. 



AN EPITAPH ON THE ADMIRABLE 
DRAMATIC POET, W. SHAKESPEARE. 

What needs my Shakespeare for his honored 

bones, 
The labor of an age in piled stones ? 
Or that his hallowed relics should be hid 
Under a star-y-pointing pyramid ? 
Dear son of memory, great heir of fame, 
What rieed'st thou such weak witness of thy 

name ? 
Thou in our wonder and astonishment 
Hast built thyself a livelong monument. 
For whilst to the shame of slow-endeavoring art 
Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart 
Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book 
Those Delphic lines with deep impression took, 
Then thou our fancy of itself bereaving. 
Dost make us marble with too much conceiv- 
ing ; 
And so sepulchred in such pomp dost lie. 
That kings for such a tomb would wish to die. 

MILTON. 



TO THE MEMORY OF BEN JONSON. 

The Muse's fairest light in no dark time, 

The wonder of a learned age ; the line 

Which none can pass ! the most proportioned 

wit, — ■ 
To nature, the best judge of what was fit ; 
The deepest, plainest, highest, clearest pen ; 
The voice most echoed by consenting men ; 
The soul which answered best to all well said 
By others, and which most requital made ; 
Tuned to the highest key of ancient Rome, 
Returning all her music with his own ; 
In whom, with nature, study claimed a part, 
And yet who to himself owed all his art : 
Here lies Ben Jonsou ! every age will look 
With sorrow here, ■ttith wonder on his book. 

John Cleveland. 



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PERSONAL POEMS. 



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ODE TO BEN JONSON. 

Ah Ben ! 
Say how or when 
Shall we, thy guests, 
Meet at those lyric feasts, 

Made at the Sun, 
The Dog, the Triple Tun ; 
Where we such clusters had 
As made us nobly wild, not mad ; 
And yet each verse of thine 
Outdid the meat, outdid the frolic wine. 

My Ben ! 

Or come again. 

Or send to us 
Thy wit's great overplus ; 

But teach us yet 
Wisely to husband it, 
Lest we that talent spend : 
And having once Ijrought to an end 

That precious stock, the store 
Of such a wit, the world should have no more. 

ROBERT HERRICK. 



BEN JONSON'S COMMONPLACE BOOK. 

His learning such, no author, old or new. 
Escaped his reading that deserved his view ; 
And such his judgment, so exact his taste, 
Of what was best in books, or M'hat books best, 
That had he joined those notes his labors took 
From each most praised and praise-deserving 

' book. 
And could the world of that choice treasure boast. 
It need not care though all the rest were lost. 

LUCIUS GARY (LORD FALKLAND). 



EPITAPH ON THE COUNTESS OF 
PEMBEOKE. 

Underneath this sable hearse 
Lies the subject of all verse, 
Sydney's sister, — Pembroke's mother. 
Death, ere thou hast slain another 
Fair and wise and good as she, 
Time shall throw a dart at thee ! 

Marble piles let no man raise 
To her name in after days ; 
Some kind woman, born as she, 
Reading this, like Niobe 
Shall turn marble, and become 
Both her mourner and her tomb. 

Ben Jonson. 



EPITAPH ON ELIZABETH L. H. 

WoULDST thou heare what man can say 

In a little ? — reader, stay ! 

Underneath this stone doth lye 

As much beauty as could dye, — 

Which in life did harbor give 

To more vertue than doth live. 

If at all she had a fault, 

Leave it buried in this vault. 

One name was Elizabeth, — • 

The other, let it sleep with death : 

Fitter <vhere it dyed to tell. 

Than that it lived at all. Farewell ! 

BEN JONSON, 



UNDER THE PORTRAIT OF JOHN 
MILTON. 

PREFIXED TO " PARADISE LOST." 

Three Poets, in three distant ages born, 
Greece, Italy, and England did adorn. 
The first in loftiness of thought surpassed ; 
The next in majesty ; in both the last. 
The force of nature could no further go ; 
To make a third, she joined the former two. 

John Drydcn, 



TO MILTON. 



'LONDON, 1802. ■ 



Milton ! thou shouldst be living at this hour : 
England hath need of thee : she is a fen 
Of stagnant waters : altar, sword, and pen, 
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower, 
Have forfeited their ancient English dower 
Of inward happiness. We are selfish men ; 
Oh ! raise us up, return to us again ; 
And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power, 
Tliy soul was like a star, and dwelt apart : 
Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea ; 
Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free. 
So didst thou travel on life's common way. 
In cheerful godliness ; and yet thy heart 
The lowliest duties on herself did lay. 

William Wordsworth. 



THE SONNET. 

Scorn not the sonnet ; critic, you have frowned, 
Mindless of its just honors ; with this key 
Shakespeare unlocked his heart ; the melody 
Of this small lute gave ease to Peti'arch's wound ; 
A thousand times this pipe did Tasso sound ; 
With it Camoens soothed an exile's grief ; 
The sonnet glittered a gay myrtle leaf 



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Amid the cypress with which Dante crowned 
His visionary brow ; a glow-worm lamp, 
It cheered mild Spenser, called from fairy-land 
To struggle through dark ways ; and -when a damp 
Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand 
The thing became a trumpet ; whence he blew 
Soul-animating strains, — alas ! too few. 

William Wordsworth. 



ON A BUST OF DANTE. 

See, from this counterfeit of him 
"Whom Arno shall remember long, 
How stern of lineament, how grim, 
The father was of Tuscan song ! 
There but the burning sense of wrong, 
Perpetual care, and scorn, abide — 
Small friendship for the lordly throng. 
Distrust of all the world beside. 

Faithful if this wan image be. 

No dream his life Avas — but a fight ; 

Could any Beatrice see 

A lover m that anchorite ? 

To that cold Ghibeline's gloomy sight 

Who could have guessed the visions came 

Of beauty, veiled with heavenly light, 

In circles of eternal flame ? 

The lips as Cumse's cavern close, 
The cheeks with fast and sorrow thin, 
The rigid front, almost morose, 
But for the patient hope within, 
Declare a life whose course hath been 
Unsullied still, though still severe, 
Which, through the wavering days of sin, 
Kept itself icy-chaste and clear. 

Not wholly such his haggard look 
When wandering once, forlorn, he strayed, 
With no companion save his book, 
To Corvo's hushed monastic shade ; 
Where, as the Benedictine laid 
His palm upon the pilgrim guest, 
The single boon for which he prayed 
The convent's charity was' rest. 

Peace dwells not here — this rugged face 
Betrays no spirit of repose ; 
The sullen warrior sole we trace. 
The marble man of many woes. 
Such was his mien when first arose 
The thought of that strange tale divine — 
When hell he peopled with his foes. 
The scourge of many a guilty line. 



War to the last he waged with all 
The tyrant canker-worms of earth ; 
Baron and duke, in hold and hall. 
Cursed the dark hour that gave him birth ; 
He used Rome's harlot lor his mirth ; 
Plucked bare hypocrisy and crime ; 
But valiant souls of knightly worth 
Transmitted to the rolls of time. 

time ! whose verdicts mock our own, 
The only righteous judge art thou ; 
That poor, old exile, sad and lone, 
Is Latium's other Virgil now. 
Before his name the nations bow ; 
His words are parcel of mankind. 
Deep in whose hearts, as on his brow, 
The marks have sunk of Dante's mind. 

Thomas William Parsons, 



WALTON'S BOOK OF LIVES. 

FROM "ecclesiastical SONNETS," PART IH. 

There are no colors in the fairest sky 

So fair as these. The feather, whence the pen 

Was shaped that traced the lives of these good 

men, 
Dropped from an angel's wing. With moistened 

eye 
We read of faith and purest charity 
In statesman, priest, and humble citizen : 
0, could we copy their mild virtues, then 
What joy to live, what blessedness to die ! 
Methinks their very names shine still and bright ; 
Apart, — like glow-worms on a summer night ; 
Or lonely tapers when from far they fling 
A guiding ray ; or seen, like stars on high, 
Satellites burning in a lucid ring 
Around meek Walton's heavenly memory. 

William Wordsworth. 



CHARACTER OF THE EARL OF 
SHAFTESBURY. 

FROM "ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL," PART I. 

For close designs and crooked councils fit ; 
Sagacious, bold, and turbulent of wit ; 
Restless, unfixed in principles and place ; 
In power unpleased, impatient of disgrace : 
A fiery soul, which, working out its way, 
Fretted the pygmy-body to decay, 
And o'er informed the tenement of clay. 
A daring pilot in extremity ; 
Pleased with the danger, when the waves went 
high 



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Ho sought the storms ; but for a calm unfit. 
Would steer too nigh the sands to boast his wit. 
Great wits are sure to madness near allied, 
And thin partitions do their bounds divide. 

JOHN DRYDEN. 



ZIMEI. 



[GEORGE VILLIERS, DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM, 1682.] 

FROM "ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL," PART V 

Some of their chiefs were princes of the land ; 
In the first rank of these did Zimri stand ; 
A man so various, that he seemed to be 
Not one, but all mankind's epitome : 
Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong ; 
Was everything by starts, and nothing long ; 
But, in the course of one revolving moon, 
Was chymist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon ; 
Then all for women, painting, rhyming, drinking, 
Besides ten thousand freaks that died in thinking. 
Blest madman, who could every hour employ, 
With something new to wish or to enjoy ! 
Railing and praising were his usual themes ; 
And both, to show his judgment, in extremes : 
So over-violent or over-civil. 
That every man with him was god or devil. 
In squandering wealth was his peculiar art ; 
Nothing went unrewarded but desert. 
Beggared by fools, whom still he found too late : 
He had his jest, and they had his estate. 
He laughed himself from court, then sought relief 
By forming parties, but could ne'er be chief; 
For, spite of him, the weight of business fell 
On Absalom, and wise Achitophel. 
Thus, wicked but in will, of means bereft, 
He left no faction, but of that was left. 

John Dryden. 



CHARLES XII. 

FROM "VANITY OF HUMAN WISHES." 

On what foundations stands the warrior's pride. 
How just his hopes, let Swedish Charles decide: 
A frame of adamant, a soul of fire, 
No dangei's fright him, and no labors tire ; 
O'er love, o'er fear, extends liis wide domain, 
UncoiKjuered lord of pleasure and of pain. 
No joys to him pacific sceiitres yield, 
AVar sounds the trump, he rushes to the field ; 
Behold surrounding kings their power combine, 
And one capitulate, and one resign ; 
Peace courts his hand, but spreads her charms in 

vain ; 
" Think nothing gained," he cries, " till naught 
remain. 



On Moscow's walls till Gothic standards fly, 
And all be mine beneath the polar sky." 
The march begins in military state, 
And nations on his eye suspended wait ; 
Stern famine guards the solitary coast, 
And winter barricades the realms of frost. 
He comes, nor want nor cold his course delay ; 
Hide, blusliiiig glory, hide Pultowa's day ! 
The vanquished hero leaves his broken bands. 
And shows his miseries in distant lands ; 
Condemned a needy supplicant to wait. 
While ladies interpose and slaves debate. 
But did not chance at length her error mend ? 
Did no subverted empire mark his end ? 
Did rival monarchs giv^ the fatal wound, 
Or hostile millions press him to the ground ? 
His fall was destined to a barren strand, 
A petty fortress, and a dubious hand ; 
He left the name, at w^hich the world grew pale. 
To point a moral or adorn a tale. 

Dr. Samuei, Johnson. 



TO THE LORD-GENERAL CROMWELL. 

CEOMVVfELL, our chief of men, who through a 

cloud, 
Not of war onlj^, but detractions rude, 
Guided by faith and matchless fortitude, 
To peace and truth thy glorious way hast 

ploughed, 
And on the neck of crowned fortune proud 
Hast reared God's trophies, and his work pur- 
sued. 
While Darwen stream, with blood of Scots im- 
bued, 
And Dunbar field resounds thy praises loud, 
And Worcester's laureate wreath. Yet nmcli re- 
mains 
To conquer still ; Peace hath her victories 
No less renowned than War : new foes arise. 
Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains: 
Help us to save free conscience from the paw 
Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw. 

MILTON. 



SPORUS. 



[lord hervey.] 

FROM THE " PROLOGUE TO THE SATIRES." 

Let Sporus tremble. — A.* What ? that thing 
of silk, 
Sporus, that mere white curd of asses' milk ' 
Satire of sense, alas ! can Sporus feel ? 
Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel ? 



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p.* Yet let me flap tliis bug with gilded 

wings, 
This painted child of dirt that stinks and stings ; 
Whose buzz the witty and the fair annoys, 
Yet wit ne'er tastes, and beauty ne'er enjoys : 
So well-bred spaniels civilly delight 
In nuunbling of the game they dare not bite. 
Eternal smiles his emptiness betray, 
As shallow streams run dimpling all the way. 
Whether in florid impotence he speaks, 
And, as the prompter breathes, the puppet 

squeaks, 
Or at the car of Eve, familiar toad, 
Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad. 
In puns, or politics, or tales, or lies. 
Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or blasphemies ; 
His wit all seesaw, between that and this, 
Now high, now low, now master up, now miss, 
And he himself one vile antithesis. 
Amphibious thing ! that, acting either part. 
The trifling head, or the corrupted heart. 
Fop at the toilet, flatterer at the board, 
Now trips a lady, and now struts a lord. 
Eve's tempter thus the rabbins have exprest, 
A cherub's face, a reptile all the rest ; 
Beauty that shocks you, parts that none will trust. 
Wit that can creep, and pride that licks the dust. 

ALEXANDER POPE. 



ADDISON. 

FROM THE "PROLOGUE TO THE SATIRES- ' 

Peace to all such! but were there one whoso fires 
True genius kindles, and fair- fame inspires ; 
Blest with each talent and each art to please. 
And born to write, converse, and live with ease : 
Should such a man, too fond to rule alone. 
Bear, like the Turk, no brother near the throne. 
View him with scornful, yet with jealous eyes. 
And hate for arts that caused himself to lise ; 
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer, 
And, without sneering, teach the rest to sneer; 
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike. 
Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike ; 
Alike reserved to blame, or to commend, 
A timorous foe, and a suspicious friend ; 
Dreading even fools, by flatterers besieged, 
And so obliging that he ne'er obliged ; 
Like Cato, give his little senate laws. 
And sit attentive to his own ajiplause ; 
Whilst wits and templars every sentence raise. 
And wonder with a foolish face of praise : — • 
Who but must laugh, if such a one there be ? 
Who would not weep, if Attieus were he ? 

ALEXANDER POPE. 
♦ Pope. 



TO THE EAKL OF WAPtWICK, ON THE 
DEATH OF ADDISON. 

If, dumb too long, the drooping Muse hath 
stayed. 
And left her debt to Addison unpaid. 
Blame not her silence, Warwick, but bemoan. 
And judge, O, judge my bosom by your own. 
What mourner ever felt poetic fires ! 
Slow comes the verse that real woe inspires : 
Grief unaffected suits but ill with art. 
Or flowing numbers with a bleeding heart. 

Can I forget the dismal night that gave 
My soul's best part forever to the grave ? 
How silent did his old companions tread. 
By midnight lamps, the mansions of the dead. 
Through breathing statues, then unheeded things. 
Through rows of warriors and through walks of 

kings ! 
What awe did the slow, solemn knell inspire ; 
The pealing organ, and the pausing choir; 
The duties by the lawn-robed prelate paid ; 
And the last words, that dust to dust conveyed ! 
While speechless o'er thy closing grave we bend, 
Accept these tears, thou dear departed friend. 
0, gone forever ! take this long adieu ; 
And sleep in peace next thy loved Montague. 
To strew fresh laurels let the task be mine, 
A frequent pilgrim at th}^ sacred shrine ; 
Mine with true sighs thy absence to bemoan, 
And grave with faithful epitaphs thy stone. 
If e'er from me thy loved memorial part. 
May shame afflict this alienated heart ; 
Of thee forgetful if I Ibrm a song. 
My lyre be broken, and untuned my tongue, 
My grief be doubled, from th\^ image free. 
And mirth a torment, unchastised by thee ! 

Oft let me range the gloomy aisles alone. 
Sad luxury ! to vulgar minds unknown. 
Along the walls where speaking marbles show 
What worthies foi'm the hallowed mould below ; 
Proud names, who once the reins of empire held ; 
In arms who triumphed, or in arts excelled ; 
Chiefs, graced with scars, and prodigal of blood. 
Stern patriots, who for sacred freedom stood ; 
Just men, by whom impartial laws were given ; 
And saints, who taught and led the way to 

heaven ; 
Ne'er to these chambei-s, where the mighty rest. 
Since their foundation came a nobler guest ; 
Nor e'er was to the bowers of bliss conveyed 
A fairer spirit or more welcome shade. 

In what new region, to the just assigned. 
What new employments please the unbodied 
mind ? 



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A winged Virtue, through the ethereal sky, 
From world to world unwearied does he fly ? 
Or curious trace the long laborious maze 
Of Heaven's decrees, where wondering angels 

gaze ? 
Does he delight to hear bold seraphs tell 
How Michael battled and the dragon fell ; 
Or, mixed with milder cherubim, to glow 
In hymns of love, not ill-essayed below ? 
Or dost thou warn poor mortals left behind, 
A task well suited to thy gentle mind ? 
0, if sometimes thj'^ spotless form descend, 
To me thy aid, thou guardian genius, lend ! 
When rage misguides me, or when fear alarms. 
When pain distresses, or when pleasure charms, 
In silent whisperings purer thoughts impart. 
And turn from ill a frail and feeble heart ; 
Lead through the paths thy virtue trod before, 
Till bliss shall join, nor death can part us more. 

That awful form which, so the heavens decree, 
Must still be loved and still deplored by me. 
In nightly visions seldom fails to rise, 
Or, .roused by fancy, meets my waking eyes. 
If business calls, or crowded courts invite, 
The unblemished statesman seems to strike my 

sight ; 
If in the stage I seek to soothe my care, 
I meet his soul which breathes in Cato there ; 
If pensive to the rural shades I rove. 
His shape o'ertakes me in the lonely grove ; 
'T was thereof just and good he reasoned strong. 
Cleared some great truth, or raised some serious 

song : 
There patient showed us the wise course to steer, 
A candid censor and a friend severe ; 
There taught us how to live, and (0, too high 
The price for knowledge !) taught us how to die. 

Thou Hill, whose brow the antique structures 
grace, 
Eeared by bold chiefs of Warwick's noble race. 
Why, once so loved, whene'er thy bower ap- 
pears. 
O'er my dim eyeballs glance the sudden tears ? 
How sweet were once thy prospects fresh and fair. 
Thy sloping walks, and unpolluted air ! 
How sweet the glooms beneath thy aged trees, 
Thy noontide shadow, and thy evening breeze ! 
His image thy forsaken bowei's restore ; 
Thy walks and airy prospects charm no more ; 
Ko more the summer in thy glooms allay, 
Thy evening breezes, and thy noonday shade. 

From other hills, however fortune frowned, 
Some refuge in the Muse's art I found'. 
Reluctant now I touch the trembling string. 
Bereft of him who taught me how to sing ; 



And these sad accents, murmured o'er his urn, 
Betray that absence they attempt to mourn. 
0, must I then (now fresh my bosom bleeds. 
And Craggs in death to Addison succeeds) 
The verse, begun to one lost friend, prolong. 
And weep a second in the unfinished song ! 

These works divine, which on his death-bed laid 
To thee, Craggs ! the expiring sage conveyed, 
Great, but ill-omened, monument of fame, 
Nor he survived to give, nor thou to claim. 
Swift after him thy social spirit flies. 
And close to his, how soon ! thy coffin lies. 
Blest pair ! whose union future bards shall tell 
In future tongues : each other's boast ! farewell ! 
Farewell ! whom, joined in fame, in friendship 

tried. 
No chance could sever, nor the grave divide. 

THOMAS TICKELL. 



THE POET'S FRIEND. 
[lord bolingbroke.] 

FROM "AN ESSAY ON MAN," EPISTLE IV. 

Come then, my friend ! my genius ! come along; 
master of the poet, and the song ! 
And while the muse now stoops, or now ascends, 
To man's low passions, or their glorious ends. 
Teach me, like thee, in various nature wise. 
To f\Ul with dignity, with temper rise ; 
Formed by thy converse happily to steer 
From grave to gay, from lively to severe ; 
Correct with spirit, eloquent with ease, 
Intent to reason, or polite to please. 
0, while along the stream of time thy name 
Expanded flies, and gathers all its fame ; 
Say, shall my little bark attendant sail. 
Pursue the triumph, and partake the gale ? 
When statesmen, heroes, kings, in dust repose. 
Whose sons shall blush their fathers were thy foes, 
Shall then this verse to future age pretend 
Thou wert my guide, philosopher, and friend ! 
That, urged by thee, I turned the tuneful art 
From sounds to things, from fancy to the heart : 
For wit's false mirror held up Nature's light ; 
Showed erring pride, whatever is, is right. 
Alexander Pope. 



NAPOLEON. 

KROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO III. 

There sunk the greatest, nor the worst of men, 
Whose spirit antithetically mixed 
One moment of the mightiest, and again 
On little objects with like firmness fixed, 



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Extreme in all things ! liadst thou been betwixt, 
Thy throne had still been thine, or never been ; 
For daring made thy rise as fall : thou seek'st 
Even now to reassume the imperial mien. 
And shake again the world, the Thunderer of the 



Conqueror and captive of the earth art thou ! 
She trembles at thee still, and thy wild name 
Was ne'er more bruited in men's minds than 

now 
That thou art nothing, save the jest of Fame, 
Who wooed thee once, thy vassal, and became 
The flatterer of thy fierceness, till thou wert 
A god unto thyself : nor less the same 
To the astounded kingdoms all inert, 
Who deemed thee for a time whate'er thou didst 

assert. 

O more or less than man — in high or low, 
Battling with nations, flying from the field ; 
Now making monarchs' necks thy footstool, 

now 
More than thy meanest soldier taught to yield : 
An empire thou couldst crush, command, re- 
build, 
But govern not thy pettiest passion, nor 
However deeply in men's spirits skilled, 
Look through thine own, nor curb the lust of 
war. 
Nor learn that tempted Fate will leave the lofti- 
est star. 

Yet well thy soul hath brooked the turning 

tide 
With that untaught innate philosophy. 
Which, be it wisdom, coldness, or deep pride, 
Is gall and wormwood to an enemy. 
When the whole host of hatred stood hard by, 
To watch and mock thee shrinking, thou hast 

smiled 
With a sedate and all-enduring eye, — 
When Fortune fled her spoiled and favorite 

child. 
He stood unbowed beneath the ills upon him 

piled. 

Sager than in thy fortunes ; for in them 
Ambition steeled thee on too far to show 
That just habitual scorn which could contemn 
Men and their thoughts ; 't was wise to feel, 

not so 
To wear it ever on thy lip and brow. 
And spurn the instruments thou wert to use 
Till they were turned unto thine overthrow ; 
'T is but a worthless world to win or lose ; 
So hath it proved to thee, and all such lot who 
choose. 



If, like a tower upon a headlong rock. 
Thou hadst been made to stand or fall alone, 
Such scorn of man had helped to brave the 

shock ; 
But men's thoughts were the steps which paved 

thy throne, 
Their admiration thy best weapon shone ; 
The part of Philip's son was thine, not then 
(Unless aside thy purple had been thrown) 
Like stern Diogenes to mock at men ; 
For sceptred cynics earth were far too wide a 

den. 

But quiet to qi;ick bosoms is a hell. 
And ihe7~e hath been thy vane ; there is a fire 
And motion of the soul which will not dwell 
In its own narrow being, but aspire 
Beyond the fitting medium of desire ; 
And, but once kindled, quenchless evermore, 
Preys upon high adventure, nor can tire 
Of aught but rest ; a fever at the core. 
Fatal to him who bears, to all who ever bore. 

This makes the madmen who have made men 

mad 
By their contagion ! Conquerors and Kings, 
Founders of sects and systems, to whom add 
Sophists, Bards, Statesmen, all unquiet things 
Which stirtoo strongly the soul's secret springs. 
And are themselves the fools to those they 

fool ; 
Envied, yet how unenviable ! what stings 
Are theirs ! One breast laid open were a school 
Which would unteach mankind the lust to shine 

or rule. 

Their breath is agitation, and their life 
A storm whereon they ride, to sink at last, 
And yet so nursed and bigoted to strife. 
That should their days, surviving perils past. 
Melt to calm twilight, they feel overcast 
With sorrow and supineness, and so die ; 
Even as a flame, unfed, which runs to waste 
With its own flickering, or a sword laid by, 
Which eats into itself, and rusts ingloriously. 

He who ascends to mountain-tops shall find 
The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and 

snow ; 
He who surpasses or subdues mankind 
Must look down on the hate of those below. 
Though high above the sun of glory glow, 
And far beneath the earth and ocean spread, 
Round him are icy rocks, and loudly blow 
Contending tempests on his naked head, 
And thus reward the toils which to those sum- 
mits led. 

LoKD Byron. 



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POPULAR RECOLLECTIONS OF 
BONAPARTE. 

A RENDERING OF BERANGER'S "SOUVENIRS DU PEUPLE." 

TiiEY '11 talk of him for years to come, 

Li cottage chronicle and tale ; 
When, for aught else, renown is dumb, 

His legend shall prevail ! 
When in the hamlet's honored chair 

Shall sit some aged dame, 
Teaching to lowly clown and villager 

That narrative of fame. 
" 'T is true," they '11 say, "his gorgeous throne 

France bled to raise ; 
But he was all our own ! " 

" Mother, say something in his praise, — 

0, speak of him always ! " 

" I saw him pass, — his was a host 

Countless beyond your young imaginings, — 
My children, he could boast 

A train of conquered kings ! 
And when he came this road, 

'T was on my bridal day, 
He wore, for near to him I stood, 

Cocked hat and surcoat gray. 
I blushed ; he said, ' Be of good cheer ! 
Courage, my dear ! ' 

That was his very word." 

" Mother ! 0, then, this really occurred. 
And you his voice could hear." 

" A year rolled on, when next at Paris I, 

Lone woman that I am, 
Saw him pass by. 

Girt with his peers to kneel at Notre Dame, 
I knew, by merry chime and signal gun, 
God granted him a son. 

And 0, I wept for joy ! 
For why not weep when warrior men did. 
Who gazed upon that sight so splendid. 

And blessed the imperial boy? 
Never did noonday sun shine out so bright ! 
0, what a sight ! " 

" Mother, for you that must have been 

A glorious scene." 

" But when all Europe's gathered strength 
Burst o'er the French fronti(;r at length, 

'T will scarcely be believed 

What wonders, single-handed, he achieved ; 

Such general ne'er lived ! 
One evening on my threshold stood 

A guest, — 't was he ! Of warriors few 

He had a toil-worn retinue. 
He Hung himself into this chair of wood. 



Muttering, meantime, with fearful air, 
' Quelle guerre ! 0, quelle guerre ! ' " 
" Mother ! and did our emperor sit there. 
Upon that very chair ? " 

" He said, ' Give me some food.' 

Brown loaf I gave, and homely wine. 
And made the kindling iire-blocks shine 

To dry his cloak with wet bedewed. 
Soon by the bonny blaze he slept. 
Then waking chid me, — • for I wept ; 

' Courage ! ' he cried, ' I '11 strike for all 

Under the sacred wall 

Of France's noble capital ! ' 

Those were his words : I 've treasured up 

With pride that same wine-cup ; 

And for its weight in gold 

It never shall be sold ! " 

" Mother, on that proud relic let us gaze. 
0, keep that cup always ! " 

" But through some fatal witchery 

He, whom a pope had crowned and blest. 
Perished, my sons, by foulest ti'eachery. 

Cast on an isle far in the lonely West ! 
Long time sad rumors M'ere afloat, — • 

The fatal tidings we would spurn, 
Still hoping from that isle remote 

Once more our hero would return. 
But when the dark announcement drew 

Tears from the virtuous and the brave, 
When the sad whisper proved too true, 

A flood of grief I to his memory gave. 
Peace to the glorious dead ! " 

" Mother, may God his fullest blessing shed 

Upon your aged head ! " 

FRANCIS MaHONV (Father Prcut). 



MURAT. 

FROM "ODE FROM THE FRENCH." 

There, where death's brief pang was quickest. 
And the battle's wreck lay thickest, 
Strewed beneath the advancing banner 

Of the eagle's burning crest — 
(There with thunder-clouds to fan her. 
Who could then her wing arrest — 

Victory beaming from her breast ?) 
While the broken line enlarging 

Fell, or fled along the plain : — 
There be sure Murat was charging ! 

There he ne'er shall charge again ! 

i LORD BY RON. 



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TO MADAME DE SEVIGNE, 

PLAYING BLIND-MAN'S-BUFF. 

You charm when you talk, walk, or move, 
Still more on this day than another : 

When blinded — you 're taken for Love ; 
When the bandage is off — for his mother ! 

DE MONTREUIL. 



ON A PORTRAIT OF WORDSWORTH, 



EY R. B. HAYDON. 



h 



Wordsworth upon Helvellyn ! Let the cloud 
Ebb audibly along the mountain-wind, 
Then break against the rock, and show behind 
The lowland valleys floating up to crowd 
The sense with beauty. He, with forehead bowed 
And humble-lidded eyes, as one inclined 
Before the sovran thought of his own mind, 
And very meek with inspirations proud, - — 
Takes here his rightful place as poet-priest 
By the high-altar, singing prayer and prayer 
To the higher Heavens. A noble vision free. 
Our Haydon's hand hath flung out from the mist ! 
No portrait this, with Academic air, — 
This is the poet and his poetry. 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 



BURNS. 
a poet's epitaph. 

Stop, mortal ! Here thy brother lies, — 

The poet of the poor. 
His books were rivers, woods, and skies, 

The meadow and the moor ; 
His teachers were the torn heart's wail, 

The tyrant, and the slave, 
The street, the factory, the jail. 

The palace, — and the grave ! 
Sin met thy brother everywhere ! 

And is thy brother blamed ? 
From passion, danger, doubt, and care 

He no exemption claimed. 
The meanest thing, eartli's feeblest worm, 

He feared to scorn or luite ; 
But, honoring in a peasant's form 

The equal of the great. 
He blessed the steward, whose wealth makes 

The poor man's little more ; 
Yet loathed the haughty wretch that takes 

From plundered labor's store. 
A hand to do, a head to plan, 

A heart to feel and dare, — 
Tell man's worst foes, here lies the man 

Who drew them as they are. 

EBENEZER Elliott. 



BURNS. 

ON receiving a sprig of heather in BLGSSOIL 

No more these simple flowers belong 

To Scottish maid and lover ; 
Sown in the common soil of son g. 

They bloom the wide world over. 

In smiles and tears, in sun and showers. 

The minstrel and the heather. 
The deathless singer and the flowers 

He sang of live together. 

Wild heather-bells and Robert Burns ! 

The moorland flower and peasant ! 
How, at their mention, memory turns 

Her pages old and pleasant ! 

The gray sky wears again its gold 

And purple of adorjiing, 
And manhood's noonday shadows hold 

The dews of boyhood's morning : 

The dews that washed the dust and soil 

From off" the wings of pleasure. 
The sky, that flecked the ground of toil 

With golden threads of leisure. 

I call to mind the summer day, 

The early harvest mowing. 
The sky with sun and clouds at play, 

And flowers with breezes blowing. 

I hear the blackbird in the corn. 

The locust in the haying ; 
And, like the fabled hunter's horn, 

Old tunes my heart is playing. 

How oft that day, with fond delay, 

I sought the maple's shadow. 
And sang with Burns the hours away. 

Forgetful of the meadow ! 

Bees hummed, birds twittered, overhead 

I heard the squirrels leaping ; 
The good dog listened while I read, 

And wagged his tail in keeping. 

I watched him while in sportive mood 
I read " The Twa Dogs' " story, 

And hal f believed he understood 
The poet's allegory. 

Sweet day, sweet songs ! — The golden houi-s 

Grew brighter for tliat singing, 
From brook and bird and meadow flowers 

A dearer welcome bringing. 



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New light on home-seen Nature beamed, 

New glory over Woman ; 
And daily life and duty seemed 

No longer poor and common. 

I woke to find the simple truth 

Of fact and feeling better 
Than all the dreams that held my youth 

A still repining debtor : 

That Nature gives her handmaid. Art, 
The themes of sweet discoursing ; 

The tender idyls of the heart 
In eveiy tongue rehearsing. 

Why dream of lands of gold and pearl, 

Of loving knight and lady, 
When farmer boy and barefoot girl 

Were wandering there already ? 

I saw through all familiar things 

The romance underlying ; 
The joys and griefs that plume the wings 

Of Fancy skyward ilying. 

I saw the same blithe day return. 

The same sweet fall of even, 
That rose on wooded Craigie-burn, 

And sank on crystal Devon. 

I matched with Scotland's heathery hills 
The sweet-brier and the clover ; 

With Ayr and Doon, my native rills, 
Their wood-hymns chanting over. 

O'er rank and pomp, as he had seen, 

I saw the Man uprising ; 
No longer common or unclean, 

The child of God's baptizing. 

With clearer eyes I saw the worth 

Of life among tlie lowly ; 
The Bible at his Cotter's hearth 

Had made my own more holy. 

And if at times an evil strain. 

To lawless love appealing, 
Broke in upon the sweet refrain 

Of pure and healthful feeling, 

It died upon the eye and ear. 

No inward answer gaining ; 
No heart had I to see or hear 

The discord and the staining. 

Let those who never erred forget 
His worth, in vain bewailings ; 

Sweet Soul of Song ! — I own my debt 
Uncancelled by his failings ! 



Lament who will the ribald line 
Which tells his lapse from duty. 

How kissed the maddening lips of wine. 
Or wanton ones of beauty ; 

But think, while falls that shade between 

The erring one and Heaven, 
That he who loved like Magdalen, 

Like her may be forgiven. 

Not his the song whose thunderous chime 

Eternal echoes render, — 
The mournful Tuscan's haunted rhyme, 

And Milton's starry splendor ; 

But who his human heart has laid 

To Nature's bosom nearer ? 
Who sweetened toil like him, or paid 

To love a tribute dearer ? 

Through all his tuneful art, how strong 

The human feeling gushes ! 
The very moonlight of his song 

Is warm with smiles and blushes ! 

Give lettered pomp to teeth of Time, 

So " Bonny Doon " but tarry ; 
Blot out the Epic's stately rhyme, 

But spare his " Highland Mary" ! 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 



BURNS. 

TO A ROSE BROUGHT FROM NEAR ALLOWAY KIRK, IN AYR- 
SHIRE, IN THE AUTUMN OF 1S22. 

Wild rose of Alloway ! my thanks : 
Thou 'mind'st me of that autumn noon 

When first we met upon "the banks 
And braes o' bonny Doon." 

Like thine, beneath the thorn-tree's bough, 
My sunny hour was glad and brief ; 

We 've crossed the winter sea, and thou 
Art withered — flower and leaf. 

And will not thy death-doom be mine — 
The doom of all things wrouglit of clay ? 

And withered my life's leaf like thine. 
Wild rose of Alloway ? 

Not so his memory for whose sake 
My bosom bore thee far and long — 

His, who a humbler flower could make 
Immortal as his song, 

The memory of Burns — a name 

That calls, when brinmied her festal cup, 

A nation's glory and her shame, 
In silent sadness up. 



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A nation's glory — be the rest 

Forgot — she 's canonized his mind. 

And it is joy to speak the best 
We may of humankind. 

I Ve stood beside the cottage-bed 

Where the bard-peasant first drew breath ; 
A straw-thatched roof above his head, 

A straw- wrought couch beneath. 

And I have stood beside the pile, 

His monument — that tells to Heaven 

The homage of earth's proudest isle 
To that bard-peasant given. 

Bid thy thoughts hover o'er that spot. 
Boy-minstrel, in thy dreaming hour ; 

And know, however low his lot, 
A poet's pride and power ; 

The pride that lifted Burns from earth, 
The power that gave a child of song 

Ascendency o'er rank and birth, 
The rich, the brave, the strong ; 

And if despondency weigh down 
Thy spirit's fluttering pinions then, 

Despair — thy name is written on 
The roll of common men. 

There have been loftier themes than his, 
And longer scrolls, and louder lyres, 

And lays lit up with Poesy's 
Purer and holier fires ; 

Yet read the names that know not death ; 

Few nobler ones than Burns are there ; 
And few have won a greener wreath 

Than that which binds his hair. 

His is that language of the heai-t 

In which the answering heart would speak, 
Thought, word, that bids the warm tear start, 

Or the smile light the cheek ; 

And his that music to whose tone 

The common pulse of man keeps time, 

In cot or castle's mirth or moan, 
In cold or sunny clime. 

And who hath heard his song, nor knelt 
Before its spell with willing knee. 

And listened and believed, and felt 
The poet's mastery 

O'er the mind's sea, in calm and storm, 
O'er the heart's sunshine and its showers, 

O'er Passion's moments, bright and warm, 
O'er Reason's dark, cold hours ; 



On fields where brave men "die or do," 
In halls where rings the banquet's mirth, 

Where mourners weep, where lovers woo, 
From throne to cottage hearth ? 

What sweet tears dim the eye unshed, , 
What wild vows falter on the tongue, 

When " Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled," 
Or " Auld Lang Syne," is sung ! 

Pure hopes, that lift the soul above, 
Come with his Cotter's hymn of praise. 

And dreams of youth, and truth, and love 
With " Logan's" banks and braes. 

And when he breathes his master-lay 
Of Alloway's witch-haunted wall, 

All passions in our frames of clay 
Come thronging at his call. 

Imagination's world of air, 

And our own world, its gloom and glee, 
Wit, pathos, poetry, are there, 

And death's sublimity. 

And Burns — though brief the race he ran, 
Though rough and dark the path he trod — 

Lived, died, in form and soul a man. 
The image of his God. 

Through care, and pain, and want, and woe, 
With wounds that only death could heal, 

Tortures the poor alone can know, 
The proud alone can feel ; 

He kept his honesty and truth, 
His independent tongue and pen, 

And moved, in manhood as in youth. 
Pride of his fellow-men. 

Strong sense, deep feeling, passions strong, 

A hate of tyrant and of knave, 
A love of right, a scorn of wrong. 

Of coward and of slave ; 

A kind, true heart, a spirit high, 

That could not fear, and would not bow, 

Were written in his manly eye 
And on his manly brow. 

Praise to the bard ! his words are driven, 
Like flower-seeds by the far winds sown. 

Where'er, beneath the sky of heaven, 
The birds of fame have flown. 

Praise to the man ! a nation stood 

Beside his coffin with wet eyes, 
Her brave, her beautiful, her good, 

As when a loved one dies. 



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And still, as on Ms funeral-daj', 

Man stand his cold earth-couch around, 

With the mute homage that we pay- 
To consecrated ground. 

And consecrated gi'ound it is, 

The last, the hallowed home of one 

Who lives upon all memories, 
Though with the buried gone. 

Such graves as his are pilgrim-shrines. 
Shrines to no code or creed confined — 

The Delphian vales, the Falestines, 
The Meccas, of the mind. 

Sages, with Wisdom's garland wreathed. 
Crowned kings, and mitred priests of power. 

And warriors with their bright swords sheathed, 
The mightiest of the hour ; 

And lowlier names, whose humble home 

Is lit by Fortune's dimmer star, 
Are there — o'er wave and mountain come, 

From countries near and far ; 

Pilgrims, whose wandering feet have pressed 
The Switzer's snow, the Arab's sand, 

Or trod the piled leaves of the West, 
My own green forest-land. 

All ask the cottage of his birth. 

Gaze on the scenes he loved and sung, 

And gather feelings not of earth 
His fields and streams among. 

They linger by the Doon's low trees. 
And pastoral Kith, and wooded Ayr, 

And round thy sepulchres, Dumfries ! 
The Poet's tomb is there. 

But what to them the sculptor's art. 

His funeral columns, wreaths, and urns ? 

Wear they not graven on the heart 
The name of Kobert Burns ? 

Fitz-Greene Halleck. 



A BARD'S EPITAPH. 

Is there a whim-inspired fool, 

Owre fast for thought, owre hot for rule, 

Owre blate * to seek, owre proud to snool ; t 

Let him draw near. 
And owre this gi'assy henp sing dool, 

And drap a tear. 

• bashful. t tamely submit. 



Is there a bard of rustic song. 

Who, noteless, steals the crowd among, 

That wei;kly this area throng ; 

0, pass not by ; 
r.ut, with a frater-feeling strong. 

Here heave a sigh ! 

Is th. re a man whose judgment clear 
Can otliors teach the course to steer. 
Yet runs himself life's mad career. 

Wild as the wave ; 
Here pause, and, through the starting tear, 

Survey this grave. 

The poor inhabitant below 

Was quick to learn and wise to know, 

And keenly felt the friendly glow. 

And sober Hame ; 
But thoughtless follies laid him low. 

And stained his name ! 

Reader, attend, — whether thy soul 
Soars fancy's flights beyond the pole. 
Or darkly grubs this eartlily hole, 

In low pursuit ; 
EJiow, prudent, cautious self-control 

Is wisdom's root. 

ROBERT BURNS. 



ELEGY ON CAPTAIN MATTHEW 
HENDERSON. 

He 's gane, he 's gane ! he 's frae us torn. 
The ae best fellow e'er was born ! 
Thee, Matthew, Nature's sel' shall mourn 

By wood and wild, 
Where, haply, pity strays forlorn, 

Frae man exiled. 

Ye hills, near neebors o' the stams, 
That proudly cock your cresting cairns ! 
Yc cliffs, the haunts of sailing yearns,* 

Where echo slumbers ! 
Come join, ye Nature's sturdiest bairns, 

My wailing numbers ! 

Mourn, ilka grove the cushat kens ! 
Ye hazelly shaws and briery dens ! 
Ye burnies, wimpliu' down your glens, 

Wi' toddlin' din. 
Or foaming Strang, wi' hasty stens, 

Frae lin to lin t 

Mourn, little harebells o'er the lea, 
Ye stately foxgloves fair to see ; 
Ye woodbines hanging bonnilie 

• eagles. 



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In scented bowers ; 
Ye roses on your thorny tree, 

The first o' flowers. 

At dawn, when every grassy blade 
Droops with a diamond at his head, 
At even, when beans their fragrance sb'-d, 

I' the rustling gale, 
Ye maukins whiddin through the jla.de, 

Come join my wail. 

Mourn, ye wee songsters o' the wood ; 
Ye grouse that crap the heather bud ; 
Ye curlews calling through a clud ; 

Ye whistling plover ; 
And mourn, ye whirring paitrick brood ; 
He 's gane forever ! 

Mourn, sooty coots, and speckled teals, 
Ye fisher herons, watching eels ; 
Ye duck and drake, wi' airy wheels 

Circling the lake ; 
Ye bitterns, till the quagmire reels, 

Rair for his sake. 

Mourn, clamoring craiks at close o' day^ 
'Mang fields o' flowering clover gay ; 
And when ye wing your annual way 

Frae our cauld shore, 
Tell thae far warlds wha lies in clay. 

Wham we deplore. 

Ye houlets, frae your ivy bower, 
In some auld tree, or eldritch tower. 
What time the moon, wi' silent glower, 

Sets up her horn, 
Wail thro' the dreary midnight hour 
Till waukrife morn. 

rivers, forests, hills and plains ! 
Oft have ye heard my canty strains : 
But now, what else for me remains 

But tales of wo ? 
And frae my een the drapping rains 

Maun ever flow. 

Mourn, Spring, thou darling of the year ! 
Ilk cowslip cup shall keep a tear : 
Thou, Simmer, while each corny spear 

Shoots up its head. 
Thy gay, green flowery tresses shear. 

For him that 's dead ! 

Thou, Autumn, wi' th}'^ yellow hair, 
In grief thy sallow mantle tear ! 
Thou, Winter, hurling through the air 

The roaring blast. 
Wide o'er the naked world declare 

The wortli we 've lost. 



Mourn him, thou sun, great source of light ! 
Mourn, empress of the silent night ! 
And you, ye twinkling starnies bright, 

My Matthew mourn ! 
For thro' your orbs he 's ta'en his flight, 

Ne'er to return. 

Henderson, the man ! the brother ! 
And art thou gone, and gone forever ! 
And hast thou crost that unknown river. 

Life's dreary bound ! 
Like thee where shall I find another, 

The world around ! 

Go to your sculptured tombs, ye great, 
In a' the tinsel trash o' state ! 
But by thy honest turf I '11 wait, 

Thou man of worth ! 
And weep the ae best fellow's fate 

E'er lay in earth. 

ROBERT BURNS. 



BYRON. 



FROM "THE COURSE OF TIME," BOOK IV, 

Take one example — to our purpose quite. 
A man of rank, and of capacious soul. 
Who riches had, and fame, beyond desire, 
An heir of flattery, to titles born, 
And reputation, and luxurious life : 
Yet, not content with ancestorial name, 
Or to be known because his fathers were. 
He on this height hereditary stood, 
And, gazing higher, purposed in his heart 
To take another step. Above him seemed. 
Alone, the mount of song, the lofty seat 
Of canonized bards ; and thitherward. 
By nature taught, and inward melody, 
In prime of youth, he bent his eagle eye. 
No cost was spared. What books he wished, he 

read ; 
What sage to hear, he heard ; what scenes to see. 
He saw. And first, in rambling school-boy days, 
Britannia'smountain-walks, and heath-girt lakes. 
And story-telling glens, and founts, and brooks, 
And maids, as dew-drops pure and fair, his soul 
With grandeur filled, and melody, and love. 
Then travel came, and took him where he wished : 
He cities saw, and courts, and princely pomp ; 
And mused alone on ancient mountain-brows ; 
And mused on battle-fields, where valor fought 
In other days ; and mused on ruins gray 
With years ; and drank from old and fabulous 

wells. 
And plucked the vine that first-born prophets 

plucked ; 



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And mused on famous tombs, and on the wave 
Of ocean mused, and on the desert waste ; 
The heavens and earth of every country saw : 
"Where'er the old inspiring Genii dwelt. 
Aught that could rouse, expand, refine the soul. 
Thither he went, and meditated there. 

He touched his harp, and nations heard en- 
tranced. 
As some vast river of unfailing source, 
Kapid, exhaustless, deep, his numbers flowed. 
And opened new fountains in the human heart. 
Where Fancy halted, weary in her flight, 
In other men, his fresh as morning rose, 
And soared untrodden heights, and seemed at 

home, 
Where angels bashful looked. Others, though 

great, 
Beneath their argument seemed struggling ; 

whiles 
He, from above descending, stooped to touch 
The loftiest thought ; and proudly stooped, as 

though 
It scarce deserved his verse. With Nature's self 
He seemed an old acquaintance, free to jest 
At will with all her glorious majesty. 
He laid his hand upon " the Ocean's mane," 
And played familiar with his hoary locks ; 
Stood on the Alps, stood on the Apennines, 
And with the thunder talked as friend to friend ; 
And wove his garland of the lightning's wing. 
In sportive twist, — the lightning's fiery wing, 
Which, as the footsteps of the dreadful God, 
Marching upon the storm in vengeance, seemed ; 
Then turned, and with the grasshopper, M'ho 

sung 
His evening song beneath his feet, conversed. 
Suns, moons, and stars, and clouds his sisters 

were ; 
Eocks, mountains, meteors, seas, and winds, and 

storms 
His brothers, younger brothers, whom he scarce 
As equals deemed. All passions of all men, 
Tlie wild and tame, the gentle and severe ; 
All thoughts, all maxims, sacred and profane ; 
All creeds ; all seasons, time, eternity ; 
All that was hated, and all that was dear ; 
All that was hoped, all that was feared, by man, — 
He tossed about, as tempest-withered leaves ; 
Then, smiling, looked upon the wreck he made. 
With terror now he froze the cowering blood, 
And now dissolved the heart in tenderness ; 
Yet would not tremble, would not weep himself ; 
But back into his soul retired, alone. 
Dark, sidlen, proud, gazing contemptuously 
On hearts and passions prostrate at his feet. 
So Ocean, from the plains his waves had late 
To desolation swept, retired in pride, 



Exulting in the glory of his might. 

And seemed to mock the ruin he had wrought. 

As some fierce comet of tremendous size. 
To which the stars did reverence as it passed. 
So he, through learning and through fancy, took 
His flight sublime, and on the loftiest top 
Of Fame's dread mountain sat ; not soiled and 

worn. 
As if he from the earth had labored up. 
But as some bird of heavenly plumage fair 
He looked, which down from higher regions came. 
And perched it there, to see what lay beneath. 
The nations gazed, and wondered much and 

praised. 
Critics before him fell in humble plight ; 
Confounded fell ; and made debasing signs 
To catch his eye ; and stretched and swelled 

themselves 
To bursting nigh, to utter bulk}"- words 
Of admiration vast ; and many too. 
Many that aimed to imitate his flight. 
With weaker wing, unearthly fluttering made, 
And gave abundant sport to after days. 

Great man ! the nations gazed and wondered 

much, 
And praised ; and many called his evil good. 
Wits wrote in favor of his wickedness ; 
And kings to do him honor took delight. 
Thus full of titles, flattery, honor, fame ; 
Beyond desire, beyond ambition, full, — 
He died, — he died of what ? Of wretchedness ; 
Drank every cup of joy, heard every trump 
Of fame ; drank early, deeply drank ; drank 

draughts 
That common millions might have quenched, — 

then died 
Of thirst, because there was no more to drink. 
His goddess. Nature, wooed, embraced, enjoyed. 
Fell from his arms, abhon-ed ; his passions died ; 
Died, all but dreary, solitary Pride ; 
And all his sympathies in being died. 
As some ill-guided bark, well built and tall. 
Which angry tides cast out on desert shore, 
And then, retiiing, left it there to rot 
And moulder in the winds and rains of heaven ; 
So he, cut from the sympathies of life, 
And cast ashore from pleasure's boisterous surge, 
A wandering, weary, worn, and wretched thing, 
A scorched and desolate and blasted soul, 
A gloomy wilderness of dying thought, — 
Repined, and groaned, and withered from the 

earth. 
His groanings filled the land his numbere filled ; 
And yet he seemed ashamed to groan. — Poor 

man ! 
Ashamed to ask, and yet he needed help. 

Robert pollok. 



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TO CAMPBELL, 

True bai'd and simple, — as the race 
Of heaven -born poets always are, 

When stooping from their starry place 
They 're children near, though gods afar. 

THOMAS MOORE. 



CAMP-BELL. 

CHARADE. 

Come from my first, ay, come ! 

The battle-dawn is nigh ; 
And the screaming trump and the thundering 
drum 

Are calling thee to die ! 

Fight as thy father fought ; 

Fall as thy father fell ; 
Thy task is taught ; thy shroud is wrought ; 

So forward and farewell ! 

Toll ye my second, toll ! 

Fling high the flambeau's light, 
And sing the hymn for a parted soul 

Beneath the silent night ! 

The wreath upon his head, 

The cross upon his breast. 
Let the prayer be said and the tear be shed, 

So, — take him to his rest ! 

Call ye my whole, — ay, call 

The lord of lute and lay ; 
And let him greet the sable pall 

With a noble song to-day. 

Go, call him by his name ! 

No fitter hand may crave 
To light the Hame of a soldier's fame 

On the turf of a soldier's grave. 

WINTHROP MACKWORTH PRAED. 



TO THOMAS MOORE. 

My boat is on the shore. 
And my bark is on the sea ; 

But before I go, Tom Moore, 
Here 's a double health to thee ! 

Here 's a sigh to those who love me, 
And a smile to those who hate ; 

And, whatever sky 's above me, 
Here 's a heart for every fate 1 



Though the ocean roar around me, 

Yet it still shall bear me on ; 
Though a desert should surround me. 

It hath springs that may be won. 

Were 't the last drop in the well, 

As 1 gasped upon the brink, 
Ere my fainting spirit fell, 

'T is to thee that I would drink. 

With that water, as this wine, 

The libation I would pour 
Should be, — Peace with thine and mine, 

And a health to thee, Tom Moore ! 

LORD BYRON. 



BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE. 

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note, 
As his corse to the rampart w^e hurried ; 

Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot 
O'er the grave where our hero we bitried. 

We buried him darkly, at dead of night. 
The sods with our bayonets turning ; 

By the struggling moonbeams' misty light. 
And the lantern dimly burning. 

No useless coffin enclosed his breast. 

Not in sheet or in shroud we wound him | 

But he lay, like a Vv'arrior taking his rest, 
With his martial cloak around him. 

Few and short were the prayers we said. 
And we spoke not a word of sorrow ; 

But we steadfastly gazed on the face of the dead, 
And we bitterly thought of the morrow. 

We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed. 
And smoothed down his lonely pillow. 

That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er 
his head. 
And we far away on the billow ! 

Lightly they '11 talk of the spirit that 's gone. 
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him ; 

But little he '11 reck, if they let him sleep on 
In the grave where a Briton has laid him ! 

But half of our heavy task was done. 

When the clock struck the hour for retiring ; 

And we heard the distant and random gun 
That the foe was suddenly firing. 

Slowly and sadly we laid him down. 

From the field of his fame fresh and gory ! 

We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone, 
But we left him alone with his glory. 

CHARLES Wolfe. 



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EMMET'S EPITAPH. 

[Robert Emmet, the celebrated Irish Revolutionist, at his trial 
for high treason, which resulted in his conviction and execution, 
September 20, 1S03, made an eloquent and pathetic defence, con- 
cluding with these words : "Let there be no inscription upon my 
tomb. Let no man write my epitaph. Let my character and my 
motives repose in security and peace till etlier times and other men 
can do them justice. Then shall my character be vindicated ; then 
may my -epitaph be written. I have done." It was immediately 
upon reading this speech that the following lines were written.] 

" Let no man write my epitaph ; let my grave 
Be uti inscribed, and let my memory rest 
Till other times are come, and other men, 
Who then may do me justice." 

Emmet, no ! 
No withering curse hath dried my spirit up, 
That I should now be silent, — that my soul 
Should from the stirring inspiration shrink, 
Now when it shakes her, and withhold her voice, 
Of that divinest impulse nevermore 
Worthy, if impious I withheld it now. 
Hardening my heart. Here, here in this free Isle, 
To which in thy young virtue's erring zeal 
Thou wert so perilous an enemy, 
Here in free Phigland shall an English hand 
Build thy imperishable monument ; 
0, to thine own misfortune and to ours, 
By thine own deadly error so beguiled. 
Here in free England shall an English voice 
Raise up thy mourning-song. For thou hast paid 
The bitter penalty of that misdeed ; 
Justice hath done her unrelenting part. 
If she in truth be Justice who drives on, 
Bloody and blind, the chariot- wheels of death. 

So young, so glowing for the general good, 
0, what a lovely manhood had been thine. 
When all the violent workings of thy youth 
Had passed away, hadst thou been wisely spared. 
Left to the slow and certain influences 
Of silent feeling and maturing thought ! 
How had that heart, — that noble heart of thine. 
Which even now had snapped one spell, which 

beat 
With such brave indignation at the shame 
And guilt of France, and of her miscreant lord, — 
How had it clung to England ! With what love, 
What pure and perfect love, returned to her, 
Now worthy of thy love, the champion now 
For freedom, — yea, the only champion now. 
And soon to be the avenger. But the blow 
Hath fallen, the undiscriminating blow. 
That for its portion to the grave consigned 
Youth, Genius, generous Virtue. 0, grief, grief ! 
0, sorrow and reproach ! Have ye to leara, 
Deaf to the past, and to the future blind. 
Ye who thus iiTemissibly e.xact 
The forfeit life, how lightly life is staked, 
When in distempered times the feverish mind 



To strong delusion yields ? Have ye to learn 
With what a deep and spirit-stirring voice 
Pity doth call Revenge ? Have ye no hearts 
To feel and understand how Mercy tames 
The rebel nature, maddened by old wrongs. 
And binds it in the gentle bands of love. 
When steel and adamant were weak to hold 
That Samson-strength subdued ! 

Let no man write 
Thy epitaph ! Emmet, nay ; thou shalt not go 
Without thy funeral strain ! young and good. 
And wise, though erring here, thou shalt not go 
Unhonored or unsung. And better thus 
Beneath that undiscriminating stroke. 
Better to fall, than to have lived to mourn. 
As sure thou wouldst, in misery and remorse. 
Thine own disastrous triumph ; to have seen, 
If the Almighty at that a\vful horn- 
Had turned away his face, wild Ignorance 
Let loose, and frantic Vengeance, and dark zeal, 
And all bad passions tyrannous, and the fires 
Of Persecution once again ablaze. 
How had it sunk into thy soul to see, 
Last curse of all, the ruffian slaves of France 
In thy dear native country lording it ! 
How happier thus, in that heroic mood 
That takes away the sting of death, to die, 
By all the good and all the wise forgiven ! 
Yea, in all ages by the wise and good 
To be remembered, mourned, and honored still ! 

Robert southey. 



0, BREATHE NOT HIS NAME ! 

ROBERT EMMET. 

0, BREATHE not his name ! let it sleep in the 

shade. 
Where cold and unhonored his relics are laid ; 
Sad, silent, and dark be the tears that we shed. 
As the night-dew that falls on the grave o'er his 

head. 

But the night-dew that falls, though in silence 

it weeps. 
Shall brighten with verdure the grave where he 

sleeps ; 
And the tear that we shed, though in secret it 

rolls. 
Shall long keep his memory gi-een in our souls. 

Thomas Moore. 



TO TOUSSAINT L'OUVERTURE. 

ToussAiNT ! the most unhappy man of men ! 
Whether the whistling rustic tend his plough 
Within thy hearing, or thy head be now 
Pillowed in some deep dungeon's earless den, 



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miserable .cliieftain ! where and when 

AVilt thou find patience ? Yet die not ; do 

thou 
"Wear rather in thy bonds a cheerful brow : 
Though fallen thyself, never to rise again, 
Live and take comfort. Thou hast left behind 
Powers that will work for thee ; air, earth, and 

skies : 
There 's not a breathing of the common wind 
That will forget thee ; thou hast great allies ; 
Thy friends are exultations, agonies. 
And love, and man's unconquerable mind. 

WiLLrAM WORDSWORTH. 



t 



DEATH-BED OF BOMBA, KING OF 
NAPLES, 

AT BARI, 1859. 

Could I pass those lounging sentries, through 

the aloe-bordered entries, up the sweep of 

squalid stair. 
On through chamber after chamber, where the 

sunshine's gold and amber turn decay to 

beauty rare, 
I should reach a guarded portal, where for strife 

of issue mortal, face to face two kings are 

met : 
One the grisly King of Terrors ; one a Bourbon, 

with his errors, late to conscience-clearing 

set. 
Well his fevered pulse may flutter, and the priests 

their mass may mutter with such fervor as 

they may : 
Cross and chrism, and genuflection, mop and 

mow, and interjection, will not frighten 

Death away. 
By the dying despot sitting, at the hard heart's 

portals hitting, shocking the dull brain to 

work, 
Death makes clear what life has hidden, chides 

what life has left unchidden, quickens truth 

life tried to burke. 
He but ruled within his borders after Holy 

Church's orders, did what Austria bade him 

do; 
By their guidance flogged and tortured ; high- 
born men and gently nurtured chained with 

crime's felonious crew. 
What if summer fevers gripped them, what if 

winter freezings nipped them, till they rotted 

in their chains ? 
He had word of Pope and Kaiser ; none could 

holier be or wiser ; theirs the counsel, his 

the reins. 



So he pleads excuses eager, clutching, with his 
fingers meagre, at the bedclothes as he 
speaks ; 

But King Death sits grimly giinning at the 
Bourbon's cobweb-spinning, — as each cob- 
web-cable breaks. 

And the poor soul, from life's eylot, rudderless, 
without a pilot, drifteth slowly down the 
dark ; 

While mid rolling incense vapor, chanted dirge, 
and flaring taper, lies the body, stiff and 
stark. 

PUNCH. 



TO THE MEMORY OF THOMAS HOOD. 

Take back into thy bosom, earth, 

This joyous, May-eyed morrow, 
The gentlest child that ever mirth 

Gave to be reared by sorrow ! 
'T is hard — while rays half green, half gold, 

Through vernal bowers are burning, 
And streams their diamond mirrors hold 

To Summer's face returning — 
To say we 're thankful that his sleep 

Shall nevermore be lighter, 
In whose sweet-tongued companionship 

Stream, bower, and beam grow brighter ! 



But all the more intensely true 

His soul gave out each feature 
Of elemental love, — each hue 

And grace of golden nature, — 
The deeper still beneath it all 

Lurked the keen jags of anguish ; 
The more the laurels clasped his brow 

Their poison made it languish. 
Seemed it that, like the nightingale 

Of his own mournful singing, 
The tenderer would his song prevail 

While most the thorn was stinging. 



So never to the desert-worn 

Did fount bring freshness deeper 
Than that his placid rest this morn 

Has brought the shrouded sleeper. 
That rest may lap his weary head 

Where charnels choke the city. 
Or where, mid woodlands, by his bed 

The wren shall wake its ditty ; 
But near or far, while evening's star 

Is dear to hearts regretting. 
Around that spot admiring thought 

Shall hover, unforgetting. 

Bartholomew Simmons. 



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A VOICE, AND NOTHING ELSE. 

" I WONDER if Brougham thinks as much as he 
talks," 
Said a punster, perusing a trial : 
" I vow, since his lordship was made Baron 
Vaux, 
He 's been Vmix et prceterea nihil ! " 

Anonymous. 



MACAULAY. 

The dreamy rhymer's measured snore 
Falls heavy on our ears no more ; 
And by long strides are left behind 
The dear delights of womankind. 
Who wage their battles like their loves, 
In satin waistcoats and kid gloves, 
And have achieved the crowning work 
When they have trussed and skewered a Turk. 
Another comes with stouter tread, 
And stalks among the statelier dead. 
He rushes on, and hails by turns 
High-crested Scott, broad-breasted Burns ; 
And shows the British youth, who ne'er 
Will lag behind, what Romans were. 
When all the Tuscans and their Lars 
Shouted, and shook the towers of Mars. 

WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR. 



SONNETS TO GEORGE SAND. 

A DESIRE. 

Thou large-brained woman and large-hearted 

man. 
Self-called George Sand ! whose soul amid the 

lions 
Of thy tumultuous senses, moans defiance. 
And answers roar for roar, as spirits can, 
I would some mild miraculous thunder ran 
Above the applauded circus, in appliance 
Of thine own nobler nature's strength and sci- 
ence. 
Drawing two pinions, white as wings of swan. 
From thy strong shoulders, to amaze the place 
With holier light ! that thou to woman's claim. 
And man's, might join beside the angel's grace 
Of a pure genius sanctified from blame ; 
Till child and maiden pressed to thine embrace. 
To kiss upon thy lips a stainless fame. 



A RECOGNITION. 



True genius, but true woman ! dost deny 
Thy woman's nature with a manly scorn, 
And break away the gauds and armlets woi'n 
By weaker women in captivity ? 



Ah, vain denial ! that revolted cry 
Is sobbed in by a woman's voice forlorn ; 
Thy woman's hair, my sister, all unshorn. 
Floats back dishevelled strength in agony. 
Disproving thy man's name ; and while before 
The world thou burnest in a poet-fire. 
We see thy woman-heart beat evermore 
Through the large flame. Beat purer, heart, and 

higher. 
Till God unsex thee on the heavenly shore, 
Where unincarnate spirits purely aspire. 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 



HEINE'S GRAVE. 

" Henri Heine " — 't is here ! 
The black tombstone, the name 
Carved there — no more ! and the smooth. 
Swarded alleys, the limes 
Touched with yellow by hot 
Summer, but under them still- 
In September's bright afternoon 
Shadow and verdure and cool ! 
Trim Montmartre ! the faint 
Murmur of Paris outside ; 
Crisp everlasting- flowers. 
Yellow and black on the graves. 

Half blind, palsied, in pain. 
Hither to come, from the streets' 
Uproar, surely not loath 
Wast thou, Heine, — to lie 
Quiet ! to ask for closed 
Shutters, and darkened i-oom. 
And cool drinks, and an eased 
Posture, and opium, no more ! 
Hither to come, and to sleep 
Under the wings of Renown. 

Ah ! not little, when pain 
Is most quelling, and man 
Easily quelled, and the fine 
Temper of genius alive 
Quickest to ill, is the praise 
Not to have yielded to pain ! 
No small boast for a weak 
Son of mankind, to the earth 
Pinned by the thunder, to rear 
His bolt-scathed front to the stars, 
And, undaunted, retort 
'Gainst thick-crashing, insane, . 
Tyrannous tempests of bale. 
Arrowy lightnings of soul ! 

Hark ! through the alley resounds 
Mocking laughter ! A film 
Creeps o'er the sunshine ; a breeze 
Ruflles the warm afternoon, 



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Saddens my soul with its chill. 

Gibing of spirits in scorn 

Shakes every leaf of the grove, 

Mars the benignant repose 

Of this amiable home of the dead. 

Bitter spirits ! ye claim 

Heine ? — Alas, he is yours ! 

Only a moment I longed 

Here in the quiet to snatch 

From such mates the outworn 

Poet, and stejep him in calm. 

Only a moment ! I knew 

"Whose he was who is here 

Buried ; I knew he was yours ! 

Ah, I knew that I saw 

Here no sepulchre built 

In the laurelled rock, o'er the blue 

Naples bay, for a sweet 

Tender Virgil ! no tomb 

On Eavenna sands, in the shade 

Of Ravenna pines, for a high 

Austere Dante ! no grave 

By the Avon side, in the bright 

Stratford meadows, for thee, 

Shakespeare ! loveliest of souls. 

Peerless in radiance, in joy. 

What so harsh and malign, 
Heine ! distils from thy life. 
Poisons the peace of thy grave ? 

Charm is the glor}' which makes 

Song of the poet divine ; 

Love is the fountain of charm. 

How without charm wilt thou draw, 

Poet, the world to thy way ? 

Not by the lightnings of wit. 

Not by the thunder of scorn ! 

These to the world, too, are given ; 

AVit it possesses, and scorn, — 

Charm is the poet's alone. 

Hollow and dull are the great, 

And artists envious, and the mob profane. 

We know all this, we know ! 

Cam'st thou from heaven, child 

Of light ! but this to declare ? 

Alas ! to help us forget 

Such barren knoAvledge awhile, 

God gave the poet his song. 

Therefore a secret unrest 

Tortured thee, brilliant and bold ! 

Therefore triumph itself 

Tasted amiss to thy soul. 

Therefore, with blood of thy foes, 

Trickled in silence thine own. 

Therefore the victor's heart 

Broke on the field of his fame. 



Ah ! as of old from the pomp 

Of Italian Milan, the fair 

Flower of marble of white 

Southern palaces, — steps 

Bordered by statues, and walks 

Terraced, and orange bowers 

Heavy with fragrance, — the blond 

German Kaiser full oft 

Longed himself back to the fields, 

Rivers, and high-roofed towns 

Of his native Germany ; so. 

So, how often ! from hot 

Paris drawing-rooms, and lamps 

Blazing, and brilliant crowds, 

Starred and jev/elled, of men 

Famous, of women the queens 

Of dazzling converse, and fumes 

Of praise, — hot, heady fumes, to the poor brain 

That mount, that madden ! — how oft 

Heine's vspirit, outworn, 

Longed itself out of the din 

Back to the tranquil, the cool. 

Far German home of his youth ! 

See ! in the May afternoon, 

O'er the fresh short turf of the Hartz, 

A youth, with the foot of youth, 

Heine ! thou climbest again. 

Up, through the tall dark firs 

Warming their heads in the sun, 

Checkering the grass with their shade, 

Up, by the stream with its huge 

Moss-hung bowlders and thin 

Musical water half-hid, 

Up o'er the rock-strewn slope. 

With the sinking sun, and the air 

Chill, and the shadows now 

Long on the gi'ay hillside, 

To the stone-i'oofed hut at the top. 

Or, yet later, in watch 
On the roof of the Brocken tower 
Thou standest, gazing ! to see 
The broad red sun, over field, 
Forest and city and spire 
And mist-tracked stream of the wide. 
Wide German land, going down 
In a bank of vapors, — again 
Standest ! at nightfall, alone ; 
Or, next morning, with limbs 
Rested by slumber, and heart 
Freshened and light with the May, 
O'er the gracious spurs coming down 
Of the lower Hartz, among oaks, 
And beechen coverts, and copse 
Of hazels green in whose depth 
Use, the fairy transformed. 
In a thousand water-breaks light 



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Pours her petulant youth, — 

Climbing the rock which juts 

O'er the valley, the dizzily perched 

Rock I to its Iron Cross 

Once more thou cling' st ; to the Cross 

Clingest ! with smiles, with a sigh. 

But something prompts me : Not thus 
Take leave of Heine, not thus 
Speak the last word at his grave ! 
Not in pity, and not 
With half-censure, — with awe 
Hail, as it passes from earth, 
Scattering lightnings, that soul ! 

The spirit of the world. 

Beholding the absurdity of men, — 

Their vaunts, their feats, — let a sardonic smile 

For one short moment wander o'er his lips. 

That smile was Heine ! for its earthly hour 

The strange guest sparkled ; now 'tis passed away. 

That was Heine ! and we, 

Myriads who live, ^who have lived, 

What are we all, but a mood, 

A single mood, of the life 

Of the Being in whom we exist. 

Who alone is all things in one. 

Spirit, who fillest us all ! 

Spirit, who utterest in each 

New-coming son of mankind 

Such of thy thoughts as thou wilt ! 

thou, one of whose moods, 

Bitter and strange, was the life 

Of Heine, — his strange, alas ! 

His bitter life, — may a life 

Other and milder be mine ! 

Mayst thou a mood more serene. 

Happier, have uttered in mine ! 

Mayst thou the rapture of peace 

Deep have embreathed at its core ! 

Made it a ray of thy thought, 

Made it a beat of thy joy ! 

MATTHEW Arnold. 



A WELCOME TO "BOZ." 

ON HIS FIRST VISIT TO THE WEST 

Come as artist, come as guest. 
Welcome to the expectant West, 
Hero of the charmed pen. 
Loved of children, loved of men. 
We have felt thy spell for years ; 
Oft with laughter, oft with tears. 
Thou hast touched the tenderest part 
Of our inmost, hidden heart. 
We have fixed our eager gaze 
On thy pages nights and days, 



Wishing, as we turned them o'er, 

Like poor Oliver, for "more," 

And the creatures of thy brain 

In our memory remain. 

Till through them we seem to be 

Old acquaintances of thee. 

Much we hold it thee to greet, 

Gladly sit we at thy feet ; 

On thy features we would look, 

As upon a living book, 

And thy voice would grateful hear, 

Glad to feel that Boz were near. 

That his veritable soul 

Held us by direct control : 

Therefore, author loved the best. 

Welcome, welcome to the West, 

In immortal Weller's name, 
By the rare Micawber's fame, 
By the flogging wreaked on Squeers, 
By Job Trotter's fluent tears, 
By the beadle Bumble's fate 
At the hands of shrewish mate. 
By the famous Pickwick Club, 
By the dream of Gabriel Grubb, 
In the name of Snodgrass' muse, 
Tupman's amorous interviews, 
Winkle's ludicrous mishaps, 
And the fat boy's countless naps ; 
By Ben Allen and Bob Sawyer, 
By Miss Sally Brass, the law3'er, 
In the name of Newman Noggs, 
River Thames, and London fogs, 
Richard Swiveller's excess. 
Feasting with the Marchioness, 
By Jack Bunsby's oracles. 
By the chime of Christmas bells, 
By the cricket on the hearth. 
By the sound of childish mirth. 
By spread tables and good cheer. 
Wayside inns and pots of beer. 
Hostess plump and jolly host. 
Coaches for the turnpike post. 
Chambermaid in love with Boots, 
Toodles, Traddles, Tapley, Toots, 
Betsey Trotwood, Mister Dick, 
Susan Nipper, Mistress Chick, 
Snevellicci, Lilyvick, 
Mautalini's predilections 
To transfer his warm afi'ections, 
By poor Barnaby and Grip, 
Flora, Dora, Di, and Gip, 
Perrybingle, Pinch, and Pip, — 
Welcome, long-expected guest. 
Welcome to the grateful West. 

In the name of gentle Nell, 
Child of light, beloved well, — 



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Weeping, did we not behold 

Eoses on her bosom cold ? 

Better we for every tear 

Shed beside her snowy bier, — 

By the mournful group that played 

Kound the grave where Smike was laid. 

By the life of Tiny Tim, 

And the lesson taught by him, 

Asking in his plaintive tone 

God to "bless us every one," 

By the sounding waves that bore 

Little Paul to Heaven's shore. 

By thy yearning for the human 

Good in every man and woman, 

By each noble deed and word 

That thy story-books record, 

And each noble sentiment 

Dickens to the world hath lent, 

By the effort thou hast made 

Truth and true reform to aid, 

By thy hope of man's relief 

Finally from want and grief, 

By thj' never-failing trust 

That the God of love is just, — 

We would meet and welcome thee. 

Preacher of humanity : 

Welcome fills the throbbing breast 

Of the sympathetic West. 

W. H. V'ENABLE. 



DICKENS IN CAMP. 

Above the pines the moon was slowly drifting, 

The river sang below ; 
The dim Sierras, far beyond , uplifting 

Their minarets of snow. 

The roaring camp-fire, with rude humor, painted 

The ruddy tints of health 
On haggard face and form that drooped and fainted 

In the fierce race for wealth ; 

Till one arose, and from his pa<^.k's scant treasure 

A hoarded volume drew. 
And cards were dropped from hands of listless 
leisure. 

To hear the tale anew ; 

And then, while round them shadows gathered 
faster. 

And as the firelight fell. 
He read aloud the book wherein the Master 

Had writ of "Little Nell." 

Perhaps 't was boyish fancy, — for the reader 

Was youngest of them all, — 
But, as he read, from clustering pine and cedar 

A silence seemed to fall : 



The fir-trees, gathering closer in the shadows. 

Listened in every spraj', 
While the whole camp, with "Nell," on English 
meadows 

Wandered and lost their way. 

And so in mountain solitudes — o'ertaken 

As by some spell divine — 
Their cares dropped from them like the needles 
shaken 

From out the gusty pine. 

Lost is that camp, and wasted all its fire ; 

And he who wrought that spell ? — 
Ah, toweling pine and stately Kentish spire. 

Ye have one tale to tell ! 

Lost is that camp ! but let its fragrant story 
Blend with the breath that thrills 

With hop-vines' incense all the pensive glory 
That fills the Kentish hills. 

And on that grave where English oak and holly 

And laurel wreaths intwine. 

Deem it not all a too presiynjrtuous folly, — 

This spray of Western pine. 

Bret Harte. 



TO VICTOR HUGO. 

Victor in poesy ! Victor in romance ! 

Cloud-weaver of phantasmal hopes and fears ! 
French of the French and lord of human 
tears ! 
Child-lover, bard, whose fame-lit laurels glance, 
Darkening the wreaths of all that would ad- 
vance 
Beyond our strait their claim to be thy peers ! 
Weird Titan, by thy wintry weight of years 
As yet unbroken ! Stoiiny voice of France, 
Who does not love our England, so they say ; 
I know not ! England, France, all men to be, 
Will make one people, ere man's race be 
run ; 
And I, desiring that diviner day, 

Yield thee full thanks for thy full courtesy 
To younger England in the boy, my son, 
Alfred Tennyson. 



DANIEL BOONE. 

FROM "DON JUAN." 

Of all men, saving Sylla the man-slayer, 

Who passes for in life and death most lucky. 

Of the great names which in our faces stare, 
The General Boone, backwoodsman of Ken- 
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Was happiest amongst mortals anywhere ; 

For, killing nothing but a bear or buck, he 
Enjoyed the lonely, vigorous, harmless days 
Of his old age in wilds of deepest maze. 

Crime came not near him, she is not the child 
Of solitude ; Health shrank not from him, for 

Her home is in the rarely trodden wild, 

Where if men seek her not, and death be more 

Their choice than life, forgive them, as beguiled 
By habit to what their own hearts abhor, 

In cities caged. The present case in point I 

Cite is, that Boone lived hunting up to ninety ; 

And, what 's still stranger, left behind a name 
For which men vainly decimate the throng, 

Not only famous, but of that good fame. 

Without which glory 's but a tavern song, — 

Simple, serene, the antipodes of shame, 

Which hate nor envy e'er could tinge with 
wrong ; 

An active hermit, even in age the child 

Of nature, or the Man of Ross run wild. 

'T is true he shrank from men, even of his nation ; 

When they built up unto his darling trees, 
He moved some hundred miles off, for a station 

Where there were fewer houses and more ease ; 
The inconvenience of civilization 

Is that you neither can be pleased nor please ; 
But where he met the individual man. 
He showed himself as kind as mortal can. 

He was not all alone ; around him grew 
A sylvan tribe of children of the chase. 

Whose young, imwakened world was ever new ; 
Nor sword nor sorrow yet had left a trace 

On her nnwrinkled brow, nor could you view 
A frown on nature's or on human face : 

The freeborn forest found and kept them free, 

And fresh as is a torrent or a tree. 

And tall, and strong, and swift of foot, were they. 
Beyond the dwarfing city's pale abortions. 

Because their thoughts had never been the prey 
Of care or gain : the green woods were their 
portions ; 

No sinking spirits told them they gi'ew gray ; 
No fashion made them apes of her distortions ; 

Simple they were, not savage ; and their rifles, 

Though very true, were not yet used for trifles. 

Motion was in their days, rest in their slumbers, 
And cheerfulness the handmaid of their toil ; 

Nor yet too many nor too few their numbers ; 
Corruption could not make their hearts her 
soil. 



The lust which stings, the splendor which en- 
cumbers. 
With the free foresters divide no spoil : 
Serene, not sullen, were the solitudes 
Of this unsighing people of the woods. 

LORD BYRON. 



WASHINGTON. 

FROM " UNDER THE ELM," READ AT CAMBRIDGE, JULY 3, 
1875, ON THE HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF WASHING- 
TON'S TAKING COMMAND OF THE AMERICAN ARMY. 

Beneath our consecrated elm 

A century ago he stood. 

Famed vaguely for that old fight in the wood. 

Which redly foamed round him but could not 

overwhelm 
The life foredoomed to wield our rough-hewn 

helm. 
From colleges, where now the gown 
To arms had yielded, from the town. 
Our rude self-summoned levies flocked to see 
The new-come chiefs and wonder which was he. 
No need to question long ; close-lipped and tall, 
Long trained in murder-brooding forests lone 
To bridle others' clamors and his own. 
Firmly erect, he towered above them all, 
The incarnate discipline that was to free 
AVith iron curb that armed democracy. 

Haughty they said he was, at first, severe, 
But owned, as all men owned, the steady hand 
Upon the bridle, patient to command. 
Prized, as all prize, the justice pure from fear. 
And learned to honor first, thei} love him, then 

revere. 
Such power there is in clear-eyed self-restraint, 
And purpose clean as light from every selfish 

taint. 

Musing beneath the legendary tree. 

The years between furl off : I seem to see 

The sun-flecks, shaken the stirred foliage through, 

Dapple with gold his sober buff and blue, 

And weave prophetic aureoles round the head 

That shines our beacon now, nor darkens with 

the dead. 
man of silent mood, 
A stranger among strangers then. 
How art thou since renowned the Great, the 

Good, 
Familiar as the day in all the homes of men ! 
The winged years, that winnow praise and blame, 
Blow many names out : they but fan to flame 
The self-renewing splendors of thy fame. 

0, for a drop of that terse Roman's ink 
Who gave Agricola dateless length of days, 



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To celebrate him fitly, neither swerve 

To phrase unkempt, nor pass discretion's brink, 

With him so statuelike in sad reserve, 

So diffident to claim, so for\\'ard to deserve ! 

Nor need I shun due influence of his fame 

Who, mortal among mortals, seemed as now 

The equestrian shape with unimpassioned brow, 

That paces silent on through vistas of acclaim. 

What figure more immovably august 

Than that grave strength so patient and so pure. 

Calm in good fortune, when it wavered, sure, 

That soul serene, impenetrably just. 

Modelled on classic lines, so simple they endure ? 

That soul so softly radiant and so white 

The track it left seems less of fire than light, 

Cold but to such as love distemperature ? 

And if pure light, as some deem, be the force 

That drives rejoicing planets on their course. 

Why for his power benign seek an impurer 

source ? 
His was the true enthusiasm that burns long. 
Domestically bright, 
Fed from itself and shy of human sight, 
The hidden force that makes a lifetime strong. 
And not the short-lived fuel of a song. 
Passionless, say you ? What is passion for 
But to sublime our natures and control 
To front heroic toils with late return. 
Or none, or such as shames the conqueror ? 
That fire was fed with substance of the soul. 
And not with holiday stubble, that could burn 
Through seven slow years of unadvancing war. 
Equal when fields were lost or fields were won, 
With breath of popular apj>lause or blame. 
Nor fanned nor damped, unquenehably the same. 
Too inward to be reached by flaws of idle fame. 

Soldier and statesman, rarest unison; 
High-poised example' of great duties done 
Simply as breathing, a world's honors worn 
As life's indifferent gifts to all men born ; 
Dumb for himself, unless it were to God, 
But for his barefoot soldiers eloquent, 
Tramping the snow to coral where they trod. 
Held by his awe in hollow-eyed content ; 
Modest, yet firm as Nature's self ; unblamed 
Save by the men his nobler temper shamed ; 
Not honored then or now because he wooed 
The popular voice, but that he still withstood ; 
Broad-minded, higher-souled, there is but one 
Who was all this, and ours, and all men's, — 
Washington. 

Minds strong by fits, irregularly great. 
That flash and darken like revolving lights. 
Catch more the vulgar eye unschooled to wait 
On the long curve of patient days and nights. 



Rounding a whole life to the circle fair 

Of orbed completeness ; and this balanced soul, 

So simple in its grandeur, coldly bare 

Of draperies theatric, standing there 

In perfect symmetry of self-control, 

Seems not so great at first, but greater grows 

Still as we look, and by experience learn 

How grand this quiet is, how nobly stern 

The discipline that wrought through life-long 

throes 
This energetic passion of repose. 
A nature too decorous and severe. 
Too self-respectful in its griefs and joys 
For ardent girls and boys. 
Who find no genius in a mind so clear 
That its grave deptlis seem obvious and near, 
Nor a soul great that made so little noise. 
They feel no force in that calm, cadenced phrase, 
The. habitual full-dress of his well-bred mind. 
That seems to pace the minuet's courtly maze 
And tell of ampler leisures, roomier length of 

days. 
His broad-built brain, to self so little kind 
That no tumultuary blood could blind, 
Formed to control men, not amaze. 
Looms not like those that borrow height of haze : 
It was a world of statelier movement then 
Than this we fret in, he a denizen 
Of that ideal Rome that made a man for men. 

Placid completeness, life without a fall 

From faith or highest aims, truth's breachless 

wall, 
Surely if any fame can bear the touch. 
His will say " Here ! " at the last trumpet's call, 
The unexpressive man whose life expressed so 

much. 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 

By broad Potomac's silent shore 
Better than Trajan lowly lies. 
Gilding her green declivities 

With glory now and evermore ; 
Art to his fame no aid hath lent ; 
His country is his nmnument. 

Anonymous. 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 

When, stricken by the freezing blast, 
A nation's living' pillai's fall, 

How rich the stoiied page, liow vast, \ 
A word, a whisper, can recall ! 



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No medal lifts its fretted face, 

Nor si)eakiiig marble cheats your eye ; 

Yet, while these pictured lines I trace, 
A living image passes by : 

A roof beneath the mountain pines ; 

The cloisters of a hill-girt plain ; 
The front of life's embattled lines ; 

A mound beside the heaving main. 

These are the scenes : a boy- appears ; 

Set life's round dial in the sun. 
Count the swift arc of seventy years, 

His frame is dust ; his task is done. 

Yet pause upon the noontide houi', 

Ere the declining sun has laid 
His bleaching rays on manhood's power. 

And look upon the mighty shade. 

No gloom that stately shape can hide. 
No change uncrown his brow ; behold ! 

Dark, calm, large-fronted, lightning-eyed, 
Earth has no double from its mould ! 

Ere from the fields by valor won 
The battle-smoke had rolled away, 

And bared the blood-red setting sun, 
His eyes were opened on the day. 

His land was bu,t a shelving strip. 

Black with the strife that made it free ; 

He lived to see its banners dip 
Their fringes in the western sea. 

The boundless prairies learned his name, 
His words the mountain echoes knew ; 

The northern breezes swept his fame 
From icy lake to warm bayou. 

In toil he lived ; in peace he died ; 

When life's full cycle was complete, 
Put off his robes of power and pride. 

And laid them at his Master's feet. 

His rest is by the storm-swept waves, 
Wliom life's wild tempests roughly tried. 

Whose heart was like the streannng caves 
Of ocean, throbbing at his side. 

Death's cold white hand is like the snow 
Laid softly on the furrowed hill ; 

It hides the broken seams below, 

And leaves the summit brighter still. 

In vain the envious tongue upbraids ; 

His name a nation's heait shall keep, 
TUl morning's latest sunlight fades 

On the blue tablet of the deep ! 

Oliver Wendell Holmes. 



ICHABOD. 



DANIEL WEBSTER. rS 



So fallen ! so lost ! the light withdi'awn, 

Which once he wore ! 
The glory from his gray hairs gone 

Forevermoi'e ! 

Revile him not, — the Tempter hath 

A snare for all ! 
And pitying tears, not scorn and wrath. 

Befit his fall ! 

0, dumb be passion's stormy rage, 

When he who might 
Have lighted up and led his age 

Falls back in night ! 

Scorn ! would the angels laugh to mark 

A bright soul driven. 
Fiend-goaded, down the endless dark. 

From hope and heaven ? 

Let not the land, once proud of him. 

Insult him now ; 
Nor brand with deeper shame his dim. 

Dishonored brow. 

But let its humbled sons instead, 

From sea to lake, 
A long lament, as for the dead, 

In sadness make. 

Of all we loved and honored, naught 

Save power remains, — 
A fallen angel's pride of thought, 

Still strong in chains. 

All else is gone ; from those great eyes 

The soul has fled : 
When faith is lost, when honor dies. 

The man is dead ! 

Then pay the reverence of old days 

To his dead fame ; 
Walk backward, with averted gaze, 

And hide the shame ! 

John Greenleaf Whittier. 



THE DEAD CZAR NICHOLAS. 

Lay him beneath his snows, 

The great Norse giant who in these last days 

Troubled the nations. Gather decently 

The imperial robes about him. 'T is but man, ■ 



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This demi-god. Or rather it was man, 
And is — a little dust, that will corrupt 
As fast as any nameless dust which sleeps 
'Neath Alma's grass or Balaldava's vines. 

No vineyard grave for him. No quiet tomb 
By river margin, where across the seas 
Children's fond thoughts and women's memories 

come. 
Like angels, to sit by the sepulchre, 
Saying : ' ' All these were men who knew to count, 
Front-faced, the cost of honor, nor did shrink 
From its full payment ; coming here to die, 
They died— like men." 

But this man ? Ah ! for him 
Funereal state, and ceremonial grand, 
The stone-engraved sarcophagus, and then 
Oblivion. 

Nay, oblivion were as bliss 
To that fierce howl which rolls from land to land 
Exulting, — "Art thou fallen, Lucifer, 
Son of the morning ? " or condemning, — "Thus 
Perish the wicked ! " or blaspheming, — " Here 
Lies our Belshazzar, our Sennacherib, 
Our Pharaoh, — he whose heart God hardened. 
So that he would not let the people go." 

Self-glorifying sinners ! Why, this man 

"Was but like other men, — you, Levite small, 

Who shut your saintly ears, and prate of hell 

And heretics, because outside church-doors, 

Your church-doors, congregations poor and small 

Praise Heaven in their own way ; you, autocrat 

Of all the hamlets, who add field to field 

And house to house, whose slavish children cower 

Before your tyrant footstep ; you, foul-tongued 

Fanatic or ambitious egotist, 

Who think God stoops from his high majesty 

To lay his finger on your puny head, 

And crown it, that you henceforth may parade 

Your maggotship throughout the wondering 

world, — 
" I am the Lord's anointed ! " 

Fools and blind ' 
This czar, this emperor, this disthroned corpse, 
Lying so straightly in an icy calm 
Grander than sovereignty, was but as ye, — 
No better and no worse : Heaven mend us all ! 

Carry him forth and bury him. Death's peace 
Rest on his memory ! Mercy by his bier 
Sits silent, or says only these few words, — • 
" Let him who is without sin 'mongst ye all 

Cast the first stone." 

Dinah Maria Mulock Craik. 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

FROM THE "COMMEMORATION ODE." 

Life may be given in many ways, 
And loyalty to Truth be sealed 
As bravely in the closet as the field. 
So bountiful is Fate ; 
But then to stand beside her, 
When craven churls deride her, 
To front a lie in arms and not to yield, 
This shows, methinks, God's plan 
And measure of a stalwart man. 
Limbed like the old heroic breeds, 
Who stand self-poised on manhood's solid 
earth, 
Not forced to frame excuses for his birth, 
Fed from within with all the strength he needs. 

Such was he, our Martyr-Chief, 
Whom late the Nation he had led, 
AVith ashes on her head, 
Wept with the passion of an angry grief : 
Forgive me, if from present things I turn 
To spealv what in my heart will beat and burn, 
And hang my wreath on his world-honored urn. 
Nature, they say, doth dote. 
And cannot make a man 
Save on some worn-out plan, 
Repeating us by rote : 
For him her Old- World moulds aside he threw, 
And, choosing sweet claj^ from the breast 
Of the unexhausted West, 
With stuff untainted shaped a hero new, 
Wise, steadfast in the strength of God, and true. 

How beautiful to see 
Onoe more a shepherd of mankind indeed. 
Who' loved his charge, but never loved to lead ; 
One whose meek flock the people joyed to be, 
Not lured by any cheat of birth. 
But by his clear-grained human worth. 
And brave old wisdom of sincerity ! 
They knew that outward grace is dust ; 
They could not choose but trust 
In that sure-footed mind's unfaltering skill, 

And supple-tempered will 
That bent like perfect steel to spring again and 
thrust. 
His was no lonely mountain-peak of mind, 
Thrusting to thin air o'er our cloudy bars, 
A sea-mark now, now lost in vapors blind ; 
Broad prairie rather, genial, level-lined, 
Fruitful and friendly for all human kind, 
Yet also nigh to heaven and loved of loftiest stai's. 

Nothing of Europe here. 
Or, then, of Europe fronting niornward still, 
Ere any names of Serf and Peer 
Could Nature's equal scheme deface ; 



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Here was a type of the true elder race, 
And one of Plutarch's men talked with us face 
to face. 
I praise him not ; it were too late ; 
And some innative weakness there must be 
In him who condescends to victory- 
Such as the Present gives, and cannot wait. 
Safe in himself as iu a fate. 
So always firmly he : 
He knew to bide his time, 
And can his fame abide, 
Still patient in his simple faith sublime. 
Till the wise years decide. 
Great captains, with their guns and drums, 
Disturb our judgment for the hour, 
But at last silence comes ; 
These all are gone, and, standing like a tower, 
Our children shall behold his fame, 

The kindly-earnest, brave, foreseeing man, 
Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame, 
New birth of our new soil, the first American. 
James Russell Lowell. 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN.* 

FOULLY ASSASSINATED APRIL 14, 1865. 

You lay a wreath on murdered Lincoln's bier, 
Yo2(; who with mocking pencil wont to trace, 

Bi'oad for the self-complacent British sneer. 
His length of shambling limb, his furrowed face, 

His gaunt, gnarled hands, his unkempt, bl'ist- 
ling hair, 

His garb uncouth, his bearing ill at ease. 
His lack of all we prize as debonair. 

Of power or will to shine, of art to please ; 

You, whose smart pen backed up the pencil's 
laugh, 
Judging each step as though the way were 
plain. 
Reckless, so it could point its paragraph 
Of chief's perplexity, or people's pain : 

Beside this corpse, that bears for winding-sheet 
The Stars and Stripes he lived to rear anew. 

Between the mourners at his head and feet. 
Say, scurrile jester, is there room for you ? 

Yes : he had lived to shame me from my sneer. 
To laine my pencil, and confute my pen ; 

To make me own this hind of princes peer, 
This rail-splitter a true-born king of men. 



♦ This tribute appeared in the London Punch, which, up to 
the time of the assassination of Mr. Lincoln, had ridiculed and 
maligned him with all its well-known powers of pen and pencil. 



My shallow judgment I had learned to rue. 
Noting how to occasion's height he rose ; 

How his quaint wit made home-truth seem more 
true ; 
How, iron-like, his temper grew by blows. 

How humble, yet how hopeful, he could be ; 

How, in good fortune and in ill, the same ; 
Nor bitter in success, nor boastful he. 

Thirsty for gold, nor feverish for fame. 

He went about his work, — such work as few 
Ever had laid on head and heart and hand, — 

As one who knows, where there 's a task to do, 
Man's honest will must Heaven's good grace 
command ; 

Who trusts the strength will with the burden 
grow, 

That God makes instruments to work his will, 
If but that will we can arrive to know, 

Nor tamper with the weights of good and ill. 

So he went forth to battle, on the side 

That he felt clear was Liberty's and Right's, 

As in his jjcasant boyhood he had plied 

His warfare with rude Nature's thwarting 
mights ; 

The uncleared forest, the unbroken soil. 

The iron-bark, that turns the lumberer's axe, 

The I'apid, that o'erbears the boatman's toil. 
The prairie, hiding the mazed wanderer's tracks, 

The ambushed Indian, and the prowling bear,— 

Such were the deeds that helped his youth to 

train : 

Rough culture, but such trees large fruit may 

bear, 

If but their stocks be of right girth and grain. 

So he grew up, a destined work to do. 

And lived to do it : four long-suffering years' 

Ill-fate, ill-feeling, ill-report, lived through. 
And then he heard the hisses change to cheers. 

The taunts to tribute, the abuse to praise, 

And took both with the same unwavering mood ; 

Till, as he came on light, from darkling days, 
And seemed to touch the goal from where he 
stood, 

A felon hand, between the goal and him. 

Reached from behind, his back, a trigger prest. 

And those perplexed and patient eyes were dim. 
Those gaunt, long-laboring limbs were laid to 
rest ! 



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The words of mercy were upon his lips, 
Forgiveness in his heart and on his pen, 

When this vile murderer brought swift eclipse 
To thoughts of pieace on earth, good-will to men. 

The Old World and the New, from sea to sea. 
Utter one voice of sympathy and shame : 

Sore heart, so stopped when it at last beat high ; 
Sad life, cut short just as its triumph came ! 

A deed accurst ! Strokes have been struck before 
By the assassin's hand, whereof men doubt 

If more of horror or disgrace they bore ; 

But thy foul crime, like Cain's, stands darkly 
out. 

Vile hand, that brandest murder on a strife, 
Whate'erits grounds, stoutly and nobly striven ; 

And with the martyr's crown crownest a life 
With much to praise, little to be forgiven. 

TOM Taylor. 



AVILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 

" Some time afterward, it was reported to me by tlie city officers 
that they had ferreted out the paper and its editor ; that liis ofRce 
was an obscure hole, his only visible auxiliary a negfro boy, and his 
supporters a few very insignificant persons of all colors." — Letter of 
H. G. OTIS. 

In a small chamber, friendless and unseen. 
Toiled o'er his types one poor, unlearned young 
man ; 

The place was dark, unfurnitured, and mean : 
Yet there the freedom of a race began. 

Help came but slowly ; surely no man yet 
Put lever to the heavy world with less : 

What need of help ? He knew how types were set. 
He had a dauntless spirit, and a press. 

Such earnest natures are the fiery pith. 

The compact nucleiis, round which systems 
grow : 

Mass after mass becomes inspired therewith, 
And whirls impregnate with the central glow. 

Truth ! Freedom ! how are ye still born 
In the rude stable, in the manger nursed ! 

What humble hands unbar those gates of morn 
Through which the splendors of the New Day 
burst ! 

What ! shall one monk, scarce known beyond his 
cell, 
Front Rome's far-reaching bolts, and scorn her 
frown ? 
Brave Luther answered Yes ; that thunder's swell 
Rocked Europe, and discharmed the triple 
crown. 



Whatever can be known of earth we know, 
Sneered Europe's wise men, in their snail- 
shells curled ; 

No ! said one man in Genoa, and that No 
Out of the dark created this New World. 

Who is it will not dare himself to trust ? 

Who is it hath not strength to stand alone ? 
Who is it thwarts and bilks the inward Must ? 

He and his works, like sand^ from earth are 
blown. 

Men of a thousand shifts and wiles, look here ! 

See one straightforward conscience put in pawn 
To win a world ; see the obedient sphere 

By bravery's simple gravitation drawn ! 

Shall we not heed the lesson taught of old, 
And by the Present's lips repeated still, 

In our own single manhood to be bold, 

Fortressed in conscience and impregnable will ? 

We stride the river daily at its spring, 

Nor, in our childish thoughtlessness, foresee 

What myriad vassal streams shall tribute bring, 
How like an equal it shall greet the sea. 

small beginnings, ye are great and strong, 
Based on a faithful heart and weariless brain ! 

Ye build the future fair, ye conquer wrong, 
Ye earn the crown, and wear it not in vain. 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 



THE OLD ADMIRAL. 

ADMIRAL STEWART, U. S. NAVY. 

Gone at last. 

That brave old hero of the past ! 
His spirit has a second birth. 

An unknown, grander life ; 
All of him that was earth 

Lies mute and cold. 

Like a wrinkled sheath and old, 
Thrown off forever from the shimmering blade 
That has good entrance made 

Upon some distant, glorious strife. 

From another generation, 

A simpler age, to oui's Old Ironsides came ; 
The morn and noontide of the nation 

Alike he knew, nor yet outlived his fame, — 
0, not outlived his fame ! 
The dauntless men whose service guards our shore 

Lengthen still their glory-roll 

With his name to lead the scroll. 
As a flagship at her fore 

Carries the Union, with its azure and the stars. 
Symbol of times that are no more 

And the old heroic wars. 



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He was the one 

Whom Death had spared alone 

Of all the captains of that lusty age, 
Who sought the foeman where he lay, 
On sea or sheltering bay, 

ISTor till the prize was theirs repressed their 
rage. 
They are gone, — all gone : 

They rest with glory and the undying Powers ; 

Only their name and fame, and what they 
saved, are ours ! 

It was fifty years ago, 
Upon the Gallic Sea, 
He bore the banner of the free. 
And fought the fight whereof our children 
know, — 
The deathful, desperate fight ! 
Under the fair moon's light 
The frigate squared, and yawed to left and right. 

Every broadside swept to death a score ! 
Roundly played her guns and well, till their 
fiery ensigns fell, 
Neither foe replying more. 
All in silence, when the night-breeze cleared the 
air. 
Old Ironsides rested there, 
Locked in between the twain, and drenched with 
blood. 
Then homeward, like an eagle with her prey ! 
0, it was a gallant fray, — 
That fight in Biscay Bay ! 
Fearless the captain stood, in his youthful hardi- 
hood : 
He was the boldest of them all, 
Our brave old Admiral ! 

And still our heroes bleed. 
Taught by that olden deed. 

Whether of iron or of oak 
Tlie ships we marshal at our country's need. 

Still speak their cannon now as then they 
spoke ; 
Still floats our unstruck banner from the mast 

As in the stormy past. 

Lay him in the ground : 

Let him rest where the ancient river rolls ; 
Let him sleep beneath the shadow and the sound 

Of the bell whose proclamation, as it tolls. 
Is of Freedom and the gift our fathers gave. 

Lay him gently down : 

The clamor of the town 
Will not break the slumbers deep, the beautiful, 
ripe sleep, 

Of this lion of the wave. 

Will not trouble the old Admiral in his sn-ave. 



Earth to earth his dust is laid. 
Methinks his stately shade 

On the shadow of a great ship leaves the shore ; 
Over cloudless western seas 
Seeks the far Hesperides, 

The islands of the blest, 
Where no turbulent billows roar, — 

Where is rest. 
His ghost upon the shadowy quarter stands 
Nearing the deathless lands. 

There all his martial mates, renewed and 
strong, 

Await his coming long. 

I see the happy Heroes rise 

With gratulation in their eyes : 
"Welcome, old comrade," Lawrence cries ; 
" Ah, Stewart, tell us of the wars ! 
Who win the glory and the scars ? 

How floats the skyey flag, — how many 
stars ? 

Still speak they of Decatur's name ? 

Of Bainbridge's and Perry's fame ? 

Of me, who earliest came ? 
Make ready, all : 
Room for the Admiral ! 

Come, Stewart, tell us of the wars ! " 

Edmund Clarence Stedman. 



KANE. 



DIED FEBRUARY l6, 1837. 

Aloft upon an old basaltic crag, 

Which, scalped by keen winds that defend 

the Pole, 
Gazes with dead face on the seas that roll 
Around the secret of the mystic zone, 
A mighty nation's star-bespangled flag 

Flutters alone, 
And underneath, upon the lifeless front 

Of that drear cliff, a simple name is traced ; 
Fit type of him who, famishing a,nd gaunt, 
But with a rocky purpose in his soul. 
Breasted the gathering snows. 
Clung to the drifting floes. 
By want beleaguered, and by winter chased, 
Seeking the brother lost amid that frozen waste. 

Not many months ago we greeted him, 
Crowned with the icy honors of the North, 
Across the land his hard-won fame went forth. 

And Maine's deep woods were shaken limb by 
limb. 

His own mild Keystone State, sedate and prim. 
Burst from decorous quiet, as he came. 
Hot Southern lips, with eloquence aflame. 

Sounded his triumph. Texas, wild and grim, 



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Proffered its horny hand. The large-lunged West, 

From out his giant breast, 
Yelled its frank welcome. And from main to main 

Jubilant to the sky, 

Thundered the mighty cry, 
Honor to Kane ! 

In vain, — in vain beneath his feet we flung 
The reddening roses ! All in vain we poured 
The golden wine, and round the sliining board 
Sent the toast circling, till the rafters rung 
With the thrice-tripled honors of the feast ! 
Scarce the buds wilted and the voices ceased 
Ere the pure light that sparkled in his eyes. 
Bright as auroral fires in Southern skies, 

Faded and faded ! And the brave young heart 
That the relentless Arctic winds had robbed 
Of all its vital heat, in that long quest 
For the lost captain, now within his breast 

More and more faintly throbbed. 
His was the victory ; but as his grasp 
Closed on the laurel crown with eager clasp, 
Death launched a whistling dart ; 
And ere the thunders of applause were done 
His bright eyes closed forever on the sun ! 
Too late, — too late the splendid prize he won 
In the Olympic race of Science and of Art ! 
Like to some shattered berg that, pale and lone, 
Drifts from the white North to a Tropic zone. 
And in the burning day 
Wastes peak by peak away, 
Till on some rosy even 
It dies with sunlight blessing it ; so he 
Tranquilly floated to a Southern sea, 
And melted into heaven ! 

He needs no tears who lived a noble life ! 
We will not weep for him who died so well ; 
But we will gather round the hearth, and tell 
The story of his strife ; 
Such homage suits him well. 
Better than funeral pomp or passing bell ! 

What tale of peril and self-sacrifice ! 
Prisoned amid the fastnesses of ice, 

With hunger howling o'er the wastes of snow ! 

Night lengthening into months ; the ravenous 
floe 
Crunching the massive ships, as the white bear 
Crunches his prey. The insufficient share 

Of loathsome food ; 
The lethargy of famine ; the despair 

Urging to labor, nervelessly pursued ; 

Toil done with skinny arms, and faces hued 
Like pallid masks, while dolefully behind 
Glimmered the fading embers of a mind ! 
That awful hour, when through the prostrate baud 
Delirium stalked, laying his burning hand 



Upon the ghastly foreheads of the crew ; 

The whispers of rebellion, faint and few 

At first, but deepening ever till they grew 
Into black thoughts of murder, — such the throng 
Of horrors bound the hero. High the song 
Should be that hymns the noble part he played ! 
Sinking himself, yet ministering aid 

To all around him. By a mighty will 

Living defiant of the wants that kill. 
Because his death would seal his comrades' fate ; 

Cheering with ceaseless and inventive skill 
Those polar waters, dark and desolate. 
Equal to every trial, every fate. 

He stands, until spring, tardy with relief. 
Unlocks the icy gate, 
And the pale prisoners thread the world once 

more. 
To the steep cliffs of Greenland's pastoral shore 
Bearing their dying chief ! 

Time was when he should gain his spurs of gold! 

From royal hands, who wooed the knightly 
state ; 
The knell of old formalities is tolled. 

And the world's knights are now self-conse- 
crate. 
No grander episode doth chivalry hold 

In all its annals, back to Charlemagne, 

Than that lone vigil of unceasing pain, 
Faithfully kept through hunger and through cold, 

By the good Christian knight, Elisha Kane ! 

FITZ-JAMES O'BRIEN. 



MAZZmi. 

A LIGHT is out in Italy, 

A golden tongue of purest flame. 
We watched it burning, long and lone, 

And every watcher knew its name. 
And knew from whence its fervor came : 

That one rare light of Italy, 
Which put self-seeking souls to shame ! 

This light which burnt for Italy 

Through all the blackness of her night, 

She doubted, once upon a time. 
Because it took away her sight. 

She looked and said , ' There is no light ! ' 
It was thine eyes, poor Italy ! 

That knew not dark apart from bright. 

This flame which burnt for Italy, • 
It. would not let her haters sleep. 

They blew at it with angry breath, 
And only fed its upward leap. 

And only made it hot and deep. 



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Its burning showed us Italy, 
And all the hopes she had to keep. 

This light is out in Italy, 

Her eyes shall seek for it in vain ! 
For her sweet sake it spent itself, 

Too early flickering to its wane, — 
Too long blown over by her pain. 

Bow down and weep, Italj'', 
Thou canst not kindle it again ! 

Laura C. redden {Howard Glyndon). 



JOHN CHARLES FREMONT. 

Thy error, Fremont, simply was to act 

A brave man's part, without the statesman's tact, 

And, taking counsel but of common sense. 

To strike at cause as well as consequence. 

0, never yet since Roland wound his horn 

At Roncesvalles has a blast been blown 

Far-heard, wide-echoed, startling as thine own, 

Heard from the van of freedom's hope forlorn ! 

It had been safer, doubtless, for the time, 

To flatter treason, and avoid offence 

To that Darlc Power whose underlying crime 

Heaves upward its perpetual turbulence. 

But, if thine be the fate of all who break 

The ground for truth's seed, or forerun their 

years 
Till lost in distance, or with stout hearts make 
A lane for freedom through the level spears. 
Still take thou courage ! God has spoken through 

tliee. 
Irrevocable, the mighty words. Be fi'ee ! 
The land shakes with tliem, and the slave's dull 

ear 
Turns from the rice-swamp stealthily to hear. 
Who would recall them now must first arrest 
The winds that blow down from the free North- 
west, 
Ruffling the Gulf ; or like a scroll roll back 
The Mississippi to its upper springs. 
Such words fulfil their prophecy, and lack 
But the full time to harden into things. 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 



TO THE MEMORY OF FLETCHER 
HARPER. 

No soldier, statesman, hierophant, or king ; 
None of the heroes that you poets sing ; 
A toiler ever since his days began. 
Simple, though shrewd, just-judging, man to 
man ; 



God-fearing, learned in life's hard-taught school ; 
By long obedience lessoned how to rule ; 
Through many an early struggle led to find 
That crown of prosperous fortune, — to be kind. 
Lay on his breast these English daisies sweet ! 
Good rest to the gray head and the tired feet 
That walked this world for seventy steadfast 

years ! 
Bury him with fond blessings and few tears, 
Or only of remembrance, not reg)'et. 
On his full life the eternal seal is set. 
Unbroken till the resurrection day. 
So let his children's children go their way, 
Go and do likewise, leaving 'neath this sod 
An honest man, " the noblest work of God." 

Dinah Maria Mulock Craik. 



THE FIFTIETH BIRTHDAY OF AGASSIZ. 

MAY 28, 1857. 

It was fifty years ago, 

In the pleasant month of May, 

In the beautiful Pays de Vaud, 
A child in its cradle lay. 

And Nature, the old nurse, took 

The child upon her knee, 
Saying, "Here is a story-book 

Thy Father has written for thee." 

" Come, wander with me," she said, 

"Into regions yet untrod. 
And read what is still unread 

In the manuscripts of God." 

And he wandered away and away 
With Nature, the dear old nurse. 

Who sang to him night and day 
The rhymes of the universe. 

And whenever the way seemed long. 

Or his heart began to fail, 
She would sing a more wonderful song, 

Or tell a more marvellous tale. 

So she keeps him still a child. 

And will not let him go, 
Though at times his heart beats wild 

For the beautiful Pays de Vaud ; 

Though at times he hears in his dreams 

The Ranz des Vaches of old, 
And the rush of mountain streams 

From glaciers clear and cold ; 



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And the mother at home saj^s, "Hark ! 

For his voice I listen and yearn : 
It is growing late and dark, 

And my boy does not return ! " 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 



THE PRAYER OF AGASSIZ. 

On the isle of Penikese, 
Einged ahout hy sapphire seas, 
Fanned by breezes salt and cool, 
Stood the Master with his school. 
Over sails that not in vain 
"Wooed the west-wind's steady strain, 
Line of coast that low and far 
Stretched its undulating bar, ♦ 
Wings aslant along the rim 
Of the waves they stooped to skim. 
Rock and isle and glistening bay. 
Fell the beautiful white day. 

Said the Master to the youth : 

" We have come in search of trath, 

Trying with uncertain key 

Door by door of mystery ; 

We are reaching, through His laws. 

To the garment-hem of Cause, 

Him, the endless, xmbegun, 

The Unnameable, the One, 

Light of all our light the Source, 

Life of life, and Force of force. 

As with fingers of the blind, 

We are groping here to find 

What the hieroglyphics mean 

Of the Unseen in the seen. 

What the Thought which underlies 

Nature's masking and disguise. 

What it is that hides beneath 

Blight and bloom and birth and death. 

By past efforts unavailing. 

Doubt and error, loss and failing, 

Of our weakness made aware, 

On the threshold of our task 

Let us light and guidance ask. 

Let us pause in silent prayer ! " 

Then the Master in his place 
Bowed his head a little space. 
And" the leaves by soft airs stirred. 
Lapse of wave and cry of bird. 
Left the solemn hush unbroken 
Of that wordless prayer unspoken, 
While its wish, on earth unsaid. 
Rose to heaven interpreted. 
As in life's best hours we hear 
By the spirit's finer ear 
His low voice within us, thus 



The All-Father heareth us ; 
And his holy ear we pain 
With our noisy words and vain. 
Not for him our violence, 
Storming at the gates of sense, 
His the primal language, his 
The eternal silences ! 
Even the careless heart was moved. 
And the doubting gave assent, 
With a gesture reverent, 
To the Master well-beloved. 
As thin mists are glorified 
By the light they cannot hide, 
All who gazed upoir him saw, 
Through its veil of tender awe, 
How his face was still nplit 
By the old sweet look of it. 
Hopeful, trustful, full of cheer. 
And the love that casts out fear. 
Who the secret may declare 
Of that brief, unuttered prayer ? 
Did the shade before him come 
Of the inevitable doom, 
Of the end of earth so near, 
And Eternity's new year ? 

Li the lap of sheltering seas 
Rests the isle of Penikese ; 
But the lord of the domain 
Comes not to his own again : 
Where the eyes that follow fail, 
On a vaster sea his sail 
Drifts beyond our beck and hail ! 
Other lips within its bound 
Shall the laws of life expound ; . 
Other eyes from rock and shell 
Read the world's old riddles well ; 
But when breezes light and bland 
Blow from Summer's blossomed land, 
W^hen the air is glad with wings, 
And the blithe song-sparrow sings. 
Many an eye with his still face 
Shall the living ones displace. 
Many an ear the word shall seek 
He alone could fitly speak. 
And one name fore verm ore 
Shall be uttered o'er and o'er 
By the waves that kiss the shore, 
By the curlew's whistle, sent 
Down the cool, sea-scented air ; " 
In all voices known to her 
Nature own her worshipper. 
Half in triumph, half lament. 
Thither love shall tearful turn, 
Friendship pause uncovered thei'e, 
And the wisest reverence learn 
From the Master's silent prayer. 

John Greenleaf Whittier 



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TO HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW, 

ON HIS BIRTHDAY, 27TH FEBRUARY. 1867. 

I NEED not praise the sweetness of his song, 
Where limpid verse to limpid verse succeeds 

Smooth as our Charles, when, fearing lest he 
wrong 

The new moon's mirrored skiff, he slides along. 
Full without noise, and whispers in his reeds. 

With loving breath of all the winds his name 

Is blown about the world, but to his friends 
A sweeter secret hides behind his fame, 
And Love steals shyly through the loud acclaim 
To murmur a God Mess you ! and there ends. 

As I muse backward up the checkered years. 

Wherein so much was given, so much was lost, 
Blessings in both kinds, such as cheapen tears — 
But hush ! this is not for profaner ears ; 

Let them drink molten pearls nor dream the 
cost. 

Some suck up poison from a sorrow's core. 
As naught but nightshade grew upon earth's 
ground ; 
Love turned all his to heart's-ease, and the more 
Fate tried his bastions, she but forced a door. 
Leading to sweeter manhood and more sound. 

Even as a wind-waved fountain's swaying shade 
Seems of mixed race, agray wraith shot with sun, 
So through his trial faith translucent rayed. 
Till darkness, half disnatured so, betrayed 
A heart of sunshine that would fain o'errun. 

Surely if skill in song the shears may staj^, 

And of its purpose cheat the charmed abyss. 
If our poor life be lengthened by a lay, 
He shall not go, although his presence may, 
And the next age in praise shall double this. 

Long days be his, and each as lusty-sweet 
As gracious natures iind his song to be ; 
May Age steal on with softly cadenced feet 
Falling in music, as for him were meet 

Whose choicest verse is harsher-toned than he ! 
James Russell Lowell. 



JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE. 

died in new YORK, SEPTEMBER, 182O. 

Green be the turf above thee, 
Friend of my better days ! 

None knew thee but to love thee, 
Nor named thee but to praise. 



Tears fell, when thou wert dying. 

From eyes unused to weep. 
And long, where thou art lying, 

Will tears the cold turf steep. 

When hearts, whose truth was proven, 

Like thine, are laid in earth, 
There should a wreath be woven 

To tell the world their worth ; 

And I, who woke each morrow 

To clasp thy hand in mine. 
Who shared thy joy and sorrow, 

Whose weal and woe were thine. 

It should be mine to braid it 

Around thy faded brow, 
But I 've in vain essayed it, 

And feel I cannot now. 

While memory bids me weep thee. 
Nor thoughts nor worSs are free, 

The grief is fixed too deeply 
That mourns a man like thee. 

Fitz-Greene Halleck. 



FITZ-GREENE HALLECK. 

READ AT THE UNVEILING OF HIS STATUE IN CENTRAL 
' PARK, MAY, 1877. 

Among their graven shapes to whom 

Thy civic wreaths belong, 
city of his love ! make room 

For one whose gift was song. 

Not his the soldier's sword to wield, 

Nor his the helm of state. 
Nor glory of the stricken field, 

Nor triumph of debate. 

In common ways, with common men, 

He served his race and time 
As well as if his clerkly pen 

Had never danced to rhyme. 

If, in the thronged and noisy mart. 

The Muses found their son, 
Could any say his tuneful art 

A duty left undone ? 

He toiled and sang ; and year by year 
Men found their homes more sweet, 

And through a tenderer atmosphere 
Looked down the brick-walled street. 

The Greek's wild onset Wall Street knew. 
The Red King walked Broadway ; 

And Alnwick Castle's roses blew 
From Palisades to Bay. 



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Fair City by the Sea ! upraise 
His veil with reverent hands ; 

And mingle with thy own the praise 
And pride of other lands. 

Let Greece his fiery lyric breathe 

Above her hero-urns ; 
And Scotland, with her holly, wreathe 

The flower he culled for Burns, 

0, stately stand thy palace walls, 

Thy tall ships ride the seas ; 
To-day thy poet's name recalls 

A prouder thought than these. 

Not less thy pulse of trade shall beat, 

Nor less thy tall fleets swim, 
That shaded square and dusty street 

Are classic ground through him. 

Alive, he loved, like all who sing, 

The echoes of his song ; 
Too late the tardy meed we bring. 

The praise delayed so long. 

Too late, alas ! — Of all who knew 

The living man, to-day 
Before his unveiled face, how few 

Make bare their locks of gray ! 

Our lips of praise must soon be dumb. 

Our grateful eyes be dim ; 
0, brothers of the days to come, 

Take tender charge of him ! 

New hands the wires of song may sweep, 

New voices challenge fame ; 
But let no moss of years o'ercreep 

The lines of Halleck's name. 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 



FRAGMENTS. 

Chaucee, 

As that renowmed poet them compyled 
With warlike numbers and heroicke sound, 
Dan Chaucer, well of English undefyled. 
On Fame's eternall beadroll worthie to be fyled. 

Faerie Queene, Book iv. Cant. ii. SPENSER. 



The Eael of Warwick, 

Peace, impudent and shameless Warwick ! 
Proud setter-up and puller-down of kings. 

Kin^ Henry VI., Part III. Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. 



The Duke of Glostee. 

I, that am rudely stamped and want love's 

majesty 
To strut before a wanton ambling nymph ; 
I, that am curtailed of this fair proportion, 
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature, 
Deformed, unfinished, sent before my time 
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up, 
And that so lamely and unfashionable 
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them, — 
Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace. 
Have no delight to pass away the time, 
LTnless to see my shadow in the sun. 

Kin«^ Richard III., Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE. 



Galileo. 
The starry Galileo, with his woes, 

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. 



Sir Philip Sidney, 

The admired mirror, glory of our isle, 

Thou far, far more than mortal man, whose style 

Struck more men dumb to hearken to thy song 

Than Orpheus' harp, or Tully's golden tongue. 

To him, as right, for wit's deep quintessence, 

For honor, valor, virtue, excellence, 

Be all the garlands, crown his tomb with bay. 

Who spake as much as e'er our tongue can say, 

Britannia's Pastorals, Book ii. Song 2. W. BROWNE. 



Edmund Spenser. 

Divinest Spenser, heaven-bred, happy Muse ! 
Would any power into my brain infuse 
Thy worth, or all that poets had before, 
I could not praise till thou deserv'st no more, 

Britannia's Pastorals, Book ii. Song i. W. BROWNE. 

I was promised on a time 
To have reason for my rhyme ; 
From that time unto this season, 
I received nor rhyme nor reason. 

Lines 071 his promised Pension. SPENSER. 



Christopher Marlowe, 

For that fine madness still he did retain. 
Which rightly should possess a poet's brain. 

To Henry Reynolds : 0/ Poets and Poesy. M. DRAYTON. 



Lord Bacon, 

If parts allure thee, think how Bacon shined, 
The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind ! 

Essay on Man, Epistle IV. POPE. 



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Ben Jonson. 



rare Ben Jonson ! 

Epitaph, 



Sir J. YOUNG. 



What things have we seen 
Done at the Mermaid ! heard words that have 

been 
So nimble, and so full of subtle flame, 
As if that every one from whence they came 
Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest, 
And had resolved to live a fool the rest 
Of his dull life : then when there hath been 

thrown 
Wit able enough to justify the town 
For three days past ; wit that might warrant be 
For the whole city to talk foolishly 
Till that were cancelled; and when that was gone, 
We left an air behind us, which alone 
Was able to make the two next companies 
(Right witty, though but downright fools) more 

wise. 

Letter to Ben yonson. F. BEAUMONT. 



William Shakespeare. 

Far from the sun and summer gale. 
In thy green lap was Nature's darling laid. 
What time, where lucid Avon strayed, 

To him the mighty mother did unveil 
Her awful face : the dauntless child 
Stretched forth his little arms and smiled. 
"This pencil take," she said, " whose colors clear 
Richly paint the vernal year : 
Thine too these golden keys, immortal boy ! 
This can unlock the gates of joy ; 
Of horror that, and thrilling fears. 
Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic tears." 

Progress of Poesy. T. CRAY. 

Renowned Spenser, lie a thought more nigh 
To learned Chaucer, and rare Beaumont lie 
A little nearer Spenser, to make room 
For Shakespeare in your threefold, fourfold tomb. 

On Shakespeare. W. BASSE. 



Abraham Cowley. 

Old mother-wit and nature gave 

Shakespeare and Fletcher all they have ; 

In Spenser and in Jonson art 

Of slower nature got the start ; 

But both in him so equal are. 

None knows which bears the happiest share ; 

To him no author was unknown. 

Yet what he wrote was all his qwn. 

Elegy on Cowley. SIR J. Denham. 



Earl of Marlborough. 

[Lord-President of the Council to King James I. Parliament was 
dissolved March lo, and he died March 14, 1628.] 

Till the sad breaking of that Parliament 

Broke him. . . . 
Killed with report that old man eloquent. 

To the Lady Margaret Ley. MiLTON. 



John Wickliffe. 

As thou these ashes, little Brook ! wilt bear 
Into the Avon, Avon to the tide 
Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas. 
Into main ocean they, this deed accursed 
An emblem yields to friends and enemies. 
How the bold Teacher's doctrine, sanctified 
By truth, shall spread, throughout the world 
dispersed. 

Eccles. Sonnets, Part II. xvii. : To IVickliffe. WORDSWORTH. 
[Bartlett quotes, in this connection, the following:] 

" Some prophet of that day said : 
' The Avon to the Severn runs. 

The Severn to the sea ; 
And Wickliffe's dust shall spread abroad, 
Wide as the waters be.' " 

From Address before the " Sons of New Hampshire " (1849). 

DANIEL WEBSTER. 



John Milton. 

Nor second he, that rode sublime 
Upon the seraph-wings of ecstasy, 
The secrets of the abyss to spy. 

He passed the flaming bounds of place and time : 
The living throne, the sapphire blaze, 
Where angels tremble while they gaze. 
He saw ; but, blasted with excess of light. 
Closed his eyes in endless night. 

Progress of Poesy. T. GRAY. 



Oliver Cromwell. 

How shall I then begin, or whej-e conclude. 
To draw a fame so truly circular ? 

For in a round what order can be showed. 
Where all the parts so equal perfect are ? 

His grandeur he derived from Heaven alone ; 

For he was great, ere fortune made him so : 
And wars, like mists that rise against the sun. 

Made him but greater seem, not greater grow. 

Oliver Cromwell. J. DrydeN. 

Or, ravished with the whistling of a nnme. 
See Cromwell, damned to everlasting fame ! 

Essay on Man, Epistle IK POPE. 



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King Charles II. 

Here lies our sovereign lord the king, 

Whose word no man relies on ; 
He never says a foolish thing, 

Nor ever does a wise one. 

Written on the Bedchamber Door of Charles II. 

EARL OF ROCHESTER. 



James Thomson. 

A bard here dwelt, more fat than bard beseems 
Who, void of envy, guile, and lust of gain. 
On virtue still, and nature's pleasing themes, 
Poured forth his unpremeditated strain : 
The world forsaking with a calm disdain, 
Here laughed he careless in his easy seat ; 
Here quaffed, encircled with the joyous train, 
Oft moralizing sage : his ditty sweet 
He loathed much to write, ne cared to repeat. 

Stajiza introduced into Thojnson^s " Castle of I}idole}ice" Cant, i. 
Lord Lyttelton. 

In yonder grave a Druid lies. 

Where slowly winds the stealing wave ; 
The year's best sweets shall duteous rise 

To deck its poet's sylvan grave. 

And see, the fairy valleys fade ; 

Dun night has veiled the solemn view ! 
Yet once again, dear parted shade, 

Meek Nature's child, again adieu ! 

Ode on the Death of Thomson. W. COLLINS. 



William Hogarth. 

The hand of him here torpid lies 

That drew the essential form of grace ; 

Here closed in death the attentive eyes 
That saw the manners in the face. 

Epitaph. DR. S. JOHNSON. 



William Wordsworth. 

Thine is a strain to read among the hills, 
The old and full of voices ; — by the source 

Of some free stream, whose gladdening presence 
fills 
The solitude with sound ; for in its course 

Even such is thy deep song, that seems a part 

Of those high scenes, a foimtain from their heart. 

Wordsworth. F. D. Hemans. 



Richard Brinsley Sheridan. 

Whose humor, as gay as the firefly's light, 

Played round every subject, and shone as it 
played ; — 

Whose wit, in the combat, as gentle as bright, 
Ne'er carried a heart-stain away on its blade ; — 



Whose eloquence — brightening whatever it 
tried. 

Whether reason or fancy, the gay or the grave — 
Was as rapid, as deep, and as brilliant a tide. 

As ever bore freedom aloft on its wave ! 

Lines on the Death of Sheridan. T. MOORE, 

Ye men of wit and social eloquence ! 
He was your brother, — bear his ashes hence ! 
While powers of mind almost of boundless range, 
Complete in kind, as various in their change, — 
While eloquence, wit, poesy, and mirth, 
That humbler harmonist of care on earth, 
Survive within our souls, — while lives our sense 
Of pride in merit's proud pre-eminence, 
Long shall we seek his likeness, — long in vain. 
And turn to all of him which may remain. 
Sighing that Nature formed but one such man, 
And broke the die — in moulding Sheridan ! 

Monody on the Death of Sheridan. BYRON'. 



Amos Cottle. 

Oh ! Amos Cottle ! * — PhcEbus ! what a name 
To fill the speaking trump of future fame ! — 
Oh ! Amos Cottle ! for a moment think 
What meagre profits spring from pen and ink ! 

Ejiglish Bards and Scotch Reviewers, BYRON. 



The Duke of Wellington. 

good gray head which all men knew, 

voice from which their omens all men drew, 

iron nerve to true occasion true, 

fallen at length that tower of strength 

Which stood four-square to all the winds that 

blew ! 
Such was he whom we deplore. 
The long self-sacrifice of life is o'er. 
The great World-victor's victor will be seen no 

more. 

On the Death of the Duke of Wellington. TENNYSON. 



Nathaniel Hawthorne. 

There in seclusion and remote from men 

The wizard hand lies cold. 
Which at its topmost speed let fall the pen, 

And left the tale half told. 

Ah ! who shall lift that wand of magic power. 

And the lost clew regain ? 
The unfinished window in Aladdin's tower 

Unfinished must remain ! 

Hawthorne, May 23, 1864. LONGFELLOW. 

* " Mr. Cottle, Amos or Joseph, I don't know which, but one or 
both, once sellers of books they did not write, but now writers of 
books that do not sell, have published a pair of epics." — THE 
Author. 



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KING JOHN AND THE ABBOT OF 
CANTERBURY. 

FROM " PERCY'S RELIQUES." 

An ancient story I '11 tell you anon 
Of a notable prince that was called King John ; 
And he ruled England with main and with might, 
For he did great wrong, and maintained little 
right. 

And 1 '11 tell you a story, a story so merry, 
Concerning the Abbot of Canterbury ; 
How for his house-keeping and high renown, 
They rode poste for him to fair London towne. 

An hundred men the king did heare say. 
The abbot kept in his house every day ; 
And fifty golde chaynes without any doubt. 
In velvet coates waited the abbot about. 

" How now, father abbot, I heare it of thee, 
Thou keepest a farre better house than niee ; 
And for thy house-keeping and high renowne, 
I feare thou work'st treason against my crown." 

"My liege," quo' the abbot, "I would it were 

knowne 
I never spend nothing, but what is my owne ; 
And I trust your grace will doe me no deere, 
For spending of my owne true-gotten geere." 

"Yes, yes, father abbot, thy fault it is highe, 
And now for the same thou needest must dye ; 
For except thou canst answer me questions three, 
Thy head shall be smitten from thy bodie. 

" And first," quo' the king, " when I 'm in this 

stead. 
With my crowne of golde so faire on my head. 
Among all my liege-men so noble of birthe. 
Thou must tell me to one penny what I am 

worthe. 

" Secondly, tell me, without any doubt, 
How soone I may ride the whole world about ; 
And at the third question thou must not shrink. 
But tell me here truly what I do think." 



" these are hard questions for my shallow witt. 
Nor I cannot answer your grace as yet : 
But if you will give me but three weeks' space. 
He do my endeavor to answer your grace." 

"Now three weeks' space to thee will I give, 
And that is the longest time thou hast to live ; 
For if thou dost not answer my questions three, 
Thy lands and thy livings are forfeit to mee." 

Away rode the abbot all sad at that word, 
And he rode to Cambridge, and Oxenford ; 
But never a doctor there was so wise. 
That could M'ith his learning an answer devise. 

Then home rode the abbot of comfort so cold. 

And he met his shepheard a-going to fold : 

" How now, my lord abbot, you are welcome 

home ; 
What newes do you bring us from good King 

John ? " 

" Sad news, sad news, shepheard, I must give, 
That I have but three days more to live ; 
For if I do not answer him questions three, 
My head will be smitten from my bodie. 

" The first is to tell him, there in that stead, 
With his crowne of golde so fair on his head, 
Among all his liege-men so noble of birth. 
To within one penny of what he is worth. 

" The seconde, to tell him without any doubt. 
How soone he may ride this whole world about ; 
And at the third question I must not shrinke, 
But tell him there truly what he does thinke." 

" Now cheare up, sire abbot, did you never hear 

yet, 

That a fool he may learne a wise man witt ? 
Lend me horse, and serving-men, and your ap- 
parel. 
And He ride to London to answere your quarrel. 



" Nay, frowne not, if it hath bin told unto me, 
I am like your lordship, as ever may be ; 



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And if you will but lend me your gowne, 
There is none shall know us at fair London towne." 

' ' Now horses and serving-men thou slialt have, 
With sumptuous array most gallant and brave, 
With crozier, and mitre, and rochet, and cope, 
Fit to appear 'fore our fader the pope. " 

"Now welcome, sire abbot," the king he did say, 
" 'T is well thou 'rt come back to keepe thy day : 
For and if thou canst answer my questions three. 
Thy life and thy living both saved shall be. 

"And first, when thou seest me here in this stead. 
With my crowne of golde so fair on my head, 
Among all my liege-men so noble of birthe. 
Tell me to one penny what I am worth." 

" For thirty pence our Saviour was sold 
Among the false Jewes, as I have bin told, 
And twenty-nine is the worth of thee, 
For I thinke thou art one penny worser than he." 

The king he laughed, and swore by St. Bittel, 
" I did not think I had been worth so littel ! 

— Now secondly tell me, without any doubt, 
How soone I may ride this whole world about." 

" You must rise with the sun, and ride with the 

same 
Until the next morning he riseth againe ; 
And then your grace need not make any doubt 
But in twenty-four hours you '11 ride it about." 

The king he laughed, and swore by St. Jone, 
" I did not think it could be gone so soone ! 

— Now from the third question thou must not 

shrinke. 
But tell me here truly what I do thinke." 

"Yea, that shall I do, and make your grace 

merry ; 
You thinke I 'm the Abbot of Canterbury ; 
But I 'm his poor shepheard, as plain you may 

see. 
That am come to beg pardon for him and forme." 

The king he laughed, and swore by the Masse, 
"He make thee lord abbot this day in his place ! " 
" Now naye, my liege, be not in such speede, 
For alacke I can neither write ne reade." 

" Four nobles a week then I will give thee. 
For this merry jest thou hast showne unto me ; 
And tell the old abbot when thou comest home, 
Thou hast brought him a pardon from good King 

John. " 

Anonymous. 



JOHN BAKLEYCOEN.* 

There was three kings into the East, 
Three kings both great and high. 

And they hae sworn a solemn oath 
John Barleycorn should die. 

They took a plough and ploughed him down. 

Put clods upon his head. 
And they hae sworn a solemn oath, 

John Barleycorn was dead. 

But the cheerful spring came kindly on, 

And showers began to fall ; 
John Barleycorn got up again, 

And sore surprised them all. 

The sultry suns of summer came, 

And he grew thick and strong. 
His head well armed wi' pointed spears. 

That no one should him wrong. 

The sober autumn entered mild. 

When he grew wan and pale ; 
His bending joints and drooping head 

Showed he began to fail. 

His color sickened more and more, 

He faded into age ; 
And then his enemies began 

To show their deadly rage. 

They 've ta'en a weapon long and sharp. 

And cut him by the knee ; 
And tied him fast upon the cart, 

Like a rogue for forgerie. 

They laid him down upon his back, 

And cudgelled him full sore ; 
They hung him up before the storm, 

And turned him o'er and o'er. 

They filled up a darksome pit 

AVith water to the brim. 
They heaved in John Barleycorn, 

There let him sink or swim. 

They laid him out upon the floor. 

To work him further woe. 
And still, as signs of life appeared, 

They tossed him to and fro. 

They wasted, o'er a scorching flame, 

The marrow of his bones ; 
But a miller used him worst of all. 

For he crushed him between two stones. 

* An improvement on a very old ballad found in a black-letter 
volume in the Pepys library, Cambridge University. 



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And they hae ta'cn liis very heart's blood, 
And drank it round and round ; 

And still the more and more they drank, 
Their joy did more abound. 

John Barleycorn was a hero bold, 

Of noble enterprise ; 
For if you do but taste his blood, 

'T will make your courage rise. 

Then let us toast John Barleycorn, 

Each man a glass in hand ; 
And may his great posterity 

Ne'er fail in old Scotland ! 

ROBERT BURNS. 



OF A CERTAINE MAN. 



certaine 



There was (not certaine when) 

preacher, 

That never learned, and yet became a teacher, 

Who having read in Latine thus a text 

Of evat quidmii homo, much perplext, 

He seemed the same with studie great to scan, 

In English thus, There was a certaine man. 

But now (quoth lie), good people, note you this. 

He saitli there was, he doth not say there is ; 

For in these dales of ours it is most plaine 

Of promise, oath, word, deed, no man 's certaine ; 

Yet by my text you see it comes to passe 

That surely once a certaine man there was : 

But yet, I think, in all your Bible no man 

Can finde this text. There was a certaine 

woman. 

Sir. John Harrington. 



LOGIC OF HUDIBRAS. 

FROM " HUDIBRAS," PART I. CANTO I. 

He was in logic a great critic. 
Profoundly skilled in analytic ; 
He could distinguish and divide 
A hair, 'twixt south and southwest side ; 
On either which he would dispute, 
Confute, change hands, and still confute ; 
He 'd undertake to prove, by force 
Of argument, a man 's no horse ; 
He 'd prove a buzzard is no fowl. 
And that a lord may be an owl, 
A calf an alderman, a goose a justice, 
And rooks committee-men and trustees. 
He 'd run in debt by disputation. 
And pay with ratiocination : 
All this by syllogism true. 
In mood and figure he would do, 

DR. Samuel Butler. 



THE VICAR OF BRAY. 

["The Vicar of Bray in Berlcshire, England, was Simon Alleyn, 
or Allen, and held his place from 1540 to 1588. He was a Papist 
under the reign of Henry the Eighth, and a Protestant under Ed- 
ward the Sixth. He was a Papist again under Mary, and once more 
became a Protestant in the reign of Elizabeth. When this scandal 
to the gown was reproached for his versatility of religious creeds, 
and taxed for being a turn-coat and an inconstant changeling, as 
Fuller expresses it, he replied : ' Not so neither ; for if I changed 
my religion, I am sure I kept true to my principle, which is to live 
and die the Vicar of Bray.' " — DlSRAELi.J 

In good King Charles's golden days, 

When loyalty no harm meant, 
A zealous high-churchman was I, 

And so I got preferment. 
To teach my flock I never missed : 

Kings were by God appointed. 

And lost are those tliat dare resist 

Or touch the Lord's anointed. 

And this is laiv that I'll maintain 

Until my dying day, sir. 
That whatsoever king shall reign. 
Still I'll be the Vicar of Bray, sir. 

When royal James possessed the crown, 

And popery came in fashion. 
The penal laws I hooted down, 

And read the Declaration ; 
The Church of Rome I found would fit 

Full well my constitution ; 
And I had been a Jesuit 

But for the Revolution. 
And this is laio, etc 

When William was our king declared, 

To ease the nation's grievance ; 
With this new wind about I steered, 

And swore to him allegiance ; 
Olil principles I did revoke, 

Set conscience at a distance ; 
Passive obedience was a joke, 

A jest was non-resistance. 
And this is law, etc. 

When royal Anne became our queen. 

The Church of England's glory. 
Another face of things was seen, 

And I became a Tory ; 
Occasional conformists base, 

I blamed their moderation ; 
And thought the Church in danger was, 

By such prevarication. 
And this is law, etc. 

When George in pudding-time came o'er, 
And moderate men looked big, sir. 

My principles I changed once more. 
And so became a Whisr, sir ; 



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And thus preferment I procured 
From our new faith's-defender, 

And almost every day abjured 
The Pope and the Pretender. 
And this is law, etc. 

The illustrious house of Hanover, 

And Protestant succession, 
To these I do allegiance swear — 

While they can keep possession : 
For in my faith and loyalty 

I nevermore will falter, 
And George my lawful king shall be- 

Until the times do alter. 
And this is law, etc. 



Anonymous. 



GOOD ALE. 

I CANNOT eat but little meat, — 

My stomach is not good ; 
But, sure, I think that I can drink 

"With him that wears a hood. 
Though I go bare, take ye no care ; 

I nothing am a-cold, — 

I stuff my skin so full within 

Of jolly good ale and old. 

Back and side go bare, go bare ; 

Both foot and hand go cold ; 
But, belly, God send thee good ale enoicgh. 
Whether it be neiv or old ! 

I love no roast but a nut-brown toast, 

And a crab laid in the fire ; 
A little bread shall do me stead, — 

Much bread I not desire. 
No frost, nor snow, nor wind, I trow. 

Can hm-t me if I wold, — 
I am so wrapt, and thorowly lapt 

Of jolly good ale and old. 
Back and side, etc. 

And Tyb, my wife, that as her life 

Loveth well good ale to seek. 
Full oft drinks she, till you may see 

The tears run down her cheek ; 
Then doth she trowl to me the bowl. 

Even as a malt-worm should ; 
And saith, "Sweetheart, I took my part 

Of this jolly good ale and old." 
Back and side, etc. 

Now let them drink till they nod and wink, 

Even as good fellows should do ; 
They shall not miss to have the bliss 

Good ale doth bring men to ; 



And all poor souls that have scoured bowls. 

Or have them lustily trowled, 
God save the lives of them and their wives. 

Whether they be young or old ! 

. Back and side, etc. 

JOHN Still. 
• 

GLUGGITY GLUG. 

FROM " THE MYRTLE AND THE VINE." 

A JOLLY fat friar loved liquor good store. 

And he had drunk stoutly at supper ; 
He mounted his horse in the night at the door, 

And sat with his face to the crupper : 
"Some rogue," qiioth the friar, " quite dead to 
remorse, 
Some thief, whom a halter will throttle. 
Some scoundrel has cut off the head of my horse. 
While I was engaged at the bottle, 

Which went gluggity, gluggity — glug 
— glug — glug." 

The tail of the steed pointed south on the dale, 

'T was the friar's road home, straight and level; 
But, when spurred, a horse follows his nose, not 
his tail, 
So he scampered due north, like a devil : 
" This new mode of docking," the friar then said, 

" I perceive does n't make a horse trot ill ; 
And 't is cheap, — for he never can eat off his head 
While I am engaged at the bottle. 

Which goes gluggity, gluggity — glug 
glug." 



The steed made a stop, — in a pond he had got, 

He was rather for drinking than grazing ; 
Quoth the friar, "'Tis strange headless horses 
should trot, 
But to drink with their tails is amazing ! " 
Turning round to see whence this phenomenon 
rose. 
In the pond fell this son of a pottle ; 
Quoth he, ' ' The head 's found, for I 'm under 
his nose, — 
I wish I were over a bottle, 

Which goes gluggity, gluggity — glug 
—glug — glug!" 

George Colman, the Younger. 



THE VIRTUOSO.* 

"Videmus 
Nugarisolitos."— PERSIUS. 

Whilom by silver Thames's gentle stream. 
In London town there dwelt a subtle wight, — 

A wight of mickle wealth, and mickle fame. 
Book-learned and quaint : a Virtuoso hight. 



In imitation of Spenser's style and stanza. 



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Uncommon things, and rare, were Ms delight ; 
From musings deep his brain ne'er gotten 
ease, 

ISTor ceased he from study, day or night, 
Until (advancing onward by degi-ees) 
He knew whatever breeds on earth or air or 



He many a creature did anatomize. 

Almost unpeopling water, air, and land ; 

Beasts, fishes, birds, snails, caterpillars, flies, 
Were laid full low by his relentless hand. 

That oft with gory crimson was distained ; 
He many a dog destroyed, and many a cat ; 

Of fleas his bed, of frogs the marshes drained. 
Could tellen if a mite were lean or fat. 
And read a lecture o'er the entrails of a 
gnat. 

He knew the various modes of ancient times. 

Their arts and fashions of each different guise, 
Their weddings, funerals, punishments for 
crimes. 
Their strength, their learning eke, and rarities ; 
Of old habiliments, each sort and size, 

Male, female, high and low, to him were known ; 
Each gladiator dress, and stage disguise ; 

With learned, clerkly phrase he could have 
shown 
How the Greek tunic differed from the Eoman 
gown. 

A curious medallist, I wot, he was. 
And boasted many a course of ancient coin ; 

Well as his wife's he knewen every face. 
From Julius Caesar down to Constantine : 

For some rare sculpture he would oft ypine, 
(As green-sick damosels for husbands do ;) 

And when obtained, with enraptured eyne, 
He 'd run it o'er and o'er with greedy view, 
And look, and look again, as he would look it 
through. 

His rich museum, of dimensions fair. 

With goods that spoke the owner's mind was 
fraught : 

Things ancient, curious, value-worth, and rare. 
From sea and land, from Greece and Rome, 
were brought, 

Which he with mighty sums of gold had bought : 
On these all tides with joyous eyes he pored ; 

And, sooth to say, himself he greater thought. 
When he beheld his cabinets thus stored, 
Than if he'd been of Albion's wealthy cities lord. 

Mark Akenside, 



THE SPLENDID SHILLING.* 

" Sing, heavenly Muse. 
Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme ; " 
A shilling, breeches, and chimeras dire. 

Happy the man, who, void of cares and strife. 
In silken or in leathern purse retains 
A Splendid Shilling : he nor hears with pain 
New oysters cried, nor sighs for cheerful ale ; 
But with his friends, when nightly mists arise, 
To Juniper's Magpie, or Town Hall repairs ; 
Where, mindful of the nymph, whose wanton eye 
Transfixed his soul, and kindled amorous flames, 
Chloe or Phyllis, he each circling glass ' 
Wisheth her health and joy and equal love. 
Meanwhile he smokes, and laughs at merry tale, 
Or pun ambiguous or conundrum quaint. 
But I, whom griping penury surrounds, 
And hunger, sure attendant upon want, 
With scanty offals, and small acid tiff 
(Wretched repast !) my meagre corpse sustain : 
Then solitary walk, or doze at home 
In garret vile, and with a warming puff 
Regale chilled fingers ; or from tube as black 
As winter-chimney or well-polished jet. 
Exhale mundungus, ill-perfuming scent. 
Not blacker tube, nor of a shorter size, 
Smokes Cambro- Briton (versed in pedigree. 
Sprung from Cadwallador and Arthur, kings 
Full famous in romantic tale) when he 
O'er many a craggy hill and barren cliff, 
Upon a cargo of famed Cestrian cheese. 
High overshadowing rides, with a design 
To wend his wares at the Arvonian mart. 
Or Maridunum, or the ancient town 
Ycleped Brechinia, or where Vaga's stream 
Encircles Ariconium, fruitful soil ! 
Whence flow nectareous wines, that well may vie 
With Massic, Setin, or renowned Falern. 

Thus, while my joyless minutes tedious flow. 
With looks demure, and silent pace, a Dun, 
Horrible monster ! hated by gods and men. 
To my aerial citadel ascends. f 
With vocal heel thrice thundering at my gate. 
With hideous accent thrice he calls ; I know 
The voice ill-boding, and the solemn sound. 
What should I do ? or whither turn ? Amazed, 
Confounded, to the dark recess I fly 
Of wood-hole ; straight my bristling hairs erect 
Through sudden fear ; a chilly sweat bedews 
My shuddering limbs, and (wonderful to tell !) 
My tongue forgets her faculty of speech ; 
So horrible he seems ! His faded brow 
Intrenched with many a frown, and conic beard. 
And spreading band, admired by modern saints. 
Disastrous acts forebode j in his i-ight hand 

* A burlesque imitation of Milton's style. 
+ To wit, his garret. 



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Long scrolls of paper solemnly lie waves, 
With characters and figures dire inscribed, 
Grievous to mortal eyes, (ye gods, avert 
Such plagues from righteous men !) Behind him 

stalks 
Another monster, not unlike itself, 
Sullen of aspect, by the vulgar called 
A Catchpole, whose polluted hands the gods 
With force incredible, and magic charms. 
First have endued : if he his ample palm 
Should haply on ill-fated shoulder lay 
Of debtor, straight his body to the touch 
Obsequious (as whilom knights were wont) 
To some enchanted castle is conveyed, 
Where gates impregnable, and coercive chains, 
In durance strict detain him, till, in form 
Of money, Pallas sets the captive free. 

Beware, ye debtors ! when ye walk, beware. 
Be circumspect ; oft with insidious ken 
The caitiff eyes your steps aloof, and oft 
Lies perdue in a nook or gloomy cave. 
Prompt to enchant some inadvertent wretch 
With his unhallowed touch. So (poets sing) 
Grimalkin to domestic vermin sworn 
An everlasting foe, with watchful eye 
Lies nightly brooding o'er a chinky gap. 
Portending her fell claws, to thoughtless mice 
Sure ruin. So her disembowelled web 
Arachne, in a hall or kitchen, spreads 
Obvious to vagrant flies : she secret stands 
Within her woven cell ; the humming pi'ey, 
Regardless of their fate, rush on the toils 
Inextricable, nor will aught avail 
Their arts, or arms, or shapes of lovely hue. 
The wasp insidious, and the buzzing drone. 
And butterfly proud of expanded wings 
Distinct with gold, entangled in her snares, 
Useless resistance make ; with eager strides. 
She towering flies to her expected spoils : 
Then with envenomed jaws the vital blood 
Drinks of reluctant foes, and to her cave 
Their bulky carcasses triumphant drags. 

So pass my days. But ■when nocturnal shades 
This world envelop, and the inclement air 
Persuades men to repel benumbing frosts 
With pleasant wines and crackling blaze of wood. 
Me, lonely sitting, nor the glimmering light 
Of make-weight candle, nor the joyous talk 
Of loving friend, delights ; distressed, forlorn, 
Amidst the horrors of the tedious night, 
Darkling I sigh, and feed with dismal thoughts 
My anxious mind ; or sometimes mournful verse 
Indite, and sing of groves and myrtle shades, 
Or desperate lady near a purling stream. 
Or lover pendent on a willow-tree. 
Meanwhile I labor with eternal drought. 
And restless wish, and rave ; my parched throat 



Finds no relief, nor heavy eyes repose : 
But if a slumber haplj'- does invade 
My weary limbs, my fancy, still awake. 
Thoughtful of drink, and eager, in a dream. 
Tipples imaginary pots of ale ; 
In vain ; — awake I find the settled thirst 
Still gnawing, and the pleasant phantom curse. 
Thus do I live, from pleasure quite debarred, 
Nor taste the fruits that the sun's genial rays 
Mature, john-apple, nor the downy peach, 
Nor walnut in rough-furrowed coat secure, 
Nor medlar fruit delicious in decay ; 
Afflictions great ! yet greater still remain. 
My galligaskins, that have long withstood 
The winter's fury and encroaching frosts, 
By time subdued, (what will not time subdua I) 
An horrid chasm disclose with orifice 
Wide, discontinuous ; at which the winds 
Eurus and Auster and the di-eadful force 
Of Boreas, that congeals the Cronian waves, 
Tumultuous enter with dire chilling blasts, 
Portending agues. Thus a well-fraught ship, 
Long sails secure, or through the Mgean deep, 
Or the Ionian, till cruising near 
The Lilybean shore, with hideous crush 
On Scylla or Charybdis (dangerous rocks) 
She strikes rebounding ; whence the shattered 

oak. 
So fierce a shock unable to withstand, 
Admits the sea. In at the gaping side 
The crowding waves gush with impetuous rage. 
Resistless, overwhelming ; horrors seize 
The mariners ; Death in their eyes appears. 
They stare, they lave, they pump, they swear, 

they pray : 
(Vain eff"orts!) still the battering waves rush in, 
Implacable, till, deluged bj' the foam, 
The ship sinks foundering in the vast abyss. 

John Philips. 



ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A MAD DOG. 

Good people all, of every sort. 

Give ear unto my song ; 
And if you find it wondrous short, 

It cannot hold you long. 

In Islington there was a man 
Of whom the world might say. 

That still a godly race he ran — 
Whene'er he went to pray. 

•A kind and gentle heart he had, 

To comfort friends and foes : 
The naked every day he clad — 

When he put on his clothes. 



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And in that town a dog was found, 

As many dogs there be, 
Both mongrel, pnppj', whelp, and hound, 

And curs of low degree. 

This dog and man at iirst were friends ; 

But when a pique began, 
The dog, to gain his private ends, 

Went mad, and bit the man. 

Around from all the neighboring streets 

The wondering neighbors ran. 
And swore the dog had lost his wits, 

To bite so good a man ! 

The wound it seemed both sore and sad 

To every Christian eye : 
And while they swore the dog was mad, 

They swore the man would die. 

But soon a wonder came to light, 

That showed the rogues they lied : — 

The man recovered of the bite, 
The dog it was that died ! 

OLIVER GOLDSMITH. 



ELEGY ON MADAM BLAIZE. 

Good people all, with one accord, 

Lament for Madam Blaize ; 
Who never wanted a good word — 

From those who spoke her praise. 

The needy seldom passed her door, 
And always found her kind ; 

She freely lent to all the poor — 
Who left a pledge behind. 

She strove the neighboi'hood to please, 
With manner wondrous winning ; 

She never followed wicked ways — 
Unless when she was sinning. 

At church, in silk and satins new, 
With hoop of monstrous size. 

She never slumbered in her pew — 
But when she shut her eyes. 

Her love was sought, I do aver. 

By twenty beaux, or more ; 
The king himself has followed her — 

When she has walked before. 

But now, her wealth and finery fled. 
Her hangers-on cut short all, 

Her doctors foiind, when she was dead- 
Her last disorder mortal. 



Let us lament, in sorrow sore ; 

For Kent Street well may say, 
That, had she lived a twelvemonth more — 

She had not died to-day. 



OLIVER GOLDSMITH. 



THE DEVIL'S WALK. 

From his brimstone bed at break of day 

A walking the Devil has gone. 
To look at his little, snug farm of the world, 

And see how his stock went on. 

Over the hill and over the dale. 

And he went over the plain. 
And backwai'd and forward he swished his tail, 

As a gentleman swishes a cane. 

How then was the Devil dressed ? 

0, he was in his Sunday's best ; 
His coat was red, and his breeches were blue, 
And there was a hole where his tail came through. 

A lady drove by in her pride. 

In whose face an expression he spied. 

For which he could have kissed her ; 
Such a flourishing, fine, clever creature was she, 
With an eye as wicked as wicked can be : 
" I should take her for my aunt," thought he ; 

" If my dam had had a sister." 

He met a lord of high degree, — 
No matter what was his name, — 
Whose face with his own when he came to com- 
pare 
The expression, the look, and the air, 
And the character too, as it seemed to a hair, — 
Such a twin-likeness there was in the pair, 
That it made the Devil start and stare ; 
For he thought there was surely a looking-glass 
there 
But he could not see the frame. 

He saw a lawyer killing a viper 

On a dunghill beside his stable ; 
" Ho ! " quoth he, " thou put'st me in mind 

Of the story of Cain and Abel." 

An apothecary on a white horse 

Rode by on his vocation ; 
And the Devil thought of his old friend 

Death in the Revelation. 

He passed a cottage with a double coach-house, 

A cottage of gentility ; 
And he owned with a grin 
That his favorite sin 

Is pride that apes humility. 



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He saw a pig rapidly 

Down a river float ; 
The pig swam well, but every stroke 

Was cutting his own throat ; 

And Satan gave thereat his tail 

A twirl of admiration ; 
For he thought of his daughter War 

And her suckling babe Taxation. 

Well enough, in sooth, he liked that truth, 
And nothing the worse for the jest ; 

But this was only a first thought ; 
And in this he did not rest : 

Another came presently into his head ; 

And here it proved, as has often been said, 
That second thoughts are best. 

For as piggy plied, with wind and tide. 

His way with such celerity, 
And at every stroke the water dyed 
With his own red blood, the Devil cried, 
" Behold a swinish nation's pride 

In cotton-spun prosperity ! " 

He walked into London leisurely ; 

The streets were dirty and dim ; 
But there he saw Brothers the prophet. 

And Brothers the prophet saw him.* 

He entered a thriving bookseller's shop ; 

Quoth he, " We are both of one college, 
For I myself sate like a cormorant once 

Upon the tree of knowledge." 

As he passed through Cold-Bath Fields, he looked 

At a solitary cell ; 
And he was well pleased, for it gave him a hint 

For improving the prisons of hell. 

He saw a turnkey tie a thief s hands 

With a cordial tug and jerk ; 
" Nimbly," quoth he, "a man's fingers move 

When his heart is in his work." 

He saw the same turnkey unfettering a man 

With little expedition ; 
And he chuckled to think of his dear slave-trade, 
And the long debates and delays that were made 

Concerning its abolition. 

At this good news, so great 
The Devil's pleasure grew. 
That with a joyful swish he rent 

The hole where his tail came through. 



* " After this I was in a vision, having the angel of God near me, 
and saw Satan walking leisurely into London." — BROTHERS* 
Prophecies, Part I. p. 41. 



His countenance fell for a moment 

When he felt the stitches go ; 
"Ah ! " thought he, " there 's a job now 

That I 've made for my tailor below." 

" Great news ! bloody news ! " cried a newsman ; 

The Devil said, "Stop, let me see ! 
Great news ? bloody news ? " thought the Devil, 

"The bloodier the better for me." 

So he bought the newspaper, and no news 

At all for his money he had. 
"Lying varlet," thought he, "thus to take in 
Old Nick ! 

But it 's some satisfaction, my lad, 
To know thou art paid beforehand for the trick. 

For the sixpence I gave thee is bad." 

And then it came into his head. 

By oracular inspiration. 
That what he had seen and what he had said. 

In the course of this visitation. 
Would be published in the Morning Post 

For all this reading nation. 

Therewith in second-sight he saw 
The place and the manner and time, 

In which this mortal story 

Would be put in immortal rhyme. 

That it would happen when two poets 

Should on a time be met 
In the town of Nether Stowey, 

In the shire of Somerset. 

There, while the one was shaving, 

Would he the song begin ; 
And the other, when he heard it at breakfast, 

In ready accord join in. 

So each would help the other, 
Two heads being better than one ; 

And the phrase and conceit 

Would in unison meet. 
And so with glee the verse flow free 

In ding-dong chime of sing-song rhyme, 

Till the whole were merrily done. 

And because it w^as set to the razor, 

Not to the lute or harp. 
Therefore it was that the fancy 
Should be bright, and the wit be sharp. 

" But then," said Satan to himself, 

' ' As for that said beginner. 
Against my infernal Majesty 

There is no gi'eater sinner. 



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" He hath put me in ugly ballads 
With libellous pictures for sale ; 

He hath scoffed at my hoofs and my horns, 
And has made very free with my tail. 

" But this Mister Poet shall find 
I am not a safe subject for whim ; 

For I '11 set up a school of my own, 
And my poets shall set upon him." 

As he went along the Strand 

Between three in the morning and four. 
He observed a queer-looking person * 

Who staggered from Perry's door. 

And he thought that all the world over 
In vain for a man you might seek. 

Who could drink more like a Trojan, 
Or talk more like a Greek. 



The Devil then he prophesied 
It would one day be matter of talk, 
That with wine when smitten, 
And with wit moreover being happily bitten. 
This erudite bibber was he who had written 
The story of this walk. 

"A pretty mistake," quoth the Devil ; 

"A pretty mistake, I opine ! 
I have put many ill thoughts in his mouth ; 
He will never put good ones in mine." 

Now the morning air was cold for him, 

Who was used to a warm abode ; 
And j'-et he did not immediately wish 

To set out on his homeward road. 

For he had some morning calls to make 

Before he went back to hell ; 
"So," thought he, "I'll step into a gaming- 
house, 

And that will do as well ; " 
But just before he could get to the door 

A wonderful chance befell. 

For all on a sudden, in a dark place, 
He came upon General 's burning face ; 

And it struck him with such consternation. 
That home in a hurry his way did he take. 
Because he thought by a slight mistake 

'T was the general conflagration. 

Robert Southey. 



* Porson, the Greek scholar. 



THE DEVIL AT HOME. 

FROM "THE DEVIL'S PROGRESS." 

The Devil sits in his easy-chair. 

Sipping his sulphur tea. 

And gazing out, with a pensive air. 

O'er the broad bitumen sea ; 

Lulled into sentimental mood 

By the spirits' far-off wail, 

That sweetly, o'er the burning flood. 

Floats on the brimstone gale ! — • 

The Devil, who can be sad at times. 

In spite of all his mummery. 

And grave, — though not so prosy quite 

As drawn by his friend Montgomery, — 

The Devil to-day has a dreaming air, 

And his eye is raised, and his throat is bare. 

His musings are of many things, 

That — good or ill — befell, 

Since Adam's sons macadamized 

The highways into hell : — 

And the Devil — whose mirth is 7i0ver loud — 

Laughs with a quiet mirth. 

As he thinks how well his serpent-tricks 

Have been mimicked upon earth ; 

Of Eden and of England, soiled , 

And darkened by the foot 

Of those who preach with adder-tongues, 

And those who eat the fruit ; 

Of creeping things, that drag their slime 

Into God's chosen places, 

And knowledge leading into crime. 

Before the angels' faces ; 

Of lands — ■ from Nineveh to Spain — 

That have bowed beneath his sway, 

And men who did his work, — from Cain 

To Viscount Castlereagh ! 

Thomas Kibble Hervey. 



THE NOSE AND THE EYES. 

Between Nose and Eyes a strange contest arose ; 

The spectacles set them, unhappily, wrong ; 
The point in dispute was, as all the world knows, 

To whom the said spectacles ought to belong. 

So Tongue was the lawyer, and argued the cause, 
With a great deal of skill,, and a wig full of 
learning. 

While chief baron Ear sat to balance the laws, — ■ 
So famed for his talent in nicely discerning. 

" In behalf of the Nose, it will quickly appear 
(And your lordship," he said, "will undoubt- 
edly find) 



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That the Nose has the spectacles always to wear, 
Which amounts to possession, time out of 
mind." 

Then, holding the spectacles up to the court, 
" Your lordship observes, they are made with 
a straddle, 

As wide as the ridge of the Nose is ; in short. 
Designed to sit close to it, just like a saddle. 

"Again, would your lordship a moment suppose 
('T is a case that has happened, and may hap- 
pen again) 
That the visage or countenance had not a Nose, 
Pray, who would, or who could, wear spectacles 
then ? 

" On the whole, it appears, and my argument 
shows, 
"With a reasoning the court will never condemn. 
That the spectacles, plainly, were made for the 
Nose, 
And the Nose was, as plainly, intended for 
them." 

Then shifting his side (as a lawyer knows how), 
He pleaded again in behalf of the Eyes : 

5ut what were his arguments, few people know. 
For the court did not think them equally wise. 

So his lordship decreed, with a grave, solemn 
tone. 

Decisive and clear, witliout one if or hut, 
That whenever the Nose put his spectacles on. 

By daylight or candlelight, — Eyes should be 



shut. 



William Cowper. 



ADDRESS TO THE TOOTHACHE. 

My curse upon thy venomed stang. 
That shoots my tortured gums alang ; 
An' through my lugs gies mony a twang, 

Wi' gnawing vengeance ! 
Tearing my nerves wi' bitter pang. 

Like racking engines. 

When fevers burn, or ague freezes, 
Rheumatics gnaw, or cholic squeezes ; 
Our neighbor's sympathy may ease us, 

Wi' pitying moan ; 
But thee, — thou hell o' a' diseases, 

Aye mocks our groan. 

Adown my beard the slavers trickle ; 
I throw the wee stools o'er the mickle. 
As round the fire the giglets keckle 

To see me loup ; 
"WHrile, raving mad, I wish a heckle 

Were in their doup. 



0' a' the numerous human dools, 

111 har'sts, daft bargains, cutty-stools. 

Or worthy friends raked i' the mools. 

Sad sight to see ! 
The tricks o' knaves or fash o' fools, 

Thou bear'st the gree. 

Where'er that place be priests ca' hell, 
Whence a' the tones o' mis'ry yell. 
And ranked plagues their numbers tell. 

In dreadfu' raw. 
Thou, Toothache, surely bear'st the bell, 

Among them a' ; 

thou grim mischief-making chiel. 
That gars the notes of discord squeal, 
Till daft mankind aft dance a reel 

In gore a shoe-thick ! — 
Gie a' the faes o' Scotland's weal 

A fowmond's Toothache ! 

Robert Burns. 



THE FRIEND OF HUMANITY AND THE 
KNIFE-GRINDER.* 

FRIEND OF HUMANITY. 

Needy knife-grinder ! whither are you going ? 
Rough is the road ; your wheel is out of order. 
Bleak blows the blast ; — your hat has got a hole 
in't ; 
So have your breeches ! 

Weary knife-grinder! little think the proud ones. 
Who in their coaches roll along the turnpike- 
Road, what hard work 't is crying all day, 
' Knives and 
Scissors to grind ! ' 

Tell me, knife-grinder, how came you to grind 

knives ? 
Did some rich man tyrannically use you ? 
Was it the squire ? or parson of the parish ? 
Or the attorney ? 

Was it the squire for killing of his game ? or 
Covetous parson for his tithes distraining ? 
Or roguish lawyer made you lose your little 
All in a lawsuit ? 

(Have you not read the Rights of Man, by Tom 

Paine ?) 
Drops of compassion tremble on my eyelids, 
Ready to fall as soon as you have told your 
Pitiful story. 

* A burlesque upon the humanitarian sentiments of Southey in 
his younger days, as well as of the Sapphic stanzas in which he 
sometimes embodied them. 



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KXIFK-GRINDER. 

Story ! God bless you ! I have none to tell, sir ; 
Only, last night, a-drinking at the Chequers, 
This poor old hat and breeches, as you see, were 
Torn in a scuffle. 

Constables came up for to take me into 
Custody ; they took me before the justice ; 
Justice Oldniixon put me into the parish 
Stocks for a vagrant. 

I should be glad to drink your honor's health in 
A pot of beer, if you will give me sixpence ; 
But for riiy part, I never love to meddle 
With politics, sir. 

FRIEND OF HUMANITY. 

I give thee sixpence ! I will see thee damned 

first, — 
Wretch ! whom no sense of wrongs can rouse to 

vengeance, — 
Sordid, unfeeling, reprobate, degraded. 

Spiritless outcast ! 
{Kicks the knife-grinder, overturns his wheel, and 
exit in a transport of re2nMican enthusiasm^ 
and universal philanthropy.) 

George Canning. 



EPITAPH 

FOR THE TOMBSTONE ERECTED OYER THE MAR- 
QUIS OF ANGLESEA'S leg, LOST AT THE BATTLE 
OF WATERLOO. 

Hkrk rests, and let no saucy knave 

Presume to sneer and laugh. 
To learn that mouldering in the grave 

Is laid a British Calf. 

For lie who writes these lines is sure. 

That those who read the whole 
Will find such laugh was premature, 

For here, too, lies a sole. 

And here five little ones repose, 

Tv.'in born witii other five, 
Unheeded by their brother toes, 

Who all are now alive. 

A leg and foot, to speak more plain, 

Eests here of one commanding ; 
Who, though his wits he might retain. 

Lost half his understanding. 

And when the guns, with thunder fraught. 

Poured bullets thick as hail. 
Could only in this way be taught 

To give the foe leg-bail. 



And now in England, just as gay 

As in the battle brave, 
Goes to a rout, review, or play, 

With one foot in the grave. 

Fortune in vain here showed her spite, 

For he will still be found, 
Should England's sons engage in fight, 

Resolved to stand his ground. 

But Fortune's pardon I must beg ; 

She meant not to disarm, 
For when she lopped the hero's leg. 

She did not seek his harm, 

And but indulged a harmless whim ; 

Since he could walk with one. 
She saw two legs were lost on him, 

Who never meant to run. 

George Ca.n.ming. 



THE PILGRIMS AND THE PEAS. 

A BRACE of sinners, for no good, 

Were ordered to the Virgin Mary's shrine, 
Who at Loretto dwelt, in wax, stone, wood, 

And in a fair white wig looked wondrous fine. 
Fifty long miles had those sad rogues to travel, 
With something in their shoes much worse than 

giavel ; 
In short, their toes so gentle to amuse, 
The priest had ordered peas into their .shoes : 
A nostrum famous in okl popish times 
For purifying souls that stunk of crimes : 
A sort of apostolic salt, 
Whicli popish parsons for its powers exalt, 
For keeping souls of sinners sweet. 
Just as our kitchen salt keeps meat. 

The knaves set off on the same day, 
Peas in their shoes, to go and pray ; 

But very different was their speed, I wot : 
One of the sinners galloped on, 
Swift as a bullet from a gun ; 

The other limped, as if he had been shot 
One saw the Vii'gin soon, Peccavi cried. 

Had his soul whitewashed all so clever ; 
Then home again he nimbly hied, 

Made fit with saints above to live forever. 

In coming back, however, let me saj"". 

He met his brother rogue about half-Avay, • — 

Hobbling, with outstretched anus and bended 

knees. 
Cursing the souls and bodies of the peas ;• 
His eyes in tears, his cheeks and brow in sweat. 
Deep sympathizing ^vith his groaning feet. 



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" How now," the light-toed, whitewashed pil- 
grim broke, 
" You lazy lubber ! " 
" Ods curse it ! " cried the other, " 't is no joke ; 
My feet, once hard as any rock, 
Are now as soft as blubber. 

' ' Excuse me. Virgin Mary, that I swear, 
As for Loretto, I shall not get there ; 
No, to the devil my sinful soul must go, 
For damme if I ha'n't lost every toe. 
But, brother sinner, pray explain 
How 't is that you are not in pain. 

What power hath worked a wonder for your 
toes. 
Whilst I just like a snail am crawling. 
Now swearing, now on saints devoutly bavv'ling, 

Whilst not a rascal comes to ease my woes ? 

" How is 't that you can like a grej'hound go, 
Merry as if that naught had happened, burn 
ye!" 
"Wh}-," cried the other, grinning, " you must 
know, 
That just before I ventured on my journey. 
To walk a little more at ease, 
I took the liberty to boil my peas." 

Dr. John WOLCOTT iPefe>- Pi?tiiar). 



THE RAZOR-SELLER. 

A FELLOW in a market-town. 

Most musical, cried razors up and down. 

And offered twelve for eighteen pence ; 
Which certainly seemed wondrous cheap. 
And, for the money, quite a heap. 

As every man would buy, with cash and sense. 

A country bumpkin the great offer heard, — 
Poor Hodge, who suffered by a broad black beard. 

That seemed a shoe-brush stuck beneath his 
nose : 
With cheerfulness the eighteen pence he paid, 
And proudly to himself in whispers said, 

" This rascal stole the razors, I suppose. 

" No matter if the fellow he a knave. 
Provided that the razors shave ; 

\t certainly will be a monstrous prize." 
So home the clown, with his good fortune, went. 
Smiling, in heart and soul content. 

And quickly soaped himself to ears and eyes. 

Being well lathered from a dish or tub, 
Hodge now began with grinning pain to grub. 
Just like a hedger cutting furze ; 



'T was a vile razor ! — then the rest he tried, — 
All were impostors. " Ah ! " Hodge sighed, 
"I wish my eighteen pence within my purse." 

In vain to chase his beard, and bring the graces. 
He cut, and dug, and winced, and stamped, 
and swore ; 
Brought blood, and danced, blasphemed, and 
made wry faces. 
And cursed each razor's body o'er and o'er : 

His muzzle formed of opposition stuff. 
Firm as a Foxite, would not lose its ruff ; 

So kept it, — laughing at the steel and suds. 
Hodge, in a ytassion, stretched his angry jaws. 
Vowing the direst vengeance with clenched claws. 

On the vile cheat that sold the goods. 
" Razors ! a mean, confounded dog. 
Not fit to scrape a hog ! " 

Hodge sought the fellow, — • found him, — and 

begun : 
" P'rhaps, Master Razor-rogue, to you 'tis fun. 

That people Hay themselves out of their lives. 
You rascal ! for an hour have I been grubbing. 
Giving my crying whiskers here a scrubbing, 

With razors just like oyster-knives. 
Sirrah ! I tell you you 're a knave. 
To cry up razors that can't shave ! " 

"Friend," quoth the razor-man, "I'm not a 
knave ; 
As for the razors you have bought. 
Upon my soul, I never thought 
That they would shave." 

" Not think they 'd shave ! " quoth Hodge, with 
wondering eyes. 
And voice not much unlike an Indian yell ; 
" What were they made for, then, you dog ? " 
he cries. 
'^ Made," quoth the fellow with a smile, — 
"to sell." 

DR. John WolCOTT (Peter Pindar). 



EPIGRAMS BY S. T. COLERIDGE. 



In Koln, a town of monks and bones. 

And pavements fanged with murderous stones. 

And rags, and hags, and hideous wenches, — 

I cor;nted two-and-seventy stenches, 

All well-defined and several stinks ! 

Ye nymphs that reign o'er sewers and sinks, 

The river Rhine, it is well known, 

Doth wash your city of Cologne ; 

But tell me, nymphs ! wliat power divine 

Shall henceforth wash the river Rhine ? 



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Si,Y Beelzebub took all occasions 

To try Job's constancy and patience. 

He took his lionor, took his health ; 

He took his children, took his wealth, 

His servants, oxen, horses, cows — 

But cunning Satan did not take his spouse. 

But Heaven, that brings out good from evil, 

And loves to disappoint the devil, 

Had predetermined to restore 

Tivofold all he had before ; 

His servants, horses, oxen, cows — 

Short-sighted devil, not to take his spouse ! 



Hoarse Msevius reads his hobbling verse 

To all, and at all times, 
And finds them both divinely smooth, 

His voice as well as rhymes. 

Yet folks say Msevius is no ass ; 

But Moevius makes it clear 
That he 's a monster of an ass, — 

An ass without an ear ! 



Swans sing before they die, — 't were no bad thing 
Did certain persons die before they sing. 



THE WELL OF ST. KEYNE. 

" In the parish of St. Neots, Cornwall, is a well arched over with 
the robes of four kinds of trees, — withy, oak, elm, and ash, — and 
dedicated to St. Keyne. The reported virtue of the water is this, 
that, whether husband or wife first drink thereof, they get the mas- 
tery thereby." — FULLER. 

A WELL there is in the West country. 
And a clearer one never was seen ; 

There is not a wife in the West country 
But has heard of the Well of St. Keyne. 

An oak and an elm tree stand beside, 
And behind does an ash-tree grow. 

And a willow from the bank above 
Droops to the water below. 

A traveller came to the Well of St. Kej'ne ; 

Pleasant it was to his eye, 
For from cock-crow he had been travelling, 

And there was not a cloud in the sky. 

He drank of the water so cool and clear. 

For thirsty and hot was he, 
And he sat down upon the bank. 

Under the willow-tree. 

There came a man from the neighboring town 

At the well to fill his pail, 
On the well-side he rested it. 

And bade the stranger hail. 



"Now art thou a bachelor, stranger ? " quoth he, 

' ' For an if thou hast a wife. 
The happiest draught thou hast drank this day 

That ever thou didst in thy life. 

" Or has your good woman, if one you have. 

In Cornwall ever been ? 
For an if she have, I '11 venture my life 

She has drunk of the Well of St. Keyne." 

"1 have left a good woman who never was here," 

The stranger he made reply ; 
"But that my draught should be better for that, 

" I pray you answer me why." 

"St. Keyne," quoth the countryman, "many a 
time 

Drank of this crystal well. 
And before the angel summoned. her 

She laid on the water a spell. 

" If the husband of this gifted well 

Shall drink before his wife, 
A happy man theaceforth is he. 

For he shall be master for life. 

" But if the wife should drink of it first, 

Heaven help the husband then ! " 
The stranger stooped to the Well of St. Keyne, 

And drank of the waters again. 

"You drank of the well, I warrant, betimes ?" 

He to the countryman said. 
But the countryman smiled as the stranger spake, 

And sheepishly shook his head. 

"I hastened, as soon as the wedding was done, 

And left my wife in the porch. 
But i' faith, she had been wiser than me. 

For she took a bottle to church." 

ROBERT SOUTHEY. 



THE EGGS AND THE HORSES. 

A MATRIMONIAL EPIC. 

John Dobbins was so captivated 
By Mary Trueman's fortune, face, and cap, 
(With near two thousand pounds the hook was 

baited,) 
That in he popped to matrimony's trap. 

One small ingredient towards happiness, 
It seems, ne'er occupied a single thought ; 

For his accomplished bride 

Appearing well supplied 
With the three charms of riches, beauty, dress, 

He did not, as he ought. 

Think of aught else ; so no inquiry made he 
As to the temper of the lady. 



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And here was certainly a great omission ; 
None should accept of Hymen's gentle fetter, 

" For worse or better," 
Whatever be their prospect or condition, 
Without acquaintance with each other's nature ; 
For many a mild and quiet creature 
Of charming disposition, 
Alas ! by tlioughtless marriage has destroyed it. 
So take advice ; let girls dress e'er so tastily, 
Don't enter into wedlock hastily 
Ujdess you can't avoid it. 
> 

Week followed week, and, it must be confest, 
The bridegroom and the bride had both been 

blest ; 
Month after month had languidly transpired, 
Both parties became tired : 
Year after year dragged on ; 
Their happiness was gone. 

Ah ! foolish pair ! 

" Bear and foi'bear" 

Should be the rule for married folks to take. 

But blind mankind (poor discontented elves !) 

Too often make 

The misery of themselves. 

At length the husband said, " This will not do ! 
Mary, I never will be ruled by you ; 

So, M'ife, d' ye see ? 
To live together as we can't agree, 
Suppose we part ! " 
With woman's pride, 
Mary replied, 

" With all my heart ! " 

Jolin Dobbins then to Mary's father goes, 
And gives the list of his imagined woes. 

" Dear son-in-law ! " the father said, "I see 
All is quite true that you 've been telling me ; 
Yet there in marriage is such strange fatality, 

That when as much of life 

You shall have seen 

As it has been 
My lot to see, I think you '11 own your wife 
As good or better than the generality. 

" An interest in your case I really take. 

And therefore gladly this agreement make : 

An hundred eggs within this basket lie, 

With which your luck, to-morrow, you shall try ; 

Also my five best horses, with my cart ; 

And from the farm at dawn you shall depart. 

All round the country go, 

And be particular, I beg ; 
Where husbands rule, a horse bestow, 
But where the wives, an egg. 



And if the horses go before the eggs, 

I '11 ease you of your wife, — I will, — I' fegs ! " 

Away the married man departed. 
Brisk and light-hearted : 
Not doubting that, of course, 
The first five houses each would take a horse. 
At the first house he knocked. 
He felt a little shocked 
To hear a female voice, with angry roar, 
Scream out, — ' ' Hullo ! 
Who 's there below ? 
Why, husband, are you deaf ? go to the door, 
See who it is, I beg." 

Our poor friend John 
Trudged quickly on, 
P>ut first laid at the door an egg. 

I will not all his journey through 
The discontented traveller pursue ; 
Suffice it here to say 
That when his first day's task was nearly done, 
He 'd seen an hundred husbands, minus one, 
And eggs just ninety-nine had given away. 
"Ha! there's a house where he I seek must 

dwell," 
At length cried John ; "I'll go and ring the 
bell." 

The servant came, — John asked him, 

"Pray, 
Friend, is your master in the way ? " 

" No," said the man, with smiling phiz, 
" My master is not, but my mistress is ; 
Walk in that parlor, sir, my lady 's in it : 
Master will be himself there — in a minute. " 
The lady said her husband then was dressing. 
And, if his business was not very pressing, 
She would prefer that he should wait until 
His toilet was completed ; 
Adding, "Pray, sir, be seated." 
" Madam, 1 will," 
Said John, with great politeness ; " but I own 
That you alone 
Can tell me all I wish to know ; 
Will you do so ? 
Pardon my rudeness, 
And just have the goodness 
(A wager to decide) to tell me — do — 
Who governs in this house, — your spouse or 
you ? " 

" Sir," said the lady, with a doubting nod, 

"Your question 's very odd ; 
But as I think none ought to be 
Ashamed to do their duty (do you see ?) 
On that account I scruple not to say 
It always is my pleasure to obey. 



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But liere 's my husband (always sad without 

me) ; 
Take not my word, but ask him, if you doubt 

me." 

"Sir," said the husband, "'tis most true ; 

I promise you, 
A more obedient, kind, and gentle woman 
Does not exist." 
" Give us your fist," 
Said John, " and, as the case is something more 
than common. 
Allow me to present you with a beast 
Worth fifty guineas at the very least. 

"There's Smiler, sir, a beauty, you must own, 

There 's Piince, that handsome black, 
Ball the graj' mare, and Saladin the roan, 
Besides old Dunn ; 
Come, sir, choose one ; 
But take advice from me, 
Let Prince be he ; 
Why, sir, you '11 look the hero on his back." 

I '11 take the black, and thank you too." 
" Nay, husband, that will never do ; 
You know, you 've often heai'd me say 
How much I long to have a gray ; 
And this one will exactly do for me." 
" No, no," said he, 
" Friend, take the four others back, 
And onl}^ leave the black." 
' ' Nay, husband, I di^clare 
I must have the gray mare ; " 
Adding (with gentle force), 
"The gray mare is, I 'm sure, the better horse." 

" Well, if it must be so, — good sir, 

The gray mare ire prefer ; 
So we accept your gift." John made a leg : 
' ' Allow me to present you with an egg ; 

'T is my last egg remaining. 

The cause of my regaining, 
I trust, the fond affection of my wife, 
Whom I will love the better all my life. 

•' Home to content has her kind father brought 

me ; 
I thank him for the lesson he has taught me." 

Anonymous. 



THE MILKMAID. 

A MILKMAID, who poised a full pail on her head. 
Thus mused on her prospects in life, it is said : 
"Let me see, — I should think that this milk 

will procure 
One hundred good eggs, or fourscore, to be sure. 



' ' Well then, — stop a bit, — it must not be for- 
gotten. 

Some of these may be broken, and some may be 
rotten ; 

But if twenty for accident should be detached, 

It will leave me just sixty sound eggs to be 
hatched. 

" Well, sixty sound eggs, — no, sound chickens, 

I mean : 
Of these some may die, — we'll suppose seventeen, 
Seventeen ! not so many, — say ten at the most. 
Which will leave fifty chickens to boil or to roast. 

" But then there 's their barley : how much will 

they need ? 
Why, they take but one grain at a time when 

they feed, — 
So that 's a mere trifle ; now then, let us see. 
At a fair market price how much money there '11 

be. 

' ' Six shillings a pair — five — four — three-and- 

six, 
To prevent all mistakes, that low price I will fix ; 
Now what will tliat make ? fifty chickens, I said, — 
Fifty times three-and-sixpence — I'll ask Brother 

Ned. 

" 0, but stop, — three-and-sixpence ajMir I must 

sell 'em ; 
Well, a pair is a couple, — now then let us tell 

'em ; 
A couple in fifty will go (my poor brain ! ) 
Why, just a score times, and five pair will remain. 

' ' Twenty-five pair of fowls — now how tiresome 

it is 
That I can't reckon up so much money as this ! 
Well, there 's no use in trying, so let 's give a 

guess, — 
I '11 say twenty pounds, and it cant he no less. 

"Twenty pounds, I am certain, will buy me a cow. 
Thirty geese, and two turkeys, — eight pigs and 

a sow ; 
Now if these turn out well, at the end of the year, 
I shall fill both my pockets with guineas, 'tis 

clear." 

Forgetting her burden, when this she had said, 
The maid superciliously tossed up her head ; 
When, alas for her prospects ! her milk-pail de- 
scended, 
And so all her schemes for the future were ended. 

This moral, I think, may be safely attached, ■ — 
' ' Eeckon not on your chickens before they are 

hatched." 

Jeffreys Taylor. 



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WHERE ARE YOU GOING, MY PRETTY 
MAID ? 

"Where are you going, my pretty maid ? " 

" I am going a-niilking, sir," she said. 

" May I go with you, my prett}' maid ? " 

"You 're kindly welcome, sir," she said. 

" What is your father, my pretty maid ? " 

" My father's a farmer, sir," she said. 

" What is your fortune, my pretty maid ?" 

" My face is my fortune, sir," she said. 

" Then I won't marry you, my pretty maid ?" 

"Nobody asked you, sir," she said. 

Anonymous. 



TOBY TOSSPOT. 

Alas ! what pity 't is that regularity, 

Like Isaac Shove's, is such a rarity ! 
But there are swilling wights in London town, 

Termed jolly dogs, choice spirits, alias swine. 
Who pour, in midnight revel, bumpers down, 

Making their throats a thoroughfare for wine. 

These spendthrifts, who life's pleasures thus run on. 
Dozing with headaches till the afternoon. 

Lose half men's regular estate of sun. 
By borrowing too largely of the moon. 

One of this kidney — Toby Tosspot hight — • 
Was coming from the Bedford late At night ; 
And being Bacchi j^lcnus, full of wine, 
Altliough he had a tolerable notion 
Of aiming at progressive motion, 
'T was n't direct, — 't was serpentine. 
He worked with sinuosities, along. 
Like Monsieur Corkscrew, worming through a 

cork. 
Not straight, like Corkscrew's proxy, stiif Don 
Prong, — a fork. 

At length, with near four bottles in his pate. 
He saw the moon shining on Shove's brass plate. 
When reading, " Please to ring the bell," 

And being civil beyond measure, 
"Ring it ! " says Toby, — "very well ; 

I '11 ring it with a deal of pleasure." 
Toby, the kindest soul in all the town, 
Gave it a jerk that almost jerked it down. 

He waited full two minutes, — no one came ; 

He waited full two minutes more ; — and then 
Says Toby, " If he 's deaf, I 'm not to blame ; 

I '11 pull it for the gentleman again." 

But the first peal woke Isaac in a fright, 

Wlio, quick as lightning, popping up his head, 
Sat on his head's antipodes, in bed, 

Pale as a parsnip, — bolt upright. 



At length he wisely to himself doth say, calming 

his fears, — 
" Tush ! 't is some fool has rung and run away ; " 
When peal the second rattled in his ears. 

Shove jumped into the middle of the floor ; 
And, trembling at each breath of air that 
stirred. 
He groped down stairs, and opened the street 
door. 
While Toby was performing peal the third. 

Isaac eyed Toby, fearfully askant, 

And saw he was a strapper, stout and tall ; 

Then put this question, " Pray, sir, what d' ye 
want ? " 
Says Toby, " I want nothing, sir, at all.' 

' ' Want nothing ! Sir, you 've pulled my bell, I 
vow. 

As if you 'd jerk it off the wire." 
Quoth Toby, gravely making him a bow, 

" I pulled it, sir, at your desire." 

"At mine?" "Yes, yours; I hope I've done 
it well. 

High time for bed, sir ; I was hastening to it ; 
But if you write up, ' Please to ring the bell,' 

Common politeness makes me stop and do it." 

GEORGE COLMAN THE YOUNGER. 



SIR MARMADUKE. 

Sir Marmaduke was a hearty knight, - 

Good man ! old man ! 
He 's painted standing bolt upright, 

AVith his hose rolled over his knee ; 
His periwig 's as white as chalk. 
And on his fist he holds a hawk ; 

And he looks like the head 
Of an ancient family. 

His dining-room was long and wide, — 

Good man ! old man ! 
His spaniels lay by the fireside ; 

And in other parts, d' ye see, 
Cross-bows, tobacco-pipes, old hats, 
A saddle, his wife,, and a litter of cats ; 

And he looked like the head 
Of an ancient family. 

He never turned the poor from the gate. 

Good man ! old man ! 
But was always ready to break the pate 

Of his country's enemy. 



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What knight could do a better thing 
Than serve the poor and fight for his king ? 
And so may .every head 
Of an ancient family. 

GEORGE COLMAN THE YOUNGER. 



And much more economical, 
For all his bills were r^i^^- 
Then leave your new vagaries quite, 

And take up the old trade 
Of a fine old English gentleman, 

All of the olden time. ^^^^^^^^,_ 



THE FINE OLD ENGLISH GENTLEMAN.* 

I 'll sing you a good old song, 

Made by a good old pate, 
Of a fine old English gentleman 

Who had an old estate, 
And who kept up his old mansion 

At a bountiful old rate ; 
With a good old porter to relieve 

The old poor at his gate, 
Like a fine old English gentleman 

All of the olden time. 

His hall so old was hung around 

With ijikes and guns and bows. 
And swords, and good old bucklers. 

That had stood some tough old blows ; 
'Twas there "his worship " held his state 

In doublet and trunk hose, 
And quaffed his cup of good old sack, 

To warm his good old nose, 
Like a fine, etc. 

When winter's cold brought frost and snow, 

He opened house to all ; 
And though threescore and ten his years. 

He featly led the ball ; 
Nor was the houseless wanderer 

E'er driven from his hall ; 
For while he feasted all the great, 

He ne'er forgot the small ; 
Like a fine, etc. 

But time, though old, is strong in flight, 

And years rolled swiftly by ; 
And Autumn's falling leaves proclaimed 

This good old man must die ! 
He laid him down right tranquilly. 

Gave up life's latest sigh ; 
And mournful stillness reigned around, 

And tears bedewed each eye. 
For this good, etc. 

Now surely this is better far 

Than all the new parade 
Of theatres and fancy halls, 

«' At home" and masquerade : 

* Modelled upon an old black-letter song, called "The Old 
Young Courtier." 



THE DIVERTING HISTORY OF JOHN 
GILPIN. 

SHOWING HOW HE WENT FARTHER THAN HE INTENDED. 
AND CAME SAFE HOME AGAIN. 



John Gilpin was a citizen 

Of credit and renown, 
A trainband captain eke was he 

Of famous London town. 

John Gilpin's spouse said to her dear — 

"Though wedded we have been 
These twice ten tedious years, yet we 

No holiday have seen. 

"To-morrow is our wedding-day, 

And we will then repair 
Unto the Bell at Edmonton 

All in a chaise and pair. 

" My sister and my sister's child. 

Myself and children three, 
Will fill the chaise ; so you must ride 

On horseback after we." 

He soon replied, " I do admire 

Of womankind but one, 
And you are she, ray dearest dear : 

Therefore it shall be done. 

" I am a linendraper bold. 

As all the world doth know, 
And my good friend the calender 

Will" lend his horse to go." 

Quoth Mrs. Gilpin, "That's well said ; 

And for that wine is dear. 
We will be furnished with our own, 

Which is both bright and clear." 

John Gilpin kissed his loving wife ; 

O'erjoyed was he to find. 
That, though on pleasure she was bent. 

She had a frugal mind. 

The morning came, the chaise was brought, 

But yet was not allowed 
To drive up to the door, lest all 

Should say that she was proud. 



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So three doors off the chaise was stayed, 

Where they did all get in ; 
Six precious souls, and all agog 

To dash through thick and thin. 

Smack went the whip, round went the wheels, 

Were never folks so glad ; 
The stones did rattle underneath, 

As if Cheapside were mad. 

John Gilpin at his horse's side 

Seized fast the flowing mane. 
And up he got, in haste to ride, 

But soon came down again ; 

For saddle-tree scarce reached had he, 

His journey to begin. 
When, turning round his head, he saw 

Three customers come in. 

So down he came ; for loss of time, 

Although it grieved him sore, 
Yet loss of pence, full well he knew, 

Would trouble him much more. 

'T was long before the customers 

Were suited to their mind. 
When Betty screaming came down stairs, 

" The wine is left behind ! " 

" Good lack ! " quoth he, "yet bring it me. 

My leathern belt likewise. 
In which I bear my trusty sword 

When I do exercise." 

Now Alistress Gilpin (careful soul !) 

Had two stone bottles found, 
To hold the liquor that she loved, 

And keep it safe and sound. 

Each bottle had a curling ear. 
Through which the belt he drew, 

And hung a bottle on each side, 
To make his balance true. 

Then over all, that he might be 

Equipped from top to toe. 
His long red cloak, well brushed and neat, 

He manfully did throw. 

Now see him mounted once again 

Upon his nimble steed, 
Full slowly pacing o'er the stones. 

With caution and good heed. 

But finding soon a smoother road 

Beneath his well-shod feet. 
The snorting beast began to trot. 

Which galled him in his seat. 



" So, fair and softly," John he cried, 

But John he cried in vain ; 
That trot became a gallop spon, 

In spite of curb and rein. 

So stooping down, as needs he must 

Who cannot sit upright, 
He grasped the mane with both his hands. 

And eke with all his might. 

His horse, who never in that sort 

Had handled been before. 
What thing upon his back had got 

Did wonder more and more. 

Away went Gilpin, neck or naught ; 

Away went hat and wig ; 
He little dreamt, when he set out, 

Of running such a rig. 

The wind did blow, the cloak did fly, 

Like streamer long and gay. 
Till, loop and button failing both. 

At last it flew away. 

Then might all people well discern 

The bottles he had slung ; 
A bottle swinging at each side, 

As hath been said or sung. 

The dogs did bark, the children screamed. 

Up flew the windows all ; 
And every soul cried out, " Well done ! " 

As loud as he could bawl. 

Away went Gilpin, — who but he ? 

His fame soon spread around, 
'• He carries weight ! he rides a race ! 

'T is for a thousand pound ! '' 

And still as fast as he drew near, 

'T was wonderful to view, 
How in a trice the turnpike men 

Their gates wide open threw. 

And now, as he went bowing down 

His reeking head full low. 
The bottles twain behind his back 

Were shattered at a blow. 

Down ran the wine into the road. 

Most piteous to be seen, 
Whicli made his horse's flanks to smoko 

As they had basted been. 

But still he seemed to carry weight, 

With leathern girdle braced ; 
For all might see the bottle necks 

Still dangling at his waist. 



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Tims all through merry Islingtoa 

These gambols did he play, 
Until he came unto the Wash 

Of Edmonton so gay ; 

And there he' threw the wash about 

On both sides of the way, 
Just like unto a trundling mop, 

Or a wild goose at play. 

At Edmonton his loving wife 

From the balcony spied 
Her tender husband, wondering much 

To see how he did ride. 

"Stop, stop, John Gilpin ! — Here's the house,' 

They all at once did crj'' ; 
"The dinner waits, and we are tired." 

Said Gilpin, " So am I ! " 

Bat yet his horse was not a whit 

Inclined to tarry there ; 
For why ? — his owner had a house 

Full ten miles off, at Ware. 

So like an arrow swift he flew. 

Shot by an archer strong ; 
So did he flj' — which brings me to 

The middle of my song. 

Away went Gilpin out of breath, 

And sore against his will. 
Till at his friend the calender's 

His horse at last stood still. 

The calender, amazed to see 

His neighbor in such trim. 
Laid down his pipe. Hew to the gate. 

And thus accosted him : 

" What news ? what news ? your tidings tell ; 

Tell me you'must and shall, • — ■ 
Say why bareheaded you are come, 

Or why you come at all ? " 

Now Gilpin had a pleasant wit, 

And loved a timely joke ; 
And thus unto the calender 

In merry guise he spoke : 

" I came because your horse would come ; 

And, if I well forebode. 
My hat and wig will soon be here. 

They are upon the road." 

The calender, right glad to find 

His friend in merry pin, 
Returned him not a single word. 

But to the house went in ; 



Whence straight he came with hat and wig 

A wig that flowed behind, 
A hat not much the worse for wear, 

Each comely in its kind. 

He held them up, and in his turn 

Thus showed his ready wit, 
"My head is twice as big as yours, 

They therefore needs must lit. 

" But let me scrape the dirt away 

Tliat hangs upon your face ; 
And stop and eat, for well you may 

Be in a hungry case." 

Said John, " It is my wedding-day, 
And all the world would stare, 

If wife should dine at Edmonton, 
And I should dine at Ware." 

So turning to his horse, he said, 

" I am in haste to dine ; 
'T was for your pleasure you came here, 

You shall go back for mine." 

Ah, luckless speech, and bootless boast ! 

For which he paid full dear ; 
For, while he spake, a braying ass 

Did sing most loud and clear ; 

Whereat his horse did snort, as he 

Had heard a lion roar. 
And galloped off with all his might, 

As he had done before. 

Away went Gilpin, and away 

Went Gilpin's hat and wig : 
He lost them sooner than at first, 

For why i — they were too big. 

Now Mistress Gilpin, M'hen she saw 

Her husband posting down 
Into the country far awaj% 

She pulled out half a crown ; 

And thus unto the youth she said, 

That drove them to the Bell, 
"This shall be yours when you bring back 

My husband safe and well." 

The youth did ride, and soon did meet 

John coming back amain ; 
Whom in a trice he tried to stop 

By catching at his rein ; 

But not performing what he meant, 

And gladly would have done, 
The frighted steed he frighted more, 

And made him faster run. 



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Away went Gilpin, and awa}' 

Went postboy at his heels, 
The postboy's horse right glad to miss 

The lumbering of the wheels. 

Six gentlemen upon the road, 

Thus seeing Gilpin 11}', ■ 
With p)Ostboy scampering in the rear, 

They raised the hue and cry : — 

" Stop thief ! stop thief ! — a highwayman ! ' 

Not one of them was mute ; 
And all and each that passed that way 

Did join in the pursuit. 

And now the turnpike-gates again 

Flew open in short sj^ace ; 
The toll-men thinking, as before, 

That Gilpin rode a race. 

And so he did, and won it too, 

For he got first to town ; 
Nor stopped till where he had got up 

He did again get down. 

Now let us sing, " Long live the king. 

And Gilpin, long live he ; 
And when he next doth ride abroad. 

May I be there to see ! " 

WILLIAJI COWPCR. 



THE GOUTY MERCHANT AND THE 
STRANGER. 

In Broad Street building (on a winter night). 

Snug by his parlor-fire, a gouty wight 

Sat all alone, with one hand rubbing 

His feet, rolled up in fleecy hose : 

With t' other he 'd beneath his nose 

The Public Ledger, in whose columns grubbing, 

He noted all the sales of hops. 

Ships, shops, and slops ; 
Gum, galls, and groceries ; ginger, gin. 
Tar, tallow, turmeric, turpentine, and tin ; 
When lo ! a decent personage in black 
Entered and most politely said, — 

" Your footman, sir, has gone his nightly 
track 

To the King's Head, 
And left your door ajar ; w^iich I 
Observed in passing by. 

And thought it neighborly to give you notice." 

" Ten thousand thanks ; how very few get, 
In time of danger, 

Such kind attentions from a stranger ! 
Assuredly, that fellow's throat is 
Doomed to a final drop at Newgate : 



He knows, too, (the unconscionable elf !) 
That there 's no soul at home except myself." 

" Indeed," replied the stranger (looking grave), 

" Then he 's a double knave ; 
He knows that rogues and thieves by scores 
Nightly beset unguarded doors : 
And see, how easily might one 

Of these domestic foes. 

Even beneath your very nose, 
Perform his knavish tricks ; 
Enter your room, as I have done, 
Blow out your candles — thus — and thus — 
Pocket your silver candlesticks. 

And — walk oft" — thus " — 
So said, so done ; he made no more remark 

Nor waited for leplies. 

But marched oH' with his prize. 
Leaving the gouty merchant in the dark. 

Horace Smith. 



ORATOR PUFF. 

Mr. Ojiatok Puff had two tones in his voice. 

The one squeaking thus, and the other down so; 
In each sentence he uttered he gave you your 
choice. 
For one half was B alt, and the rest G below. 
! ! Orator Puff", 
One voice for an orator 's surely enough. 

But he still talked away, spite of coughs and of 
frowns. 
So distracting all ears with his ups and his 
downs. 
That a wag once, on hearing the orator say, 
"My voice is for war!" asked, "Which of 
them-, praj' ? " 
! ! Orator Puff", etc. 

Reeling homewards one evening, top-heavy with 

And rehearsing his speech on the weight of 
the crown. 
He tripiped near a saw-pit, and tumbled right in, 
"Sinking fund " the last words as his noddle 
came down. 
! ! Orator Puff, etc. 

" Good Lord ! " he exclaimed, in his he-and-she 
tones, 
" Help me out ! Help me out / I have broken 
my bones ! " 
" Help you out ? " said a Paddy who passed, 
" what a bother ! 
Why, there 's two of you there — can't you help 
one another ? " 
! ! Oratoi' Puff", 
One voice for an orator 's surely enough. 

THO.MAS MOORE. 



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MORNIFG MEDITATIONS. 

Lkt Taylor pref^f \i, upon a moniing breezy, 
Howv litorisQ- iiilcnightsandlarksareflyiug,- 
For my part, g'tting up seems not so easy 
Bj half as lyi7ig. 

What if the I'^i'k does carol in the sky, 
Soaring bdy^i'd the sight to find him out, — 
Wherefore am 1 to rise at such a lly ? 
I 'm not a trout. 

Tallf 11' t I -' me of bees and such-like hums. 
The smel^ of sweet herbs at the morning prime,— 
Only li :■ long enough, and bed becomes 
A bed of tiiiie. 

■ .e Dan Phoebus and his car are naught, 
steeds that paw impatiently about, — 
" ,. them enjoy, say I, as horses ought, 
The first turn-out ! 

Eight beautiful the dewy meads appear 
Besprinkled by the rosy-fingered girl ; 
What then, — if I prefer my pillow-beer 
To early pearl ? 

i. y stomach is not ruled by other men's, 
Ard, grumbling for a reason, quaintly begs 
Wherefore should master rise before the hens 
Have laid their eggs ? 

Wjiy from a comfortable pillow start 
To see faint flushes in the east awaken ? 
A fig, say I, for any streaky part, 
Excepting bacon. 

An early riser Mr. Gray has drawn, 
Who used to haste the dewy grass among, 
"To meet the sun upon the upland lawn," — 
Well, — he died young. 

With charwomen such early hours agree. 
And sweeps that earn betimes their bit and sup 
But I 'm no climbing bo)% and need not be 
All up, — all up ! 

So here I lie, my morning calls deferring. 
Till something nearer to the stroke of noon ; ■ — 
A man that 's fond precociously of stirriny 
Must be a spoon. 

THOMAS HOOD. 



FAITHLESS SALLY BROWN. 

Young Ben he was a nice young man, 

A carpenter by trade ; 
And he fell in love with Sally Brown, 

That was a lady's maid. 



But as they fetched a walk one day. 

They met a press-gang crew ; 
And Sally she did faint away. 

Whilst Ben he was brought to. 

The boatswain swore with wicked words 

Enough to shock a saint. 
That, though she did seem in a fit, 

'T was nothing but a feint. 

"Come, girl," said he, "hold up your head, 

He '11 be as good as me ; 
For when your swain is in our boat 

A boatswain he will be." 

So when they 'd made their game of her. 

And taken off her elf. 
She roused, and found she only was 

A coming to herself. 

" And is he gone, and is lie gone ?" 

She cried and wept outriglit ; 
' ' Then I will to the water-side, 

And see him out of siglit " 

A waterman came up to her ; 

" Now, young woman," said he, 
" If you weep on so, you will make 

Eye-water in the sea." 

" Alas ! they've taken my bean, Ben, 

To sail with old Benbow ; " 
And her woe began to run afresh, 

As if she 'd said, Gee woe ! 

Says he, " They 've only taken him 

To the tender-ship, you see." 
" The tender-ship," cried Sally Brown, — 

"What a hard-ship that must be ! " 

" 0, would I were a mermaid now, 

For then I 'd follow him ! 
But 0, I 'm not a fish-woman. 

And so I cannot swim. 

" Alas ! I was not born beneath 

The Virgin and the Scales, 
So I nmst curse my cruel stars, 

And walk about in Wales." 

Now Ben had sailed to many a place 

That 's underneath the world ; 
But in two years the ship came home. 

And all her sails were furled. 

But when he called on Sally Brort'u, 

To see how she got on, 
He found she 'd got another Ben, 

Whose Christian-name was John. 



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" Sally Brown ! Sally Brown ! 

How could you serve me so ? 
I 've met with many a breeze before, 

But never such a blow ! " 

Then, reading on his 'bacco box. 

He heaved a heavy sigh, 
And then began to eye his pipe, 

And then to pipe his eye. 

And then he tried to sing, "All 's Well ! " 
But could not, though he tried ; 

His head was turned, — and so he chewed 
His pigtail till he died. 

His death, which happened in his berth, 

At forty-odd befell ; 
They went and told the sexton, and 
1 he sexton tolled the bell. 

THOMAS HOOD. 



FAITHLESS NELLY GRAY. 

A PATHETIC BALLAD. 

Beh Battle was a soldier bold. 

And used to war's alarms ; 
But a cannon-ball took off his legs, 

So he laid down his arms. 

Now as they bore him off the field. 
Said he, " Let others shoot ; 

For here I leave my second leg, 
And the Forty-second Foot." 

The army-surgeons made him limbs : 
Said he, " They 're only pegs ; 

But there 's as wooden members quite, 
As represent my legs." 

Now Ben he loved a pretty maid, — 
Her name was Nelly Gray ; 

So he went to pay her his- devours, 
"When he devoured his pay. 

But when he called on Nelly Gray, 
She made him quite a scoff ; 

And when she saw his wooden leg--^, 
Began to take them off. 

" Nelly Gray ! Nelly Gray ! 

Is this your love so warm ? 
The love that loves a scarlet coat 

Should be more uniform." 

.-jaid .she, " I loved a soldier once, 
For he was blithe and brave ; 

Bat I will never have a man 
With both higs in the grave. 



" Before you had those timb^^r toes 

Your love I did allow ; 
But then, you know, you stan \ upon 

Another footing novi, " 

" Nelly Gray ! Nelly Gray ^■ 

For all your jeering speeches, 
At duty's call I left my legs 

In Badajos's breaches." 

" Why, then," said she, "you 've lo^t the feet 

Of legs in war's alarms, 
And now you <!annot wear your siiO'-s 

Upon your feats of arms ! " 

" false and fickle Nelly Gray ! 

I know why you refuse : • 

Though I 've no feet, some other man 

Is standing in my shoes. 

" I wish I ne'er had seen your face ; 

But, now, a long farewell ! 
For you will be mjf deatli ; — alas ! 

You will not be my Nell ! " 

Now when he went from Nelly Gray 

His heart so heavy got, 
And life was such a burden grown, 

It made him take a knot. 

So round his melancholy neck 

A rope he did intwine, 
And, for his second time in life, 

Enlisted in the Line. 

One end he tied around a beam, 

And then removed his pegs ; 
And, as his legs were off, — of course 

He soon was off his legs. 

And there he hung till he was dead 

As any nail in town ; 
For, though distress had cut him up, 

It could not cut him down. 

A dozen men sat on his corpse. 

To find out wliy he died, — 
And they buried Ben in four cross-roads. 

With a stake in his inside. 

THOMAS HOOD. 



I AM A FRIAR OF ORDERS GRAY. 

FROM THE OPERA OF "ROBIN HOOD." 

I AM a friar of orders gray, 
And down in the valleys I take my way ; 
I pull not blackberry, haw, or hip, — 
Good store of venison fills my scrip ; 



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My long bead-roll I merrily chant ; 

Where'er I walk no money I want ; 

And why I 'm so plump the reason I tell, — 

"Who leads a good life is sure to live well. 
What baron or squire, 
Or knight of the shire, 
Lives half so well as a holy friar ? 

After supper of heaven I dream. 
But that is a pullet and clouted cream ; 
Myself, by denial, I mortify — 
With a dainty bit of a warden-pie ; 
I 'm clothed in sackcloth for my sin, — 
With old sack wine I 'm lined within ; 
A chirping cup is my matin song. 
And the vesper's bell is my bowl, ding dong. 
Wliat baron or sipire. 
Or knight of the shire. 
Lives half so well as a holy friar ? 

John O'Keefe. 



THE JACKDAW OF RHELMS. 

The Jackdaw sat on the Cardinal's chair ! 
Bishop and abbot and prior were there ; 

Many a monk, and many a friar, 
Many a knight, and many a squire. 
With a great many more of lesser degree, — 
In sooth, a goodly company ; 
And they served the Lord Primate on bended 
knee. 
Never, I ween, 
Was a prouder seen. 
Read of in books, or dreamt of in dreams. 
Than the Cardinal Lord Archbishop of Rheims ! 
In and out, 

Through the motley rout. 
That little Jackdaw kept hopping about : 
Here and theie. 
Like a dog in a fair. 
Over comfits and cates, 
And dishes and plates. 
Cowl and cope, and rochet and pall, 
Mitre and crosier, he hopped upon all. 
With a saucy air. 
He perched on the chair 
Where, in state, the great Lord Cardinal sat. 
In the great Lord Cardinal's great red hat ; 
And he peered in the face 
Of his Lordship's Grace, 
With a satisfied look, as if he would say, 
" We two are the greatest folks here to-day ! " 
And the priests, with awe, 
As siich freaks they saw. 
Said, "The Devil must be in that little Jack 
daw ! " 



The feast was over, the board was cleared. 
The flawns and the custards had all disappeared. 
And six little Singing-boys, — dear little souls 
In nice clean faces, and nice white stoles, — 

Came, in order due. 

Two by two. 
Marching that grand refectory through ! 
A nice little boy held a golden ewer. 
Embossed and tilled with water, as pure 
As any that flows between Rheims and ISramur, 
Which a nice little boy stood ready to catch 
In a line golden hand-l)asin made to match. 
Two nice little boys, rather more grown. 
Carried lavender-water and eau-de-Cologne ; 
And a nice little boy had a nice cake of soap, 
Worthy of washing the hands of the Pope ! 

One little boy more 

A napkin bore, 
Of the best white diaper, fringed with pink, 
And a cardinal's hat marked in " permanent 
ink." 

The great Lord Cardinal turns at the sight 
Of these nice little boys dressed all in white ; 

From his finger he draws 

His costly tunpioise : 
And, not thinking at all about little Jackdaws, 

Deposits it straight 

By the side of his plate, 
While the nice little boys on his Eminence wait ; 
Till, when nobody 's dreaming of any sucli thing. 
That little Jackilaw hops off with the ring ! 

There 's a cry and a shout, 

And a deuce of a rout, 
And nobody seems to know what they 're about, 
But the monks have their pockets all turned in- 
side out ; 

The friars are kneeling. 

And hunting and feeling 
The carpet, the floor, and the walls, and the ceiling. 

The Cardinal drew 

Off each plum-colored shoe. 
And left his red stockings exposed to the view ; 

He peeps, and he feels 

In the toes and the heels. 
They turn up the dishes, — they turn up the 

plates, — 
They take up the poker and poke out the grates, 

— They turn up the rugs, , 

They examine the mugs ; 

But, no ! — no such thing, — 

They can't find the ring ! 
And the Abbot declared that "when nobody 

twigged it. 
Some rascal or other had popped in and prigged 
it!" 



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The Cardinal rose with a dignified look, | 

He called for his candle, his bell, and his book ! 
In holy anger and pious grief 
He solemnly cursed that rascally thief ! 
He cursed hiin at board, he cursed him in bed ; 
From the sole of his foot to the crown of his 

head ; 
He Cursed him in sleeping, that every night 
He should dream of the Devil, and wake in a 

fright. 
He cursed him in eating, he cursed him in 

drinking. 
He cursed him in coughing, in sneezing, in 

winking ; 
He cursed him in sitting, in standing, in lying ; 
He cursed him in walking, in riding, in flying ; 
He cursed him living, he cursed him dying ! — 
Never was heard such a terrible curse ! 
But what gave rise 
To no little surprise, 
Nobody seemed one penny the worse ! 

The day was gone, 

Tlie night came on. 
The monks and the friars they searched till dawn ; 

When the sacristan saw. 

On crumpled claw, 
Come limping a poor little lame Jackdaw ! 

No longer gay. 

As on yesterday ; 
His feathers all seemed to be turned the wrong 

way ; — 
His pinions drooped, — he could hardly stand, — 
His head was as bald as the palm of your hand ; 

His eye so dim. 

So wasted each limb. 
That, heedless of grammar, they all cried, 

"That 's him ! — 
That 's the scamp that has done this scandalous 

thing, 
That 's the thief that has got my Lord Cardinal's 
Ring ! " 

The poor little Jackdaw, 

When the monks he saw, 
Feebly gave vent to the ghost of a caw ; 
And turned his bald head as much as to say, 
" Pray be so good as to walk this way ! " 

Slower and slower 

He limped on before, 
Till they came to the back of the belfry-door, 

Where the first thing they saw. 

Midst the sticks and the straw. 
Was the ring, in the nest of that little Jackdaw ! 

Then the great Lord Cardinal called for his book. 

And off that terrible curse he took : 
The mute expression 
Served in lieu of confession, 



And, being thus coupled with full restitution, 
The Jackdaw got plenary absolution ! 

— When those words were heard, 

That poor little bird 
Was so changed in a moment, 't was really ab- 
surd ; 

He grew sleek and fat ; 

In addition to that, 
A fresh crop of feathers came thick as a mat t 

His tail waggled more 

Even than before ; 
But no longer it wagged with an impudent air. 
No longer he perched on the Cardinal's chair : 

He hopped now about 

With a gait devout ; 
At Matins, at Vespers, he never was out ; 
And, so far from any more pilfering deeds, 
He always seemed telling the Confessor's beads. 
If any one lied, or if any one swore. 
Or slumbered in prayer-time and happened to 
snore. 

That good Jackdaw 

Would give a great " Caw ! " 
As much as to say, " Don't do so any more ! " 
While many remarked, as his manners they saw. 
That they "never had known such a pious Jack- 
daw ! " 

He long lived the pride 

Of that country side. 
And at last in the odor of sanctity died ; 

When, as words were too faint 

His merits to paint. 
The Conclave determined to make him a Saint. 
And on newly made Saints and Popes, as you 

know. 
It 's the custom of Eome new names to bestow. 
So they canonized him by the name of Jem Crow ! 
Richard Harris Barham 

{ Thomas higoldsby. Esq,), 



MISADVENTURES AT MARGATE. 

Mr. Simpkinson {loquitur). 

I WAS in Margate last Jul}', I walked upon the 
pier, 

I saw a little vulgar Boy, — I said, " What make 
you here ? 

The gloom upon your youthful cheek speaks any- 
thing but joy ;" 

Again I said, " What make you here, you little 
vulgar Boy ? " 

He frowned, that little vulgar Boy, — he deemed 

I meant to scoff, — 
And when the little heart is big, a little " sets 

it of!'." 



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He put his finger in his mouth, his little bosom 

rose, — 
He had no little handkerchief to wipe his little 

nose ! 

"Hark ! don't you hear, my little man ? — it's 

striking Nine," I said, 
" An hour when all good little boys and girls 

should be in bed. 
Run home and get your supper, else your Ma 

will scold, — fie ! 
It 's very wrong indeed for little bo3's to stand 

and cry ! " 

The tear-drop in his little eye again began to 

spring, 
His bosom throbbed with agony, — he cried like 

anything ! 
I stooped, and thus amidst his sobs I heard him 

murmur, — " Ah ! 
I have n't got no supper ! and I have n't got no 

Ma! 

"My father, he is on the seas, — my mother's 

dead and gone ! 
And I am here, on this here pier, to roam the 

world alone ; 
I have not had, this livelong day, one drop to 

cheer my heai't. 
Nor ^ brown' to buy a bit of bread with, — let 

alone a tart. 

" If there 's a soul will give me food, or find me 
in employ. 

By day or night, then blow me tight ! " (he was 
a vulgar Boy ;) 

" And now I 'm here, from this here pier it is my 
fixed intent 

To jump as Mister Levi did from oflT the Monu- 
ment ! " 

"Cheer up! cheer up! my little man, — cheer 

up ! " I kindly said, 
"You are a naughty boy to take such things 

into your head ; 
If you should jump from off the pier, you'd surely 

break your legs. 
Perhaps your neck, — then Bogey 'd have you, 

sure as eggs are eggs ! 

" Come home with me, my little man, come home 

with me and sup ! 
My landlady is Mrs. Jones, — we must not keep 

her up, — 
There 's roast potatoes at the fire, — enough for 

me and you, — ■ 
Come home, you little vulgar Boy, — I lodge at 

Number 2." 



I took him home to Number 2, the house beside 

"The Foy," 
I bade him wipe his dirty shoes, — that little 

vulgar Boy, — 
And then I said to Mistress Jones, the kindest of 

her sex, 
" Pray be so good as go and fetch a pint of 

double X ! " 

But Mrs. Jones was rather cross, she made a little 
noise. 

She said she " did not like to wait on little vul- 
gar Boys." 

She with her apron wiped the plates, and, as she 
rubbed the delf. 

Said I might "go to Jericho, and fetch my beer 
myself ! " 

I did not go to Jericho, — I went to Mr. Cobb, — 
I changed a shilling (which in town the people 

call a Bob), — ■ 
It was not so much for myself as for that vulgar 

child, — 
And I said, "A pint of double X, and please to 

draw it mild ! " 

When I came back I gazed about, ■ — I gazed on 

stool and chair, — 
I could not see my little friend, because he was 

not there ! 
I peeped beneath the table-cloth, beneath the 

sofa, too, — 
I said, "You little vulgar Boy! why, Avhat's 

become of you ! " 

I could not see my table-spoons, — I looked, but 

could not see 
The little fiddle-patterned ones I use when I 'ni 

at tea ; 
I could not see my sugar-tongs, my silver watch, 

— 0, dear ! 
I know 't was on the mantel-piece when I went 

out for beer. 

I could not see my Macintosh, — it was not to 

be seen ! 
Nor yet my best white beaver hat, broad-brimmed 

and lined with green ; 
My carpet-bag, — my cruet-stand, that holds my 

sauce and soy, — 
My roast potatoes ! — all are gone ! — and so 's 

that vulgar Boy ! 

T rang the bell for Mrs. Jones, for she was down 

below, 
" Mrs. Jones, what do you think 1 — ain't this 

a pretty go ? 



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That horrid little vulgar Boy whom I brought 

here to-night 
He 's stolen my things and run away ! " Says 

she, " And sarve you right ! " 

Next morning I was up betimes, — I sent the 

Crier round, 
All with his bell and gold-laced hat, to say I 'd 

give a pound 
To find that little vulgar Boy, who 'd gone and 

used nie so ; 
But when the Crier cried, "0 Yes ! " the people 

cried, " No ! " 

I went to " Jarvis' Landing-place," the glory of 

the town. 
There was "a common sailor-man a walking up 

and down, 
I told ray tale, — he seemed to think I 'd not 

been treated well, 
And called me " Poor old Buffer ! " — what that 

means I cannot tell. 

That Sailor-man, he said he 'd seen that morning 

on the shore 
A son of — something — 't was a name I 'd never 

heard before, — 
A little "gallows-looking chap," — dear me, 

what could he mean ? — • 
With a "carpet-swab" and " mucking-togs," 

and a hat turned up with green. 

He spoke about his " precious eyes," and said 

he 'd seen him " sheer," — 
It 's very odd that Sailor-men should talk so very 

queer ; 
And then he hitched his trousers up, as is, I 'm 

told, their use, — 
It 's very odd that Sailor-men sliould -wear those 

things so loose. 

I did not understand him well, but think he 

meant to say 
He'd seen that little vulgar Boy, that morning, 

swim away 
In Captain Large's Eoyal George, about an hour 

before, 
And they were now, as he supposed, "some- 

wJieres" about the Nore. 

A landsman said, " I hoig the chap, he 's been 
upon the Mill, — 

And 'cause he gammons so the flats, ve calls him 
Veeping Bill ! " 

He said " he 'd done me worry brown, and nicely 
stmned the svtcig," — 

That 's French, I fancy, for a hat, or else a car- 
pet-bag. 



I went and told the constable my property to 

track ; 
He asked me if " I did not wish that I might get 

it back." 
I answered, " To be sure I do ! — it 's what I 'm 

come about." 
He smiled and said, " Sir, does your mother know 

that you are out ? " 

Not knowing what to do, I thought I'd hasten 

back to town, 
And beg our own Lord Mayor to catch the boy 

who 'd " done me brown," 
His Lordship very kindly said he 'd try and find 

him out. 
But he "rather thought that there were several 

vulgar boys about." 

He sent for Mr. Whithair then, and I described 

" the swag," 
My Macintosh, my sugar-tongs, my spoons, and 

carpet-bag ; 
He promised that the New Police should all 

their powers employ, 
But never to this hour have I beheld that vulgar 

Boy! 



Remember, then, that when a boy I 've heard my 
Grandma tell, 

" Be WAIiNEI) IN TIME BY OTHERS' HAKM, AND 
YOU SHALL DO FULL WELL ! " 

Don't link yourself with vulgar folks, who 've 

got no fixed abode, 
Tell lies, use naughty words, and say they "wish 

they may be blowed ! " 

Don't take too much of double X ! — and don't 
at night go out 

To fetch your beer yourself, but make the pot- 
boy bring your stout ! 

And when you go to Margate next, just stop, 
and ring the bell, 

Give my respects to Mrs. Jones, and say I 'm 

pretty well ! 

Richard Harris Barham 

(Thomas higoldsby, Esq.). 



THE YARN OF THE "NANCY BELL. 

FROM "THE BAB BALLADS." 

'T WAS on the shores that round our coast 
From Deal to Ramsgate span. 

That I found alone, on a piece of stone, 
An elderly naval man. 



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His liair was weedy, his beard was long, 

And weedy and long was he ; 
And I lieard this wight on the shore recite, 

In a singular minor key : — 

"0, I am a cook and a captain bold, 
And the mate of the Nancy brig. 

And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipinite, 
And the crew of the captain's gig." 

And lie shook his fists and he tore his hair, 

Till I really felt afraid. 
For I could n't help thinking the man had been 
drinking. 

And so I simply said : — 

" elderly man, it 's little I know 

Of the duties of men of the sea, 
And I '11 eat my hand if I understand 

How you can possibly be 

" At once a cook and a captain bold. 
And the mate of the Nancy brig, 

And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite. 
And the crew of the captain's gig ! " 

Then he gave a hitch to his trousers, which 

Is a trick all seamen lam. 
And having got rid of a thumping quid 

He spun this painful yarn : — 

" 'T was in the good ship Nancy Beh 
That we sailed to the Indian sea. 

And there on a reef we (;ome to grief, 
"Which has often occurred to me. 

" And pretty nigh all o' the crew was drowned 
(There was seventy-seven o' soul) ; 

And only ten of the Nancy's men 
Said ' Here ' to the muster-roll. 

" There was me, and the cook, and the captain 
bold. 

And the mate of the Nancy brig, 
And the bo'sun tight, and a midshijimite, 

And the crew of the captain's gig. 

" For a month we 'd neither wittles nor drink, 

Till a-hungry we did feel, 
So we drawed a lot, and, accordin', shot 

The captain for our meal. 

"The next lot fell to the Nancy's mate, 

And a delicate dish he made ; 
Then our appetite with the midshipmite 

We seven survivors stayed. 



"And then we murdered the bo'sun tight, 

And he much resembled pig ; 
Then we wittled free, did the cook and me. 

On the crew of the captain's gig. 

' ' Then only the cook and me was left, 
And the delicate question, ' Which 

Of us two goes to the kettle ? ' arose. 
And we argued it out as sich. 

" For I loved that cook as a brother, I did. 
And the cook he worshipped me ; 

But we 'd both be blowed if we 'd either be stowed 
In the other chap's hold, you see. 

" ' I '11 be eat if you dines off me,' says Tom. 

' Yes, that,' says I, ' you '11 be. 
I 'm boiled if 1 die, my friend, ' quoth I ; 

And ' Exactly so,' quoth he. 

" Says he : ' Dear James, to murder me 

Were a foolish thing to do. 
For don't you see that you can't cook me. 

While I can — and will — cook you ? ' 

" So he boils the water, and takes the salt 
And the pejipei' in portions true 

(Which he never forgot), and some chopped sha- 
lot, 
And some sage and parsley too. 

" * Come here,' says he, v/itli a proper pride. 
Which his smiling features tell ; 

' 'T will soothing be if I let you see 
How extremely nice you'll smell.' 

"And he stirred it round, and round, and round. 
And he sniffed at the ibaming froth ; 

When I ups with his heels, and smothers his 
squeals 
In the scum of the boiling broth. 

" And I eat that cook in a week or less, 

And as I eating be 
The last of his chops, why I almost drops, 

For a wessel in sight I see. 

"And I never larf, and I never smile, 

And I never lark nor play ; 
But I sit and croak, and a single joke 

I have — which is to say : 

" 0, I am a cook and a captain bold 
And the mate of the Nancy brig. 

And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite. 
And the crew of the captain's gig ! " 

William Schwenck Gilbert. 



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HUMOROUS POEMS. 



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CAPTAIN EEECK* 

Of all the ships upon the blue, 
No ship contained a better crew 
Than that of worthy Captain Eeece, 
Commanding of The Mantelpiece. 

He was adored by all his men, 
For worthy Captain Reece, E. N., 
Did all that lay within him to 
Promote the comfort of his crew. 

If ever they were dull or sad. 
Their captain danced to them like mad. 
Or tokl, to make the time pass by. 
Droll legends of his infancy. 

A feather-bed had eveiy man. 
Warm slippers and hot-water can, 
Brown Windsor from the captain's store, 
A valet, too, to every four. 

Did they with thirst in summer bum, 
Lo, seltzogenes at every turn, 
And on all very sultry days 
Cream ices handed round on trays. 

Then cun-ant wine and ginger pops 
Stood handily on all the " tops ; " 
And, also, with amusement rife, 
A " Zoetrope, or Wheel of Life." 

New volumes came across the sea 
From Mister Mudie's libraree ; 
The Times and Saturday Review 
Beguiled the leisure of the crew. 

Kind-hearted Captain Eeece, E. N., 
Was quite devoted to his men ; 
In point of fact, good Captain Eeece 
Beatitied The Mantelpiece. 

One summer eve, at half past ten. 
He said (addressing all his men), 
" Come, tell me, please, what I can do, 
To please and gratify my crew. 

" By any reasonable plan 
I '11 make yon happy if I can ; 
My own convenience count as nil ; 
It is my duty, and I wiU." 

Then up and answered William Lee 
(The kindly captain's coxswain he, 
A nervous, shy, low-spoken man); 
He cleared his throat, and thus began : 

♦ In this delicious piece of absurdity will be found the germs of 
Gilbert's two fauious comic operas,— " H. M. S. Pinafore,'" \\W\ its 
amialjle captain, ciieerful crew, and the "sisters and the cousins 
and tlie aunts," and " The Pirates of Peiiza7ice, or T/te Slave of 
Duly." 



"You have a daughter. Captain Eeece, 
Ten female cousins and a niece, 
A ma, if what I 'm told is true. 
Six sisters, and an aunt or two. 

" Now, somehow, sir, it seems to me. 
More friendly-like we all should be, 
If you united of 'em to 
Unmarried members of the crew, 

"If you 'd ameliorate our life. 
Let each select from them a wife ; 
And as for nervous me, old pal. 
Give me your own enchanting gal I " 

Good Captain Reece, that worthy man. 
Debated on his coxswain's plan : 
"I quite agree," he said, "0 Bill ; 
It is my duty, and I will. 

" My daughter, that enchanting gurl. 
Has just been promised to an earl, 
And all my other familee 
To peers of various degree, 

" But what are dukes and viscounts to 
The happiness of all my crew ? 
The word I gave you I '11 fulfil ; 
It is my duty, and I will. 

" As you desire it shall befall, 
I '11 settle thousands on you all, 
And I shall be, despite my hoard. 
The only bachelor on board." 

The boatswain of The Mantelpiece, 
He blushed and spoke to Captain Eeece : 
"I beg your honor's leave," he .said, 
" If you would wish to go and wed, 

" I have a widowed mother who 
Would be the very thing for you — 
She long has loved you from afar. 
She washes for you, Captain E." 

The captain saw the dame that day — 
Addressed her in his playful way — 
" And did it want a wedding-ring ? 
It was a tempting ickle sing ! 

" Well, well, the chaplain I will seek. 
We '11 all be married this day week 
At yonder church upon the hill ; 
It is my duty, and I will ! " 

The sisters, cousins, aunts, and niece. 
And widowed ma of Captain Reece, 
Attended there as they were bid ; 
It was their duty, and they did. 

William Schwenck Gilbert. 



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LITTLE BILLEE. 

There were three sailors of Bristol City 

Who took a boat and went to sea, 
But first with beef and captain's biscuits 

And pickled pork they loaded she. 

There was gorging Jack, and guzzling Jimmy, 
And the youngest he was little Billee ; 

Now A^-hen they 'd got as far as the Equator, 
They 'd nothing left but one split pea. 

Says gorging Jack to guzzling Jimmy, 

"I am extremely hungaree." 
To gorging Jack says guzzliug Jimmy, 

" We 've nothing left, us must eat we." 

Says gorging Jack to guzzling Jimmy, 
" With one another we should n't agree ! 

There 's little Bill, he 's young and tender, 
We 're old and tough, so let 's eat he." 

"0 Billy ! we 're going to kill and eat you, 
So undo the button of your chemie." 

When Bill received this information. 
He used his pocket-handkerchie. 

" First let me say my catechism 

Which my poor mother taught to me." 

"Make haste ! make haste ! " says guzzling Jimmy, 
While Jack pulled out his snickersnee. 

Billy went up to the main-top-gallant mast, 
And down he fell on his bended knee, 

He scarce had come to the Twelfth Command- 
ment 
When up he jumps — " There 's land I see ! 

"Jerusalem and Madagascar 

And North and South Ameiikee, 
There 's the British flag a riding at anchor, 

With Admiral Napier, K. C. B." 

So when they got aboard of the Admiral's, 
He hanged fat Jack and flogged Jimmee, 

But as for little Bill he made him 
The Captain of a Seventy-three. 

William Makepeace Thackeray. 



THE BELLE OF THE BALL. 

Yeaks, years ago, ere yet my dreams 

Had been of being wise or witty, 
Ere I had done with writing themes. 

Or yawned o'er this infernal Chitt}'-, 
Years, years ago, while all my joys 

Were in my fowling-piece and filly ; 
In .short, while I was yet a boy, 

I fell in love with Laura Lilly. 



I saw her at the county ball ; 

There, when the sounds of flute and fiddle 
Gave signal sweet in that old hall 

Of hands across and down the middle, 
Hers was the subtlest .spell by far 

Of all that sets young hearts romancing : 
She was our queen, our rose, our star ; 

And then she danced, — Heaven ! her danc- 
ing. 

Dark was her hair ; her hand was white ; 

Her voice was exquisitely tender ; 
Her eyes were full of liquid light ; 

1 never saw a waist so slender ; 
Her every look, her every smile, 

Shot right and left a sccn'e of arrows : 
I thought 't was Venus from her isle. 

And wondered where she 'd left her sparrows. 

She talked of politics or prayers. 

Of Southey's prose or Wordsworth's sonnets, 
Of danglers or of dancing bears. 

Of battles or the last new bonnets ; 
By candle-light, at twelve o'clock, — 

To me it mattered not a tittle, — 
If those bright lips had quoted Locke, 

I might have thought they murmured Little. 

Through sunny May, through sultry June, 

I loved her with a love eternal ; 
I spoke her praises to the moon, 

I wrote them to thp Sunday Journal. 
My mother laughed ; I soon found out 

That ancient ladies have no feeling : 
My father frowned ; but how should gout 

See any happiness in kneeling ? 

She was the daughter of a dean, — 

Rich, fat, and rather apoplectic ; 
She had one brother just thirteen. 

Whose color was extremely hectic ; 
Her grandmother for many a year 

Had fed the parish with her bounty ; 
Her second cousin was a peer. 

And lord-lieutenant of the county. 

But titles and the three-per-cents. 

And mortgages, and great relations, 
And India bonds, and tithes and rents, 

0, what are they to love's sensations ? 
Black eyes, fair forehead, clustering locks, — 

Such wealth, such honors Cupid chooses ; • 
He cares as little for the stocks 

As Baron Rothschild for the muses. 

She .sketched ; the vale, the wood, the beach, 
Grew lovelier from her pencil's shading : 

She botanized ; I envied each 
Young blossom in her boudoir fading : 



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She warbled Handel ; it was grand, — 

She made the Catilina jealous : 
She touched the organ ; I could stand 

For hours, and hours to blow the bellows. 

She kept an album too, at home. 

Well filled with all an album's glories, — 
Paintings of butterflies and Rome, 

Pattenis for trimmings, Pei-siau stories. 
Soft songs to Julia's cockatoo. 

Fierce odes to famine and to slaughter. 
And autograi)hs of Prince Leeboo, 

And recipes for elder-water. 

And she was flattered, worsliipped, bored ; 

Her steps were watched, her dress was noted : 
Her poodle-dog was quite adored ; 

Her sayings w'ere extremely quoted. 
She laughed, — and every heart was glad. 

As if the taxes were abolished ; 
She frowned, — and every look wag sad. 

As if the opera were demolished. 

She smiled on many just for fun, — 

I knew that there was nothing in it ; 
I was the first, the only one. 

Her heart had thought of for a minute. 
I knew it, for she told me so, 

In phi-ase which was divinely moulded ; 
She wrote a charnting hand, — and O, 

How sweetly all lier notes were folded I 

Our love was most like other loves, — ■ 

A little glow, a little shiver, 
A rosebud and a pair of gloves. 

And " Fly Not Yet," upon the river ; 
Some jealousy of some one's heir. 

Some hopes of dying broken-hearted ; 
A miniature, a lock of hair, 

Tlie usual vows, — and then we pai-ted. 

We parted : months and years rolled by ; 

We met again four summers after. 
Our parting was all sob and sigh, 

Our meeting was all mirth and laughter ! 
For in my heart's most secret cell 

There had been many other lodgers ; 
And she was not the ball-room's belle, 

But only Mrs. — Something — Rogers ! 

WINTHROP MACKWORTH PRAED. 



SORROWS OF WERTHER. 

Werther had a love for Charlotte 
Such as words could never utter ; 

Would you knoAV how first he met her ? 
She was cutting bread and butter. 



Charlotte was a married lady. 
And a moral man was Werther, 

And for all the wealth of Indies 
Would do nothing for to hurt her. 

So he sighed and pined and ogled, 
And his passion boiled and bubbled. 

Till he blew his silly brains out. 
And no more was by it troubled. 

Charlotte, having seen his body 

Borne before her on a shutter. 
Like a well-conducted person, 

Went on cutting bread and butter. 

William Makepeace Thackeray. 



wile?) 



A LIFE'S LOVE. 

I LOVED him in my dawning years — 

Far years, divinely dim ; 
My blithest smiles, my saddest tears. 

Were evermore for him. 
My dreaming when the day began. 

The latest thought I had, 
Was still some little loving plan 

To make my darling glad. 

They deemed he lacked the conquerinf 

That other children wear ; 
To me his face, in frowns or smiles, 

Was never aught but fair. 
They said that self was all his goal. 

He knew no thought beyond ; 
To me, 1 know, no living soul 

Was half so true and fond. 



In love's eclipse, in friendship's dearth. 

In grief and feud and bale, 
My heart has learnt the sacred worth 

Of one that cannot fail ; 
And come what must, and come what may. 

Nor power, nor praise, nor pelf. 
Shall lure my faitli from thee to stray, 

My sweet, my own — Myself. 

ANONYMOUS- 



ON AN OLD MUFF. 

Time has a magic wand ! 
What is this meets my hand. 
Moth-eaten, mouldy, and 

Covered with fluff, 
Faded and stiff and scant ? 
Can it be ? no, it can't, — 
Yes, — I declare 't is Aunt 

Prudence's Muff ! 



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Years ago — twenty-three ! 
Old Uncle Barnaby 
Gave it to Annty P., 

Laughing and teasing, — 
" Pru. of the breezy curls, 
"Whisper these solemn churls, 
IVhat holds a preilJj girl's 

Hand, without squeezing ? " 

Uncle was then a lad. 

Gay, but, I grieve to add. 

Gone to what's called "the bad," — 

Smoking, — and worse ! 
Sleek sable then was this 
Muff, lined with pinkiness, — 
Bloom to which beauty is 

Seldom averse. 

I see in retrospect 

Aunt, in her best bedecked, 

Gliding, with mien erect. 

Gravely to meeting : 
Psalm-hook, and kerchief new, 
Peeped from the Muff of Pru., 
Young men — and pious, too — 

Giving her greeting. 

Pure was the life she led 
Then. : from her Muff, 't is saidj 
Tracts she distributed ; — 

Scapegraces many. 
Seeing the grace they lacked, 
Followed her ; one attacked 
Prudence, and got his tract 

Oftener than any ! 

Love has a potent spell ! 
Soon this bold ne'er-do-well, 
Aunt's sweet susceptible 

Heart undermining. 
Slipped, so the scandal run.s, 
Notes in the pretty nun's 
Muff, — triple-cornered ones, — 

Pink as its lining ! 

Worse, even, soon the jade 
Fled (to oblige her blade !) 
Whilst her friends thought that they 'd 

Locked her up tightly : 
After such shocking games. 
Aunt is of wedded dames 
Gayest, — and now her name 's 

Mrs. Golightly. 

In female conduct flaw 
Sadder I never saw. 
Still I 've faith in the law 
Of compensation. 



Once uncle went astray, — 
Smoked, joked, and swore away ; 
Sworn by, he 's now, by a 
Large congregation ! 

Changed is the child of sin ; 
Now he 's (he once was thin) 
Grave, with a double chin, — 

Blest be his fat form ! 
Changed is the garb he wore : 
Preacher was never more 
Prized than is imele for 

Pulpit or platform. 

If ail ""s as best befits 
Mortals of slender wits, 
Tlien beg this Muff, and its 

Fair owner pardon ; • 

All 'sfor tiie. best, — indeed^ 
Such is my simple creed ; 
Still I must go and weed 

Hard in my garden. 

FREEERSCK LOCKER. 



JACK HORNER. 

ROM ■"MOTHER GOOSE FOR GROWN FOLKS." 

" LittJe Jack H-ornex 
Sat m a corner 

Eating a Christmas Pie; 
He put in his thumb. 
And pulled out a plum. 

And said, ' What a great boyara I !'" 

Ah, the world hath many a Horner, 

Who, seated in his corner. 
Finds a Christmas Pie provided for his thumb ; 

And ciies out with exultation. 

When successful exploration 
Doth discover the predestinated plurn ! 

Little Jack outgrows hia 'tire. 

And becometh John, Esquire ; 
And he finds a monstrous pasty ready made^ 

Stuffed with stocks and bonds and hales. 

Gold, currencies, and sales, 
And all the mixed ingredients of Trade. 

And again it is his luck 

To be just in time to pluck. 
By a clever " operation," from the pie 

An unexpected " plum ; " 

So he glorifies his thumb. 
And says proudly, "What a mighty man am I !" 

Or, perchance to science turning, 

And with weary labor learning 
All the formulas and phi'ases that oppress her, — 

For the fruit of others' baking 

So a fresh diploma taking, 
Conies he forth, a full accredited Professor ! 



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Or he 's not too nice to mix 

In the dish of politics ; 
And the dignity of office he puts on ; 

And he feels as big again 

As a dozen nobler men, 
While he writes himself the Honorable John ! 

Ah me, for the poor nation ! 

In her hour of desperation. 
Her worst foe is that unsparing Horner thumb ! 

To which War and Death and Hate, 

Right, Policy, and State, 
Are but pies wherefrom his greed may grasp a 
plum ! 

0, the work was fair and true, 

But 't is riddled through and through, 
And plundered of its glories everywhere ; 

And before men's cheated eyes 

Doth the robber triumph rise 
And magnify itself in all the air. 

Why, if even a good man dies, 

And is welcomed to the skies 
In the glorious resurrection of the just, 

Tlicy must ruffle it below 

With some vain and wretched show. 
To make each his little mud-pie of the dust ! 

Shall we hint at Lady Homers, 

Who, in their exclusive corners, 
Think the world is only made of upper-crust ? 

Who in the queer raince-pie 

That we call Society, 
Do their dainty fingers delicately thrust ; 

Till, if it come to pass. 

In the spiced and sugared mass, 
One should compass — don't they call it so ? — 
a catch, 

By the gratulation given 

It would seem the very heaven 
Had outdone itself in making such a match ! 

Or the Woman Horner, now. 

Who is raising such a row 
To prove that Jack 's no bigger boy than Jill ; 

And that she won't sit by. 

With her little saucer pie. 
While he from the Great Pastry picks his fill. 

Jealous-wild to be a sharer 

In the fruit she thinks the fairer, 
Plings by all for the swift gaining of her wish ; 

Not discerning in her blindness, 

How a tender Loving Kindness 
Hid the best things in her own rejected dish ! 



0, the world keeps Christmas Day 

In a queer, perpetual way ; 
Shouting always, ' ' What a great big boy am I ! ' 

Yet how many of the crowd 

Thus vociferating loud, 
And their honors or pretensions lifting high. 

Have really, '>nore than Jack, 

With their boldness or their knack, 
Had a finger in the making of the Pie ? 

ADELINE D..,T. WHITNEY. 



COMFORT. 

Who would care to pass his life away 

Of the Lotos-land a dreamful denizen, — 
Lotos-islands in a waveless bay. 

Sung by Alfred Tennyson ? 

Who would care to be a dull new-comer 

Far across the wild sea's wide abysses, • 
Where, about the earth's three thousandth sum- 
mer, 
Passed divine Ulysses ? 

Rather give me coffee, art, a book, 

From my windows a delicious sea-view, 
Southdown mutton, somebody to cook, — 
" Music ? " — I believe you. 

Strawberry icebergs in the summer time, — 
But of elm-wood many a massive splinter. 
Good ghost stories, and a classic rhyme. 
For the nights of winter. 

Now and then a friend and some Sauterne, 

Now and then a haunch of Highland venison. 
And for Lotos-land I '11 never yearn, 
Malgre Alfred Tennyson. 

Mortimer Collins. 



THE WOMEN FO'K.* 

0, SAIELY may I nie the day 

I fancied first the womenkind ; 
For aye sinsyne I ne'er can hae 

Ae quiet thought or peace o' mind ! 
They hae plagued my heart an' pleased my e'e, 

An' teased an' flattered me at will. 
But aye foi' a' their witcherye. 

The pawky things I lo'e them still. 

* The air of this song- is my own. It was first set to music by 
Heather, and most beautifully set too. It was afterwards set by 
Dewar, wliether with the same accouipaniments or not, I Iiave for- 
g^ot. It is my own favorite liuniorous song, wlien forced to sing by 
ladies against my will, which too frequently happens ; and, notwith- 
standing my wood-notes wild, it will never be smjg by any so well 
again. — THE AUTHOR. 



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the women fo'k ! the women Ib'k ! 

But they hae been the wreck o' ine ; 
weary fa' the women fo'k, 

For they winna let a body be ! 

I hae thought an' thought, but darena tell, 

I. 've studied them wi' a' my skill, 
1 've lo'd them better than mysell, 

I 've tried again to like them ill. 
Wha sairest strives, will sairest rue, 

To comprehend what nae man can ; 
When he has done what man can do, 

He '11 end at last where he began. 
the women fo'k, etc. 

That they hae gentle forms an' meet, 

A man wi' half a look may see ; ' 

An gracefu' airs, an' faces sweet. 

An' waving curls aboon the bree ; 
An' smiles as soft as the young rosebud. 

And een sae pawky, bright, an' rare. 
Wad lure the laverock frae the cludd, — 

But, laddie, seek to ken nae mair ! 
the women fo'k, etc. 

Even but this night nae farther gane. 

The date is neither lost nor lang, 

I tak ye witness ilka ane, 

How iell they fought, and fairly dang. 

Their point they 've carried right or wrang, 

Without a reason, rhyme, or law. 

An' forced a man to sing a sang. 

That ne'er could sing a verse ava. 

the women fo'k ! the women fo'k ! 

But they hae been the wreck o' me ; 

weary fa' the women fo'k. 

For they winna let a body be ! 

James Hogg. 
* 

WOMAN. 

When Eve brought ivoe to all mankind 

Old Adam called her wo-man ; 

But when she wooad with love so kind, 

He then pronounced her woo-man. 

But now, with folly and with pride, 

Their husbands' pockets trimming, 

• The women are so full of lohiins 

That men pronounce them loimmcn ! ■ 

anonvmous. 
— e — 

PAPER. 

A CONVERSATIONAL PLEASANTRY. 

Some wit of old — such wits of old there were. 
Whose hints sliowed meaning, whose allu.sions 

care — 
By one brave stroke to mark all human kind, 
Called clear, blank paper every infant mind ; 



Where still, as opening sense her dictates wrote, 
Fair virtue put a seal, or vice a blot. 

The thought was happy, pertinent, and true ; 
Methinks a genius might the plan pursue. 
I (can you pardon my presumption '() — 1, 
No wit, no genius, yet for once will try. 

Various the paper various wants produce, — 
The wants of fashion, elegance, and use. 
Men are as various ; and, if right I scan. 
Each sort of paper represents some man. 

Pray note the fop, half powder and half lace ; 
Nice, as a bandbox were his dwelling-place ; 
He 's the giU-pa,2)cr, which apart you store, 
And lock from vulgar hands in the 'scrutoire. 

..iechanics, servants, farmers, and so forth, 
Ai-e copy -paper, of inferior worth ; 
Less prized, more useful, for your desk decreed ; 
Free to all pens, and prompt at every need. 

The wretch whom avarice bids to pinch and spare. 
Starve, cheat, and pilfer, to enrich an heir, 
Is coarse brown paper, such as pedlers choose 
To wrap up wares, which better men will use. 

Take next the miser's contrast, who destroys 
Health, fame, and fortune in a round of joys ; 
Will any paper match him ? Yes, throughout ; 
He 's a true sinking-paper, past all doubt. 

The retail politician's anxious thought 

Deems this side always right, and that stark 

naught ; 
He foams with censure ; with applause he raves j 
A dupe to rumors, and a tool of knaves ; 
He '11 want no type, his weakness to proclaim, 
While such a thing a.s foolscap has a name. 

The hasty gentleman, whose blood runs high, 
Who picks a quarrel, if you .step awry, 
Who can't a jest, a hint, or look endure, — 
What is he ? — what ? Touck-pajier, to be sure. 

What are our poets, take them as they fall. 
Good, bad, rich, poor, much read, not read at all ? 
They and their works in the same class you '11 

find ; 
They are the mere waste-paper of mankind. 

Observe the maiden, innocently sweet ! 
She 's fair, white paper, an unsullied sheet ; 
On wliich the hap}iy man whom fate ordains 
May write his name, and take her for his pains. 

One instance more, and only one I '11 bring ; 
'T is the great man who scorns a little thing ; 



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Whose thoughts, whose deeds, whose maxims, 

are his own. 
Formed on the feelings of his heart alone, 
True, genuine, jw/al pcqie?- is his breast ; 
Of all the kinds most precious, purest, best. 

BENJAMIN Franklin. 



OLD GRIMES. 

Old Grimes is dead, that good old man, 
We ne'er shall see him more ; 

He used to wear a long black coat, 
All buttoned down before. 

His heart was open as the day, 

His feelings all were true ; 
His hair was some inclined to gray, — 

He wore it in a queue. 

Whene'er he heard the voice of pain, 
His breast with pity burned ; 

The large round head upon his cane 
From ivory was tui-ned. 

Kind words he ever had for all ; 

He knew no base design ; 
His eyes were dark and rather small. 

His nose was aquiline. 

He lived at peace with all mankind. 

In friendship he was true ; 
His coat had pocket-holes behind. 

His pantaloons were blue. 

Unharmed, the sin which earth pollutes 

He passed securely o'er, — 
And never wore a pair of boots 

For thirty years or more. 

But good Old Grimes is now at rest. 
Nor fears misfortune's frown ; 

He wore a double-breasted vest, — 
The stripes ran up and down. 

He modest merit sought to find. 

And pay it its desert ; 
He had no malice in his mind, 

No ruffles on his shirt. 

His neighbors he did not abuse, — 

Was sociable and gay ; 
He wore large buckles on his shoes, 

And changed them every day. 

His knowledge, hid from public gaze. 

He did not bring to view. 
Nor make a noise, town-meeting days. 

As many people do. 



His worldly goods he never threw 

In trust to fortune's chances, 
But lived (as all his brothers do) 

In easy circumstances. 

Thus undisturbed by anxious cares 

His peaceful moments ran ; 
And everybody said he was 

A fine old gentleman. 

Albert G. Greene. 



TJIE HEIGHT OF THE RIDICULOUS. 

I WROTE some lines once on a time 

In wondrous merry mood. 
And thought, as usual, men would say 

They were exceeding good. 

They were so queer, so very queer, 

I laughed as I would die ; 
Albeit, in the general way, 

A sober man am I. 

I called my servant, and he came ; 

How kind it was of him, 
To mind a slender man like me, 

He of the mighty limb ! 

" These to the printer," I exclaimed. 

And, in my humorous waj', 
I added (as a trifling jest), 

" There '11 be the devil to pay." 

He took the paper, and I watched. 

And saw him peep within ; 
At the first line he read, his face 

Was all upon the grin. 

He read the next ; the grin grew broad, 

And shot from ear to ear ; 
He read the third ; a chuckling noise 

I now began to hear. 

The fourth ; he broke into a I'oar ; 

The fifth ; his waistband sjdit ; 
The sixth ; he burst five buttons off. 

And tumbled in a fit. 

Ten days and nights, witli sleepless eye, 
I watched that wretched man, 

And since, I never dare to write 
As funny as I can. 

Oliver Wendell Holmes. 



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THE ONE-HOSS SHAY ; 

OK, THE deacon's MASTEPa'IECE. 
A LOGICAL STOKY. 

Have yon heard of the wonderful one-hoss shay, 

Tliat was built in such a logical way 

It ran a hundred years to a day, 

And then of a sudden, it — ah, but stay, 

I '11 tell you what happened without delay. 

Scaring the parson into fits. 

Frightening people out of their wits, — 

Have you ever heard of that, I say ? 

Seventeen hundred and fifty-five. 
Georgius Secundas was then alive, — 
Snuify old drone from the German hive. 
That was the year when Lisbon-town 
Saw the earth open and gulp her down, 
And Braddock's army was done so brown, 
Left without a scalp to its crown. 
It was on the terrible Earthquake-day 
That the Deacon finished the one-hoss shay. 

Now in building of chaises, I tell you what, 

There is always somewhere a weakest spot, — 

In hub, tire, felloe, in spring or thill. 

In panel, or crossbar, or floor, or sill, 

In screw, bolt, thoroughbrace, — lurking still. 

Find it somewhere you must and will, — 

Above or below, or within or without, — 

And that 's the reason, beyond a doubt, 

A chaise breaks down, but does n't wear out. 

But the Deacon swore (as Deacons do, 
With an "I dew vum," or an " I tell yeou,") 
He would build one shay to beat the taown 
'n' the keounty 'n' all the kentry raoun' ; 
It should be so built that it could n break daown ; 
— " Fur," said the Deacon, "'t's mighty plain 
Thut the weakes' place nnis' stan' the strain ; 
'n' the way t' fix it, uz I maintain. 

Is only jest 
T' make that place uz strong uz the rest." 

So the Deacon inquired of the village folk 

Where he could find the strongest oak. 

That could n't be split nor bent nor broke, — 

That was for spokes and floor and sills ; 

He sent for lancewood to make the thills ; 

The crossbars wei-e ash, from the straightest trees ; 

The panels of whitewood, that cuts like cheese. 

But lasts like iron for things like these ; 

The hubs of logs from the "Settler's ellum," — 

Last of its timbiM-, — they could n't sell 'em, 

Never an axe had seen their chips. 

And the wedges flew from between their lips. 

Their blunt ends frizzled like celery-tips ; 



Step and prop-iron, bolt and screw, 

Spring, tire, axle, and linchpin too. 

Steel of the finest, bright and blue ; 

Thoroughbrace bison-skin, thick and wide ; 

Boot, top, dasher, from tough old hide 

Found in the pit when the tanner died. 

That was the way he " put her through." 

" There ! " said the Deacon, " naow she '11 dew ! " 

Do ! I tell you, I rather guess 

She was a wonder, and nothing less ! 

Colts grew horses, beards turned gray. 

Deacon and deaconess dropped awaj"^. 

Children and grandchildren, — where were they ? 

But there stood the stout old one-hoss shay 

As fresh as on Lisbon-earthquake-day ! 

Eighteen hundred ; — it came and found 
The Deacon's masterpiece strong and sound. 
Eighteen hundred increased by ten ; — - 
" Hahnsum kerridge " they called it then. 
Eighteen hundred and twenty came ; — 
Running as usual ; much the same. 
Thirty and forty at last arrive, 
And then came fifty, and FiFTY-nvE. 

Little of all we value here 

Wakes on the morn of its hundredth year 

Without both feeling and looking queer. 

In fact, there 's nothing that keeps its youth, 

So far as I know, but a tree and truth. 

(This is a moral that runs at large ; 

Take it. — You 're welcome. — No extra charge. ) 

First of Novembek, — the Earthquake-day. — 

There are traces of age in the one-hoss shay, 

A general flavor of mild decay. 

But nothing local as one may say. 

There could n't be, — for the Deacon's art 

Had made it so like iii every pait 

That there was n't a chance for one to start. 

For the wheels were just as strong as the thills, 

And the floor was just as strong as the sills. 

And the panels just as strong as the flooi', 

And the whippletree neither less nor more, 

And the back-crossbar as strong as the fore, 

And spring and axle and hub encore. 

And yet, as a tvhole, it is past a doubt 

In another hour it will be worn out ! 

First of November, 'Fifty-five ! 

This morning the parson takes a drive. 

Now, small boys, get out of the way ! 

Here comes the wonderful one-hoss shay, 

Drawn by a rat-tailed, ewe-necked bay. 

" Huddup ! " said the parson. — Off went they. 

The parson was working his Sunday's text, — 

Had got to fifthly, and stopped perplexed 



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At what the— Moses — was coming next. 
All at once the horse stood still, 
Close by the meet'n' -house on the hill. 

— First a shiver, and then a thrill, 
Then something decidedly like a spill, — 
And the parson was sitting upon a rock, 

At half past nine by the meet'n'-house clock, — 
Just the hour of the Earthquake shock ! 

— What do you think the parson found, 
When he got up and stared around ? 
The poor old chaise in a heap or mound, 
As if it had been to the mill and ground ! 
You see, of course, if you 're not a dunce, 
How it went to pieces all at once, — 

All at once, and nothing lirst, — 
Just as bubbles do when they burst. 

End of the wonderful one-hoss shay. 
Logic is logic. That 's all I say. 

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 



RUDOLPH THE HEADSMAN. 

Rudolph, professor of the headsman's trade, 
Alike was famous for his arm and blade. 
One daj;^ a prisoner Justice had to kill 
Knelt at the block to test the artist's skill. 
Bare-armed, swart-visaged, gaunt, and shaggy- 
browed, 
Rudolph the headsman rose above the crowd. 
His falchion lightened with a sudden gleam, 
As the pike's armor Hashes in the stream. 
He sheathed his blade ; he turned as if to go ; 
The victim knelt, still waiting for the How. 
" Why strikest not ? Perform thy murderous 

act," 
The prisoner said. (His voice was slightly 

cracked. ) 
" Friend, 1 have struck," the artist straight re- 
plied ; 
" Wait but one moment, and yourself decide." 
He held his snuff-box, — "Now then, if you 

please ! " 
The prisoner sniffed, and, with a crashing sneeze, 
Off his head tumbled, bowled along the floor, 
Bounced down the steps ; — the prisoner said no 

more ! 

Oliver Wendell holmes. 



THE BOYS. 

Has there any old fellow got mixed with the 

l.ioys ? 
If there has, take him out, without making a 

noise. 



Hang the Almanac's cheat and the Catalogue's 

spite ! 
Old Time is a liar ! We 're twenty to-night ! 

We 're twenty ! We 're twenty ! Who says we 
are more ? 

He 's tipsy, — young jackanapes ! — show him the 
door ! 

" Gray temples at twenty ? " — Yes ! white, if we 
please ; 

Where the snow-flakes fall thickest there 's noth- 
ing can freeze ! 

Was it snowing I spoke of ? Excuse the mis- 
take ! 

Look close, — you will see not a sign of a flake ! 

We want some new garlands for those we have 
shed, — 

And these are white roses in place of the red. 

We 've a trick, we yoirng fellows, you may have 

been told. 
Of talking (in public) as if we were old : 
That boy we call "Doctor," and this we call 

" Judge ; " — 
It 's a neat little fiction, — of course it 's all 

fudge. 

That fellow's the "Speaker," — the one on the 
right ; 

" Mr. Mayor," my young one, how are you to- 
night ? 

That 's our " Member of Congress," we say when 
we chaff ; 

There 's the " Reverend " What 's Ms name ? — 
don't make me laugh ! 

That boy with the grave mathematical look 
Made believe he had written a wonderful book. 
And the Royal Society thought it was true ! 
So they chose him right in, - — a good joke it was 
too ! 

There 's a boy, we pretend, with a three-decker 

brain, 
That could harness a team with a logical chain ; 
W^hen he spoke for our manhood in syllabled 

fire. 
We called him "The Justice," but now he's 

"The Squire." 

And there 's a nice youngster of excellent jjith, — 
Fate tried to conceal him bj' naming him Smiths 
But he shouted a song for the brave and the 

free, — 
Just read on his medal, "My country," "of 

thee ! " 



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You hear that boy laughing ? — You think he's 

all fun ; 
But the angels laugh, too, at the good he has 

done ; 
The children laugh loud as they troop to his call, 
And the poor man that knows him laughs loudest 

of all ! 

Yes, we 're boys, — always playing with tongue 

or with pen ; 
And I sometimes have asked, Shall we ever be 

men ? 
Shall we always be youthful, and laughing, and 

gay. 
Till the last dear companion drop smiling away ? 

Then here's to our boyhood, its gold and its 

gray ! 
The stars of its winter, the dews of its May ! 
And when we have done with our life-lasting 

toys. 
Dear Father, take care of thy children. The 

Boys. 

Oliver Wendell Holmes. 



THE OLD MAN DREAMS. 

FOR one hour of youthful joy ! 
Give back my twentieth spring ! 

1 'd rather laugh a bright-haired hoy 

Than reign a gray-beard king ! 

Off with the spoils of wrinkled age ! 

Away with learning's crown ! 
Tear out life's wisdom-written page, 

And dash its trophies down ! 

One moment let my life-blood stream 
From boyhood's fount of flame ! 

Give me one giddy, reeling dream 
Of life all love and fame ! 

My listening angel heard the prayer, 
And, calmly smiling, said, 

" If I but touch thy silvered hair, 
Thy hasty wish hath sped. 

" Biit is there nothing in thy track 

To bid thee fondly stay, 
While the swift seasons hurry back 

To find the wished-for day ? " 

Ah ! truest soul of womankind ! 

Without thee what were life ? 
One bliss I cannot leave behind : 

I '11 take — • my — precious — wife ! 



The angel took a sapphire pen 

And wrote in rainbow dew, 
" The man would be a boy again. 

And be a husband, too ! " 

" And is there nothing yet unsaid 

Before the change appears ? 
Remember, all their gifts have fled 

With those dissolving years ! " 

" Why, yes ; for memory would recall 

My fond paternal joys ; 
I could not bear to leave them all : 

I '11 take — my— girl — and — boys ! " 

The smiling angel dropped his pen — 

" Why, this will never do ; 
The man would be a boy again, 

And be a father, too ! " 

And so I laughed — my laughter woke 
The household with its noise — 

And wrote my dream, when morning broke. 
To please the gray-haired boys. 

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 



WHITTLING. 

A "NATIONAL PORTRAIT." 

The Yankee boy, before he 's sent to school. 

Well knows the mysteries of that magic tool, 

The pocket-knife. To that his wistful eye 

Turns, while he hears his mother's lullaby ; 

His hoarded cents he gladly gives to get it, 

Then leaves no stone unturned till he can whet it ; 

And in the education of the lad 

No little part that implement hath had. 

His pocket-knife to the young whittler brings 

A growing knowledge of material things. 

Projectiles, music, and the sculptor's art. 

His chestnut whistle and his shingle dart. 

His elder popgun with its hickory rod. 

Its sharp explosion and rebounding wad, 

His cornstalk fiddle, and the deeper tone 

That murmurs from his pumpkin-stalk trombone. 

Conspire to teach the boy. To these succeed 

His bow, his arrow of a feathered seed. 

His windmill, raised the passing breeze to win. 

His water-wheel, that turns u]:on a pin ; 

Or, if his father lives upon the shore. 

You'll see his ship, "beam ends upon the floor," 

Full rigged with raking masts, and timbers 

stanch. 
And waiting near the wash-tub for a launch. 



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Thus by his genius and his jack-knife driven, 
Erelong he '11 solve you any problem given ; 
Make any gimcrack musical or mute, 
A plough, a couch, an organ or a flute ; 
Make you a locomotive or a clock, 
Cut a canal, or build a floating-dock, 
Or lead forth Beauty from a marble block ; — 
Make anything in short, for sea or shore, 
From a child's rattle to a seventy-four ; — 
Make it, said I ? — Ay, when he undertakes it, 
He '11 make the thing and the machine that 
makes it. 

And when the thing is made, — whether it be 
To move on earth, in air, or on the sta ; 
Whether on water, o'er the waves to glide, 
Or upon land to roll, revolve, or slide ; 
Whether to whirl or jar, to strike or ring, 
Whether it be a piston or a spring, 
Wheel, pulley, tube sonorous, wood or brass, 
The thing designed shall surely come to pass ; 
For, when his hand 's upon it, you may know 
That there 's go in it, and he '11 make it go. 

JOHN PlERPONT. 



RAILROAD RHYME. 

SiNCJiNG through the forests, 

Rattling over ridges ; 
Shooting under arches. 

Rumbling over bridges ; 
Whizzing through the mountains, 

Buzzing o'er the vale, - — 
Bless me ! this is pleasant, 

Riding on the rail ! 

Men of different " stations " 

In the eye of fame. 
Here are very quickly 

Coming to the same ; 
High and lowly people, 

Birds of every feather, 
On a common level. 

Travelling together. 

Gentleman in shorts. 

Looming very tall ; 
Gentleman at large 

Talking very small ; 
Gentleman in tights, 

With a loose-ish mien ; 
Gentleman in gray. 

Looking rather green ; 

Gentleman quite old. 
Asking for the news ; 



Gentleman in black, 

In a fit of blues ; 
Gentleman in claret, 

Sober as a vicar ; 
Gentleman in tweed. 

Dreadfully in liquor ! 

Stranger on the right 

Looking very sunny. 
Obviously reading 

Something rather funny. 
Now the smiles are thicker, - 

Wonder what they mean ! 
Faith, he 's got the Knicker- 

Bocker Magazine ! 

Stranger on the left 

Closing up his peepers ; 
Now he snores amain. 

Like the Seven Sleepers ; 
At his feet a volume 

Gives the explanation. 
How the man grew stupid 

From "Association" ! 

Ancient maiden lady 

Anxiously remarks, 
That there must be peril 

'Mong so many sparks ; 
Roguish-looking fellow. 

Turning to the stranger, 
Says it 's his opinion 

S/ie is out of danger ! 

Woman with her baby. 

Sitting vis-a-vis ; 
Baby keeps a-squalling. 

Woman looks at me ; 
Asks about the distance. 

Says it 's tiresome talking. 
Noises of the cars 

Are so very shocking ! 

Market-woman, careful 

Of the precious casket. 
Knowing eggs are eggs. 

Tightly holds her basket ; 
Feeling that a smash. 

If it came, would surely 
Send her eggs to pot. 

Rather prematurely. 

Singing through the forests, 
Rattling over ridges ; 

Shooting under arches. 
Rumbling over bridges ; 



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Whizzing through the mountains, 

Buzzing o'er the vale, — 
Bless me ! this is pleasant, 

Riding on the rail ! 

JOHN GODFREY SAXE. 



WOMAN'S WILL. 



AN EPIGRAM. 



Men, dying, make their wills, but wives 

Escape a work so sad ; 
Why should they make what all their lives 

The gentle dames have had ? 

JOHN GODFREY SAXE. 



"NOTHING TO WEAR." 



Miss Flora McFlimsey, of Madison Square, 
Has made three separate journeys to Paris, 
And her father assures me, each time she was 

there, 
Tliat she and her friend Mrs. Harris 
(Not the lady whose name is so famous in his- 

But plain Mrs. H., without romance or mystery) 
Spent six consecutive weeks without stopping 
In one continuous round of shopping, — 
Shopping alone, and shopping together, 
At all hours of the day, and in all sorts ot 

weather, — 
For all manner of things that a woman can put 
On the crown of her head or the sole of her loot. 
Or wrap round her shoulders, or fit round her 

waist, 

Or that can be sewed on, or pinned on, or laced, 
Or tied on with a string, or stitched on with a 

bow, 
In front or behind, above or below ; 
For bonnets, mantillas, capes, collars, and shawls; I 
Dresses for breakfasts and duiners and balls ; 
Dresses to sit in and stand in and walk in ; 
Dresses to dance in and flirt in and talk in ; 
Dresses in which to do nothing at all ; 
Dresses for winter, spring, summer, and fall ; 
All of them different in color and pattern. 
Silk, muslin, and lace, crape, velvet, and satin. 
Brocade, and broadcloth, and other material. 
Quite as expensive and much more ethereal ; 
In short, for all things that could ever be thought 

of, 
Or milliner, viodisf^, or tradesmen be bought of. 
From ten-thousand-francs robes to twenty- 
sous frills ; 



In all quarters of Paris, and to every store 
While McFlimsey in vain stormed, scolded, and 
swore. 
They footed the streets, and he footed the bills. 



The last trip, their goods shipped by the steamer 

Arago, 
Formed, McFlimsey declares, the bulk of her 

cargo. 
Not to mention a quantity kept from the rest, 
Sufficient to fill the largest-sized chest. 
Which did not appear on the ship's manifest, 
But for which the ladies themselves manifested 
Such particular interest, that they invested 
Their own proper persons in layers and rows 
Of muslins, embroideries, workedunder-clothes. 
Gloves, handkerchiefs, scarfs, and such trifles as 

those ; 
Then, wrapped in great shawls, like Circassian 

beauties, . 

Gave good-by to the ship, and go-hy to the duties. 
Her relations at home all marvelled, no doubt, 
Miss Flora had grown so enormously stout 
For an actual belle and a possible bride ; 
But the miracle ceased when she turned mside 
out, 
And the truth came to light, and the dry-goods 

beside. 
Which, in spite of collector and custom-house 

sentry. 
Had entered the port without any entry. 
And yet, though scarce three months have passed 

since the day 
This merchandise went, on twelve carts, up 

Broadway, 
This same Miss McFlimsey, of Madison Square, 
The last time we met was in utter despair, 
Because she had nothing whatever to wear ! 



Nothing to wear ! Now, as this is a true ditty, 
I do not assert — this, you know, is between 
us — 

That she 's in a state of absolute nudity, 

Like Powers' Greek Slave, or the Medici Venus; 

But I do mean to say, I have heard her declare. 
When, at the same moment, she had on a dress 
Which cosb five hundred dollars, and not a cent 

And jewelry worth ten times more, I should 

guess, 
That she had not a thing in the wide world to 

wear ! 
I should mention just here, that out of Miss 

Flora's 
Two hundred and fifty or sixty adorers, 
I had just been selected as he who should throw all 
The rest in the shade, by the gracious bestowal 



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On myself, after twenty or thirty rejections, 

Of those fossil remains which she called her 

"affections," 
And that rather decayed, but well-known work 

of art, 
Which Miss Flora persisted in styling "her 

heart." 
So we were engaged. Our troth had been plighted, 
Not by moonbeam or starbeam, by fountain or 

grove. 
But in a front parlor, most brilliantly lighted, 
Beneath the gas-fixtures we whispered our love. 
Without any romance or raptures or sighs, 
Without any tears in Miss Flora's blue eyes. 
Or blushes, or transports, or such silly actions. 
It was one of the quietest business transactions, 
With a very small sprinkling of sentiment, if any, 
And a very large diamoud imported by Tiffany. 
On her virginal lips while I printed a kiss, 
She exclaimed, as a sort of parenthesis, 
And by way of putting me quite at my ease, 
" You know, I 'm to polka as much as I please. 
And flirt when I like, — now, stop, don't you 

speak, — ■ 
And you must not come here more than twice in 

the week. 
Or talk to me either at party or ball. 
But always be ready to come when I call ; 
So don't prose to me about duty and stuff. 
If we don't break this off, there will be time 

enough 
For that sort of thing ; but the bargain must be 
That, as long as I choose, I am perfectly free. 
For this is a sort of engagement, you see, 
Which is binding on you but not binding on me." 

Well, having thus wooed Miss McFlirasey and 

gained her, 
With the silks, crinolines, and hoops that con- 
tained her, 
I had, as I thought, a contingent remainder 
At least in the property, and the best right 
To appear as its escort by day and by night ; 
And it being the week of the Stuckups' grand 
ball, — 
Their cards had been out a fortnight or so, 
And set all the Avenue on the tiptoe, — 
I considered it only my duty to call, 

And see if Miss Flora intended to go. 
I found her, — as ladies are apt to be found, 
When the time intervening between the first 

sound 
Of the bell and the visitor's entry is shorter 
Than usual, — I found — I won't say, I caught 

her, — 
Intent on the pier-glass, undoubtedly meaning 
To see if perhaps it did n't need cleaning. 



She turned as I entered, — " Why, Harry, you 
sinner, 

I thought that you went to the Flashers' to din- 
ner ! " 

"So I did," I replied ; "but the dinner is swal- 
lowed 
And digested, I trust, for 't is now nine and 
more. 

So being relieved from that duty, I followed 
Inclination, which led me, you see, to your 
door ; 

And now will your ladyship so condescend 

As just to inform me if you intend 

Your beauty and graces and presence to lend 

(All of which, when I own, I hope no one will 
borrow) 

To the Stuckups, whose party, you know, is to- 
morrow ? " 

The fair Flora looked up with a pitiful air. 
And ansv/ered quite promptly, ' ' Why, Harry, 

moil cher, 
I should like above all things to go with you 

there ; 
But really and truly — I 've nothing to wear." 
" Nothing to wear ! go just as you are ; 
Wear the dress you have on, and you '11 be by 

far, 
I engage, the most bright and particular star 

On the Stuckup horizon " — I stopped — for 
her eye. 
Notwithstanding this delicate onset of flattery, 
Opened on me at once a most terrible battery 

Of scorn and amazement. She made no reply, 
But gave a slight turn to the end of her nose 

(That pure Grecian feature), as much as to say, 
' ' How absurd that any sane man should suppose 
That a lady would go to a ball in the clothes, 

No matter how fine, that she wears every day ! '' 

So I ventured again : " Wear your crimson bro- 
cade " 
(Second turn-up of nose) — " That 's too dark by 

a shade." 
" Your blue silk " — "That 's too heavy. " " Your 

pink" — "That's too light." 
"Wear tulle over satin" — "I can't endure 

white." 
"Your rose-colored, then, the best of the 

batch" — 
"I have n't a thread of point lace to match." 
" Your brown moire antique " — " Yes, and look 

like a Quaker." 
"The pearl-colored" — "I would, but that 

plaguy dressmaker 
Has had it a week." " Then that exquisite lilac 
In which you would melt the heart of a Shylock," 



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(Here the nose took again the same elevation) — 
" I would n't wear that for the whole of creation." 
" Why not ? It's my fancy, there 's nothing 
could strike it 
As more comma il fcmt" — "Yes, but, dear me ! 
that lean 
Sophronia Stuckup has got one just like it, 
And I won't appear dressed like a chit of sixteen." 
"Then that splendid purple, that sweet Maza- 
rine, 
That superb ^OMZif d'aiguille, that imperial green, 
That zephyr-like tarlatan, that vich grenadine " — 
" Not one of all which is fit to be seen," 
Said the lady, becoming excited and flushed. 
" Then wear," I exclaimed, in a tone which quite 
crushed 
Opposition, " that goi-geous toilette which you 
sported 
In Paris last spring, at the grand presentation, 
When you quite turned the head of the head of 
the nation ; 
And by all tlie grand court were so very much 

courted." 
The end of the nose was portentously tipped up, 
And both the bright eyes shot forth indignation. 
As she burst upon me with the fierce exclamation, 
■' ' I have worn it three times at the least calcula- 
tion. 
And that and most of my dresses are ripped 
up ! " 
Here I rijyped out something, perhaps rather rash. 
Quite innocent, though ; but, to use an ex- 
pression 
More striking than classic, it "settled my hash," 
And proved very soon the last act of our ses- 
sion. 
" Fiddlesticks, is it, sir ? I wonder the ceiling 
Does n't fall down and crush you — oh ! you men 

have no feeling ; 
You selfish, unnatural, illiberal creatures. 
Who set yourselves up as patterns and preachers, 
Your silly pretence, — why, what a mere guess 

it is! 
Pray, what do you know of a woman's necessities ? 
I have told you and showed you I 've nothing to 

wear. 
And it 's perfectly plain you not only don't care. 
But you do not believe me " (here the nose went 

still higher), 
" 1 suppose, if you dared, you would call me a 

liar. 
Our engagement is ended, sir — yes, on the spot ; 
You 're a brute, and a monster, and — I don't 

know what." 
I mildly suggested the words — Hottentot, 
Pickpocket, and cannibal, Tartar, and thief, 
As gentle expletives which might give relief ; 



But this only proved as a spark to the powder, 
And the storm I had raised came faster and 

louder ; 
It blew and it rained, thundei'ed, lightened, and 

hailed 
Interjections, verbs, jpronouns, till language quite 

failed 
To express the abusive, and then its arrears 
Were brought up all at once by a torrent of tears, 
And my last faint, despairing attempt at an obs- 
Ervation was lost in a tempest of sobs. 

Well, I felt for the lady, and felt for my liat, 

■too. 
Improvised on the crown of the latter a tattoo, 
In lieu of expressing the feelings which lay 
Quite too deep for words, as Wordsworth would 

say ; 
Then, without going through the form of a bow, 
Found myself in the entry •— I hardly knew 

how, — 
On doorstep and sidewalk, past lamp-post and 

square, 
At home and up stairs, in my own easy-chair ; 

Poked my feet into slippers, my fire into blaze, 
And said to myself, as I lit my cigar. 
Supposing a man had the wealth of the Czar 

Of the Russias to boot, for the rest of his days, 
On the whole, do you think he would have much 

to spare. 
If he married a woman with nothing to wear ? 

Since that night, taking pains that it should not 

be bruited 
Abroad in society, I 've instituted 
A course of inquir}', extensive and thorough, 
On this vital subject, and find, to my horror. 
That the fair Flora's case is by no means sur- 
prising. 
But that there exists the greatest distress 
In our female community, solely arising 

From this unsupplied destitution of dress, 
Whose unfortunate victims are filling the air 
With the pitiful wail of " Nothing to wear." 
Researches in some of the " Upper Ten " districts 
Reveal the most painful and startling statistics, 
Of which let me mention only a few : 
In one single house, on Fifth Avenue, 
Three young ladies were found, all below twenty- 
two. 
Who have been three whole weeks without any- 
thing new 
In the way of flounced silks, and thus left in the 

lurch 
Are unable to go to ball, concert, or church. 
In another large mansion, near the same place, 
Was found a deplorable, heartrending case 



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Of entire destitution of Brussels point lace. 

In a neighboring block there was found, in three 

calls, 
Total want, long continued, of camel's-hair 

shawls ; 
And a suffering family, whose case exhibits 
The most pressing need of real ermine tippets ; 
One deserving young lady almost unable 
To survive for the want of a new Russian sable ; 
Another confined to the house, when it 's windier 
Than usual, because her shawl isn't India. 
Still another, whose tortures have been most 

terrific 
Ever since the sad loss of the steamer Pacific, 
In which were engulfed, not friend or relation 
(For whose fate she perhaps might have found 

consolation, 
Or borne it, at least, with serene resignation). 
But the choicest assortment of French sleeves 

and eoUai'S 
Ever sent out from Paris, worth thousands of 

dollars. 
And all as to style most reclicrchi and rare. 
The want of which leaves her with nothing to 

wear, 
And renders her life so drear and dyspeptic 
That she 's quite a recluse, and almost a scep- 
tic ; 
For she touchingly says that this sort of grief 
Cannot find in Religion the slightest relief. 
And Philosophy has not a maxim to spare 
For the victim of such overwh(dming despair. 
But the saddest by far of all these sad features 
Is the cruelty practised upon the poor creatures 
By husbands and fathers, real Bluebeards and 

Tinions, 
"Who resist the most touching appeals made for 

diamonds 
By their wives and their daughters, and leave 

them for days 
Unsupplied with new jewelry, fans, or bouquets, 
Even laugh at their miseries whenever they have 

a chance, 
And deride their demands as useless extrava- 
gance ; 
One case of a bride was brought to my view. 
Too sad for belief, but, alas ! 't was too true. 
Whose husband refused, as savage as Charon, 
To permit her to take more than ten trunks to 

Sharon. 
The consequence was, that when .she got there, 
At the end of three weeks she had nothing to 

wear. 
And when she proposed to finish the season 
At Newport, the monster refused out and out. 
For his infamous conduct alleging no reason, 
Except that the waters were good for his gout. 



Such treatment as this was too shocking, of course, 
And proceedings are now going on for divorce. 

But why harrow the feelings by lifting the cur- 
tain 
From these scenes of woe ? Enough, it is certain, 
Has here been disclosed to stir up the pity 
Of eveiy benevolent heart in the city. 
And spur up Humanity into a canter 
To rush and relieve these sad cases instanter. 
Won't somebody, moved by this touching de- 
scription. 
Come forward to-morrow and head a subscription ? 
Won't some kind philanthropist, seeing that 

aid is 
So needed at once "by these indigent ladies. 
Take charge of the matter ? Or won't Peter 

Cooper 
The corner-stone lay of some splendid super- 
Structure, like that which to-day links his name 
In the Union unending of honor and fame ; 
And found a new charity just for the care 
Of these unhappj^ women with nothing to wear, 
Which, in view of the cash which would daily 

be claimed. 
The Laying-out Hospital well might be named ? 
Won't Stewart, or some of our dry-goods im- 
porters. 
Take a contract for clothing our wives and our 

daughters ? 
Or, to furnish the cash to supply these distresses, 
And life's pathway strew with shawls, collars, 

and dresses, 
Ere the want of them makes it much rougher and 

thornier. 
Won't some one discover a new California ? 

ladies, dear ladies, the next sunny day 
Please trundle your hoops just out of Broadway, 
From its whirl and its bustle, its fashion and 

pride, 
And temples of trade which tower on each side. 
To the alleys and lanes, where Misfortune and 

Guilt 
Their children have gathered, their city have 

built ; 
Where Hunger and Vice, like twin beasts of prey, 
Have hunted their victims to gloom and de- 
spair ; 
Raise the rich, dainty dress, and the fine broi- 

dered skirt. 
Pick your delicate way through dampness and 

dirt. 
Grope through the dark dens, climb the 

rickety stair 
To the garret, where wretches, the young and 

the old. 



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Half starved and half naked, lie crouched from 

the cold. 
See those skeleton limbs, those frost-bitten feet, 
All bleeding and braised by the stones of the 

street ; 
Hear the sharp cry of childhood, the deep groans 

that swell 
From the poor dying creature who writhes on 

the floor. 
Hear the curses that sound like the echoes of 

Hell, 
As you sicken and shudder and fly from the 

door ; 
Then home to your wardrobes, and say, if you 

dare, — ■ 
Spoiled children of Fashion, — you 've nothing to 

wear ! 

And 0, if perchance there should be a sphere 
"Where all is made right which so pi;zzles us 

here, 
Where the glare and the glitter and tinsel of Time 
Fade and die in the light of that region sublime. 
Where the soul, disenchanted of flesh and of 

sense. 
Unscreened by its trappings and shows and 

pretence, 

Must be clothed for the life and the service above. 

With purity, truth, faith, meekness, and love ; 

daughters of Earth ! foolish virgins, beware ! 

Lest in that upper realm you have nothing to 

wear ! 

William Allen Butler. 



THE PEOUD MISS MACBRIDE. 

A LEGEND OF GOTHAM. 

0, TERRIBLY proud was Miss MacBride, 
The verj' personification of pride, 
As she minced along in fashion'.s tide, 
Adown Broadway — on the proper side ■ — 

When the golden sun was setting ; 
There was pride in the head she carried so high, 
Pride in her lip, and pride in her eye, 
And a world of pride in the very sigh 

That her stately bosom was fretting ! 

0, terribly proud was Miss MacBride, 
Proud of her beauty, and proud of her pride, 
And proud of fifty matters beside — 

That would n't have borne dissection ; 
Proud of her wit, and proud of her walk. 
Proud of her teeth, and proud of her talk, 
Proud of "knowing cheese from chalk," 

<^n a very slight inspection ! 



Proud abroad, and proud at home, 
Proud wherever she chanced to come — 
When she was glad, and when she was glum ; 

Proud as the head of a Saracen 
Over the door of a tippling-shop ! — 
Proud as a duchess, proud as a fop, 
"Proud as a boy with a brand-new top,'' 

Proud beyond comparison ! 

It seems a singular thing to say, 
But her very senses led her astray 

Eespecting all humility ; 
In sooth, her dull auricular drum 
Could find in humble only a "hum," 
And heard no sound of " gentle " come. 

In talking about gentility. 

What loicly meant she did n't know. 

For she always avoided " everything low," 

With care the most punctilious ; 
And, queerer still, the audible sound 
Of ".suiier-silly" she never had found 

In the adjective supercilious ! 

The meaning of meek she never knew. 
But imagined the phrase had something to do 
With " Moses," a peddling German Jew, 
Who, like all hawkers, the country through, 

Was " a person of no position ; " 
And it seemed to her exceedingly plain. 
If the word was really known to pertain 
To a vulgar German, it was n't germane 

To a lady of high condition ! 

Even her graces — not her grace — ■ 
For that was in the " vocative case " — 
Chilled with the touch of her icy face, 

Sat very stiffly upon her ! 
She never confessed a favor aloud. 
Like one of the simple, common crowd — 
But coldly smiled, and faintly bowed. 
As who should say, " You do me proud, 

And do yourself an honor ! " 

And yet the pride of Miss MacBride, 
Although it had fifty hobbies to ride, 

Had really no foundation ; 
But, like the fabrics that gossips devist? — 
Those single stories that often arise 
And grow till thej^ reach a four-story size — 

Was merely a fancy creation ! 

Her birth, indeed, was uncommonly high — 
For Miss MacBride first opened her eye 
Through a skylight dim, on the light of the sky ; 



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But pviile is a curious passion — 
And in talking about her wealth and worth, 
She always forgot to mention her birth 

To people of rank and fashion ! 

Of all the notable things on earth, 
The queerest one is pride of birth 

Among our " fierce democracie ! " 
A bridge across a hundred years, 
Without a prop to save it from sneers, — 
Not even a couple of rotten 2?cers, — 
A thing for laughter, fleers, and jeers. 

Is American aristocracy ! 

English and Irish, French and Spanish, 
German, Italian, Dutch and Danish, 
Crossing their veins until they vanish 

In one conglomeration ! 
So subtle a tangle of blood, indeed, 
No Heraldry Harvey will ever succeed 

In finding the circulation. 

Depend upon it, my snobbish friend. 
Your family thread you can't ascend. 
Without good reason to apprehend 
You may find it waxed, at the farther end. 

By some plebeian vocation ! 
Or, worse than that, your boasted line 
May end in a loop of stronger twine. 

That plagued some worthy relation ! 

But Miss MacBride had something beside 
Her lofty birth to nourish her pride — 
For rich was the old paternal MacBride, 

According to public rumor ; 
And he lived "up town," in a splendid square. 
And kept his daughter on dainty fare, 
And gave her gems that were rich and rare, 
And the finest rings and things to wear. 

And feathers enough to plume her. 

A thriving tailor begged her hand, 

But she gave "the fellow " to understand, 

By a violent manual action, 
She perfectly scorned the best of his clan. 
And reckoned the ninth of any man 

An exceedingly vulgar fraction ! 

Another, whose sign was a golden boot. 
Was mortified with a bootless suit. 

In a way that was quite appalling ; 
For, though a regular sittor by trade, 
He wasn't a suitor to suit the maid, 
Who cut him off with a saw — and bade 

" The cobbler keep to his calling ! " 



A rich tobacconist comes and sues, 
And, thinking the lady would scarce refuse 
A man of his wealth, and liberal views. 
Began, at once, with ' ' If you choose — 

And could you really love him — " 
But the lady spoiled his speech in a huff. 
With an answer rough and ready enough, 
To let him know she was up to snuff, 

And altogether above him ! 

A young attorney, of winning grace, 
Was scarce allowed to "open his face," 
Ere Miss MacBride had closed his case 

With true judicial celerity ; 
For the lawyer was poor, and " seedy " to boot. 
And to say the lady discarded his suit, 

Is merely a double verity ! 

The last of those who came to court. 

Was a lively beau, of the dapper sort, 

" Without any visible means of support," 

A crime by no means flagrant 
In one who wears an elegant coat. 
But the very point on which they vote 



Now dapper Jim his courtship plied 

(I wish the fact could be denied) 

With an eye to the purse of the old MacBride, 

And really " nothing shorter ! " 
For he said to himself, in his greedy lust, 
" Whenever he dies — as die he must — 
And yields to Heaven his vital trust. 
He 's very sure to 'come down with his dust,' 

In behalf of his only daughter." 

And the very magnificent Miss MacBride, 

Half in love, and half in pride, 
j Quite graciously relented ; 

1 And, tossing her head, and turning her back, 
; No token of proper pride to lack — 
; To be a bride, without the "Mac," 
j With much disdain, consented ! 

! Old John MacBride, one fatal day, 

I Became the unresisting prey 

I Of fortune's undertakers ; 

And staking all on a single die. 
His foundered bark went high and dry 
Among the brokers and breakers ! 

But, alas, for the haughty Miss MacBride, 
'T was such a shock to her j)recious pride ! 
She could n't recover, although she tried 
Her jaded spirits t(J rally ; 



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'T was a dreadful change in human affairs, 
From a place " up town" to a nook "up stairs," 
From an avenue down to an alley ! 

'T was little condolence she had, God wot. 
From her "troops of friends," who liad n't forgot 

The airs she used to borrow ! 
They had civil phrases enough, but yet 
'T Avas plain to see that their "deepest regret " 

Was a different thing from sorrow ! 

And one of those chaps who make a pun, 
As if it were quite legitimate fun 
To be blazing away at every one 
With a regular, double-loaded gun — 

Remarked that moral transgression 
Always brings retributive stings 
To candle-makers as well as kings ; 
For "making light of cercous things " 

Was a very totc^-ed profession ! 

And vulgar people — the saucy churls — 
Inquired about "the price of pearls," 

And mocked at her situation : 
" She wasn't ruined — they ventured to hope — 
Because she was poor, she need n't mope ; 
Few people were better off for soap. 

And that was a consolation ! " 

And to make her cup of woe run over, 
Her elegant, ardent plighted lover 

Was the very first to forsake her ; 
" He quite regretted the steji, 't was true — 
The lady had pride enough 'for two,' 
But that alone would never do 

To quiet the butcher and baker ! " 

And now the unhappy Miss Mac Bride — 
The merest ghost of her eai'ly pride — 

Bewails her lonely position ; 
Cramped in the very narrowest niche. 
Above the poor, and below the rich — 

Was ever a worse condition ! 



Because you flourish in worldly affairs. 
Don't be haughty, and put on airs. 

With insolent pride of station ! 
Don't be proud, and turn up your nose 
At poorer people in plainer clothes, 
But learn, for the sake of your mind's repose. 
That wealth 's a bubble that comes — and goes ! 
And that all proud flesh, wherever it grows, 

Is subject to irritation I 

John Godfrey Saxe. 



PLAIN LANGUAGE FROM TRUTHFUL 
JAMES. 

POPULARLY KNOWN AS THE "HEATHEN CHINEE." 

Which I wish to remark - 

And my language is plain — 
That tor ways that are dark 

And for tricks that are vain, 
The heathen Chinee is peculiar : 

Which the same I would rise to explain. 

Ah Sin was his name ; 

And I shall not deny 
In regard to the same 

What that name might imply ; 
But his smile it was pensive and childlike, 

As I frequent remarked to Bill Nye. 

It was August the third, 

And quite soft was the skies, 
Which it might be inferred 

That Ah Sin was likewise ; 
Yet he played it that day upon William 

And me in a way I despise. 

Which we had a small game, 

And Ah Sin took a hand : 
It was euchre. The same 

He did not understand, 
But he smiled, as he sat by the table, 

With the smile that was childlike and bland. 

Yet the cards they were stocked 

In a way that I grieve, 
And my feelings were shocked 

At the state of Nj'^e's sleeve, 
Which was stuffed full of aces and bowers. 

And the same with intent to deceive. 

But the hands that were played 

By that heathen Chinee, 
And the points that he made, 

Were quite frightful to see, — 
Till at last he put down a right bower. 

Which the same Nye had dealt unto me. 

Then I looked up at Nye, 

And he gazed upon me ; 
And he rose with a sigh. 

And said, " Can this be ? 
We are ruined by Chinese cheap labor," — 

And he went for that heathen Chinee. 

In the scene that ensued 

I did not take a hand. 
But the floor it was strewed. 

Like the leaves on the strand. 
With the cards that Ah Sin had been hiding 

In the same " he did not understand." 



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In his sleeves, which were long, 

He had twenty-four jacks, — 
Which was coming it strong, 

Yet I state but the facts. 
And we found on his nails, which were taper, - 

What is freqpoiit in tapers, — tliat 's wax. 

Which is why I remark, 

A \d my language is plain. 
That for ways that are dark, 

And for tricks that are vain. 
The heathen Chinee is peculiar, — 

Which the same I am free to maintain. 

Bret harte. 



THE SOCIETY UPON THE STANISLAUS. 

I RESIDE at Table Mountain, and my name is 

Truthful James : 
I am not up to small deceit or any sinful games ; 
And I '11 tell in simple language what I know 

about the row 
That broke up our Society upon the Stanislow. 

But first I would remark, that 't is not a proper 

plan 
For any scientific gent to whale his fellow-man ; 
And, if a member don't agree with his peculiar 

whim. 
To lay for that same member for to " put a 
head " on him. 

Now, nothing could be finer, or more beautiful 

to see. 
Than the first six months' proceedings of that 
same society ; 
Till Brown of Calaveras brought a lot of fossil 

bones 
That lie found within a tunnel near the tene- 
ment of Jones. 

Then Brown lie read a paper, and he recon- 
structed there, 
From those same bones, an animal that was 
extremely rare ; 
And Jones then asked the Chair for a suspen- 
sion of the rules, 
Till he could prove that those same bones was 
one of his lost mules. 

Then Brown he smiled a bitter smile, and said 

he was at fault ; 
It seemed he had been trespassing on Jones's 
family vault ; 
He was a most sarcastic man, this quiet Mr. 

Brown, 
And on several occasions he had cleaned out 
tlic town. 



Now I hold it is not decent for a scientific gent 
To say another is an ass, — at least, to all intent ; 
Nor should the individual who happens to be 

meant 
Reply by heaving rocks at him to any great 
extent. 

Then Abner Dean of Angel's raised a point of 

order, when 
A chunk of old red sandstone took him in the 
abdomen ; 
And he smiled a kind of sickly smile, and 

curled up on the floor. 
And the subsequent proceedings interested him 
no more. 

For in less time than I write it, every member 

did engage 
In a warfare with the remnants of a palaeozoic 
age ; 
And the way they heaved those fossils in their 

anger was a sin. 
Till the skull of an old mammoth caved tlie 
head of Thompson in. 

And this is all I have to say of these improper 

games, 
For 1 live at Table Mountain and my name is 
Truthful James, 
And I 've told in simple language what I know 

about the row 
Tliat broke up our Society upon the Stanislow. 

Bret Harte. 



THE NANTUCKET SKIPPER. 

Many a long, long year ago, 

Nantucket skippers had a plan 
Of finding out, though " lying low," 

How near New York their schooners ran. 

They greased the lead before it fell. 

And then by sounding, tlirongh the night, 

Knowing the soil that stuck so well, 

They always guessed their reckoning right. 

A skipper gray, whose eyes were dim, 
Could tell, by tasting, just the spot. 

And so below he 'd "douse the glim," — 
After, of course, his " something hot." 

Snug in his birth, at eight o'clock. 
This ancient skipper might be found ; 

No mat>3r how his craft would rock, 
He slept, — for skijipers' naps are .sound. 

The watch on deck would now and then 
Run down and wake him, with the lead ; 

He 'd up, and taste, and tell the men 
How many miles they went ahead. 



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One night 't was Jotham Maiden's watch, 
A curious wag, — the pedler's son ; 

And so he mused, (the wanton wretch !) 
" To-night I '11 have a grain of fun. 

" We 're all a set of stupid fools, 
To think the skipper knows, by tasting, 

What ground he 's on ; Nantucket schools 
Don't teach such stuff, with all their basting! '' 

And so he took the well-greased lead. 

And rubbed it o'er a box of earth 
That stood on deck, — a parsnip-bed, — 

And then he sought the skipper's berth. 

" Where are we now, sir ? Please to taste." 
The skipper yawned, put out his tongue, 

Opened his eyes in wondrous haste. 
And then upon the floor he sprung ! 

The skipper stormed, and tore his hair. 

Hauled on his boots, and roared to Marden, 

" Nantucket's sunk, and here we are. 
Right over old Marm Hackett's garden ! " 

James Thomas Fields. 



THE ART OF BOOK-KEEPING. 

How hard, when those who do not wish 

To lend, thus lose, their books, 
Are snared by anglers — folks that fish 

With literary hooks — • 
Who call and take some favorite tome, 

But never read it through ; 
They thus complete tlieir set at home 

By making one at you.- 

I, of my "Spenser" quite bereft. 

Last winter sore was shaken ; 
Of " Lamb" 1 've but a quarter left. 

Nor could I save my " Bacon ;" 
And then I saw my " Crabbc " at last. 

Like Hamlet, backward go. 
And, as the tide was ebbing fast, 

Of course I lost my " Rowe." 

Aly "Mallet" served to knock me down, 

Which makes me thus a talker. 
And once, when I was out of town, 

My "Johnson" proved a " Walker." 
While studying o'er the fire one day 

My "Hobbes" amidst the smoke. 
They bore my " Coluian " clean away, 

And carried off my " Coke." 

They picked my " Locke," to me far more 
. Than Bramah's patent worth, 
And now my losses I deplore, 
Without a "Home " on cartli. 



If once a book you let them lift, 

Another they conceal, 
For thougli I caught them stealing 

As swiftly went my "Steele." 



' Swift, 



"Hope " is not now upon my shelf. 

Where late he stood elated. 
But, what is strange, my " Pope " himself 

Is excommunicated. 
My little " Suckling" in the grave 

Is sunk to swell the ravage. 
And what was Crusoe's fate to save, 

'T was mine to lose — a " Savage." 

Even " Glover's" works I cannot put 

My frozen hands upon, 
Though ever since I lost my " Foote " 

My " Bunyau " has been gone. 
My " Hoyle " with "Cotton " went oppressed, 

My "Taylor," too, must fail, 
To save my "Goldsmith" from arrest, 

In vain I offered " Bayle." 

I " Prior" sought, but could not see 

The " Hood" so late in front. 
And when I turned to hunt for " Lee," 

0, where was my " Leigh Hunt " ? 
I tried to laugh, old Care to tickle, 

Yet could not "Tickell " touch, 
And then, alack ! I missed my " Mickle," 

And surely mickle 's much. 

'T is quite enough my griefs to feed. 

My sorrows to excuse. 
To think I cannot read my " Reid," 

Nor even use .my " Hughes." 
My classics would not quiet lie, — 

A thing so fondly hoped ; 
Like Dr. Primrose, I may cry, 

My " Livy " has eloped. 

My life is ebbing fast away ; 

I suffer from these shocks ; 
And though I fixed a lock on " Gray," 

There 's gray upon my locks. 
I 'm far from " Young," am growing pale, 

I see my "Butler" fly, 
And when they ask about my ail, 

'T is " Burton " I reply. 

They still have made me slight returns, 

And thus my griefs divide ; 
For 0, they cured me of my " Burns," 

And eased mj' " Akenside." 
But all I think I shall not say, 

Nor let my anger burn, 
For, as they never found me " Gay," 

They have not left me " Sterne." 

Thomas Hood. 



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ODE TO TOBACCO. 

Thou who, when fears attack, 
Bid'st them avaunt, and Black 
Care, at the horseman's back 

Perching, unseatest ; 
Sweet when the morn is gray ; 
Sweet, when they 've cleared away 
Lunch ; and at close of day 

Possibly sweetest : 

I have a liking old 

For thee, though manifold 

Stories, I know, are told, 

Not to thy credit ; 
How one (or two at most) 
Drops make a cat a ghost — 
Useless, except to roast — 

Doctors have said it : 

How they who use fusees 
All gi'ow by slow degrees 
Brainless as chimpanzees. 

Meagre as lizards ; 
Go mad, and beat their wives ; 
Plunge (after shocking lives) 
Razors and carving-knives 

Into their gizzards. 

Confound such knavish tricks ! 
Yet know I five or six 
Smokers who freely mix 

Still with their neighbors ; 
Jones — (who, I 'm glad to say. 
Asked leave of Mrs. J. ) — 
Dail}"- absorbs a clay 

After his labors. 

Cats may have had their goose 
Cooked by tobacco-juice ; 
Still why deny its use 

Thoughtfully taken ? 
We 're not as tabbies are : 
Smith, take a fresh cigar ! 
Jones, the tobacco-jar ! 

Here 's to thee. Bacon ! 

Charles S. Calverley. 



DISASTER. 

'T was ever thus from childhood's hour 

My fondest hopes would not decay ; 
I never loved a tree or flower 

"Which was the first to fade away ! 
The garden, where I used to delve 

Short-frocked, still yields me pinks in plenty ; 
The pear-tree that I climbed at twelve, 

I see still blossoming, at twenty. 



I never nursed a dear gazelle. 

But I was given a paroquet — 
How I did nurse him if unwell ! 

He 's imbecile, but lingers yet. 
He 's green, with an enchanting tuft ; 

He melts me with his small black eye : 
He 'd look inimitable stuifed. 

And knows it — but he will not die ! 

I had a kitten — I was rich 

In pets — but all too soon my kitten 
Became a full-sized cat, by which 

I 've more than once been scratched and bitten ; 
And when for sleep her limbs she curled 

One day beside her untouched plateful, 
And glided calmly from the world, 

I freely own that I was grateful. 

And then I bought a dog — ■ a queen ! 

Ah, Tiny, dear departing pug ! 
She lives, but she is past sixteen. 

And scarce can crawl across the rug. 
I loved her beautiful and kind ; 

Delighted in her pert Bow-wow : 
But now she snaps if you don't mind ; 

'T were lunacy to love her now. 

I used to think, should e'er mishap 

Betide my crumple-visaged Ti, 
In shape of prowling thief, or trap. 

Or coarse bull-terrier — I should die. 
But ah ! disasters have their use ; 

And life might e'en be too sunshiny : 
Nor would I make myself a goose, 

If some big dog should swallow Tiny. 

CHARLES S. CALVERLEY. 



MOTHERHOOD. 

She laid it where the sunbeams fall 
Unscanned upon the broken wall. 
Without a tear, without a groan, 
She laid it near a mighty stone. 
Which some rude swain had haply cast 
Thither in sport, long ages past, 
And Time with mosses had o'erlaid. 
And fenced with many a tall grass-blade, 
And all about bid roses bloom 
And violets shed their soft perfume. 
There, in its cool and quiet bed. 
She set her burden down and fled : 
Nor flung, all eager to escape. 
One glance upon the perfect shape. 
That lay, still warm and fresh and fair. 
But motionless and soundless there. 



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No human eye had marked her pass 

Across the lindeu-shadowed grass 

Ere yet the minster clock chimed seven : 

Only the innocent birds of heaven — 

The magpie, and the rook whose nest 

Swings as the elm -tree waves his crest — 

And the lithe cricket, and the hoar 

And huge-limbed hound that guards the door, 

Looked on when, as a sunnncr wind 

That, passing, leaves no trace behind. 

All unapparelled, barefoot all. 

She ran to that old ruined wall. 

To leave upon the chill dank earth 

(For ah ! she never knew its worth), 

Mid hemlock rank, and fern and ling, 

And dews of night, that precious thing ! 

And then it might have lain forlorn 

From morn to eve, from eve to morn : 

Birt that, by some wild impulse led. 

The mother, ere she turned and flt-d, 

One moment stood erect and high ; 

I'hen poured into the silent sky 

A cry so jubilant, so strange. 

That Alice — as she strove to range 

Her rebel ringlets at her glass — 

Sprang up and gazed across the grass ; 

Shook back those curls so fair to sec, 

Clapped her soft hands in childish glee ; 

And shrieked — her sweet face all aglow, 

Her very limbs with rapture shaking — 
" My hen has laid an egg, I know ; 

And only hear the noise she 's making ! " 
Charles S. Calverley. 



THE HEN. 

A FAMOUS hen 's my story's tlieme, 

Which ne'er was known to tire 
Of laying eggs, but then she 'd scream 
So loud o'er every egg, 'twould seem 

The house must be on fire. 
A turkey-cock, who ruled the walk, 

A wiser bird and older. 
Could bear 't no more, so off did stalk 

Right to the hen, and told her : 
"Madam, that scream, I apprehend, 

Adds nothing to the matter ; 
It surely helps the egg no whit ; 
Then lay your egg, and done with it ! 
I pray you, madam, as a friend, 

Cease that superfluous clatter ! 
You know not how 't goes through my head. 
" Humph ! very likely ! " madam said. 
Then, proudly putting forth a leg, — 
" Uneducated barnyard fowl ! 
You know, no more than any owl, 



The noble privilege and praise 
Of authorship in modern days — 

I '11 tell you why I do it : 
First, you perceive, I lay the egg. 

And then — review it." 

From the German of CLAUDIUS. 



THE COSMIC EGG. 

Upon a rock yet uncreate, 

Amid a chaos inchoate, 

An uncreated being sate ; 

Beneath him, rock, 

Above him, cloud. 

And the cloud was rock, 

And the rock was cloud. 

The rock then growing soft and warm, 

The cloud began to talce a form, 

A form chaotic, vast, and vague. 

Which issued in the cosmic egg. 

Then the Being uncreate 

On the egg did incubate. 

And thus became the incubator ; 

And of the egg did allegate. 

And thus became the alligator ; 

And the incubator was potentate. 

But the alligator was potentator. 



ANONYMOUS- 



DARWIN. 

TuEiiE was an ape in the days that were earlier ; 
Centuries passed, and his hair grew curlier ; 
Centuries more gave a thumb to his wrist. 
Then he was a Man and a Positivist. 

MORTIMER COLLINS. 



TO THE PLIOCENE SKULL. 

A GEOLOGICAL ADDRESS. 

" A human skull has been found in CaHfornia, in the pliocene 
formation. This skull is the remnant, not only of the earliest pio- 
neer of this State, but the oldest known human being. . . . The 
skull was found in a shaft one hundred and fifty feet deep, two 
miles from Ansjel's, in Calaveras County, by a miner named James 
Matson, who gave it to Mr. Scribner, a merchant, and he gave it to 
Dr. Jones, who sent it to the State Geological Survey. . . . The 
published volume of the State Survey on the Geology of California 
states that man existed contemporaneously with the mastodon, but 
this fossil proves that he was here before the mastodon was known 
to exist." — DniVy Paper. 

"Speak, man, less recent ! Fiugmentary fossil ! 
Primal pioneer of pliocene formation. 
Hid in lowest drifts below the earliest stratum 
Of Volcanic tufa ! 

" Older than the beasts, the oldest Palseotherium ; 
Older than the trees, the oldest Cryptogamia ; 
Older than the hills, those infantile eruptions 
Of earth's epidermis ! 



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" Eo — Mio — Plio — whatsoe'er the ' cene ' was 
That those vacant sockets filled with awe and 

wonder, — 
Whether shores Devonian or Silurian beaches, — 
Tell us thy strange story ! 

"Or has the Professor slightly antedated 
Ijy some thousand years thy advent on this planet, 
(Jiving thee an air that 's somewhat better fitted 
For cold-blooded creatures ? 

* 
" Wert thou true spectator of that mighty forest, 
When above thy head the stately Sigillaria 
Reared its columned trunks iu that remote and 
distant 
Carboniferous epoch ? 

"Tell us of that scene, — the dim and watery 
woodland, 

Songless, silent, hushed, with never bird or in- 
sect, 

Veiled with spreading fronds and screened with 
tall club-mosses, 
Lycopodiacea — 

" When beside thee walked the solemn Plesio- 

saurus, 
And around thee crept the festive Ichthyosaurus, 
While from time to time above thee Hew and 
circled 
Cheerful Pterodactyls. 

" Tell us of thy food, — those half- marine refec- 
tions, 

Ciinoids on the shell, and Bracliipods an natu- 
re!,, — 

CUittle-fish to which the pieuvi'e of Victor Hugo 
Seems a periwinkle. 

"Speak, thou awful vestige of the earth's crea- 
tion, — 
Solitary fragment of remains organic ! 
Tell the wondrous secrets of thy past existence, — 
Speak ! thou oldest primate ! " 

Even as I gazed, a thrill of the maxilla 
.•\nd a lateral movement of the condyloid process, 
With post-pliocene sounds of healthy mastica- 
tion, 
Ground the teeth together ; 

And from that imperfect dental exhibition. 
Stained with expressed juices of the weed Nico- 
tian, 
Came these hollow accents, blent with softer 
murmurs 
Of expectoration ; 



" Which my name is Bowers, and my crust was 

busted 
Falling down a shaft, in Calaveras County, 
But I 'd take it kindly if you 'd send the pieces 
Home to old Missouri ! " 

Bret harte. 



PHYSICS. 

[THE UNCONSCIOUS POETIZING OF A PHILOSOPHER.] 

There is no force however great 
Can stretch a cord however fine 
Into a horizontal line 

That shall be accurately straight. 

William Whewell. 



THE COLLEGIAN TO HIS BRIDE : 

BEING A MATHEMATICAL MADRIGAL IN THE SIMPLEST FORM. 

Charmer, on a given straight line, 
And which we will call B C, 
Meeting at a common point A, 
Draw the lines A C, A B. 
But, my sweetest, so arrange it 
That they 're equal, all the three ; 
Then you '11 find that, in the sequel, 
All their angles, too, are equal. 

Equal angles, so to term them, 
Each one opposite its brother ! 
Equal joys and equal sorrows. 
Equal hopes, 't were sin to smother, 
Equal, — 0, divine ecstatics, — 
Based on Hutton's mathematics ! 



THE LAWYER'S INVOCATION TO 
SPRING. 

Whereas, on certain boughs and sprays 
Now divers birds are heard to sing, 

And sundry flowers their heads upraise, 
Hail to the coming on of spring ! 

The songs of those said birds arouse 
The memory of our youthful hours, 

As green as those said sprays and boughs. 
As fresh and sweet as those said flowers. 

The birds aforesaid, — happy paii-s, — 
Love, mid the aforesaid boughs, inshrines 

In freehold nests ; themselves, their heirs. 
Administrators, and assigns. 



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busiest term of Cupid's Court, 

Wliere tender plaintiffs actions bring, — 

Season of frolic and of sport, 

Hail, as aforesaid, coming Spring ! 

Henry Howard Brownell, 



TONIS AD RESTO MARE. 

Air : " O Mary, Jieave a si^h/or 7>u" 

MARE aeva si forme ; 

Forme ure tonitru ; 
lambicum as amandum, 

Olet Hymen promptu ; 
Mihi is vetas an ne se, 

As humano erebi ; 
Olet mecum marito te, 

Or eta heta pi. 

Alas, piano more meretrix, 

Mi ardor vel uno ; 
Inferiam ure artis base, 

Tolerat me urebo. 
Ah me ve ara silicet, 

Vi laudu vimin thus ? 
Hiatu as arandum sex — 

lUuc lonicus. 

Heu sed heu vix en imago. 

My missis mare sta ; 
cantu redit in mihi 

Hibernas arida ? 
A veri vafer heri si, , 

Mihi resolves indu ; 
' Totius olet Hymen cum — 

Accepta tonitru. 

JONATHAN SWIFT. 

NURSERY RHYMES. 

"JOHN, JOHN, THE PIPER'S SON." 

Johannes, Johannes, tibicine natus 
Fugit perniciter porcum furatus, 
Sed porcus voratus, Johannes delatus, 
Et plorans per vias est fur flagellatus. 



"twinkle, twinkle, little star. 
Mica, mica, parva stella ; 
Miror, qusenam si tam bella ! 
Splendens eminus in illo, 
Alba velut gemma, coelo. 



'boys and girls, come out TO PLAY. 

Garqons et fiUes venez toujours, 
La lune est brillante comme le jour, 
Venez au bruit d'un joyeux eclat 
Venez du bons coeurs, ou ne venez pas. 



"three wise men of GOTHAM. 

Tres Philosophi de Tusculo 
Mare navigarunt vasculo : 
Si vas id esset tutius 
Tibi canerem diutius. 



"ding DONG BELL, THE CAT S IN THE WELL. 
AIANON atKivov eiire • (ppeap \dfiei', ot/\oy &^v<x- 

ffOV, 

T^j/ yaKerjy ' t'kt ttjctS' (dTios afxirXaKiris ; 
TvrObs 'Iwafi'jjs, x^'<'P^*' yo-vos, aiffvKa eiSws ' 
Tov ya\eriv fivdiaai vryrciov wS' &.KaKov. 



THE COURTIN'. 

God makes sech nights, all white an' still 
Fur 'z you can look or listen ; 

Moonshine an' snow on field an' hill, 
All silence an' all glisten. 

Zekle crep' up quite unbeknown 
An' peeked in thru' the winder. 

An' there sot Huldy all alone, 
'Ith no one nigh to bender. 

A fireplace filled the room's one side, 
With half a cord o' wood in — 

There warn't no stoves (tell comfort died) 
To bake ye to a puddin'. 

The wa'nut logs shot sparkles out 
Towards the pootiest, bless her ! 

An' leetle flames danced all about 
The chiny on the dresser. 

Agin the chimbley crook-necks hung, 

An' in amongst 'em rusted 
The ole queen's arm thet gran'ther Young 

Fetched back from Concord busted. 

The very room, coz she was in, 
Seemed warm from floor to ceilin'. 

An' she looked full ez rosy agin 
Ez the apples she was peelin'. 

'T was, kin o' kingdom-come to look 

On sech a blessed cretur, 
A dogrose blushin' to a brook 

Ain't modester nor sweeter. 

He was six foot o' man, A 1, 
Clean grit an' human natur' ; 

None could n't quicker pitch a ton, 
Nor dror a furrer straighter. 



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He 'd sparked it with full twenty gals, 
Hed squired 'em, danced 'em, druv 'em, 

Fust this one, an' then thet, by spells — 
All is, he could n't love 'em. 

But long o' her his veins 'ould run 
All crinkly like curled maple, 

The side she breshed felt full o' sun 
Ez a south slope in Ap'il. 

She thought no v'ice hed such a swing 

Ez hisn in the choir ; 
My ! when he made Ole Hundred ring, 

She knoived the Lord was nigher. 

An' she 'd blush scarlit, right in prayer. 
When her new meetin'-bunnet 

Felt somehow thru' its crown a pair 
0' blue eyes sot upon it. 

Thet night, I tell ye, she looked some ! 

She seemed to 've gut a new soul, 
For she felt sartin-sure he 'd come, 

Down to her very shoe-sole. 

She heered a foot, an' knowed it tu, 

A-raspin' on the scraper, — 
All ways to once her feelin's flew 

Like sparks in burnt-up paper. 

He kin' o' I'itered on the mat, 

Some doubtfle o' the sekle, 
His heart kep' goin' pitty-pat. 

But hern went pity Zekle. 

An' yit she gin her cheer a jerk 
Ez though she wished him furder, 

An' on her apples kep' to work, 
Parin' away like murder. 

" You want to see my Pa, I s'pose ? " 
" Wal ... no ... I come dasignin' " 

*' To see my Ma ? She 's sprinklin' clo'es 
Agin to-morrer's i'nin'." 

To say why gals acts so or so. 
Or don't, 'ould be presumin' ; 

Mebby to mean yes an' say no 
Comes nateral to women. 

He stood a spell on one foot fust. 
Then stood a spell on t' other. 

An' on which one he felt the wust 
He couldn't ha' told ye nuther. 

Says he, " I 'd better call agin ; " 
Says she, "Think likely. Mister ; " 

Thet last word pricked him like a pin. 
An' . . . Wal, he up an' kist her. 



When Ma binreby upon 'em slips, 

Huldy sot pale ez ashes. 
All kin' o' smily roun' the lips 

An' teary roun' the lashes. 

For she was jes' the quiet kind 

Whose naturs never vary. 
Like streams that keep a summer mind 

Snow-hid in Jenooary. 

The blood clost roun' her heart felt glued 

Too tight for all expressin'. 
Tell mother see how metters stood. 

And gin 'em both her blessin'. 

Then her red come back like the tide 

Down to the Bay o' Fundy, 
An' all I know is they was cried 

In meetin' come nex' Sunda3^ 

James Russell Lowell. 



M^HAT MR. ROBINSON THINKS.* 

FROM "THE BIGLOW PAPERS," NO. Ill- 

GuvENER B. is a sensible man ; 

He stays to his home an' looks arter his folks j 

He draws his furrer ez straight ez he can. 

An' into nobody's tater-patch pokes ; — 

But John P. 

Robinson he 

Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B. 

My ! ain't it terrible ? Wut shall we du ? 
We can't never choose him o' coui-se, — thet 's 
flat ; 
Guess we shall hev to come round, (don't you ?) 
An' go in fer thunder an' guns, an' all that ; 
Fer John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B. 

Gineral C. is a dreffle smart man : 

He 's ben on all sides thet give places or pelf ; 
But consistency still wuz a part of his plan, — 
He 's ben true to one party, — an' thet is him- 
self ; — 
So John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez he shall vote fer Gineral C. 

Gineral C. he goes in fer the war ; f 

He don't vally principle more 'n an old cud ; 

Wut did God make us raytional creeturs fer, 
But glory an' gunpowder, plunder an' blood ? 

• Preserved here because the L-ssent!aI humor of the satire has 
outlived its local and temporary application. 

t Written at the time of the Mexican war, which was strongly 
opposed by the Antislavery party as being unnecessary and wrong. 



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So John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez he shall vote fer Gineral C. 

We were gittin' on nicely up here to our village, 
"With good old idees o' wut 's right an' wut 
ain't, 
We kind o' thought Christ went agin war an' 
pillage, 
An' thet eppyletts worn't the best mark of a 
saint ; 
But John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez this kind o' thing 's an exploded idee. 

The side of our country must oilers be took, 
An' Presidunt Polk, you know, he is our coun- 
try ; 
An' the angel thet writes all our sins in a book 
Puts the debit to him, an' to us the ^^er contry ; 
An' John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez this is his view o' the thing to a T. 

Parson Wilbur he calls all these ai'gimunts lies ; 
Sez they 're nothin' on airth but jest fee, faw, 
fuin : 
And thet all this big talk of our destinies 
Is half ov it ign'ance, an' t' other half rum ; 
But John P. 
♦ Robinson he 
Sez it ain't no sech thing ; an', of course, so 
must we. 

Parson Wilbur sez he never heerd in his life 
Thet th' Apostles rigged out in their swaller- 
tail coats. 
An' marched round in front of a drum an' a fife, 
To git some on 'em office, an' some on 'em 
votes ; 
But John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez they didn't know every thin' down in 
Judee. 

Wal, it 's a marcy we 've gut folks to tell us 

' The rights an' the wrongs o' these matters, I 

vow, — 
God sends countrj' lawyers, an' other wise fellers. 
To drive the world's team wen it gits in a 
slough ; 
Fer John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez the world '11 go right, ef he hollers out 



Gee ! 



James Rl'sseli. Lowell. 



WIDOW BEDOTT TO ELDER SNIFFLES. 

FROM "THE WIDOW BEDOTT PAPERS," 

REVEREND sir, I do declare 

It drives me most to frenzy, 
To think of you a lying there 

Down sick with intiuenzy. 

A body 'd thought it was enough 
To mourn your wive's departer, 
• Without sich trouble as this ere 
To come a follerin' arter. 

But sickness and affliction 

Are sent by a wise creation, 
And always ought to be underwent 

By patience and resignation. 

0, I could to your bedside fly. 

And wipe your weeping eyes, 
And do my best to cui'e you up. 

If 't would n't ci'eate surprise. 

It 's a world of trouble we tarry in. 

But, Elder, don't despair ; 
That you nxay soon be niovin' again 

Is constantly my prayer. 

Both sick and well, you may depend 

You '11 never be forgot 
By your faithful and affectionate friend, 

Priscilla Pool Beuott. 

Frances Miriam whitcher. 



THE NEW CHURCH ORGAN. 

They 've got a bran new organ. Sue, 

For all their fuss and search ; 
They 've done just as they said they 'd do, 

And fetched it into church. 
They 're bound the critter shall be seen, 

And on the preacher's right, 
They 've hoisted up their new machine 

In everybody's sight. 
They 've got a chorister and choir, 

Ag'in viy voice and vote ; 
For it was never my desire 

To praise the Lord by note ! 

I 've been a sister good an' true, 

Foi' five an' thirty year ; 
I 've done what seemed my part to do. 

An' prayed my duty clear ; 
I 've sung the hymns both slow and quick, 

Just as the preacher read ; 
And twice, when Deacon Tubbs was sick, 

I took the fork an' led ! 



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An' now, their bold, new-fangled waj's 

Is coniin' all about ; 
And I, right in my latter days, 

Am fairly crowded out ! 

To-day, the preacher, good old dear, 

With tears all in his eyes, 
Read — " I can read my title clear 

To mansions in the skies." — 
I al'ays liked that blessed hymn — 

I s'pose I al'ays will ; 
It somehow gratifies my whim, 

In good old Ortonville ; 
But when that choir got up to sing, 

I could n't catch a word ; 
They sung the most dog-gonedest thing 

A body ever heard ! 

Some worldly chaps was standin' near, 

An' when I see them grin, 
I bid farewell to every fear, 

And boldly waded in. 
I thought I 'd chase the tune along, 

An' tried with all my might ; 
But though my voice is good an' strong, 

I could n't steer it right. 
When they was high, then I was low. 

An' also contra'wise ; 
And I too fast, or they too slow. 

To " mansions in the skies." 

An' after every verse, j^ou know. 

They played a little tune ; 
I did n't understand, an' so 

I started in too soon. 
I pitched it purty middlin' high, 

And fetched a lusty tone, 
But 0, alas ! I found that I 

Was singin' there alone ! 
They laughed a little, I am told ; 

But 1 had done my best ; 
And not a wave of trouble rolled 

Across my peaceful breast. 

And ftister Brown, — I could but look, - 

She sits right front of me ; 
She never was no singin' book, 

An' never went to be ; 
But then she al'ays tried to do 

The best she could, she said ; 
She understood the time, light through. 

An' kep' it with her head ; 
But when she tried this mornin', 0, 

I had to laugh, or cough ! 
It kep' her head a bobbin' so. 

It e'en a'aiost come off ! 



An' Deacon Tubbs, — he all broke down, 

As one might well suppose ; 
He took one look at Sister Brown, 

And meekly scratched his nose. 
He looked his hymn-book through and through, 

And laid it on the seat, 
And then a pensive sigh he drew, 

And looked completely beat. 
An' when they took another bout, 

He did n't even rise ; 
But drawed his red bandanner out, 

An' wiped his weeping eyes. 

I 've been a sister, good an' true, 

For five an' thirty year ; 
I 've done what seemed my part to do, 

An' prayed my duty clear ; 
But death will stop my voice, I know, 

For he is on my track ; 
And some day, I '11 to meetin' go, 

And nevermore come back. 
And when the folks get up to sing — 

Whene'er that time shall be — 

I do not want no patent thing 

A squealin' over me ! 

Will m. Carleton. 



THE RETORT. 

Old Birch, who taught the village school, 

Wedded a maid of homespun habit ; 
He was as stubborn as a mule. 

And she as playful as a rabbit. 
Poor Kate had scarce become a wife 

Before her husband sought to make her 
The pink of country polished life. 

And prim and formal as a Quaker. 

One day the tutor went abroad, 

And simjile Katie sadly missed him ; 
When he returned, behind her lord 

She shyly stole, and fondly kissed him. 
The husband's anger rose, and red 

And white his face alternate grew : 
"Less freedom, ma'am ! " Kate sighed and said, 

" 0, dear ! I did w'i know 't was yoit ! " 

George Perkins Morris. 



DOW'S FLAT. 

1856. 
Dow's Flat. That 's its name. 

And I. reckon that j'ou 
Are a stranger ? The same ? 
Well, I thought it was true, 
For thar is n't a man on the river as can't spot 
the place at first view. 



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It was called after Dow, — 

Which the same was an ass ; 
And as to the how 

Thet the thing kem to pass, — 
Just tie up your hoss to that buckeye, and sit ye 
down here in the grass. 

You see this yer Dow 

Hed the woi'st kind of luck ; 
He slipped up somehow 

On each thing thet he struck. 
Why, ef he 'd a' straddled thet fence-rail the 
derned thing 'ed get up and buck. 

He mined on the bar 

Till he could n't pay rates ; 
He was smashed by a car 

When he tunnelled with Bates ; 
And right on the top of his trouble kem his wife 
and five kids from the States. 

It was rough, — mighty rough ; 

But the boys they stood hj, 
And they brouglit him the stuff 
For a house, on the sly ; 
And the old woman, — well, she did washing, and 
took on when no one was nigh. 

But this yer luck of Dow's 

Was so powerful mean 
That the spring near his house 
Dried right up on the green ; 
And he sunk forty feet down for water, but nary 
a drop to be seen. 

Then the bar petered out, 

And the boys would n't stay ; 
And the chills got about. 
And his wife fell away ; 
But Dow, in his well, kept a peggin' in his usual 
ridikilous way. 

One day, — it was June, — 

And a year ago, jest, — 
This Dow kem at noon 
To his work like the rest. 
With a shovel and pick on his shoulder, and a 
derringer hid in his breast. 

He goes to the well. 

And he stands on the brink, 
And stops for a spell 
Jest to listen and think : 
For the sun in his eyes, (jest like this, sir !) you 
see, kinder jnade the cuss blink. 

His two ragged gals 

In the gulch were at play. 
And a gownd that was Sal's 



Kinder flapped on a bay : 
Not much for a man to be leavin', but his all, — 
as I 've heer'd the folks say. 

And — that 's a peart hoss 

Thet you 've got — ain't it now ? 
What might be her cost ? 

Eh ? Oh ! — Well then, Dow — 
Let's see, — well, that forty-foot grave was n't 
his, sir, that day, anyhow. 

For a blow of his pick 

Sorter caved in the side. 
And he looked and turned sick. 
Then he trembled and cried. 
For you see the dern cuss had struck — ■- ' ' Wa- 
ter ?" — beg your parding, young man, 
there you lied ! 

It was gold, — in the quartz, 

And it ran all alike ; 
And I reckon five oughts 

Was the worth of that strike ; 
And that house with the coopilow 's his'n, — 
which the same is n't bad for a Pike. 

Thet 's why it 's Dow's Flat ; 

And the thing of it is 
That he kinder got that 

Through sheer contrairiness : 
For 't was luater the derned cuss was seekin', and 
his luck made him certain to miss. 

Thet 's so. Thar 's your way 

To the left of yon tree ; 
But — a — look h'yur, say. 
Won't you come up to tea ? 
No ? Well, then the next time you 're passin' ; 
and ask after Dow, — and thet 's me. 

BRET HARTE- 



JIM. 



^ 



Say there ! P'r'aps 
Some on you chaps 
Might know Jim Wild ? 

Well, — no offence : 

Thar ain't no sense 
In gittin' riled ! 

Jim was my chum 

Up on the Bar : 
That 's why I come 

Down from up thar, 
Lookin' for Jim. 
Thank ye, sir ! you 
Ain't of that crew, — 

Blest if you are ! 



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Money ? — Not much : 

That ain't my kind ; 
I ain't no such. 
Rum ? — I don't mind, 

Seein' it 's you. 

Well, this yer Jim, 
Did you know him ? — 
Jess 'bout your size ; 
Same kind of eyes ? — 
Well, that is strange : 

Why, it 's two year 

Since he come here, 
Sick, for a change. 

Well, here 's to us ; 

Eh? 
The deuce you say ! 

Dead? — 
That little cuss ? 

What makes you star, — 
You over thar ? 
Can't a man drop 
's glass in yer shop 
But you must I'ar' ? 

It would n't take 

Darned much to break 
You and your bar. 

Dead! 
Poor — little — Jim ! 
■ — Why, there was me, 
Jones, and Bob Lee, 
Harry and Ben, — 
No-account men : 
Then to take him ! 

Well, thar — Good-by, — 
No more, sir, — I — 

Eh? 
What 's that you say ? — 
Why, dern it ! — sho ! — 
No 1 Yes ! By Jo ! 

Sold! 
Sold ! Why you limb, 
Yoii ornery, 

Derned old 
Long-legged Jim ! 

BRET HARTE. 



BANTY TIM., 

[Remarks of Sersjeant Tilmon Joy to the White Man's Coni- 
niittee of Spunky Point, Illinois.] 

I RECKON I git your drift, gents — 
You 'low the boy sha'n't stay ; 

This is a white man's country : 
You 're Dimocrats, you say : 



And whereas, and seein', and wherefore, 

The times bein' all out o' jint, 
The nigger has got to mosey 

From the limits o' Spunky P'int ! 

Let 's reason the thing a minute ; 

I 'm an old-fashioned Dimocrat, too, 
Though I laid my politics out o' the way 

For to keep till the war was through. 
But I come back here allowin' 

To vote as I used to do, 
Though it gravels me like the devil to train 

Along o' sich fools as you. 

Now dog my cats ef I kin see, 

III all the light of the day, 
What you 've got to do with the question 

Ef Tim shall go or stay. 
And furder than that I give notice, 

Ef one of you tetches the boy. 
He kin check his trunks to a warmer clime 

Than he'll find in lUanoy. 

Why, blame your hearts, jist hear me ! 

You know that ungodly day 
When our left struck Vicksburg Heights, how 
ripped 

And torn and tattered we lay. 
When the I'est retreated, I stayed behind, 

Fur reasons sufficient to me, — 
With a rib caved in, and a leg on a strike, 

I sprawled on that cursed glacee. 

Loi"d ! how the hot sun went for us, 

And br'iled and blistered and burned ! 
How the rebel bullets whizzed round us 

When a cuss in his death-giip turned ! 
Till along toward dusk I seen a thing 

I could n't believe for a spell : 
That nigger — that Tim — was a-crawlin' to me 

Through that fire-proof, gilt-edged hell ! 

The rebels seen him as quick as me, 

And the bullets buzzed like bees ; 
But he jumped for me, and shouldered me, 

Though a shot brought him once to his knees ; 
But he staggered up, and packed me off. 

With a dozen stumbles and falls, 
Till safe in our lines he drapped us both. 

His black hide riddled with balls. 

So, my gentle gazelles, thar 's my answer. 

And here stays Banty Tim : 
He trumped Death's ace for me that day, 

And I 'm not goin' back on him ! 
You may rezoloot till the cows come home. 

But ef one of you tetches the boy, 

He '11 wrastle his hash to-night in hell. 

Or my name 's not Tilmon Joy ! 

JOHN Hay. 



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LITTLE BREECHES. 

A PIKE COUNTY VIEW OF SPECIAL PROVIDENCE. 

I don't go much on religion, 

I never ain't had no show ; 
But I 've got a middlin' tight grip, sir, 

On the handful o' things I know. 
I don't pan out on the prophets 

And free-will, and that sort of thing, — 
But I b'lieve in God and the angels. 

Ever sence one night last spring. 

1 come into town with some turnips, 

And my little Gabe come along, — 
No four-year-old in the county 

Could beat him for pretty and strong, 
Peart and chipper and sassj'^, 

Always ready to swear and fight, — 
And I 'd larnt him ter chaw terbacker, 

Jest to keep his milk-teeth white. 

The snow come down like a blanket 

As I passed by Taggart's store ; 
I went in for a jug of molasses 

And left the team at the door. 
They scared at something and started, — 

I heard one little squall. 
And liell-to-split over the praii-ie 

Went team, Little Breeches and all. 

Hell-to-split over the prairie ! 

I was almost froze with skeer ; 
But we rousted up some torches. 

And sarched for 'em far and near. 
At last we struck bosses and wagon, 

Snowed under a soft white mound, 
Upsot^ dead beat, — but of little Gabe 

No hide nor hair was found. 

And here all hope soured on me 

Of my fellow-critter's aid, — 
I jest flojiped down on my marrow-bones. 

Crotch-deep in the snow, and prayed. 
***** 
By this, the torches was played out. 

And me and Isrul Parr 
Went off for some wood to a sheepfold 

That he said was somewhar thar. 

We found it at last, and a little shed 

Where they shut up the lambs at night. 
We looked in, and seen them huddled thar, 

So warm and sleepy and white ; 
And THAR sot Little Breeches and chirped. 

As peart as ever you see, 
" I want a chaw of terbacker. 

And that 's what 's the matter of me." 



How did he git thar ? Angels. 

He could never have walked in that storm. 
They jest scooped down and toted him 

To whar it was safe and warm. 
And I think that saving a little child, 

And bringing him to his own, 
Is a derned sight better business 

Than loafing around The Throne. 

JOHN Hay. 



HANS BREITMANN'S PARTY. 

Hans Breitmann gife a barty, 

Dey had biano-blayin ; 
I felled in lofe mit a Merican frau, 

Her name was Madilda Yane. 
She had haar as prown ash a pretzel. 

Her eyes vas himmel-plue, 
Und ven dey looket indo mine, 

Dey shplit mine heart in two. 

Hans Breitmann gife a barty, 

I vent dere you '11 pe pound. 
I valtzet mit Madilda Yane 

Und vent shpinnen round und round. 
De pootiest Frauelein in de House, 

She vayed 'pout dwo hoondred pound, 
Und efery dime slie gife a shoorap 

She make de vindows sound. 

Hans Breitmann gife a barty, 

I dells you it cost him dear. 
Dey rolled in more as sefen kecks 

Of foost-rate Lager Beer. 
Und venefer dey knocks de shpicket in 

De Deutschers gifes a cheer. 
I dinks dat so vine a barty 

Nefer coom to a het dis year. 

Hans Breitmann gife a barty ; 

Dere all vas Souse und Brouse. 
Ven de sooper comed in, de gompany 

Did make demselfs to house ; 
Dey ate das Brot und Gensy broost, 

De Bratwurst und Braten fine, 
Und vash der Abendessen down 

Mit four parrels of Neckarwein. 

Hans Breitmann gife a barty ; 

We all cot troonk ash bigs. 
I poot mine mout to a parrel of bier, 

Und emptied it oop mit a schwigs. 
Und denn I gissed Madilda Yane 

Und she shlog me on de kop, 
Und de gompany fited rait daple-lecks 

Dill de coonshtable made oos shtop. 



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Hans Breitmann gife a barty — 

Where ish dat barty now ? 
Where ish de lofely golden cloud 

Dat float on de nioundain's prow ? 
Where ish de hininielstrahlende Stern — 

De shtar of de shpirit's light ? 
All goned afay mit de Lager Beer — 

Afay in de Ewigkeit ! 

CHARLES G. LELAND. 



t^- 



RITTER HUGO. 

Der noble Ritter Hugo 

Von Schwillerisanfenstein 
Rode out mit shpeer und helmet, 

Und he coom to de panics of de Rhine. 

Und oop dere rose a meermaid, 

Vot had n't got nodings on, 
Und she say, ' ' 0, Ritter Hugo, 

Vare you goes mit yourself alone ? " 

Und he says, "I ride in de creen-wood, 

Mit helmet and mit shpeer. 
Till I cooms into ein Gasthaus, 

Und dere I drinks some peer." 

Und den outshpoke de maiden, 

Vot had n't got nodings on, 
" I ton't dink mooch of beebles 

Dat goes mit demselfs alone. 

" You 'd petter coom down in de wasser, 

Vare dere 's heaps of dings to see, 
Und hafe a shplendid dinner, 

Und trafel along mit me. 

" Dare you sees de fish a schwimmin, 

Und you catches dem efery one." 
.So sang dis wasser maiden, 

Vat had n't got nodings on. 

"Dare is drunks all full mit money, 

In ships dat vent down of old ; 
Und you helpsh yourself, by dunder ! 

To shimmeriu crowns of gold. 

" Shoost look at dese shpoons und vatches ! 

Shoost look at dese diamond rings I 
Come down und fill your bockets, 

Und I '11 kiss you like eferydings ! 

" Vat you vantsh mit your schnapps und j'our 
lager ? 

Coom down into der Rhine ! 
Dere ish pottles der Kaiser Charlemagne, 

Vonce filled mit gold-red wine ! " 



Dat fetched him, — he shtood all shpell-pound. 

She [mlled his coat-tails down, 
She drawed him under de wasser, 

Dis maiden mit nodings on. 

CHARLES G. LELAND. 



COLLUSION BETWEEN A ALEGAITER 
AND A WATER-SNAIK. 

TRIUMPH OF THE WATEE-SNAIK : DETH OF THE 
ALEGAITER. 

There is a niland on a river lying. 
Which runs into Gautimaly, a warm country. 
Lying near the Tropicks, covered with sand ; 
Hear and their a symptum of a Wilow, 
Hanging of its umberagious limbs & branches 
Over the clear streme meandering far below. 
This was the home of the now silent Alegaiter, 
When not in his other element confine'd ; 
Here he wood set upon his eggs asleep 
With 1 ey observant of flis and other passing 
Objects : a while it kept a going on so : 
Fereles of danger was the happy Alegaiter ! 
But a las ! in a nevil our he was fourced to 
Wake ! that dreme of Blis was two sweet for 

him. 
1 morning the sun arose with unusool splender 
Whitch allso did our Alegaiter, coming from the 

water. 
His scails a flinging of the rais of the son back, 
To the fountain-head which tha originly sprung. 
But having not had nothing to eat for some time, 

he 
Was slepy and gap'd, in a short time, widely. 
Unfoalding soon a welth of perl-white teth, 
The rais of the son soon shet his sinister ey 
Because of their mutool splendor and warmth. 
The evil Our (wli'ch I sed) was now come ; 
Evidently a good chans for a water snaik 
Of the large specie, which soon appeared 
Into the horison, near the bank where repos'd 
Calmly in slepe the Alegaiter before spoken of. 
About 60 feet was his Length (not the 'gaiter) 
And he was aperiently a ■^^'ell-proportioned snaik. 
When he was all ashore he glared upon 
The iland with approval, but was soon 
"Astonished with the view and lost to wonder" 

(from Wats) 
(For jest then he began to see the Alegaiter) 
Being a nateral enemy of his'n, he worked his- 

self 
Into a fury, also a ni position. 
Before the Alegaiter well could ope 
His eye (in other words perceive his danger) 
The Snaik had enveloped his body just 19 
Times with " foalds voluminous and vast" (from 

Milton ) 



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And had tore off several scails in the confusion, 
Besides squeazing him awfullj^ into his stomoc. 
Just then, by a fortinate turn in his affairs, 
He ceazed into his moutli the careless tale 
Of the unreflecting water-snaik ! Grown des- 
perate 
He, finding that his tale was fast squesed 
Terrible while they roaled all over the iland. 

It was a well-conduckted Affair ; no noise 

Disturbed the harmony of the seen, ecsept 

Onct when a Wilow was snaped into by the 
roaling. 

Eeach of the combatence hadn't a minit for 
holering. 

So the conflick was naterally tremenjous ! 

But soon by grate force the tale was bit complete- 

Lj of ; but the eggzeration was too much 

For his delicate Constitootion : he felt a com- 
pression 

Onto his chest and generally over his body ; 

When he ecspress'd his breathing, it was with 

Grate difficulty that he felt inspired again onct 
more. 

Of course this State must suffer a revolootion. 

So the Alegaiter give but one yel, and egspii'ed. 

The waiter-suaik realed hisself off, & survay'd 

For say 10 minits, the condition of 

His fo : then wondering what made his tail liurt, 

He sloly went off for to cool. 

J. W. Morris. 



SWELL'S SOLILOQUY. 

I don't appwove .this hawid waw ; 

Those dweadful bannahs hawt my eyes ; 
And guns and dwuuis are such a baw, — 

Why don't the pawties compwamise ? 

Of cawce, the twoilet has its chawms ; 

But why must all the vulgah cwowd 
Pawsist in spav\'ting unifawms. 

In cuUahs so extwemely loud ? 

And then the ladies, pAvecious deahs I — 
I mawk the change on ev'wy bwow ; 

Bai Jove ! 1 weally have my feahs 
They wathali like the hawid wow ! 

To heah the chawming cweatures talk. 
Like patwons of the bloody wing, 

Of waw and all its dawty wawk, — 
It does n't seem a pwappah thing ! 

I called at Mrs. Gweene's last night, 
To see her niece, Miss Mawy Hertz, 

And found her making — • cwushing sight I- 
The weddest kind of flannel shirts ! 



Of cawce, I wose, and sought the daw. 
With fawyah flashing from my eyes ! 

I can't appwove this hawid waw ; — 
Why don't the pawties compwamise '( 

AiNONYMOUS. 



TO THE "SEXTANT." 

Sextant of the meetin house, wich sweeps 
And dusts, or is supposed to ! and makes fires, 
And lites the gass, and sumtimes leaves a screw 

loose, 
in wich case it smells orful, worse than lamp ile ; 
And wrings the Bel and toles it when men dyes, 
to the grief of survivin pardners, and sweeps paths 
And for the servusses gets $ 100 per annum, 
Wich them that thinks deer, let 'em try it ; 
Gettin up before starlite in all wethers and 
Kindlin fires when the wether is as cold 
As zero, and like as not gi'een wood for kindlin 
i would n't be hired to do it for no sum, 
But Sextant ! there are 1 kermoddity 
Wich 's more than gold, wich doant cost nothin. 
Worth more than anything except the sole of man I 
i mean pewer Are, Sextant, i mean pewer are ! 

it is plenty out of doors, so plenty it doant no 
What on airth to dew with itself, but flys about 
Scatterin leaves and bloin off men's hatts ! 

in short, it 's jest as " fre as are " out dores, 
But Sextant, in our church its scarce as buty. 
Scarce as bank bills, when agiuts begs for misch- 

uns, 
Wich some say is purty offten (taint nothin to 

me, wat I give aint nothin to nobod}') but 

Sextant 
U shet 500 men, wimmin, and children, 
Speshally the latter, up in a tite place. 
And every 1 on em brethes in and out, and out 

and in. 
Say 50 times a minnit, or 1 million and a half 

breths an our. 
Now how long will a church ful of are last at 

that rate, 

1 ask you — say 15 minits — and then wats to be 

'did? 
Why then they must brethe it all over agin, 
And then agin, and so on till each has took it 

down 
At least 10 times, and let it up agin, and wats 

more 
The same individoal don't have the priviledge 
of brethin his own are, and no ones else, 
Each one must take whatever comes to him. 
Sextant, doant you no our lungs is bellusses. 
To bio the fier of life, and keep it from goin out ; 
and how can bellusses bio without wind 
And aint wind are ? i ])ut it to your conschens. 



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1002 



HUMOROUS POEMS. 



B] 



Are is the same to us as milk to babies, 

Or water is to fisli, or pendlums to clox, 

Or roots and airbs unto an injun doctor, 

Or little pills unto an omepath, 

Or boys to gurls. Are is for us to brethe, 

What signifies who preaches if i cant brethe ? 

Wats Pol ? Wats PoUus to sinners who are 

ded ? 
Ded for want of breth, why Sextant, when we dy 
Its only coz we cant brethe no more, thats all. 
And now Sextant, let me beg of you 
To let a little are into our church. 
( Pewer are is sertain proper for the pews) 
And do it weak days, and Sundays tew, 
It aint much trouble, only make a hole 
And the are will come of itself ; 
(It luvs to come in where it can git warm) 
And how it will rouze the people up, 
And sperrit up the preacher, and stop garps, 
And yawns and figgits, as eifectooal 
As wind on the dry boans the Profit tells of. 

Arabella M. Willson. 



MR. MOLONY'S ACCOUNT OF THE BALL. 

GIVEN TO THE NEPAULESE AMBASSADOR BY THE PENIN- 
SULAR AND ORIENTAL COMPANY. 

0, WILL ye choose to hear the news ? 

Bedad, I cannot pass it o'er : 
I '11 tell you all about the ball 

To the Naypaulase Ambassador. 
Begor 1 this fete all balls does bate, 

At which I worn a pump, and I 
Must here relate the splendthor great 

Of th' Oriental Company. 

These men of sinse dispoised expinse, 

To fete these black Achilleses. 
"We '11 show the blacks," says they, ''Almack's, 

And take the rooms at Willis's." 
With flags and shawls, for these Nepauls, 

They hung the rooms of Willis up, 
And decked the walls and stairs and halls 

With roses and with lilies up. 

And Jullien's band it tuck its stand 

So sweetly in the middle there, 
And soft bassoons played heavenly chunes, 

And violins did fiddle there. 
And when the Coort was tired of spoort, 

1 'd lave you, boys, to think there was 
A nate bufi'et before them set. 

Where lashins of good dlirink there was ! 



At ten before the ball-room door, 
His moighty Excellency was ; 



He smoiled and bowed to all the crowd, 
So gorgeous and immense he was. 

His dusky shuit, sublime and mute, 
Into the doorway followed him ; 

And the noise of the blackguard boys. 
As they hurrood and hollowed him ! 

The noble Chair stud at the stair, 

And bade the dthrums to thump ; and he 
Did thus evince to that Black Prince 

The welcome of his Company. 
fair the girls, and rich the curls. 

And bright the oys, you saw there, was ; 
And fixed each oye, ye there could spoi, 

On Gineral Jung Bahawther was ! 

This Gineral great then tuck his sate, 

With all the other ginerals 
(Bedad, his troat, his belt, his coat, 

All bleezed with precious minerals) ; 
And as he there, with princely air, 

Eecloinin on his cushion was. 
All round about his royal chair, 

The squeezin and the pushin was. 

Pat, such girls, such Jukes and Earls, 

Such fashion and nobilitee ! 
Just think of Tim, and fancy him 

Amidst the hoigh gentility ! 
There was Lord Be L'Huys, and the Portygeese 

Ministher and his lady there, 
And I reckonized, with much surprise, 

Our messmate. Bob O'Grad}^, there ; 

There was Baroness Brunow, that looked like 
Juno, 

And Baroness Rehausen there, 
And Countess RouUier, that looked peculiar 

Well, in her robes of gauze in there. 
There was Lord Crowhurst (I knew him first 

When only Mr. Pijas he was), 
And Mick O'Toole, the great big fool. 

That after supper tipsy was. 

There was Lord Fingall and his ladies all, 

And Lords Killeen and DuflS'erin, 
And Paddy Fife, with his fat wife, — 

I wondther how he could stuft" her in. 
There was Lord Belfast, that by me past, 

And seemed to ask how should / go there ? 
And the Widow Macrae, and Lord A. Hay, 

And the Marchioness of Sligo there. 

Yes, Jukes and Earls, and diamonds and pearls, 
And pretty girls, was spoorting there ; 

And some beside (the rogues ! ) I spied, 
Behind the windies, coorting there. 



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HUMOROUS POEMS. 



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0, there 's one I know, bedad, would show 

As beautiful as any there ; 
And I 'd like to hear the pipers blow, 

And shake a fut with Fanny there ! 

WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 



WIDOW MALONE. 

Did you hear of the Widow Malone, 

Ohone ! 
Who lived in the town of Athlone, 
Alone ! 
0, she melted the hearts 
Of the swains in them parts : 
So lovely the Widow Malone, 

Ohone ! 
So lovely the Widow Malone. 

Of lovers she had a full score. 
Or more, 
And fortunes they all had galore, 
In store ; 
From the minister down 
To the clerk of the Crown 
All were courting the Widow Malone, 

Ohone ! 
All were courting the Widow Malone. 

But so modest was Mistress Malone, 

'T was known 
That no one could see her alone, 
Ohone ! 
Let them ogle and sigh, 
They could ne'er catch her eye. 
So bashful the Widow Malone, 

Ohone ! 
So bashful the Widow Malone. 

Till one Misther O'Brien, from Clare 

(How quare ! 
It 's little for blushing they care 
Down there), 
Put his arm round her waist, — 
Gave ten kisses at laste, — 
" 0," says he, "you 're my Molly Malone, 

My own ! 
0," says he, "you 're my Molly Malone ! " 

And the widow they all thought so shy. 

My eye ! 
Ne'er thought of a simper or sigh, — 
For why ? 
But, "Lucius," says she, 
" Since you 've now made so free, 
You may marry your Mary Malone, 

Ohone ! 
You may maiTy your Mary Malone." 



There 's a moral contained in my song, 

Not wrong ; 
And one comfort, it 's not very long, 
But strong, — 
If for widows you die, 
Learn to kiss, not to sigh ; 
For they 're all like sweet Mistress Malone, 

Ohone ! 
0, they 're all like sweet Mistress Malone ! 

Charles Lever. 



BACHELOE'S HALL. 

Bachelor's Hall, what a quare-lookin' place 
it is ! 

Kape me from such all the days of my life ! 
Sure but I think what a burnin' disgrace it is, 

Niver at all to be gettin' a wife. 

Pots, dishes, pans, an' such gi'asy commodities. 
Ashes and praty-skins, kiver the floor ; 

His cupboard 's a stoi'ehouse of comical oddities. 
Things that had niver been neighbors before. 

Say the old bachelor, gloomy an' sad enough, 
Placin' his tay-kettle over the fire ; 

Soon it tips over — Saint Patrick ! he 's mad 
enough. 
If he were prisent, to fight with the squire ! 

He looks for the x^latter — Grimalkin is scourin' 
it! 
Sure, at a baste like that, swearin' 's no sin ; 
His dishcloth is missing ; the pigs are devourin' 
it — 
Tunder and turf ! what a pickle he 's in ! 

When his male 's over, the table 's left sittin' 
so ; 

Dishes, take care of yourselves if yoir can ; 
Divil a drop of hot water will visit ye, • — 

Och, let him alone for a baste of a man ! 

Now, like a pig in a mortar-bed wallowin'. 
Say the old bachelor kneading his dough ; 

Troth, if his bread he could ate without swal- 
lowin'. 
How it would favor his palate, ye know ! 

Late in the night, when he goes to bed shiverin', 
Niver a bit is the bed made at all ; 

He crapes like a terrapin under the kiverin' ; — 
Bad Inck to the pictur of Bachelor's Hall ! 

John Finlev. 



U 



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lEn 



1004 



HUMOROUS POEMS. 



-n 



ST. PATRICK WAS A GENTLEMAN. 

0, St. Patrick was a gentleman, 

Who came of decent people ; 
He biiilt a church in Dublin town, 

And on it put a steeple. 
His father was a Gallagher ; 
His mother was a Brady ; 
His aunt was an O'Shaughnessy, 
His uncle an O'Grady. 

So, succass attend St. Patrick's fist. 

For he 's a Saint so clever ; 
0, he gave the snakes and toads a twist, 
And bothered them forever ! 

The Wicklow hills are very high, 

And so 's the Hill of Howth, sir ; 
But there 's a hill, much bigger still, 

Much higher nor them both, sir. 
'T was on the top of this high hill 

St. Patrick preached his sarmint 
That drove the frogs into the bogs. 

And banished all the varmint. 

So, success attend St. Patrick's fist, etc. 

There 's not a mile in Ireland's isle 

Where dirty varmin musters. 
But there he put his dear fore-foot, 

And murdered them in clusters. 
The toads went pop, the frogs went hop. 

Slap -dash into the water ; 
And the snakes committed suicide 

To save themselves from slaughter. 

So, success attend St. Patrick's fist, etc. 

Nine hundred thousand reptiles blue 

He charmed with sweet discourses. 
And dined on them at Killaloe 

In soups and second courses. 
Where blind worms crawling in the grass 

Disgusted all the nation. 
He gave them a rise, which opened their eyes 

To a sense of their situation. 

So, success attend St. Patrick's fist, etc. 

No wonder that those Irish lads 

Sliould be so gay and frisky. 
For sure St. Pat he taught them that. 

As well as making whiskey ; 
No wonder that the saint himself 

Should understand distilling. 
Since his mother kept a shebeen shop 

In the town of Enniskillen. 

So, success attend St. Patrick's fist, etc. 

0, was I but so fortunate 

As to be back in Munster, 
'T is I 'd be bound that from that gi'ound 

1 nevermore M^ould once stir. 



For there St. Patrick planted turf. 

And plenty of the praties. 
With pigs galore, ma gra, ma 'store, 
And cabbages — and ladies ! 

Then my blessing on St. Patrick's fist, 

For he 's the darling Saint ! 
0, he gave the snakes and toads a twist ; 
He 's a beauty without paint, ! 

Henry Bennett. 



THE BIRTH OF ST. PATRICK. 

On the eighth day of March it was, some people 

say. 
That Saint Pathrick at midnight he first saw the 

day ; 
While others declare 'twas the ninth he was 

born, 
And 't was all a mistake between midnight and 

morn ; 
For mistakes will occur in a hurry and shock. 
And some blamed the babby — and some blamed 

the clock — 
Till with all their cross-questions sure no one 

could know 
If the child was too fast, or the clock was too 

slow. 

Now the first faction-fight in owld Ireland, they 

say, 
Was all on account of Saint Pathrick's birthday : 
Some fought for the eighth — for the ninth more 

would die. 
And who would n't see right, sure they blackened 

his eye ! 
At last, both the factions so positive grew. 
That each kept a birthda}', so Pat then had two, 
Till Father Mulcahy, who showed them their 

sins. 
Said, "No one could have two birthdays, but a 

twins." 

Says he, " Boy.s, don't be fightin' for eight or for 

nine, 
Don't be always dividin' — but sometimes com- 
bine ; 
Combine eight with nine, and seventeen is the 

mark, 
So let that be his birthday," — "Amen," says 

the clerk. 
" If he was n't a twins, sure our hist'ry will show 
That, at least, he 's worthy any two saints that 

we know ! " 
Then they all got blind dhrunk — which com- 

plated their bliss. 
And we keep up the practice from that day to 

this. 

S,'\MUEL LOVHR. 



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HUMOROUS POEMS. 



1005 



ra 



THE LOVERS. 

Sally Salter, she was a young teaclier who 

taught, 
And her friend, Charley Church, was a preacher 

who praught. 
Though his enemies called him a screecher who 

scraught. 

His heart, when he saw her, kept sinking and 

sunk. 
And his eye, meeting hers, began winking, and 

wunk ; 
While she, in her turn, kept thinking, and 

thunk. 

He hastened to woo her, and sweetly he wooed. 
For his love grew until to a mountain it grewed. 
And what he was longing to do then he doed. 

In secret he wanted to speak, and he spoke. 

To seek with his lips what his heart long had 

soke ; 
So he managed to let the truth leak, and it loke. 

He asked her to ride to the church, and they 

rode ; 
They so sweetly did glide that they both thought 

they glode. 
And they came to the place to be tied, and were 

toed. 

Then homeward, he said, let us drive, and they 

drove. 
And as soon as they wished to arrive, they 

arrove, 
For whatever he could n't contrive, she controve. 

The kiss he was dying to steal, then he stole ; 
At the feet where he wanted to kneel then he 

knole ; 
And he said, " I feel better than ever I fole." 

So they to each other kept clinging, and clung. 
While Time his swift circuit was winging, and 

wung ; 
And this Avas the thing he was bringing, and 

brung : 

The man Sally wanted to catch, and had caught ; 
That she wanted from others to snatch, and had 

snaught ; 
Was the one she now liked to scratch, and she 

scraught. 

And Charley's warm love began freezing, and 

froze, 
While he took to teazing, and cruelly toze 
The girl he had v.dshed to be squeezing, and 

squoze. 



" Wretch ! " he cried, when she threatened to 

leave him, and left, 
' ' How could you deceive me, as you have de- 

ceft?" 
And she answered, ' ' I promised to cleave, and 

I 've cleft." 

PHCEBE GARY. 



DEBORAH LEE.* 

'T IS a dozen or so of years ago, 

Somewhere in the West countree. 
That a nice girl lived, as ye Hoosiers know 

By the name of Deborah Lee ; 
Her sister was loved by Edgar Poe, 

But Deborah by me. 

Now I was green, and she was green, 

As a summer's squash might be ; 
And we loved as warmly as other folks, — 

I and my Deborah Lee, — 
With a love that the lasses of Hoosierdom 

Coveted her and me. 

But somehow it happened a long time ago. 

In the aguish West countree. 
That a chill March morning gave the shakes 

To my beautiful Deborah Lee ; 
And the grim steam-doctor (drat him !) came, 

And bore her away from me, — 
The doctor and death, old partners they, — 

In the aguish West countree. 

The angels wanted her in heaven 

(But they never asked for me), 
And that is the reason, I rather guess, 

In the aguish West countree. 
That the cold March wind, and the doctor, and 
death. 

Took off my Deborah Lee — 

My beautiful Deborah Lee — 
From the warm sunshine and the opening flower, 

And bore her away from me. 

Our love was as strong as a six-horse team. 

Or the love of folks older than we, 

Or possibly wiser than we ; 
But death, with the aid of doctor and steam, 

Was rather too many for me ; 
He closed the peepers and silenced the breath 

Of my sweetheart Deborah Lee, 
And her form lies cold in the prairie mould, 

Silent and cold, — ah me ! 

The foot of the hunter shall press her grave, 
And the prairie's sweet wild flowers 

In their odorous beauty around it wave 
Through all the sunny hours, — 

* See page 285, 



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1006 



HUMOROUS POEMS. 



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The still, bright summer hours ; 
And the birds shall sing in the tufted grass 

And the nectar-laden bee, 
With his dreamy hum, on his gauze wings pass, — • 

She wakes no more to me ; 

Ah, nevermore to me ! 
Though the wild birds sing and the wild flowers 
spring. 

She wakes no more to me. 

Yet oft in the hush of the dim, still night, 

A vision of beauty I see 
Gliding soft to my bedside, — a phantom of light, 

Dear, beautiful Deborah Lee, — 

My bride that was to be ; 
And I wake to mourn that the doctor, and 

death, 
And the cold March wind, should stop the breath 

Of my darling Deborah Lee, — 

Adorable Deborah Lee, — 
That angels should want her up in heaven 

Before they wanted me. 

WILLIAM H. Burleigh. 



ONLY SEVEN.* 

A PASTORAL STORY, AFTER WORDSWORTH. 

I MARVELLED why a simple child, 
That lightly draws its breath, 

Should utter groans so very wild 
And look as pale as Death. 

Adopting a parental tone, 

I asked her why she cried. 
The damsel answered, with a groan, 

" I 've got a pain inside ! 

" I thought it would have sent me mad 

Last night about eleven." 
Said I, " What is it makes you bad ? 
How many apples have you had ? " 

She answered, " Only seven ! " 

" And are you sure you took no more, 

My little maid ? " quoth L 
" 0, please, sir, mother gave me four, 

But they were in a pie ! " 

" If that 's the case," I stammered out, 
" Of course you 've had eleven." 

The maiden answered with a pout, 
" I ain't had more nor seven ! " 

I wondered hugely what she meant. 
And said, " I 'm bad at riddles. 

But I know where little girls are sent 
For telling taradiddles. 

* Sec page 87. 



" Now if you don't reform," said I, 
" You '11 never go to heaven ! " 

But all in vain ; each time I try 

The little idiot makes reply, 
" I ain't had more nor seven ! " 

POSTSCRIPT. 

To borrow Wordsworth's name was wrong. 

Or slightly misapplied ; 

And so I 'd better call ni)' song, 

" Lines after Ache-inside." 

H. S. Leigh. 



A TALE OF DRURY LANE.* 

FROM "REJECTED ADDRESSES." 

" Thus he went on, stringing- one extravagance upon another, in 
the style his books of chivalry liad taught him, and imitating, as 
near as he could, tlieir very phrase. ' — DON (jUI.XOTE. 

To be spoken by Mr. Keonble, in a suit of the Black 
Prince's armor, borrowed from the Tower. 

Rest there awhile, my bearded lance, 
While from green curtain I advance 
To yon foot-lights, no trivial dance. 
And tell the town what sad mischance 
Did Drury Lane befall. 

As Chaos, which, by heavenly doom, 
Had slept in everlasting gloom, 
Started with terror and surprise 
When light first flashed upon her eyes, — 
So London's sons in nightcap woke, 

In bedgown woke her dames ; 
For shoirts were heard mid fire and smoke, 
And twice ten hundred voices spoke, — 

" The playhouse is in flames ! " 
And, lo ! where Catherine Street extends, 
A fiery tail its lustre lends 

To every window-pane ; 
Blushes each spout in Martlet Court, 
And Barbican, moth-eaten fort, 
And Covent Garden kennels sport, 

A bright ensanguined drain ; 
Meux's new Brewhouse shows the light, 
Rowland Hill's Chapel, and the height 

Where Patent Shot they sell ; 
The Tennis Court, so fair and tall. 
Partakes the ray, with Surgeons' Hall, 
The Ticket-Porters' House of Call, 
Old Bedlam, close by London Wall, 
Wright's shrimp and oyster shop withal. 

And Richardson's Hotel. 
Nor these alone, but far and wide. 
Across red Thames's gleaming tide, 
To distant fields the blaze was borne, 
And daisy white and hoary thorn 



An imitation of Sir Walter Scott. 



O-^ 



^ 



In borrowed lustre seemed to sham 
The rose, or red Sweet Wil-h-am. 
To those who on the hills around 
Beheld the flames from Drury's mound, 

As from a lofty altar rise, 
It seemed that nations did conspire 
To offer to the god of fire 

Some vast, stupendous sacrifice ! 
The summoned firemen wolce at call. 
And hied them to their stations all : 
Starting from short and hroken snooze, 
Each sought his ponderous hob-nailed shoes, 
But first his woreted hosen plied ; 
Plush breeches next, in crimson dyed, 

His nether bulk embraced ; 
Then jacket thick, of red or blue. 
Whose massy shoulder gave to view 
The badge of each respective crew, 

In tin or copper traced. 
The enc^ines thundered through the street, 
rire-ho°ok, pipe, bucket, all complete, 
And torches glared, and clattering feet 

Along the pavement paced. 
And one, ttie leader of the band, 
From Charing Cross along the Strand, 
Like stag by beagles hunted hard, 
Kan till he stopped at Yin' gar Yard. 
The burning badge his shoulder bore, 
The belt and oil-skin hat he wore. 
The cane he had, his men to bang. 
Showed foreman of the British gang, — , 
His name was Higginbottoni. Now 
'T is meet that I should tell you how 

The others came in view : 
The Hand-in-Hand the race begun. 
Then came the Phrenix and the Sun, 
The Exchange, where old insurers run. 

The Eagle, where the new ; 
Y^ith these came Rumford, Bumford, Cole, 
Robins from Hockley in the Hole, 
Lawson and Dawson, cheek by jowl, 
Crump from St. Giles's Pound :^ 
YHiitford and Mitford joined the train, 
Huggins and Muggins from Chick Lane, 
And Clutterbuck, who got a sprain 

Before the plug was found. 
Hobson and Jobson did not sleep. 
But ah ! no trophy could they reap, 
For both were in the Donjon Keep 
Of Bridewell's gloomy mound ! 
E'en Higginbottom now was posed, 
For sadder scene was ne'er disclosed ; 
Without, within, ni hideous show, 
Devouring flames resistless glow, 
And blazing rafters downward go, ^^ 
And never halloo " Heads below ! " 
Nor notice give at all. 



The firemen terrified are slow 
To bid the pumping torrent flow, 
For fear the roof should fall. 
Back, Robins, back ! Crump, stand aloof ! 
Whitford, keep near the walls ! 
Huggins, regard your own behoof, 
FoiClo ! the blazing, rocking roof 
Down, down in thunder, falls ! 
An awful pause succeeds the stroke. 
And o'er the ruins volumod smoke. 
Rolling around its pitchy shroud, 
Cloncealed them from the astonished crowd. 
x\t length the mist awhile was cleared, 
Y^'hen, lo ! amid the wreck upreared, 
Gradual a moving head appeared. 

And Eagle firemen knew 
'T was Joseph Muggins, name revered, 

- The foreman of their crew. 
Loud shouted all in signs of woe, ^^ 
" A Muggins ! to the rescue, ho ! " 
And poured the hissuig tide : 
Meanwhile the Muggins fought amain, 
And strove and struggled all in vam. 
For, rallying but to fall again, 
He tottered, sunk, and died ! 

Did none attempt, before he fell, 
To succor one they loved so^ well ? 
Yes, Higginbottom did aspire 
(His fireman's soul was all on fire) 

His brother chief to save ; ^ 
But ah ! his reckless generous ire 

Served but to share his grave ! 
Mid blazing beams and scalding streams. 
Through fire and smoke he dauntless broke, 

Y''here Muggins broke before. 
But sulphury stench and boiling drench. 
Destroying sight, o'erwhelmed him quite, 

He sunk to rise no more. 
Still o'er his head, while Fate he braved. 
His whizzing water-pipe he waved : 
"Whitford and Mitford, ply your punsps ! 
You, Clutterbuck, come, stir your stumps ! 
YHiy are you in such doleful dumps ? 
A fireman, and afraid of bumps ! — 
What are they feared on ? fools ! 'od rot em ! 
Were the last words of Higginbottom. 

HORACE SMITH. 



POEMS 

RECEIVED IN RESPONSE TO AN ADVERTISE^ CALL FOR A 
NATIONAL ANTHEM. 

NATIONAL ANTHEM. 

BY DR. OLIVER WENDELL H . 

A DIAGNOSIS of our history proves 
Our native land a land its native loves ; 



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Its Ijirth a deed obstetric without peer, 
Its growth a source of wonder far and near. 

To love it more, behold how foreign shores 

Sink into nothingness beside its stores. 

Hyde Park at best — though counted ultra 

grand — • 
The " Boston Common " of Victoria's land — 

The committee must not be blamed for rejecting the above after 
roriding thus far, for such an " anthem " could only be sung by a 
college of surgeons or a Beacon Street tea-party. 

Turn we now to a 



NATIONAL ANTHEM. 

BY WILLIAM CULLEN B . 

The sun sinks softly to his evening post. 

The suil swells grandly to his morning crown ; 

Yet not a star our flag of heaven has lost, 
And not a sunset stripe with him goes down. 

So thrones may fall ; and from the dust of those 
New thrones may rise, to totter like the last ; 

But still our country's nobler planet glows, 
While tlie eternal stars of Heaven are fast. 

Upon finding that this does not go well to the air of "Yankee 
Doodle," the committee feel justified in declining it ; it being further- 
more prejudiced against it by a suspicion that the poet has crowded 
an advertisement of a paper which he edits into the first line. 

Next we quote from a 

NATIONAL ANTHEM. 

BY GENERAL GEORGE P. M . 

In the days that tried our fathers, 

Many years ago, 
Our fair land achieved her freedom 

Blood-bought, you know, 
Shall we not defend her ever, 

As we 'd defend 
That fair maiden, kind and tender, 

Calling us friend ? 

Yes ! Let all the echoes answer, 

From hill and vale ; 
Yes ! Let other nations hearing, 

Joy in the tale. 
Our Columbia is a lady, 

High-born and fair, 
We have sworn allegiance to hei-, — 

Touch her who dare. 

The tone of this " anthem " not being devotional enough to suit 
the committee, it should be printed on an edition of linen-cambric 
handkerchiefs for ladies especially. 

Observe this 

NATIONAL ANTHEM. 

BY N. P. W . 

One hue of our ilag is taken 

From the cheeks of my blushing pet, 

And its stars beat time and sparkle 
Tike the studs on her chemisette. 



Its blue is the ocean shadow 
That hides in her dreamy eyes, 

And it conquers all men, like her, 
And still for a Union Hies. 

Several members of the conunittee find that this " anthem " has 
too much of the Anacreon spice to suit them. 
We next peruse a 

NATIONAL ANTHEM. 

BY THOMAS BAILEY A . 

The little brown squirrel hops in the corn, 

The cricket quaintly sings ; 
The emerald pigeon nods his head, 

And the shad in the river springs ; 
The dainty sunflower hangs its head 

On the sliore of the summer sea ; 
And better far that I were dead, 

If Maud did not love me. 

I love the squirrel that hops in the corn, 

And the ci'icket that quaintly sings ; 
And the emerald pigeon that nods his head, 

And the shad that gayly springs. 
I love the dainty sunflower, too, 

And Maud with her snowy breast ; 
I love them all ; but I love — I love — 

I love my country best. 

This is certainly very beautiful, and sounds somewhat like Ten- 
nyson. Though it may be rejected by the committee, it can never 
lose its value as a piece of excellent reading for children. It is 
calculated to fill the youthful mind with patriotism and natural his- 
tory, beside touching the youthful heart with an emotion palpitating 
for all. 

ROBBRT H. Newell [Orpheus C. Xerr). 



THE COCK AND THE BULL.* 

You see this pebble-stone? It's a thing I bought 
Of a bit of a chit of a boy i' the mid o' the day — 
I like to dock the smaller parts-o'-speech. 
As we curtail the already cur-tailed cur 
(You catch the paronomasia, play o' words ?) — 
Did, rather, i' the pre-Landseerian days. 
Well, to my muttons. I purchased the concern, 
And clapt it i' my poke, and gave for same 
By way, to-wit, of barter or exchange — • 
"Chop" was my snickering dandiprat's own 

tei'm — 
One shilling and fourpence, current coin o' the 

realm. 
O-n-e one and f-o-u-r four 
Pence, one and fourpence — you are with me, 
I Sir? — 

What hour it skills not: ten or eleven o' the clock. 
One day (and what a roaring day it was !) 



In imitation of Robert Browning. 



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In February, eighteen sixty-nine, 
Alexandrina Victoria, Fidei 
Hm — hm — how runs the jargon ? — being on 
throne. 

Such, sir, are all the facts, succinctly put. 
The basis or substratum — what you will — 
Of the impending eighty thousand lines. 
" Not much in 'em either," quoth perhaps simple 

Hodge. 
But there 's a superstructure. Wait a bit. 

Mark first the rationale of the thing : 
Hear logic rival and levigate the deed. 
That shilling — and for matter o' that, the 

pence — 
I had o' course upo' me — wi' me, say — 
[Mccitm's, the Latin, make a note o' that) 
When I popped pen 1' stand, blew snout, 

scratched ear. 
Sniffed — tch ! — at snuff-box ; tumbled up, he- 
heed, 
Haw-hawed (not hee-hawed, that 's another guess 

thing :) 
Then fumbled at, and stumbled out of, door, 
I shoved the door ope wi' my omoplat ; 
And in vestibulo, i' the entrance-hall, 
Donned galligaskins, antigropeloes, 
And so forth ; and, complete with hat and gloves, 
One on and one a-dangle i' my hand. 
And ombrifuge, (Lord love you !) case o' rain, 
I flopped forth, 's buddikins ! on my own ten toes, 
(I do assure you there be ten of them,) 
And went clump-clumping up hill and down dale 
To find myself o' the sudden 1' front o' the boj'. 
Put case I had n't 'em on me, could I ha' bought 
This sort-o'-kind-o'-what-you-might-call toy. 
This pebble-thing, o' the boy-thing ? Q. E. D. 
That 's proven without aid from mumping Pope, 
Sleek poi'porate or bloated Cardinal, 
(Is n't it, old Fatchaps ? You 're in Euclid now.) 
So, having the shilling — having i' fact a lot — ■ 
And pence and halfpence, ever so many o' them , 
I purchased, as I think I said before. 
The pebble (lapis, lapidis, — di, — dem, — de, — 
What nouns 'crease short i' the genitive, Fat- 
chaps, eh ?) 
0' the boy, a bare-legged beggarly son of a gun, 
For one and fourpence. Here we are again. 

Now Law steps in, big-wigged, voluminous- 
jawed ; 
Investigates and re-investigates. 
Was the transaction illegal ? Law shakes head. 
Perpend, sir, all the bearings of the case. 

At first the coin was mine, the chattel his. 
But now (by virtue of the said exchange 
And barter) vice ver'sa all the coin, 



Per jicris operationeini, vests 

r the boy and his assigns till ding o' doom ; 

{In scecula soiculo-o-o-orum ; 

I think I hear the Abbate mouth out that.) 

To have and hold the same to him and them . . . 

Confer some idiot on Conveyancing, 

Whereas the pebble and every part thereof, 

And all that appertaineth thereunto, 

Or shall, will, may, might, can, could, would, or 

should, 
[Subandi ccetera — clap me to the close — 
For what 's the good of law in a case o' the kind ?) 
Is mine to all intents and purposes. 
This settled, I resume the thread o' the tale. 

Now for a touch o' the vendor's quality. 
He says a gen'lman bought a pebble of him, 
(This pebble i' sooth, sir, which I hold i' my 

hand) — 
And paid for't, like a gen'lman, on the nail. 
"Did I o'ercharge him a ha'penny ? Devil a bit. 
Fiddlestick's end ! Get out, you blazing ass ! 
Gabble o' the goose. Don't bugaboo-baby me / 
Go double or quits ? Yah ! tittup ! what 's the 

odds ? " 
— There 's the transaction viewed, 1' the vendor's 

light. 

Next ask that dumpled hag, stood simffling by, 
With her three frowsy-browsy brats o' babes. 
The scum o' the kennel, cream o' the filth-heap 

— Faugh ? 
Aie, aie, aie, aie ! otototototoi, 
('Stead which we blurt out Hoighty-toighty 

now) — • 
And the baker and candlestick-maker, and Jack 

and Gill, 
Bleared Goody this and queasy Gaffer that. 
Ask the schoolmaster. Take schoolmaster first. 

He saw a gentleman purchase of a lad 
A stone, and pay for it rite, on the square, 
And carry it off ji;er saltum, jauntily. 
Propria qioce. maribits, gentleman's property now 
(Agreeably to the law explained above). 
In proprium usum, for his private ends. 
The boy he chucked a brown i' the air, and bit 
r the face the shilling : heaved a thumping stone 
At a lean hen that ran cluck-clucking by, 
(And hit her, dead as nail i' post o' door,) 
Then abiit — -what's the Ciceronian phrase ? — 
Excessit, evasit, erupit, — off slogs boy ; 
Ofi' in three flea-skips. Hactenus, so far. 
So good, tarn bene. Bene, satis, male, — 
Where was I ? who said what of one in a quag ? 
I did once hitch the syntax into verse : 
Verbum 2^ersoncde, a verb personal. 
Concordat, — ay, " agrees," old Fatchaps — cum 



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Nominativo, .with its nominative, 

Geneve, i' point o' gender, nuvicro, 

0' number, et persona, and person. Vt, 

Instance : Sol ruit, down flops sun, et, and, 

3Iontes wmbrantur, snuffs out mountains. Pah ! 

Excuse me, sir, I think I 'm going mad. 

You see the trick on 't though, and can yourself 

Continue the discourse ad libitum. 

It takes up about eighty thousand lines, 

A thing imagination boggles at : 

And might, odds-bobs, sir ! in judicious hands, 

Extend from here to Mesopotamy. 

Charles S. Cai.verley. 



LOVERS, AND A EEELECTION.* 

In moss-prankt dells which the sunbeams flatter 
(And heaven it knoweth what that majr mean ; 

Meaning, however, is no great niattei') 

Where woods are a-tremble, with rifts atween ; 

Through God's own heather we wonned together, 
I and my Willie (0 love my love) : 

I need hardly remai'k it was glorious weather. 
And flitterbats M'avered alow, above : 

Boats were curtseying, rising, bowing ■ 
(P>oats in that climate are so polite), 

And sands were a ribbon of green endowing. 
And the sun-dazzle on bark and bight ! 

Through the rare red heather we danced together, 
(0 love my Willie !)• and smelt for flowers : 

I must mention again it was glorious weather, 
Ehjnnes are so scarce in this world of ours : — 

By rises that flushed with their purple favors, 
Through becks that brattled o'er grasses sheen. 

We walked or waded, we two young shavers, 
Thanking our stars we were both so green. 

We journeyed in parallels, I and Willie, 
In "fortunate parallels ! " Butterflies, 

Hid in .weltering shadows of daffodilly 

Or marjoram, kept making peacock's eyes : 

Song-birds darted aboirt, some inky 

As coal, some snowy (I ween) as curds ; 

Or rosy as pinks, or as roses pinky — 
They reck of no eerie To-come, those birds ! 

But they skim over bents which the mill-stream 
washes. 

Or hang in the lift 'neath a white cloud's hem ; 
They need no parasols, no galoshes ; 

And good Mrs. Trimmer she feedeth them. 

• In imitation of Jean Ingelow. 



Then we thrid God's cowslips (as erst his heather) 
That endowed the wan grass with their golden 
blooms ; 

Andsnapt — (it was perfectly charming weather) — 
Our fingers at Fate and her goddess-glooms : 

And Willie 'gan sing — (0, his notes were flutj'- ; 
Wafts fluttered them out to the white-winged 
sea) — 
Something made up of rhymes that have done 
much duty. 
Rhymes (better to put it) of "ancientry : " 

Bowers of flowers encountered showers 
In William's carol (0 love my Willie !) 

When he bade sorrow borrow from blithe To- 
morrow 
I quite forget what — say a daffodilly : 

A nest in a hollow, " with buds to follow," 
I think occurred next in his nimble strain ; 

And cla3'that was "kneaden" of course in Eden — 
A rhyme most novel, I do maintain : 

Mists, bones, the singer himself, love-stories. 
And all least furlable things got "furled ; " 

Not with any design to conceal their glories. 
But simply and solely to rhyme with " world." 

0, if billows and pillows and hours and flowers, 
And all the brave rhymes of an elder day, 

Could be furled together this genial weather. 
And carted, or carried on wafts away. 

Nor ever again trotted out — ay me ! 

How much fewer volumes of vej'se there 'd be ! 

CHARLES S. CALVERLEY. 



THE ARAB. 

On, on, my brown Arab, away, away ! 
Thou hast trotted o'er many a mile to-day. 
And I trow right meagre hath been thy fare 
Since they roused thee at dawn from thy straw- 
piled lair, 
To tread with those echoless, unshod feet 
Yon weltering flats in the noontide heat, 
W^here no palm-tree proifers a kindly shade. 
And the eye never rests on a cool grass blade ; 
And lank is thy flank, and thy frequent cough, 
0, it goes to my heart — but away, friend, off ! 

And yet, ah ! what sculptorwho saw thee stand, 
As thou standest now, on thy native strand. 
With the wild wind ruffling thine uncombed hair, 
And thy nostril upturned to the odorous air. 
Would not woo thee to pause, till his skill might 

trace 
At leisure the lines of that eager face ; 



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The collarless neck and the coal-black paws 

And the bit grasped tight in the massive jaws ; 

The delicate curve of the legs, that seem 

Too slight for their burden — and, 0, the gleam 

Of that eye, so sombre and yet so gay ! 

Still away, my lithe Arab, once more away ! 

Nay, tempt me not, Arab, again to stay ; 
Since I crave neither Echo nor Fun to-day. 
For thy hand is not Echoless — there they are, 
Fun, Gloiviuorm, and Echo, and Evening Star, 
And thou hintest withal that thou fain wouldst 

shine, 
As I read them, these bulgy old boots of mine. 
But I shrink from thee, Arab ! Thou eatest 

eel-pie. 
Thou evermore hast at least one black eye ; 
There is brass on thy brow, and thy swarthy hues 
Are due not to nature, but handling shoes ; 
And the bit in thy mouth, I regret to see. 
Is a bit of tobacco-pipe — Flee, child, flee ! 

Charles S. Calverley. 



THE MODERN HOUSE THAT JACK 
BUILT. 

Behold the mansion reared by dasdal Jack. 

See the malt, stored in many a plethoric sack, 
In the proud-^cirque of Ivan's bivouac. 

Mark ho^v the rat's felonious fangs invade 
The golden stores in John's pavilion laid. 

Anon, with velvet foot and Tarquin strides. 
Subtle grimalkin to his quarry glides, — 
Grimalkin grim, that slew the fierce rodent 
"Whose tooth insidious Johann's sackcloth rent. 

Lo ! now the deep-mouthed canine foe's assault. 
That vexed the avenger of the stolen malt ; 
Stored in the hallowed precincts of the hall 
That rose complete at Jack's creative call. 

Here stalks the impetuous cow, with crumpled 

horn, 
Whereon the exacerbating hound was torn, 
"Who bayed the feline slaughter-beast, that slew 
The rat predacious, whose keen fangs I'an through 
The textile fibres that involved the grain 
That lay in Hans' inviolate domain. 

Here walks forlorn the damsel crowned with rue, 
Lactiferous spoils from vaccine dugs who drew. 
Of that corniculate beast whose tortuous horn 
Tossed to the clouds, in fierce vindictive scorn, 



The harrowing hound, whose braggart bark and 

stir 
Arched the lithe spine and reared the indignant fur 
Of puss, that witli verminicidal claw 
Struck the weird rat, in whose insatiate maw 
Lay reeking malt, that erst in Ivan's courts we 

saw. 

Robed in senescent garb, that seemed, in sooth, 
Too long a prey to Chronos' iron tooth. 
Behold the man whose amorous lips incline. 
Full with you-ng Eros' osculative sign. 
To the lorn maiden, whose lac-albic hands 
Drew albu-lactic wealth from lacteal glands 
Of the immortal bovine, by whose horn, 
Distort, to realm ethereal was borne 
The beast catulean, vexer of that sly 
Ulysses quadrupedal who made die 
The old mordacious rat, that dared devour 
Antecedaneous ale in John's domestic bower. 

Lo ! here, with hirsute honors doffed, succinct 
Of saponaceous locks, the priest who linked 
In Hymen's golden bands the torn unthrift. 
Whose means exiguous stared from many a rift, 
Even as lie kissed the virgin all forlorn, 
Who milked the cow with implicated horn. 
Who in fine wrath the canine torturer skied. 
That dared to vex the insidious muricide, 
Who let auroral effluence through the pelt 
Of the sly rat that robbed the palace Jack had 
built. 

The loud cantankerous Shanghai 'Comes at last. 
Whose shouts aroused the shorn ecclesiast. 
Who sealed the vows of Hymen's sacrament 
To him who, robed iii garments indigent, 
Exosculates the damsel lachrymose. 
The emulgator of that horned brute morose 
That tossed the dog that worried the cat that hilt 
The rat that ate the malt that lajr in the house 

that Jack built. 

Anonymous. 



JONES AT THE BARBER'S SHOP. 

Scene, a Barber's Sho-p. Barber's man engaged 
in cutting hear, tnahmg loigs, and other har- 
beresque O2oerations. 

Enter Jones, raceting Oily the barber. 

Jones. I wish my hair cut. 

Oily. Pray, sir, take a seat. 

(OiIjY puts a chair for Jones, v^ho sits. During 
the following dialogue Oily continues cutting 
Jones's hair.) 

Oily. We 've had much wet, sir. 

Jones. Very much indeed. 



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Oily. And yet November's days were fine. 
Jones. They were. 

Oily. I hoped fair weather might have lasted us 
Until the end. 
Jones. At one time — • so did I. 

Oily. But we have had it very wet. 
Jones. We have. 

(A pause of some ten minutes.) 
Oily. I know not, sir, who cut your hair last 
time ; 
Bat this I say, sir, it was badly cut : 
No doubt 't was in the country. 
Jones. No ! in town ! 

Oily. Indeed ! I should have fancied other- 
wise. 
Jones. 'T was cut in town and in this very 

room. 
Oily. Amazement ! — but I now remember 
well — 
We had an awkward, new provincial hand, 
A fellow from the country. Sir, he did 
More damage to my business in a week 
Than all my skill can in a year repair. 
He must have cut your hair. 
Jones {looking at him). No, 't was yourself. 
Oily. Myself? Impossible! You must mis- 
take. 
Jones. I don't mistake — 't was you that cut 
my hair. 

(A long i^O'Use, interrupted only by the clipping 
of the scissors. ) 

Oily. Your hair is very dry, sir. 

Jones. Oh ! indeed. 

Oily. Our Vegetable Extract moistens it. 

Jones. I like it dry. 

Oily. But, sir, the hair when dry 
Turns quickly gray. 

Jones. That color I prefer. 

Oily. But hair, when gray, will rapidly fall 
otf. 
And baldness will ensue. 

Jones. I would be bald. 

Oily. Perhaps you mean to say you 'd like a 
wig, — 
"We 've wiga so natural they can't be told 
From real hair. 

Jones. Deception I detest. 

{Another pause ensues, during which Oily hlows 
down Jones's neck, and relieves him from the 
linen lorapper in which he has been enveloped 
during the pi'ocess of hair-cutting.) 
Oily. We 've brushes, soaps, and scent of 

every kind. 
JoNE.s. I see you have. (PdysQd.) I thiuk 

vou '11 find that right. 



Oily. If there is nothing I can show you, sir. 
Jones. No ; nothing. Yet — there may be 
something, too, 
That you may show me 
Oily. 
Jones. 

Oily {to his man), 
at any rate. 
Had I cut him as short as he cut me, 
How little hair upon his head would be ! 
But if kind friends will all our pains requite, 
We '11 hope for better luck another night. 

[Shop bell rings, and curtain falls 

PUNCH. 



Name it, sir. 

The door, 
rum customer 



That 's 



TO THE TERRESTRIAL GLOBE. 

BY A MISERABLE WRETCH. 

Roll on, thou ball, roll on ! 
Through pathless realms of space 

Roll on ! 
What though I 'm in a sorry case ? 
What though I cannot meet my bills ? 
What though I suffer toothache's ills ? 
What though I swallow countless j)ills ? 
Never you. mind ! 
RoU on ! 

Roll on, thou ball, roll on ! 
Through seas of inky air 

Roll on ! 
It 's true I 've got no shirts to wear, 
It 's true my butcher's bill is due, 
It 's true my prospects all look blue, — 
But don't let that unsettle you ! 
Never you mind ! 
Roll on ! 

\_It rolls on. 
William Schwenck Gilbert. 



MY LOVE.* 

I only knew she came and went 
Like troutlets in a pool ; 

She was a phautom of delight, 
And I was like a fool. 



Powell. 

Hood. 

Wordsivorth. 

Eastman. 



One kiss, dear maid, I said, and sighed, Coleridge. 

Out of those lips unshorn : Longfelloiv. 

She shook her ringlets round her head, Stoddard. 

And laughed in merry scorn. Tennyson. 

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, Tennyson. 

You heard them, my heart ; Alice Cary. 
'T is twelve at night by the castle clock, Coleridge. 

Beloved, we must part. Alice Cary. 

* A specimen of wliat are called " Cento Verses : " patchwork. 



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ra 



" Come back, come back ! " she cried in grief, 

Cam2)bell. 

"My eyes are dim with tears, — Bayard Taylor. 
How shall I live through all the days ? Osgood. 

All through a hundred years ?" T. S. Perry. 

'T was in the prime of summer time Hood. 

She blessed me with her hand ; Hoyt. 

AVe straj^ed together, deeply blest, Edioards. 

Into the dreaming land. Cornwall. 

The laughing bridal roses blow, Patmore. 

To dress her dark-brown hair ; Baya.rd Taylor. 
My heart is breaking with my woe, Tennyson. 

Most beautiful ! most rare ! Read. 

I clasped it on her sweet, cold hand, Broivning. 

The pi'ecious golden link ! Smith. 

I calmed her fears, and she was calm, Coleridge. 

"Drink, pretty creature, drink." Wordsworth. 



And so I won my Genevieve, 
And walked in Paradise ; 

The fairest thing that ever gi-ew 
Atween me and the skies. 



Coleridge. 

Hcrvey. 

Wordsioorth. 

Osgood. 

Anonymous. 



RECIPES. 

PvOASTED SUCKING-PIG. 
Air, — Scots wha hae," etc. 

Cooks who 'd roast a sucking-pig, 
Purchase one not over big ; 
Coarse ones are not worth a fig ; 

So a young one buy. 
See that he is scalded well 
(That is done by those who sell), 
Therefore on that point to dweU 

Were absurdity. 

Sage and bread, mix just enough, 
Salt and pepper quantum snff.. 
And the pig's interior stuff. 

With the whole combined. 
To a fire that 's rather high, 
Lay it till completely dry ; 
Then to every part apply 

Cloth, with butter lined. 

Dredge with flour o'er and o'er, . 
Till the pig will hold no more ; 
Then do nothing else before 

'T is for serving fit. 
Then scrape off the flour with care ; 
Then a buttered cloth prepare ; 
Eub it well ; then cut — not tear — 

Off the head of it. 



Then take out and mix the brains 
With the gi'avy it contains ; 
While it on the spit remains, 

Cut the pig in two. 
Chop the sage and chop the bread 
Fine as very finest shred ; 
O'er it melted butter spread, — 

Stinginess won't do. 

When it in the dish appears. 
Garnish with the jaws and ears ; 
And when dinner-hour nears. 

Ready let it be. 
Who can offer such a dish 
May dispense with fowl and fi.sh ; 
And if he a guest should wish, 

Let him send for me ! 

PUNCH'S Poetical Cookery Book. 



A EECIPE FOR SALAD. 

To make this condiment your poet begs 
The pounded yellow of two hard-boiled eggs ; 
Two boiled potatoes, passed through kitchen 

sieve, 
Smoothness and softness to the salad give ; 
Let onion atoms lark within the bowl, 
And, half susjjected, animate the whole ; 
Of mordant mustard add a single spoon. 
Distrust the condiment that bites so soon ; 
But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault 
To add a double quantity of salt ; 
Four times the spoon with oil from Lucca 

crown, 
And twice with vinegar, procured from town ; 
And lastly, o'er the flavored compound toss 
A magic soup<;oii of anchovy sauce. 
green and glorious I herbaceous treat ! 
'T would tempt the dying anchorite to eat ; 
Back to the world he 'd turn his fleeting soul. 
And plunge his fingers in the salad-bowl ; 
Serenely full, the epicure would say, 
" Fate cannot harm me, — I have dined to-day." 

SYDNEY SMITH. 



SIEGE OF BELGRADE. 

An Austrian army, awfully arrayed. 
Boldly b}"- battery besieged Belgrade. 
Cossack commanders cannonading come. 
Dealing destruction's devastating doom. 
Every endeavor engineers essay. 
For fame, for fortune fighting, — furious fray ! 
Generals 'gainst generals grapple — gracious God ! 
How honors Heaven heroic hardihood ! 



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Infuriate, indiscriminate in ill, 

Kindred kill kinsmen, kinsmen kindred kill. 

[iixbor low levels longest loftiest lines ; 

Men march mid mounds, mid moles, mid mur- 
derous mines ; 

N"ow noxious, noisy numbers nothing, naught 

Of outward obstacles, opposing ought ; 

Poor patriots, partly purchased, partly pressed. 

Quite quaking, quickly "Quarter! Quarter!" 
quest. 

Reason returns, religious right redounds, 

Suwarrow stops such sanguinary sounds. 

Truce to thee,^Turkey ! Triumph to thy train, 

Unwise, unjust, unmerciful Ukraine ! 

Vanish, vain victory ! vanish, victory vain ! 

\Vhy wish we warfare ? Wherefore welcome 
were 

Xerxes, Ximenes, Xanthus, Xavier ? 

Yield, yield, ye youths ! ye yeomen, yield jour 
yell ! 

Zeus's, Zarpater's, Zoroaster's zeal, 

Attracting all, arms against acts appeal ! 

ANONYMOUS. 



Lover. 

Echo. 
Lover. 

Echo, 
Lover. 

Echo. 
Lover. 

Echo. 
Lover. 

Echo. 
Lover. 

Echo. 
Lover. 

Echo. 
Lover. 

Echo. 
Lover. 
Echo. 
Lover. 

Echo. 



ECHO AND THE LOVER. 

Echo ! mysterious nymph, declare 

Of what you're made, and what you are. 

Air! 
Mid airy cliffs and places high. 
Sweet Echo ! listening love, you lie. 

You lie ! 
Thou dost resuscitate dead sounds, — 
Hark ! how my voice revives, resounds ! 

Zounds ! 
I '11 question thee before I go, — 
Come, answer me more apropos ! 

Poh ! poh ! 
Tell me, fair nymph, if e'er you saw 
So sweet a girl as Phoebe Shaw. 

Pshaw ! 
Say, what will turn that frisking coney 
Into the toils of matrimony ? 

Money ! 
Has Phoebe not a heavenly brow ? 
Is not her bosom white as snow ? 

Ass ! No ! 
Her eyes ! was ever such a pair ? 
Are the stars brighter than they are ? 

They are ! 
Echo, thou liest, but can't deceive me. 

Leave me ! 
But come, thou saucy, pert romancer, 
Who is as fair as Phcebe ? Answer ! 

Ann, sir. 
Anonymous. 



ECHO. 

I ASKED of Echo, t' other day, 

( Whose words are few and often funny, ) 
What to a novice she could say 

Of courtship, love, and matrimony. 

Quoth Echo, plainly, — " Matter-o'-money ! " 

Whom should I marry ? — should it be 

A dashing damsel, gay and pert, 
A pattern of inconstancy ; 

Or selfish, mercenary flirt ? 

Quoth Echo, sharply, — " Nary flirt ! " 

What if, aweary of the strife 

■ That long has lured the dear deceiver, 

She promise to amend her life. 

And sin no more ; can I believe her ? 

Quoth Echo, very promptly, — " Leave her ! 

But if some maiden with a heart 
On me should venture to bestow it, 

Pray, should I act the wiser part 
To take the ti'easure or forego it ? 
Quoth Echo, with decision, — " Go it ! " 

But what if, seemingly afraid 
To bind her fate in Hymen's fetter, 
She vow she means to die a maid, 
In answer to my loving letter ? 
Quoth Echo, rather coolly, — " Let her ! " 

What if, in spite of her disdain, 

I find my heart intwined about 
With Cupid's dear delicious chain 

So closely that I can't get out ? 

Quoth Echo, laughingly, — " Get out !" 

But if some maid with beauty blest. 

As pure and fair as Heaven can make her. 

Will share my labor and my rest 

Till envious Death shall overtake her ? 
Quoth Echo {sotto voce), — " Take her ! " 

JOHN GODFREY SAXE. 



NOCTURNAL SKETCH. 

BLANK VERSE IN RHYME. 

Even is come ; and from the dark Park, hark. 
The signal of the setting sun — one gun ! 
And six is sounding from the chime, prime time 
To go and see the Drury-Lane Dane slain, — 
Or hear Othello's jealous doubt spout out, — 
Or Macbeth raving at that shade-made blade. 
Denying to his frantic clutch much touch ; 
Or else to see Ducrow with wide stride ride 
Four horses as no other man can span ; 
Or in the small Olympic pit sit split 
Laughing at Liston, while you quiz his phiz. 



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HUMOROUS POEMS. 



1015 



■a 



Anon Night comes, and with her wings brings 

things 
Such as, with his poetic tongue, Young sung ; 
The gas upblazes with its bright white light. 
And paralytic watchmen prowl, howl, growl 
About the streets, and take up Pali-Mall Sal, 
Who, hasting to her nightly jobs, robs fobs. 

Now thieves to enter for your cash, smash, crash. 
Past drowsy Charley, in a deep sleep, creep. 
But, frightened by Policeman B. 3, flee. 
And while they 're going, whisper low, " No go ! " 

Now puss, when folks are in their beds, treads 

leads, 
And sleepers, waking, grumble, " Drat that cat ! " 
"Who in the gutter caterwauls, squalls, mauls 
Some feline foe, and screams in shrill ill-will. 

Now Bulls of Bashan, of a prize size, rise 
In childish dreams, and with a roar gore poor 
Georgy, or Charley, or Billy, willy-nilly ; — 
But Nursemaid in a nightmare rest, chest-pressed, 
Dreameth of one of her old flames, James Games, 
And that she hears — what faith is man's ! — 

Ann's banns 
And his, from Reverend Mr. Rice, twice, thrice ; 
White ribbons flourish, and a stout shout out. 
That upward goes, shows Rose knows those bows' 

woes ! 

THOMAS HOOD. 



ODE FOR A SOCIAL MEETING ; 

WITH SLIGHT ALTER.VnONS BY A TEETOTALER. 

CoiiE ! fill a fresh bumper, — for why should 
we go 

logwood 

While the Hoo t a r still reddens our cups as they 
flow? 

^decoction 

Pour out the rieiirjiiiees still bright mth the sun, 

dye-stuff 

Till o'er the brimmed crystal the HiMss shall run. 

half-ripened apples 

The purple gl » bcd oliiBtcrs their life-dews have 
bled: 



How sweet is the b^oatb of the { 



sugar of lead 
ranlc poisons itn'nes f ! / 

For summer's l ast r eses lie hid in the wmas 

stable-boys sniolcin<j lontr-nines 

That were garnered by maidens-wh o laugh ed 
thTough the - - vTOes. 

scowl howl scoff sneer 

Then aasiiie, and a glass, and atsast, and a ck-eai-, 

strychnine and whislcey, and ratsbane and beer 

For alr-TrW-goetl-wtfter^ ^ r Hi ' wo 'vo DQ JK.»-»£4t-h€re ! 
In cellar, in pantry, in attic, in hall, 

Down, down with the tyrant that masters us all ! 

Leeg-li¥e-*h9-g3j-ser7ant-that-laagh3-fs-r-as-all! 

Oliver Whndell Holmes. 



LINES WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM. 

[.\ farmer's daughter, during the rage for albums, handed to the 
author an old account-book ruled for pounds, shillings, and pence, 
and requested a contribution.] 

This world 's a scene as dark as Styx. 

Where hope is scarce worth 

Our joys are borne so fleeting hence 

That they are dear at 18 

And yet to stay here most are willing, 

Although they may not have 

WILLIS GAYLORD. 



METRICAL FEET. 

Trochee trips from long to short ; 

From long to long in solemn sort 

Slow Spondee stalks ; strong foot ! yet ill able 

Ever to come up with dactyl trisyllable. 

Iambics march from short to long ; — 

With a leap and a bound the swift Anap?ests 

throng ; 
One syllable long, with one short at each side. 
Amphibrachys hastes with a stately stride ; — 
First and last being long, middle short, Amphi- 

macer 
Strikes his thundering hoofs like a proud high- 
bred racer, 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 



SNEEZING. 

What a moment, what a doubt ! 
All my nose is inside out, — 
All my thrilling, tickling caustic, 
Pyramid rhinocerostic, 

Wants to sneeze and cannot do it ! 
How it yearns me, thrills me, .stings me, 
How with rapturous torment wrings me ! 

Now says, "Sneeze, you fool, — get through 
it." 
Shee — shee — oh ! 't is most del-ishi — 
Ishi — ishi — most del-ishi ! 
(Hang it, I shall sneeze till spring !) 
Snuff is a delicious thing. 

Leigh Hunt. 



TO MY NOSE. 

Knows he that never took a pinch. 
Nosey, the pleasiare thence which flows ? 
Knows he the titillating joys 
Which mjr nose knows ? 

nose, I am as proud of thee 
As any mountain of its snows ; 

1 gaze on thee, and feel that pride 

A Roman Icnows ! 

Alfred A. Forrester (A!fred Crawqmll). 



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1016 



HUMOROUS POEMS. 



-n 



BELAGCHOLLY DAYS. 

Chilly Dovebber with its boadigg blast 

Dow cubs add strips the beddow add the lawd, 
Eved October's suddy days are past — 
Add Subber 's gawd ! 

I kdow dot what it is to which I cligg 

That stirs to sogg add sorrow, yet I trust 
That still I sigg, but as the liddets sigg — 
Because I bust. 

Dear leaves that rustle sadly 'death by feet — 

By liggerigg feet — add till by eyes with tears, 
Ye bake be sad, add, oh ! it gars be gi-eet 
That ye are sear ! 



The sud id sulled skies too early sigks ; 

Do trees are greed but evergreeds add ferds ; 
Gawd are the orioles add boboligks — 
Those Robert Burds ! 

Add dow, farewell to roses add to birds, 

To larded fields and tigkligg streablets eke ; 
Farewell to all articulated words 
I faid would speak. 

Farewell, by cherished strolliggs od the sward. 

Greed glades add forest shades, farewell to you ; 
With sorrowigg heart I, wretched add forlord, 
Bid you — achew ! ! ! 

Anonymous. 



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INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



PAGE 

A baby was sleeping 81 

Abou Ben Adliem (may his tribe increase !) V68 

Above the pines the moon 926 

A brace of sinners for no good 953 

A chieftain, to the Highlands bound 339 

A child sleeps under a rose-bush fair 741 

A cloud lay cradled near the setting sun 693 

A country life is sweet ! 551 

Across the narrow beach we flit 482 

A dew-drop came, with a sparlt of flame 865 

A diagnosis of our history proves 1007 

Adieu, adieu, my native shore 238 

A district school not far away 99 

Ae fond kiss and then we sever 233 

A fair little girl sat under a tree 103 

A famous hen 's my story's theme 991 

Afar in the desert I love to ride 319 

A fellow in a market- town 954 

A flock of merry singing-birds 475 

A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by 763 

A footstep struck her ear 648 

Again the violet of our early days 421 

A gentle knight was pricking on the plalne 827 

A girl who has so many willful ways 130 

A good wife rose from her bed one morn 220 

A happy bit hame this auld world would be 117 

Ah; Ben ! say how or when 907 

Ah! County Guy, the hour is nigh 194 

Ah, Chloris, could I now but sit 147 

Ah, how sweet it is to love ! 145 

Ah ! little they know of true happiness 556 

Ah ! my heart is weary waiting 419 

Ah, my sweet sweeting 123 

Ah, sweet Kitty Neil! 174 

Ah, then, how sweetly closed those crowded days.. 87 

Ah, the world hath many a Horner 973 

Ah ! what is love ? It is a pretty thing 136 

Ah I whence yon glare 499 

Ah, yes,— the fight ? Well, messmates, well 612 

A jolly fat friar loved liquor good store 946 

Alas, Fra Giacomo 885 

Alas, how light a cause may move 264 

Alas ! they had been friends in youth 116 

Alas : what pity 't is that regularity 958 

A life on the ocean wave 630 

A lighter scarf of richer fold 81 

A light is out in Italy 934 

A little more toward the light 755 

All day long the storm of battle through the start- 
led valley swept 523 

All grim and soiled and brown with tan 600 

All hail ! thou noble land 588 

All hail to the ruins, the rocks, and the shores ! 608 

All in our marriage gai'den 83 

All in the Downs the fleet was moored — , 235 

" All quiet along the Potomac" 524 

AU the world 's a stage 711 



All things that are on earth shall wholly pass S88 

All thoughts, all passions, all delights 162 

Aloft upon an old basaltic crag 9"»j 

Along the frozen lake she comes 670 

Although I enter not 132 

A man there came, whence none could tell 71^5 

Amazing, beauteous change! 377 

A mighty fortress is our God 371 

A mighty hand, from an exhaustless urn 750 

A milkmaid, who poised a full paU 957 

A moment then Lord Marmion stayed 507 

Among the beautiful pictures 89 

Among their graven shapes '. 937 

Among thy fancies teUme this 186 

A Monk, when his rites sacerdotal were o'er 863 

An ancient story I'll tell you 943 

An Austrian army awfully arrayed 1013 

And are ye sure the news is true ? 246 

And hast thou sought thy heavenly home 279 

And is the swallow gone ? 473 

And Is there care in heaven ? 373 

And now behold your tender nurse, the air 4'(1 

And now, unveiled, the toilet stands displayed 713 

And said I that my limbs were old 202 

And there two runners did the sign abide 164 

And thou hast walked about 717 

And wilt thou leave me thus ? 240 

And ye sail walk in silk attire 155 

An exquisite incompleteness 711 

An exquisite invention this 195 

A nightingale, that all day long 863 

Announced by all the trumpets of the sky 4139 

An old farm-house with meadows wide 229 

A poet loved a star S02 

Appeared the princess with that merry child 172 

Arches on arches ! as it were that Rome 681 

Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers ? 550 

Art thou weary, art thou languid 364 

A ruddy drop of manly blood 112 

As beautiful Kitty one morning was tripping 187 

As by the shore, at break of day 577 

A sentinel angel sitting high in glory 270 

A simple child 87 

As into blowing roses summer dews 790 

As it fell upon a day 480 

As Memnon's marble harp renowned of old 819 

A soldier of the Legion lay dying in Algiers 521 

As once a Grecian maiden wove 103 

A song for the plant of my own native West 458 

A song to the oak, the brave old oak 454 

As, rising on its purple wing. 267 

As ships becalmed at eve, that lay 233 

As slow our ship her foamy track 237 

A stranger came one night to Yussouf 's tent 768 

A swallow in the spring 477 

A sweet disorder In the dress 713 

As when, on Carmel's sterile steep 593 



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INDEX OP FIRST LINES. 



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At Bannockburn the English lay 573 

At early dawn I marked them in the sky 480 

• A temple to friendship," cried Laura 120 

A thing of beauty is a joy forever 6T5 

A thousand miles from land are we 483 

At midnight, in his guarded tent 583 

At noon, within the dusty town 692 

At Paris it was, at the opera there 264 

A traveller througli a dusty road 779 

At setting day and rising morn 161 

At the close of the day, when the hamlet Is still 737 

Ave Maria! o'er the earth and sea 413 

A violet in her lovely hair 126 

Awake, awake, my Lyre 772 

A warrior so bold, and a virgin so bright 861 

Away ! away ! through the sightless^ir 864 

A weary weed, tossed to and fro 623 i 

A well there Is in the West country 955 ' 

A wet sheet and a flowing sea 635 

A widow— she liad only one ! 282 

A wind came up out of the sea 408 

Ay, but I know 251 

Ay, tear her tattered ensign down ! 620 

Bachelor's hall, what a quare-lookin' place it is !. . .1003 
Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your flight. . 222 

Balow, my babe, ly stll and sleipe ! 269 

Beat on, proud billows, Boreas, blow 781 

Beautiful Evelyn Hope is dead 284 

Beautiful, sublime, and glorious 607 

Beautiful was the night 432 

Because I breathe not love to everie one 144 

Before I sigh my last gasp, let me breathe 791 

Before I trust my fate to thee 143 

Behave yoursel' before folk 157 

Behold, I have a weapon 877 

Behold the mansion reared by daedal Jack 1011 

Behold the sea CIO 

Behold the young, the rosy Spring 422 

Behold this ruin ! 'T was a skull 761 

Believe me, if all those endearing young charms. . . 174 

Ben Battle was a soldier bold 964 

Beneath a shivering canopy reclined 410 

Beneath our consecrated elm 927 

Beneath this stony roof reclined 406 

Better trust all and be deceived 790 

Between Nose and Eyes a strange contest arose 951 

Between the dark and the daylight 98 

Be wise to-day ; 't Is madness to defer 748 

Beyond the smiling and the weeping 296 

Beyond these chilling winds and gloomy skies 368 

Bird of the wilderness 473 

Birds, the free tenants of land, air, and ocean 470 

Blessings on thee, little man 99 

Blest as the immortal gods is he 184 

Blossom of the almond-trees 457 

Blow, blow, thou winter wind 316 

Blue gulf all around us 573 

Bobolink! that in the meadow 475 

Bonnie wee thing: cannie wee tiling 123 

Bonny Kilmeny gaed up the glen.... 837 

Break, break, break , 315 

Break, Fantasy, from thy cave of cloud 819 

Breathes there the man with soul so dead 563 

Buried to-day 272 

Burly, dozing humble-bee '. 484 

But chief -surpassing all— a cuckoo clock 717 

But Enoch yearned to see her face again 223 

But Fortune, like some others of her sex 777 

But happy they ! the happiest of their kind 214 

But I remember, when the fight was done 506. 

But look ! o'er the fall see the angler stand 669 



But now our quacks are gamesters 783 

But where to find that liappiest spot below 229 

But who the melodies of morn can tell ? 409 

"But why do you go ?" said the lady ... 217 

By broad Potomac's silent shore 928 

By Nebo's lonely mountain , 383 

By the fiow of the inland river 5:33 

By the rude bridge that arched the flood 589 

By the wayside, on a mossy stone 323 

Calm is the mom without a sound 290 

Care-charmer Sleep, son of the sable nlglit 414 

Ca' the yowes to the knowes , 153 

Cease, rude Boreas, blustering railer 623 

Charmer, on a given straight line 992 

Cheeks as soft as July peaches 76 

Chicken-skin, delicate, white , 749 

Child of the later days ! - 662 

Chilly Dovebber with its boadigg blast 1016 

Chloe, we must not always be in heaven 192 

Christ ! I am Christ's ! and let the name 359 

Christmas is here 117 

Clear and cool, clear and cool 448 

Clear, placid Leman ! thy contrasted lake .... . . 685 

Clear the brown path to meet his coulter's gleam. . 531 

Cleon hath a million acres 732 

Clime of the unforgotten brave ! 581 

Cling to thy home ! if tliere tlie meanest shed 225 

Close his eyes ; his work Is done ! 531 

Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise 588 

Come a little nearer, doctor 541 

Come, all ye jolly sheplierds 163 

Come as artist, come as guest 925 

Come, brotlier, turn with me from pining thouglit. 368 

Come, dear children, let us away 837 

Come, dear old comrade, you and 1 112 

Come ! fill a fresh bumper, for why should we go.. 1015 

Come from my first, aj', come ! 930 

Come, gentle sleep, attend thy votary's prayer 761 

Come here, come here, and dwell 835 

Come hither, Evan Cameron 877 

Come, hoist the sail, the fast let go ! 666 

Come in the evening, or come in the morning 152 

Come into the garden, Maud 152 

Come, let us plant the apple-tree 457 

Come, listen to me, you gallants so free 638 

Come live with me. and be my love 157 

Come, now a roundel, and a fairy song 835 

Come on, sir : here's the place 445 

Come, O thou Traveller unknown , 371 

Come over, come over 153 

Come, rest In this bosom , , 185 

Come, see the Dolphin's anchor forged 5.54 

Come, Sleep, and with thy sweet deceiving 761 

Come, Sleep, O Sleep, the certain knot of peace . . . . 762 

Come then, my friend ! my genius ! come along 911 

Come to me, dearest 247 

Come to me, O my Mother '...., . 223 

Come to these scenes of peace 403 

Comrades, leave me here a little 254 

Cooks who 'd roast a sucking pig 1013 ■ 

Could I pass those lounging sentries 922 

Could ye come back to me, Douglas. Douglas 289 

Cromwell, I did not think to shed a tear 321 

Cromwell, our chief of men 909 

Cupid and my Campaspe played 186 

Cursed be the verse, how well soe'er it flow 781 

Cyriack, this three years' day 735 

Dark as the clouds of even 595 

Dark fell the night, the watch was set 645 

Darkness Is thinning 360 



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INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



1019 



S 



Daughter of GrOd ! that sitt'st on high 534 

Day dawned;— within a curtained room 741 

Day in melting purple dying 245 

Day is dying ! Float, O song 411 i 

Day set on Norhani's castled steep 6T6 

Day stars ! that ope your f rownless eyes 459 i 

Dead ! one of them shot by the sea 283 i 

Dear Chloe, while the busy crowd 226 1 

Dear friend, whose presence in the house 388 i 

Dear hearts, you were waiting a year ago 277 

Dear Ned, no doubt you '11 be surprised 201 

Deep in the wave is a coral grove 624 

Der Noble Ritter Hugo 1000 

Deserted by the waning moon 627 

Did you hear of the Widow Malone, Ohone ! 1003 

Die down, O dismal day, and let me live 419 

Dies irae, dies ilia ! 953 

Dip down upon the northern shore 418 

Does the road wind up-hill all the way ? 363 

Down deep In a hollow so damp 694 

Down, down, Ellen, my little one 776 

Down swept the chill wind from the mountain 

Down the dimpled greensward dancing 85 

Down to the wharves, as the sun goes down 318 

Dow'sFlat. That 's its name 996 

Do you ask what the birds say ? 474 

Drink to me only with thine eyes 125 

Drunk and senseless in his place 897 

Drop, drop, slow tears 360 

Duncan Gray cam' here to woo 196 

Each day, vs'hen the glow of sunset 281 

Earl Gawain wooed the Lady Barbara 163 

Early on a sunny morning 169 

Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us 424 

Earth has not anything to show more fair , 678 

Earth with its dark and dreadful ills 391 

Echo! mysterious nymph, declare 1014 

E'en such is time ; which takes on trust. , 745 

England, with all thy faults, I love thee still 575 

Ensanguined man 783 

Erratic Soul of some great Purpose, doomed 863 

Eternal spirit of the chainless mind 703 

Ethereal minstrel I pilgrim of the sky ! 475 

Even is come ; and from the dark Park, hark 1014 

Ever let the Fancy roam 819 

Every day brings a ship 746 

Everyone, by instinct taught 624 

Faintly as tolls the evening chime 665 

Fair daffodils, we weep to see 464 

Fair Greece ! sad relic of departed worth ' 581 

Fair Insect, that, with thread-like legs 487 

Fair lady, when you see the grace 125 

Fair pledges of a fruitful tree 456 

Fair Portia's counterfeit ? 122 

Fair ship that from the Italian shore 290 

Fair stood the wind for France 502 

False diamond set in flint! 166 

False world, thou ly'st ; thou canst not lend 743 

Fare thee well ! and if forever 238 

Farewell, a long farewell, to all my greatness ! 321 

Farewell ! but whenever you welcome the hour 240 

"Farewell; farewell!" is often heard 233 

Farewell, farewell to thee, Araby's daughter ! 294 

Farewell ! if ever fondest prayer 238 

Farewell, life ! my senses swim 327 

Farewell rewards and fairies ! 847 

Farewell ! thou art too dear for my possessing 239 

Farewell, thou busy world, and may 737 

Farewell to Lochaber, and farewell, my Jean 237 

Father of all ! in every age 370 



Father ! thy wonders do not singly stand 368 

Fear no more the heat o' the sun 301 

Fear not, O little flock I the foe 519 

First time he kissed me, he but only kissed 190 

Five years have past ; five summers 403 

Fled now the sullen murmur of the north 553 

Flowers are fresh, and bushes green 261 

Flow^ers to the fair : to you these flowers I bring 128 

Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes. . 447 

Flung to the heedless winds 365 

" Fly to the desert, fly with me" 151 

For aught that ever I could read 250 

For close designs and crooked councils flt 908 

For England when with favoring gale 027 

Forever with the Lord 389 

Forget thee ? If to dream by night 161 

For many, many days together 883 

For Scotland's and for freedom's right 573 

For why, who writes such histories as these 788 

Fresh from the fountains of the wood 447 

Friend after friend departs 114 

Friends ! I came here not to talk , 572 

Prom harmony, from heavenly harmony 775 

Fi'om his brimstone bed at break of day 949 

From the desert I come to thee 186 

From the recesses of a lowly spirit 375 

Full knee-deep lies the winter snow 753 

Gamarra is a dainty steed 467 

Gargons et filles, venez toujours 993 

Gather ye rosebuds as ye may 754 

Gay, guiltless pair 478 

Genteel in personage 142 

Gin a body meet a body 187 

Give me more love or more disdain 144 

Give me my scallop-shell of quiet 361 

Give me three grains of corn, mother ES8 

Give place, ye ladies, and begone 127 

Give place, ye lovers 123 

"Give us a song!" the soldiers cried 155 

God makes sech nights, all white an' still 993 

God might have bade the earth bring forth 466 

God of the thunder ! from whose cloudy seat .372 

God prosper long our noble king 6.35 

God shield ye, heralds of the spring 421 

God's love and peace be with thee Ill 

Go, feel what I have felt 546 

Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand 189 

Going— the great round Sun 7.54 

Golden hair climbed up on Grandpapa's knee 85 

Go, lovely rose ! 125 

Gone at last 932 

Go now ! and with some daring drug 546 

Good-by, proud world, I'm going home 744 

Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color off 294 

Good morrow to thy sable beak 477 

Good night ! 5,58 

Good people all of every sort 948 

Good people all, with one accord 949 

Go, patter to lubbers, and swabs, do ye see 615 

Go, soul, the body's guest 745 

Go to thy rest, fair child 282 

Go where glory waits thee 237 

Great ocean ! strongest of creation's sons 010 

Green be the turf above thee 937 

Green grow the rashes 191 

Green little vaulter in the sunny grass 485 

Grief hath been known to turn 891 

Guvener B. Is a sensible man 994 

Ha ' bully for me again when my turn for picket is 
over 525 



^ 



^ 



Hail, beauteous stranger of the grove ! 

Hail, holy Light, offspring of Heaven !,......, 

Hail to the Chief who in triumph advances !, 

Hail to thee, blithe spirit ! 

Half a league, half a league — , 

Hamelln Town 's in Brunswick 

Hans Breitmann glfe a barty ^ 

Happy insect ! ever blest , 

Happy insect, what can be , , . , . - 

Happy the man , whose wish and care 

Happy the man who, void — , , , 

Hark ! ah, the nightingale ! 

Hark ! hark : the lark at heaven's gate sings 

Hark ! the faint bells of the sunken city 

Harness me down with your iron bands 

Has there any old fellow got mixed with the boys.. 

Hast thou a charm to stay the morning star 

Have other lovers— say my love — .... 

Have you heard of the wonderful one-hoss shay.... 

Have you not heard the poets tell , 

Ha! whare ye gaun, ye crawlin' ferlie? 

Heap on more wood ! the wind is chill 

Hear the sledges with the bells ,,.,.., 

Heaven, what an age is this — , 

He clasps the crag with hooked hands , 

He had no times of study, and no i)lace.... 

Heigh-ho ' daisies and buttercups 

He Is gone on the mountain 

He is the freeman whom the truth makes free 

He is the happy man whose life even now 

He making speedy way through sper-sed ayre.. . . ... 

Hence, all ye vain delights , 

Hence, loathed Melancholy , „ . . 

Hence, vain deluding joys 

"Henri Heine"— 't is here ;, 

Here, a sheer hulk, lies poor Tom Bowling , 

Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere 

Here In this leafy place 

Here is one leaf reserved for me..... ....„,..,.., . 

Here rests, and let no saucy knave.. , , 

Here rests his head upon the lap of earth 

Here's the garden she walked across 

Here's to the maiden of bashful fifteen 

Her hair was tawny with gold. 

Her house is all of echo made..,,, — 

Her window opens to the bay 

He'sgane, he's gane i 

He that loves a rosy cheek,.. ,. ... 

He that many bokes redys 

He was in logic a great critic 

He was of that stubborn crew, 

He who hath bent him o'er the dead , 

High walls and huge the body may confine , 

His echoing axe the settler swung 

His learning such, no author, old or new 

His puissant sword unto his .side 

Home of the Percy's high-born race 

Home they brought her warrior dead 

Honor and shame from no condition rise 

Ho ! pretty page with the dimpled chin 

Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man 

Ho, sailor of the sea i ,, 

How beautiful Is the rain ! , 

How beautiful this night ' the balmiest sigh 

How calm they sleep beneath the shade , 

How dear to this heart are the scenes of my child 

hood .,. , 

How delicious is the winning , . . . , 

How desolate were nature 

How does the water come down at Lodore 

How do 1 love thee ? Let me count the ways 

How fares my lord ? , 



303 I 

593 I 

709 I 

907 

506 

677 I 

292 

781 

202 

111 

616 

428 

415 

.303 



How fine has the day been ! how bright the sun ! . . 431 

How fresh, O Lord, how sweet and clean. 768 

How happy Is he bom and taught 736 

How hard when those who do not wish 989 

How many a time have I 669 

How many summers, love 219 

How many thousand of my poorest subjects 762 

How near to good is what is fair 711 

How poor, how rich, how abject, how august 776 

How pure at heart and sound of head , 291 

How seldom, friend, a good great man inherits 739 

How shall I know thee in the sphere which keeps. . 275 

How sleep the brave, who sink to rest 563 

How still the morning of the hallowed day 378 

How sweet it was to breathe that cooler air 530 

"How sweetly," said the trembling maid 251 

How sweet the harmonies of afternoon 693 

How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank !.. 775 

How wonderful Is death ! 714 

Husband and wife ! no converse now ye hold 304 

Hush, my dear, lie still and slumber 76 

I am a friar of orders gray 964 

I am by promise tied 655 

I am dying, Egypt, dying. 296 

I am in Rome i Oft as the morning ray 680 

lam monarch of all I survey.... 738 

I am undone • there is no living, none 242 

I am watching for the early buds to wake 289 

I arise from dreams of thee 188 

I asked an aged man with hoary hairs 748 

Tasked of echo, t'other day 1014 

I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers 822 

I cannot eat but little meat 946 

I cannot make him dead ' 278 

I cannot think that thou shouldst pass away 216 

I care not, though it be 131 

I climbed the dark brow of the mighty Helvellyn. . 654 

I come from haunts of coot and hern 446 

I'd been away from her three years,— about that. . . 201 

I do not love thee for that fair 126 

I don't appwove this hawld waw 1001 

I don't go ranch on religion ■. 999 

If all the world and love were young 158 

If doughty deeds my lady please , 146 

I bear thy kisses, gentle maiden 131 

If dumb too long the drooping muse hath stayed. . . 910 

I feel a newer life in every gale 423 

If ever}' man's internal care 757 

I fill this cup to one made up.... 129 

If it be true that any beauteous thing 135 

If I were told that I must die to-morrow 381 

If love were what the rose is , 148 

If sleep and death be truly one 290 

If solitude hath ever led thy steps 412 

If stores of dry and learned lore we gain 112 

If the red slayer think he slays 746 

If this fair rose offend thy sight 123 

If thou must love me, let it be for naught 189 

If thou shouldst ever come by choice or chance 890 

If thou wert by my side, my love 219 

If thou wilt ease thine heart. 303 

If thou wouldst view fair Melrose aright 675 

If to be absent were to be 242 

If women could be fair and never fond 790 

If you're waking, call me early 328 

I gazed upon the glorious sky 425 

I grew assured before I asked 170 

I had sworn to be a bachelor 119 

I hae seen great anes and set in great ha's 227 

I have a name, a little name , . 89 

I have a son, a little son 89 



■g 



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INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



1021 



ra 



I have got a new-born sister 76 

I have had playmates 274 

I have ships that went to sea 261 

I heard the trailing garments of the night 416 

I in these flowery meads would be 668 

I knew by the smoke that so gracefully curled 228 

1 know not that the men of old 740 

I know not whence it rises 825 

I.lay me down to sleep 295 

I leaned out of window, I smelt the white clover.. . 172 

I lent my girl a book one day 253 

I like a church ; I like a cowl 735 

I like that ancient Saxon phrase 305 

I'll sing you a good old song: 959 

I love, and have some cause to love, the earth 360 

I love at eventide to walk alone 427 

I love contemplating — apart 616 

I loved him in my dawning years 972 

I loved him not ; and yet, now he is gone 260 

I loved thee once, I'll love no more 267 

Hove it. Hove it! and who shall dare 101 

I love thee, love thee, Giulio ! 236 

I love to hear thine earnest voice 485 

I love to wander through the woodlands hoary 692 

I made a posie, while the day ran by 741 

I marvelled why a simple child 1006 

I met a traveller from an antique land 717 

I'm in love with you, baby Louise ! 78 

I'm sitting alone by the fire 199 

I'm sittin' on the stile, Mary 292 

I'm wearin awa', Jean 296 

In a dirty old house lived a dirty old man 253 

In a land for antiquities greatly renowned 851 

In a small chamber, friendless and unseen 932 

In a valley, centuries ago 863 

In Broad Street building (on a winter night) 962 

Indeed this very love which is my boast 189 

In eddying course when leaves began to fly 865 

I need not praise the sweetness of his song 937 

In either hand the hastening angel caught 321 

I never gave a lock of hair away 189 

In every village marked with little spire 707 

In facile natures fancies quickly grow 781 

In good King Charles's golden days 945 

In heavy sleep the Caliph lay 866 

In holy might we made the vow 268 

In Koln, a town of monks and bones 954 

In May, when sea- winds pierced our solitudes 461 

In melancholic fancy 820 

In moss-prankt dells which the sunbeams flatter. . .1010 

In my poor mind it is most sweet to muse 86 

In Sana, O, in Sana, Grod, the Lord 652 

In sZumbers of midnight the sailor-boy lay 614 

In summer, when the days were long 160 

In the ancient town of Bruges 716 

In the barn, the tenant cock 408 

In the days that tried our fathers 1008 

In the fair gardens of celestial peace 273 

In the hollow ti-ee in the old gray tower 483 

In the hour of my distress 359 

In the low-raftered garret 251 

In the merry month of May 136 

In their ragged regimentals 590 

In the region of clouds 823 

In the still air the music lies unheard 388 

In the vaUey of the Pegnitz 678 

Into a ward of the whitewashed walls 531 

In Sanadu did Kubla Khan 834 

In vain the cords and axes were prepared 612 

I only knew she came and went 1012 

Iphigeneia, when she heard her doom 873 

1 praised the speech, but cannot now abide it 503 



I prithee send me back my heart 146 

I reckon I git your drift, gents 998 

I i-emember, I rejnember 93 

I reside at Table Mountain 988 

I saw him kiss your cheek 186 

I saw him once before 323 

I saw thee when, as twilight fell .393 

I saw two clouds at morning 137 

Is it the palm, the cocoa palm 455 

I slept and dreamed that life was Beauty 557 

I sometimes hold it half a sin 290 

I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris and he 573 

Is there a whim-inspired fool 917 

Is there for honest poverty 341 

Is there when the winds are singing 84 

Is this a dagger which I see before me 882 

Is this a fast,— to keep 361 

I stood, one Sunday morning 334 

It chanced to me upon a time to sail 579 

I thought our love at full, but I did err 216 

I thought to pass away before 329 

It is an Ancient Mariner 854 

It is done ! 597 

It is not beauty I demand 141 

It is not growing like a tree 729 

It is the miller's daughter 183 

It kindles all my soul 372 

It lies around us like a cloud 387 

It must be so. Plato, thou reasonest well ! 759 

It's we two, it's we two for aye 213 

It was a beauty that I saw 123 

It was a dreary day in Padua 886 

It was a friar of orders gray 137 

It was a summer evening 538 

It was a time of sadness, and my heart 874 

It was fifty years ago 935 

It was many and many a year ago 285 

" It was our weddiag day" 218 

It was the autumn of the year 250 

It was the wild midnight 564 

It was upon an April morn 504 

I've wandered east, I've wandered west 242 

I wandered by the brookside 149 

I wandered lonely as a cloud 463 

I was a stricken deer, that left the herd 790 

I was in Margate last July 966 

I weigh not fortune's frown or smile 731 

I will go back to the great sweet mother 611 

I will not have the mad Clytie 460 

I will not let you say a woman's part 143 

I will paint her as I see her 97 

I wish my hair cut 1011 

I wonder if Brougham 923 

I would I were an excellent divine 362 

I would not enter on my list of friends 782 

I wrote some lines 976 

Jaffar, the Barmecide, the good Vizier 115 

Jenny kissed me when we met 98 

Jingle, jingle, clear the way 670 

Johannes, Johannes, tiblcine natus 993 

John Anderson, my jo, John 222 

John Brown of Ossawatomle spake on his dying 

day 599 

John Dobbins was so captivated 955 

John Gilpin was a citizen 959 

Jorasse was In his three-and-twentieth year 651 

Judge not, the workings of his brain 784 

Just in the dubious point, where with the pool 669 

Just in thy mould and beauteous in thy form 626 

King Francis was a hearty king. 652 






1022 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



n 



Kissing lier hair, I sat against lier feet 188 

Kiss me, though you make believe 188 

Knows he that never took a pinch 1015 

Know'st thou the land where bloom the citron 

bowers , "89 

Know ye the land where the cypress and myrtle. . . 451 

Lady Clara Vere de Vere 267 

Lars Porsena of Clusium 565 

Last night, among his fellow roughs 514 

Lay him beneath his snows 929 

Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom 364 

Let me be your servant 546 

Let me not to the marriage of true minds 208 

Let no man write my epitaph 921 

Let not woman e'er complain U)4 

Let Sporus tremble 909 

Let Taylor preach, upon a morning breezy 963 

Life ! I know not what thou art 303 

Life maybe given In many ways 930 

Light as a flake of foam upon the wind 623 

Light-winged smoke ! learian bird 691 

Like as the arm^d Knighte 366 

Like as the damask rose you see 302 

Like to the clear in highest sphere 127 

Like to the falling of a star 301 

Linger not long. Home is not home without thee. . 244 

Listen, my children, and you shall hear 590 

Lithe and long as the serpent train 456 

Little Ellie sits alone 102 

Little Gretchen, little Gretchen wanders 336 

Little I ask ; my wants are few 733 

Little inmate, full of mirth 485 

Little thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked clown... 405 

Loohiel, Lochiel ! beware of the day 573 

Long pored St. Austin o'er the sacred page 363 

Look at me with thy large brown eyes 75 

Look in my face ; my name is Might-have-been 744 

Look round our world ; behold the chain of love. . . 405 

Lord ! call thy pallid angel 557 

Lord of the winds! I feel thee nigh 686 

Lord ! when those glorious lights I see 376 

Lo, when the Lord made north and south 128 

Lo ! where she comes along with portly pace 212 

Lo ! where the rosy-bosomed Hours 421 

Loud and clear 716 

Loud roared the dreadful thunder 628 

Love divine, all love excelling 392 

Love in my bosom like a bee 194 

Love is a little golden fish 185 

Love is a sickness full of woes 136 

Love me little, love me long ! 141 

Love not, love not ! ye hapless sons of clay ! 320 

Love not me for comely grace 141 

Love scorns degrees ; the low he iifteth high 136 

Low-anchored cloud , 691 

Low burns the summer afternoon 412 

Low on the utmost boundary of the sight 432 

Low spake the Knight 881 

Lucy is a golden girl 732 

Maiden ! with the meek brown eyes 104 

Maid of Athens, ere we part 234 

" Make way for Liberty !" he cried 584 

Man's home Is everywhere. On ocean's flood 776 

" Man wants but little here below" 7.32 

Many a green isle needs must be 441 

Many along, long year ago..* 988 

Many a year is in its grave 291 

Margarita first possessed 191 

Martial, the things that do attain 226 

Maud MuUer, on a summer's day 158 



Maxwelton banks are bonnie 155 

May the Babylonish curse 548 

Meantime, the moist malignity to shun 445 

Mellow the moonlight to shine is beginning 173 

Men dying make their wills— but wives 981 

Merrily swinging on brier and weed 476 

Merry Margaret 122 

Methinks it were no pain to die 295 

Mica, mica, parva Stella 993 

Michael bid sound the archangel trumpet 500 

Midnight past ! Not a sound of aught 265 

Mid pleasures and palaces though we may i-oam . . . 225 

Mild ofEspring of a dark and sullen sire ! 461 

Milton ! thou shouldst be living 907 

Mine be a cot beside the hill 225 

Mine eyes have seen the glory 594 

Mine eyes he closed, but open left the cell , 209 

Miss Flora McFlimsy , 981 

Moan, moan, ye dying gales! 315 

More than the soul of ancient song 767 

Most potent, grave, and reverend 145 

Most sweet it is with unuplif ted eyes 767 

Mr. Orator PufC had two tones in his voice 962 

Muses, that sing Love's sensual empiric 135 

Music, when soft voices die 776 

My beautiful, my beautiful! 664 

My boat is on the shore 920 

My curse upon thy venomed stang 952 

My dear and only love, 1 pray 1,50 

"My ear-rings, my ear-rings" 171 

My eyes ! how I love you 195 

My fairest child, I have no song 97 

My gentle Puck, come hither 835 

My girl hath violet eyes and yellow hair 181 

My God, I love thee J not because 360 

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains 316 

My heart leaps up when I behold 432 

My heart's in the Highlands 659 

My held is like to rend, Willie 269 

My letters ! all dead paper, mute and white 189 

My life is like the summer rose . 743 

My little love, do you remember 160 

My loved, my honored, much-respected friend 385 

My love and I for kisses played 186 

My love he built me a bonnie bower 638 

My love, I have no fear that thou shouldst die 216 

My niinde to me a kingdom is 729 

My mule refreshed, his bells 446 

My prime of youth is but a frost of cares 745 

My sister ! my sweet sister ! if a name 223 

My soul today ,684 

Mysterious night ! when our first parent knew 415 

My time, O ye Muses, was happily spent 245 

My true love hath my heart, and I have his 137 

My voice is still for war 570 

Nae shoon to hide her tiny taes 79 

Naked on parent's knees 78 

Nay ! if you will not sit upon my knee 488 

Nay, you wrong her, my friend 263 

Nearer, my God, to thee 373 

Needy knife-grinder! whither are you going? 952 

Never any more 260 

Never wedding, ever wooing ■ 144 

Next to thee, O fair gazelle 454 

Night is the time for rest 416 

No baby in the house, I know 80 

No more these simple flowers belong 914 

No soldier, statesman 935 

No splendor 'neath the sky's proud dome 126 

No stii' in the air, no stir in the sea 620 

No sun— no moon ! 425 



B- 



^ 



e 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



102 



ra 



fe- 



Not a drum was heard, nor a funeral note 920 

Not as you meant. O learned man 391 

Not far advanced was morning day 648 

Nothing but leaves ; the spirit grieves 370 

Not in the laughing bowers 330 

Not only we, the latest seed of Time 702 

Not ours the vows of such as plight 213 

Not yet, the flowers are in my path, 270 

Now came still evening on, and twilight gray 413 

Now gentle sleep hath closed up those eyes 186 

Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger 422 

Now the third and fatal conflict 769 

Now upon Syria's land of roses 451 

Now went forth the morn 500 

Now westward Sol had spent the richest beam 774 

O, a dainty plant Is the ivy green 465 

O beauteous God ! unciroumscribed treasure 367 

O blithe new-comer ! I have heard 472 

O, breathe not his name ' 921 

O Caledonia ' stern and wild • 575 

O. came ye ower by the Yoke-burn Ford 639 

O. deem not they are blest alone 743 

O, dinna ask me gin I lo'e ye 161 

O, don't be sorrowful, darling ! 231 

O, do not wanton with those eyes , 184 

O'er a low couch the setting sun 293 

O'er the glad waters of the dark blue sea 626 

O, ever from the deeps 394 

O faint, delicious, springtime violet ! 461 

O fairest of creation, last and best 216 

O fairest of the rural maids 130 

Of all men, saving Sylla the man-slayer 926 

Of all the flowers in the mead 462 

Of all the girls that are so smart 198 

Of all the ships upon the blue 970 

Of all the thoughts of God that are 762 

Of all the torments, all the cares 147 

Of a' the alrts the wind can blaw 242 

O Father, let me not die young ' 380 

O flrs t of human blessings, and supreme ! 499 

O for a lodge in some vast wilderness 593 

O forest dells and streams ' O Dorlantide 282 

O, formed by nature, and refined by art 209 

O for one hour of youthful joy 979 

Oft have I seen, at some cathedral door 707 

Oft In the stilly night 318 

O gentle, gentle summer rain 438 

O God, methinks, it were a happy life 225 

O God ! though sorrow be my fate 365 

O go not yet, my love 235 

O, greenly and fair in the lands of the sun 459 

O happiness ! our being's end and aim ! 736 

O hearts that never cease to yearn 272 

O how the thought of God attracts 374 

O Italy, how beautiful thou art ! 679 

O, it is hard to work for God. 390 

O, it is pleasant, vrith a heart at ease 822 

O keeper of the Sacred Key • 523 

O land, of every land the best 533 

O, lay thy hand in mine, dear' 221 

Old Birch who taught the village school 996 

Old Grimes is dead 976 

Old man, God bless you ! 520 

Old Master Brown brought his ferule down 99 

Old Tubal Cain was a man of might 537 

Old wine to drink ! 118 

O loss of sight, of thee I most complain .321 

O lovely Mary Donelly, it's you I love the best ! 198 

O, many are the poets that are sown 766 

O Marcius, Marcius 114 

O mare seva si forme-, 993 



I O Mai'y , at thy window be ! 149 

O Mary, go and call the cattle home 621 

O, may I join the choir invisible 76U 

j O melancholy bird, a winter's day 482 

I O mighty Ceesar ! dost thou lie so low 875 

I O Mistress mine, where are you roaming ? 122 

I O mortal man, who livest here by toil 831 

O mother dear, Jerusalem, 358 

O mother of a mighty race 587 

O, my love's like the steadfast sun 219 

O, my love's like a red, red rose 234 

On a hill there grows a flower 124 

On Alpine heights the love of God is shed 445 

O Nancy, wilt thou go with me 156 

Once In the flight of ages past 308 

Once more unto the breach, dear friends 503 

Once more upon the waters ' yet once more ! 563 

Once on a golden afternoon 476 

Once, Paumanok, when the snows had melted 470 

Once Switzerland was free ! 585 

Once this soft turf, this rivulet's sands 534 

Once upon a midnight dreary 85'2 

Once when the days wtTe ages 74S 

One day, as I was going by 94 

One day I wandered where the salt sea- tide 739 

One day, nigh weary of the yrksome way 928 

One eve of beauty, when the sun 713 

One hue of our flag is taken 1008 

One more tmf ortunate 335 

One night came on a hurricane 630 

One sweetly solemn thought 375 

One year ago,— a ringing voice 278 

On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore 128 

On Linden, when the sun was low 513 

Only waiting till the shadows 368 

On, on, my brown Arab lUlO 

O no, no,— let me lie 534 

On Richmond Hill there lives a lass 149 

On the cross-beam under the Old South bell 472 

On the eighth day of March it was, some people 

say 1004 

On the isle of Penikese 9:'6 

On the sea and at the Hogue 017 

On thy fair bosom, silver lake 4 19 

On what foundations stands the warrior's pride 90!) 

On woodlands ruddy with autumn 535 

O perfect Light, which shald away 406 

O, pour upon my soul again 317 

O reader, hast thou ever stood to see 455 

O, reverend sir, I do declare 995 

O Rosamond, thou fair and good 113 

O sacred Head, now wounded 373 

O, sairly may I rue the day 974 

O, saw ye bonnle Lesley 242 

O, saw ye the lass wi' the bonnle blue een 149 

O say, can ye see by the dawn's early light 592 

O say, what Is that thing called Light 343 

O sextant of the meetin-house 1001 

O singer of the field and fold 405 

O sing unto my roundelay ! 289 

O, snatched away in beauty's bloom ! 288 

O, St. Patrick was a gentleman 1C04 

O swallow, swallow, flying, flying south 171 

O, terribly proud was Miss MacBrlde 9F5 

O, that last day in Lucknow fort 515 

O that the chemist's magic art 789 

O that those lips had language 92 

O the charge of Balaklava ! 516 

O the days are gone when beauty bright 262 

O the gallant fisher's life 668 

O then I see Queen Mab hath been with you 8S6 

O, the pleasant days of old 699 



J 



fl- 



1024 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



■a 



O the snow, the beautiful snow 334 

O, those littel, those little blue shoes 82 

O thou, great Friend to all the sous of men 389 

thou of home the guardian Lar 238 

O thou vast Ocean ! 611 

O unexpected stroke, worse than of death 821 

O unseen spirit l now a calm divine 406 

Our band is few, but true and tried 589 

Our boat to the waves go free 630 

Our bugles sang truce, for the night-cloud had low- 
ered 529 

Our Fatherland ! and wouldst thou know 778 

Otir good steeds snufC the evening air 518 

Our hopes, like towering falcons 730 

Our life is twofold ■ sleep has its own world 764 

Our love is not a fading earthly flower 216 

Our revels now are ended 867 

Out of the bosom of the Air 440 

Out of the clover and blue-eyed grass 531 

Outstretched beneath the leafy shade 383 

Out upon it. I have loved 124 

Over the dumb canipagna sea 683 

Over the hill to the poor-house 342 

Over the river they beckon to me 276 

Over the snows 666 

O, wad that my time were owre but 243 

O, waly, waly up the bank 268 

O water for me ! Bright water for me ' 545 

O, when 't is summer weather 454 

O, wherefore come ye forth 575 

O whistle, and I'll come to you, my lad 156 

O, why should the spirit of mortal be proud ? 302 

O, will ye choose to hear the news ? 1002 

O winter ! wilt thou never, never go ? 441 

O World! OLlfe! OTime! 322 

O ye wha are sae guid yoursel' 784 

O yet we trust that somehow good. j, 392 

O, Young Lochinvar is come out of the west 175 

Pack clouds away, and welcome day 409 

Pale is the February sky 62 

Paris, Anchises, and Adonis, three 903 

Parrhasius stood, gazing forgetfully 8S1 

Passing from Italy to Greece 694 

Pause not to dream of the future before us 556 

Peace to all such ! 910 

Phillis is my only joy 124 

Pibroch of Donuil Dhu 518 

Piped the blackbird on the beechwood spray 88 

Pity the sorrows of a poor old man , 340 

Piping down the valleys wild 85 

Pleasing 't is, O modest Moon ! 550 

Poor Rose ! I lift you from the street 266 

" Praise God from whom all blessings flow" ,556 

Prune thou thy words 789 

Prize thou the nightingale 479 

Quivering fears, heart-tearing cares 667 

Rake the embers, blow the coals 884 

Rest there awhile, my bearded lance 1006 

Rifleman, shoot me a fancy shot 525 

Ring out wild bells, to the wild sky 752 

Rise, said the Master ; come unto the feast 301 

"Rock of Ages" 867 

Roll on, thou ball, roll on 1012 

" Room for the leper ! Room !" 701 

Rudolph, professor of the headsman's. . . : 978 

Sad is oitr youth, for it is ever going 316 

S.'iid I not so,— that I would sin no more ? ; .S66 

Sally Salter, she was a young teacher who taught. .1005 



Saviour, when in dust to thee 358 

Say, from what golden quivers of the sky 407 

Say over again, and yet once over again 189 

Say there ! P'r'aps . - 997 

Say, ye that know, ye who have felt. 469 

Scorn not the sonnet ; critic, you have frowned 907 

Search thou the ruling passion ; there alone 779 

Seated I see the two again 79 

Seated one day at the organ 760 

See, from this counterfeit of him 908 

See how the orient dew 430 

See j'on robin on the spray 475 

Shall I tell you whom I love ? 140 

Shall I, wasting In despair 193 

Shame upon thee, savage monarch— man 782 

Shame upon you, Robin 168 

Shed no tear, O, shed no tear 846 

She dwelt among the untrodden ways 104 

She is a winsome wee thing 216 

"She is dead !" they said to him 298 

She is not fair to outward view 129 

She laid it where the sunbeams fall 990 

Shepherds all, and maidens fair 469 

She says, " The cock crows,— hark !" 236 

She shrank froni all, and her silent mood 330 

She stood alone amidst the April fields 322 

She stood breast high amid the corn 106 

She walks in beauty, like the night 130 

She was a creature framed by love divine 213 

She was a phantom of delight 128 

Should auld acquaintance be forgot 118 

Silent nymph, with curious eye ! 443 

Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublime 682 

Since there's no helpe,— come, let us kisse and parte 239 

Sing, sweet thrushes, forth and sing ! 667 

Singing through the forests 980 

Sir Marmaduke was a hearty knight 958 

Sit down, sad soul, and count 369 

Sitting all day in a silver mist 823 

Six skeins and three, six skeins and three 173 

Six years had passed, and forty ere the six 323 

Sky, mountains, river, winds, lake, lightnings 767 

Slayer of winter, art thou here again ? 418 

Sleep breathes at last from out thee 88 

Sleep, little baby of mine 77 

Sleep, love, sleep ! 763 

Sleep on ! and dream of Heaven awhile ! 130 

Sleep, sleep to-day, tormenting cares 389 

Sleep sweetly in your humble graves 532 

Slowly England's sun was setting 180 

Slumber, Sleep,— they were two brothers 761 

Small service is true service while it lasts 89 

So all day long the noise of battle rolled 642 

So every spirit, as It is most pure 780 

So fallen ! so lost ! the light withdrawn 929 

Softly woo away her breath 296 

Soldier, rest ! thy warfare o'er 530 

So many words, so much to do 291 

Somebody's courting somebody 173 

Some murmur when their sky is clear 388 

Some of their chiefs were princes of the land 909 

Some reckon their age by years 742 

Some say that kissing's a sin 187 

Some wit of old 975 

So much to do : so little done ! 751 

So spake the Son, and into terror changed 500 

So the truth's out. I'll grasp it like a snake 258 

Sound all to arms ! 501 

Speak, O man, less recent ! Fragmentary fossil !. . . 991 

Spirit that breathes through my lattice 411 

Spring it is cheery 822 

Spring, the sweet spring 432 



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INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



1025 



ra 



Spring with the nameless pathos In the air. 422 

Stabat mater dolorosa 355 

St. Agnes' Eve,— ah, bitter chill it was 176 

Stand here, by my side and turn. I pray 440 

Stand ! the ground's your own, my braves ■ 590 

Star of the mead ' sweet daughter of the day 4(53 

Star that bringest home the bee 412 

Stay, jailer, stay and hear my woe '. 339 

Steady, boys, steady !.. 52tt 

Steer hither, steer your winged pines . 825 

Still to be neat, still to be drest , 713 

Strong Sou of God, immortal love 393 

Stop, mortal ' here thy brother lies , 914 

Straightway Virginius led the maid , 873 

Summer has gone 663 

Summer joys ai-e o'er 434 

Sweet and low, sweet and low 81 

Sweet are the thoughts that savor of content , 731 

Sweeet Auburn ! loveliest village of the plain 686 

Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes. . . 133 

Sweet bird .' that siug'st away the early hours 479 

Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright 301 

Sweeter and sweeter , 104 

Sweet Highland Girl, a very shower 105 

Sweet is the pleasure 557 

Sweet is the voice that calls 433 

Sweetly bi'eathing vernal air , 422 

Sweet stream that winds through yonder glade. . . . 106 

Swiftly walk over the western wave 414 

Sword, on my left side gleaming 519 

Take back into thy bosom, earth 922 

Take one example to our purpose quite 918 

Take, O, take those lips away , 263 

Tears, idle tears, 1 know not what they mean 315 

Tell me not in mournful numbers 769 

Tell me not, sweet, I am unkinde 235 

Tell me where is fancy bred 125 

Tell me, ye wingfed winds 369 

Thank Heaven ! the crisis 299 

That each who seems a separate whole .............. 290 

That I love thee, charming maid 190 

That which hath made them drunk...... 882 

That which her slender waist confined 125 

The angel of the flowers, one day , 464 

The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold. 501 

The autumn is old . 433 

The Autumn time is with us 434 

The baby sits in her cradle 433 

The baby wept 282 

The bard has sung, God never formed a soul 261 

The barge she sat in, like a burnished throne 712 

The bell strikes one ; we take no note of time 747 

The black-haired gaunt Paulinus 389 

The blessed damozel leaned out , 824 

The blessed morn has come again 440 

The boy stood on the burning deck 614 

Tlie breaking waves dashed high 587 

The bi'illiant black eye 131 

The bubbling brook doth leap when I come by 403 

The busy larke, messager of daye 418 

The careful hen 470 

The castle crag of Drachenfels 446 

The cold winds swept the mountain's height. . . 86 

The conscious water .saw its God and blushed 362 

The country ways are full of mire 210 

The cunning hand that carved this face 749 

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day 305 

The day had been a calm and sunny day 438 

The day is cold, and dark, and dreary 344 

The day returns, my bosom burns 218 

The devil sits in easy-chair 951 



The dreamy rhymer's measured snore 923 

The dule 's 1' this bonnet o' mine 196 

The dusky night rides dov»ru the sky 662 

The earth goes on, the earth glittering in gold 307 

The elder folk shook hands at last 378 

The fairest action of our human life 282 

The fallen cause still waits 596 

The farmer sat in his easy chaii' 229 

The farmer's wife sat at the door 282 

The fire of love in youthful blood 202 

The first time that the sun rose on thine oath 190 

The forward violet thus did I chide 123 

The fountains mingle with the river 188 

The Frost looked forth, one still, clear night 96 

The frugal snail, with forecast of repose 487 

The glories of our birth and state 301 

The gorse is yellow on the heath 478 

The grass is green on Bunker Hill 598 

The gray sea and the long black land 170 

The groves were God's first temples 452 

The half -seen memories of childish days Ill 

The harp that once through Tara's halls 577 

The heart of man, walk it which way it will 229 

The heath this night must be my bed 234 

The hollow winds begin to blow. 427 

The island lies nine leagues away 691 

The isles of Greece, the isles of Greece ! 580 

The Jackdaw sat on the Cardinal's chair 965 

The jester shook his hood and bells 748 

The keener tempests rise ; and fuming dun 439 

The kiss, dear maid, thy lip has left 234 

The knight had ridden down from Wensley Moor. . 660 
The laird o' Cockpen he 's proud and he 's great. ... 200 

The lark sings for joy in her own loved land 483 

The latter rain,— it falls in anxious haste 433 

The lion is the desert's king 467 

The little brown squirrel hops in the corn 1008 

The little gate was reached at last 170 

The maid, and thereoy hangs a tale 211 

The maid who binds her warrior's sash 563 

The melancholy days are come 466 

The merry brown hares came leaping 330 

The merry, merry lark was up and singing 280 

The midges dance aboon the burn 411 

The might of one fair face sublimes my love 185 

The mistletoe hung in the castle hall 891 

The moon it shines 'i'S 

The more we live, more brief appear 741 

The Moth's kiss, first ! .188 

The moving accident is not my trade 661 

The nmse disgusted at an age and clime 587 

The Muse's fairest light in no dark time 906 

Then before all they stand, the holy vow 212 

Then hear me, bounteous Heaven ! 239 

Then took the generous host 464 

The night has a thousand eyes , 135 

The night is late, the house is still 277 

The night was dark, though sometimes a faint star 409 

The night was winter in his roughest mood 437 

The ocean at the bidding of the moon 631 

The old mayor climbed the belfry tower. 285 

The path by which we twain did go 113 

The play is done,— the curtain drops 344 

The poetry of earth is never dead 485 

I The point of honor has been deemed of use 780 

; The Queen looked up, and said 754 

I The rain has ceased, and in my room. 430 

i There are a number of us creep 751 

I There are gains for all our losses 106 

i There are no colors in the fairest sky 908 

I There are some hearts like wells 739 

1^ There are who say the lover's heart 208 



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INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



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There canie a man, making his hasty moan TOO 

There came to the beach a poor exile of Erin 578 

There iu the fane a beauteous creature stands 776 

There is a dungeon iu whose dim drear light 223 

There is a flower, a little flower 463 

There is a garden in her face 123 

There is a niland on a river lying 1000 

Tibere is no force, however great — 992 

There was an ape, in the days that were earlier 991 

The summer and autumn had been so wet 879 

The summer sun is falling soft 880 

The summer sun was sinking 840 

The sunburnt mowers are in the swath 552 

The sun comes up and the sun goes down 769 

The sun has gane down o'er the lofty Ben Lomond. 148 

The sun is warm, the sky is clear 317 

The sunlight fills the trembling air 460 

The sunlight glitters keen and bright 609 

The sun shines bright iu our old Kentucky home. . . 238 

The sun sinks softly to his evening post 1008 

The sun that brief December day 436 

The tattoo beats ; the lights are gone 522 

The thoughts are strange that crowd into my brain 449 

The time hath laid his mantle by 421 

The tree of deepest root is found 756 

The twilight hours, like birds, flew by 610 

The wanton troopers, riding by 259 

The waters purled, the waters swelled 825 

The weary night is o'er at last 518 

The weather leach of the topsail shivers 619 

The wind blevr wide the casement 81 

The wind it blew, and the ship it flew 646 

The winds transferred into the friendly sky 414 

The winter being over .420 

The wisest of the wise 755 

The word of the Lord by night 597 

The world goes up and the world goes down 214 

The world is too much with us 403 

The world is very evil.... 351 

The world's a bubble, and the life of man 320 

The Yankee boy before he's sent to school 979 

They are all gone into the world of light 274 

They are dying ! they are dying ! 579 

They come ! the merry summer months 423 

They course the glass, and let it take no rest 712 

The year stood at its equinox 132 

They'll talk of him for years to come 913 

They told me I was heir : I turned in haste 770 

They tell me I am shrewd with other men 116 

They've got a bran new organ. Sue 995 

Think not I love him, though I ask for him 144 

This figure, that thou here see'st put 905 

This book is all that's left me now — 100 

This is the forest primeval 453 

This is the ship of pearl which poets feign — 635 

This life, and all that it contains 766 

This only grant me that my means may lie 730 

This region, surely, is not of the earth — , 683 

This way the noise was, if mine ear be true 829 

This world's a scene as dark as Styx 1015 

Those evening bells ! those evening bells ! 716 

Thou blossom, bright with autumn dew. 465 

Though the mills of God grind slowly. 747 

Thought is deeper than all speech 731 

Though when other maids stand by — 156 

Thou Grace Divine, encircling all 392 

Thou happy, happy elf ! 93 

Thou hast sworn by thy God, my Jeanie 208 

Thou hidden love of God, whose height 390 

Thou large-brained woman 923 

Thou lingering star, with lessening ray 288 

Thou little bird, thou dweller by the sea 482 



Thou still unravished bride of quietness 718 

Thou who dost dwell alone 359 

Thou who, when fears attack 990 

Thou whose sweet youth 364 

Three fishers went sailing out into the west. 621 

Three poets, in three distant ages born , . 907 

Three students were travelling over the Rhine 142 

Three years she grew in sun and shower 103 

Through her forced, abnormal quiet 159 

Thus, then, I steer my bark 742 

Thy braes were bonny. Yarrow stream. 288 

Thy error, Fremont 935 

Tiger! tiger! burning bright 468 

Time has a magic wand , 972 

'Tis a dozen or so of years ago 1005 

'Tis a fearful night in the winter time , 440 

'Tis an old dial dark with many a stain 184 

'Tis a little thing 770 

'Tis beauty truly blent, whose red and white 122 

'Tis believed that this harp , 365 

'Tis midnight's holy hour 752 

'Tis morning : and the sun with ruddy orb 435 

'Tis much immortal beauty to admire 730 

'Tis night, when Meditation bids us feel 415 

'Tis past,— the sultry tyrant of the South 430 

'Tis sweet to hear 166 

'Tis the last rose of summer 465 

'Tis the middle watch of a summer's night 840 

'Tis time this heart should be unmoved 250 

To bear, to nurse, to rear 213 

To be, or not to be,— that is the question 297 

To claim the Arctic came the sun 409 

To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name 905 

To heaven approached a Suli saint 36a 

To him who, in the love of Nature, holds 307 

Toiling in the naked fields 557 

Toil on ! toilonl ye ephemeral train 623 

Toll for the brave 612 

To make my lady's obsequies 300 

To make this condiment your poet begs 1013 

To-morrow's action ! can that hoary wisdom 754 

Too late, alas ! I must confess 160 

Too late I stayed,— forgive the crime ! 117 

To sea ! to sea ! the calm is o'er 630 

T' other day, as I was twining 195 

To the sounds of timbrels sweet 212 

Toussaint ! the most unhappy man of men 921 

To weary hearts, to mourning homes.,... 275 

To write a verse or two is all the praise 363 

To you, my purse, and to noon other wight 204 

Tread softly,— bow the head 341 

Tres Philosophi deTusculo 991 

Trochee trips from long to short 1015 

True bard and simple,— as the race 920 

True genius, but true woman ! dost deny 923 

Turn, Fortune, turn thy wheel , , 777 

Turn, gentle Hermit of the dale , 138 

Turn, turn, for my cheeks they burn 168 

'Twas a jolly old pedagogue, long ago 708 

'Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won. 771 

'Twas in heaven pronounced, and 'twas muttered 

in hell 778 

'Twas ever thus from childhood's hour 990 

'Twas in the prime of summer time. 895 

'Twas morn, and beautiful the mountain's brow. . . 447 

'Twas on the shores that round our coast 968 

'Twas the night before Christmas 96 

Two barks met on the deep mid-sea 115 

Two hands upon the breast. 295 

Two little feet, so small that both may nestle 77 

Two mites, two drops, yet all her hoiise and land. . 362 
Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall 711 



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INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



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Two pilgrims from the distant plain 150 

Two went to pray ? O, rather say 362 

Tying her bonnet under her chin — 190 

Under a spreading chestnut-tree 550 

Under my window, under my window 83 

Underneath this marble hearse 907 

Unfading Hope ! when life's last embers burn 743 

Untremulous in the river clear 439 

Up from the meado v/s ricli with corn 596 

Up from the South at break of day 594 

Upon ane stormy Sunday 187 

Upon a rock yet uncreate 991 

Upon the white sea-sand 333 

Up! quit thy bower! 408 

Up springs the lark 469 

Up the airy mountain 836 

Up the dale and down the bourne 425 

Up the streets of Aberdeen 536 

Veni, Creator Spiritus 357 

Veni, Sancte Spiritus 356 

Victor in poesy ! Victor in romance ! 926 

Vital spark of heavenly flame ! 365 

Waken, lords and ladies gay 658 

VParsaw's last champion from her height surveyed 583 

Wave after wave of greenness rolling down 693 

We are two travellers, Roger and 1 547 

Weehawken ! In thy mountain scenery yet 685 

Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flower 462 

Weep ye no more, sad fountains! 702 

Wee, sleekit, cow'rin, tim'rous beastie. 468 

Wee Willie Winkle rins through the town 83 

We have been friends together.... U6 

We knew it would rain, for all the morn , 427 

We know not what it is, dear, this sleep so deep — 297 

Welcome, maids of honor ! 461 

Welcome, welcome, do I sing 136 

We live in deeds, not years 742 

We meet 'neath the sounding rafter 898 

We parted in silence, we parted bj' night 240 

We pledged our hearts, my love and 1 192 

Were I as base as is the lowly plain 135 

Werther had a love for Charlotte 972 

We sat by the fisher's cottage , 691 

We scatter seeds with careless hand 739 

We see not, know not ,, all our way 375 

We stood upon the ragged rocks - 413 

We the fairies blithe and antic 835 

We were crov/ded in the cabin 627 

We were not many,— we wlio stood 523 

We wreathed about our darling's head. 280 

Whan that Aprille with hise shourds soote , 695 

What a moment, what a doubt !, ,, 1015 

What ails this heart o' mine 245 

What change has made the pastures sweet . 167 

What constitutes a state ? , , 599 

What does little birdie say 80 

What hid'st thou in thy treasure caves and cells ?. . 619 

What hope is here for modern rhyme 291 

Whatlsdeath? 'Tis to be free 744 

What is it fades and flickers m the fire , . , . 227 

What is the little one thinking about ?.. , 75 

What needs my Shakespeare for his honored bones. 906 

What's fame ?— a fancied life in others' breath 780 

What shall I do with all the days and hours 244 

What's hallowed ground ? Has earth a clod 783 

What's this dull town to me ? , , 154 

What was he doing, the great God Pan ?...,, .... 865 

What, was it a dream ? am I all alone 527 

Wheel me into the sunshine 325 



When a'ither bairnies are hushed to their hamo .... 91 

Whenas in silks my Julia goes 126 

When Britain first, at Heaven's command 576 

Whence comes my love ? O heart, disclose 268 

When chapman billies leave the street 847 

When chill November's surly blast 332 

When Delia on the plain appears 137 

When descends on the Atlantic 622 

When Eve brought woe 975 

When falls the soldier brave 533 

When first I saw sweet Peggy 197 

When first thou earnest, gentle, shy, and fond 83 

When Freedom, from her mountain height 592 

When God at first made man 778 

When I am dead, no pageant train 903 

When icicles hang by the wall 439 

When I consider how my light is spent 366 

When I do count the clock that tells the time 753 

When in the chronicle of wasted time 122 

When in the storm on Albion's coast 627 

When Israel, of the Lord beloved 372 

When I think on the happy days 247 

When Learning's triumph o'er her barbarous foes.. 905 
When leaves grow sere all things take sombre hue. 434 

When Lesbia first I saw so heavenly fair 713 

When lovely woman stoops to folly 336 

When Love with unconfined wings. . , 146 

When maidens such as Hester die 285 

When mighty roast beef was the Englishman's food 575 

When Music, heavenly maid, was young 773 

When o'er the mountain steeps 410 

When on my bed the moonlight falls 285 

When shall we all meet again 322 

When stricken by the freezing blast 928 

When Summer o'er her native hills 247 

When that my mood is sad and in the noise 448 

When the black-lettered list to the gods was pre- 
sented 220 

When the British warrior queen 572 

When the hounds of spring 419 

When the hours of day are numbered 273 

When the humid shadows hover 97 

When the lamp is shattered 262 

When the lessons and tasks are all ended 230 

When the sheep are in the fauld 249 

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought 115 

When troubled in spirit, when weary of life 665 

When your beauty appears 185 

Where are the men who went forth in the morning 530 

Where are the swallows fled ? , 318 

Where are you going, my pretty maid 958 

Whereas, on certain boughs and sprays 992 

Where did you come from, baby dear ? 78 

Where is the grave of Sir Arthvir O'Kellyn ? 538 

Where the remote Bermudas i-ide 625 

Whether with reason or with instinct blest 781 

Which is the wind that brings the cold ? 451 

Which I wish to remark, and my language is plain. 937 

Which shall it be ? which shall it be ? 230 

While on the cliff with calm delight she kneels 81 

While sauntering through the crowded street , 760 

Whilom by silver Thames's gentle stream 946 

Whither, midst falling dew 481 

Wlioe'er she be 192 

Who has not dreamed a world of bliss 410 

Who has not heard of the Vale of Cashmere 452 

Who would care to pass his life 974 

' Why came the rose ? Because the sun Is shining. . . 148 

Why, lovely charmer, tell me why... 146 

I Why sits she thus in solitude ? 790 

Why so pale and wan, fond lover ? 263 

Why thus longing, thus forever sighing 892 



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INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 



^~Qi 



Widow Machree, it's no wonder you frown 200 

Wild rose of Alloway ; my thanks 915 

Willie, fold your little hands 516 

With awful walls, far glooming, that possessed 699 

With deep affection 715 | 

With fingers weary and worn 337 

With how sad steps, O moon ! thou climb'st 249 

Within the navel of this hideous wood 830 

Within these walls of Arcadie 904 

Within the sober realm of leafless trees 710 

With silent awe I hail the sacred morn 410 

With sorrow and heart's distress 321 

Woodman, spare that tree !... 101 

Wordsworth upon Helvellyn ! let the cloud 914 

Word was brought to the Danish king 293 

Wouldst thou hear what man can say 907 

Would ye be taught, ye feathered throng 904 

Would you know why I summoned you together ?.. 875 

Year after year unto her feet 174 

Years, years ago, ere yet my dreams 971 

Ye banks and braes o' bounie Doon 249 

Ye little snails 486 



Ye mariners of England 629 

Ye powers who rule the tongue 780 

Yes ! bear them to their rest 763 

" Yes," 1 answered you last night 144 

Ye sons of freedom, wake to gloi-y ! - 584 

Ye who would have your features florid 545 

Yield to me now, for I am weak 371 

"You are old. Father William," the young man 

cried 545 

You bells in the steeple 101 

You charm when you talk , 914 

"You have heard," said a youth 156 

You know we French stormed Ratisbon 513 

You lay a wreath on murdered Lincoln's bier 931 

You meaner beauties of the night 124 

You must wake and call me early 327 

Young Ben he was a nice young man 963 

" Young, gay, and foi'tunate :" Each yields a theme. 106 

Young Rory O'More courted Kathleen Bawn 196 

Your f av'rite picture risgs up before me , 81 

Your horse Is faint, my king, my lord 507 

Your wedding-ring wears thin, dear wife 221 

You see tlils pebble stone ? It's a thing I bought. ..1008 



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-a 



ANALYTICAL INDEX 



OF FAMOUS AND APT POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



The Poetical Quotations referred to in this Index will be found— as indicated by the page-number fol- 
lowing the line or phrase indexed— either in the body of some poem, or as a brief or "fragment " in its 
appropriate Division. The key-words, under which these are indexed, will ordinarily be the nouns of the 
quotation, although there is many a "bold expressive phrase," the essential peculiarities of which are 



indexed, whatever they may be. 



Take two familiar instances, the key- words being here italicized: 
' Truth crushed to earth shall rise again" 



is found in Wm. Cullen Bryant's poem entitled "The Battle-Field," on page 534; while 

"SigJudani hoked unutterahh things" 

on page 204 is found to be a fragment from "The Seasons: Summer," by James Thomson. Thus the reader 
may ascertain the position in this volume, the original source or poem, the name of the author, and the 
correct reading of the thousands of poetical quotations given in the book. 



Abandon, all hope, ye who enter here, 

396. 
Abashed the dei-il stood, 398. 
Abdiel, the seraph, 387. 
Abode, dread, 307. 
Abora, Mount, sin^ng of, 8.3i. 
Above the reach ot ordinary men, 807. 
Abridgment of all that was pleasant in 

man, 721. 
Absence, every little, is an age, 218. 

makes the heart grow fonder, 248. 

I dote on his very, 248. 

increases love, 248. 

of occupation is not rest, 815. 

short, hurt him more, 248. 
Absent, a sigh the, claims, 801. 

from him I roam, 339. 

thee from felicity awhile, 811. 

though, present In desires. 248. 
Absolute rule, eye sublime declared, 711. 
Abstract doth contain th.at large, 107. 
Abyss, cares little into what, 271. 
Abyssinian maid, it was an, 834. 
Academe, olive grove of, 720, 
Academes that nourish all the world, 133. 
Accent, persuasive, 724. 
Accidents by flood and field 14.'). 
Accomplishment of verse, 700. 
Account, beggai-ly, of empty boxes, 809. 

sent to my, 310. 
Accoutred as I was, 670. 
Accuse not nature, 79.5. 
Acorns, oaks from little, 107. 
Acquaintance, should auld, 118. 
Acres, few paternal, 225. 

over whose, walked, 397. 
Act well your part, 781. 
Acting of a dreadful thing, 900. 
Action, faithful in, 120. 

in the tented field, 145. 

lose the name of, 297. 

no worthy, done, 398. 

of the tiger, imitate the, ,503. 

pious, wo sugar o'er, 396. 
Actions, speaker of my living, 811. 

virtuous, are but born and die, 811. 
Actors, these our, were all spirits, 867. 
Acts being seven ages, 711. 

little nameless, 404. 

our angels are, or good or ill, 797. 

the best who thinks most, 742. 

those graceful, 795. 

unreinembered, 404. 
Adage, cat i' the, 800. 
Adam dolve and Eve span, 5.59. 

the goodliest man of men, 712. 

the offending, 395. 

waked so customed, 390. 
Adam's fall, simied all in, 397. 



Adds a precious seeing, 203. 
Adieu, dear amiable youth, TSS. 

my native shore, 238. 

she cried, and waved her lily hand, 
235. 

so sweetly she bade me, 241. 
Admiration, greatest works of, 348. 
Admire, where none, 133. 
Admit impediments, 208. 
Admitted to that e(3_ual sky, 399. 
Adoption tried, their, 121. 
Adore the hand, 312. 
Adoi-es and burns, seraph that, 394. 
Adorn a tale, point a moral oi', 909. 

the cottage might, 690. 
Adorned the most when unadorned, 795. 
Adorning with so much art, 795. 
Adorns and cheers the way, 800. 
Adulteries of art, 713. 
Advantage, feet nailed for our, 397. 
Adventure of the diver, 801. 

preys upon high, 798. 
Advei-saries, as, do in law, 121. 
Advereity, autumn of, 120. 

bruised with, 345. 

crossed mth, 345. 
Adversity, sweet are the uses of, 34S. 

works wrought by, 348. 
Advices, lengthened sage, 847. 
Aei'i.al tumult swells, 031. 
Aerj'-light his sleep, 490. 
Affairs of men, tide in the, 802. 
Affect, study what you most, 804. 
Affections mild, of, 724. 
Affects to nod, 771. 
Affliction, try me with, 725. 
Affliction's heaviest shower, 398. 

violence, 348. 
Affront me, a well-bred man vnW not,7S0. 
Af ric's sunny fountains, 395. 
After-loss, drop in for an, 271. 
Afterwards he taught, 697. 
Agate-stone, no bigger tlian an, 838. 
Age, ache, penury, 347. 

accompany old, 794. 

be comfort to my, 394. 

cannot wither her, 712. 

expect one of my, you'd scarce, 107. 

grow dim with, the sun, 7.59. 

in every, in evei-y clime, 370. 

labor o'f an, 906. 

not of an, but for all time, 906. 

of ease, 687. 

old, serene and bright. 311. 

root of, worm is at the, 308. 

should accompany old, 794. 

soul of the, 905. 

talking, made for, 686. 

that melts in unperceived decay, 794. 



Age to come my own, make the, 811. 

'twixt bov and youth, 108. 
Ages, alike all, 232. 

heir of all the, 258. 

his acts being seven, 711. 

once in the flight of, 308. 

three poets in three, 907. 

through the, one purpose owns, 2.57, 

wakens the slumbering, 812. 
Ages, ye unborn, 868. 
Agonies, despairing, 800. 
Agony all we know of, 583. 

distrest, though oft to, 203. 

of prayer, 358. 

swimmer in his, 632. 
Agree as angels do above, 399. 
Aid, apt alliteration's artful, 807. 

foreign, of ornament, 795. 
Air a chartered libertine, 723. 

and harmony of shape, 725. 

benediction of the, 807. 

bites shrewdly, 491. 

desert and illimitable, 481. 

diviner, an ampler ether, 399. 

fairer than the evening, 134. 

fills the silent, 491. 

heaven's sweetest, 722. 

hurtles in the darkened, 540. 

is delicate, 720. 

is full of farewells, S».2. 

love free as, 215. 

melted into thin, 867. 

nipping and an eager, 491. 

of glbiy, walking in an, 271. 

recommends itself, 720. 

scent the morning, 489. 

summer's noontide, 492. 

sweetness on the desert, 306. 

to rain in the, 489. 

trifles light as, 207. 

vocal, 726. 

wantons with the, lovesick, 133. 
Air-drawn dagger, 868. 
Ail's, gentle, fi-esli gales and, 209. 
Airy nothing, a local habitation to, R67. 

purposes, execute, 868. 

tongues that syllable men's names 
830. 
Aisle, long-d^a^^'n, 306. 
Aisles of Chi-istian Home, 736. 
Ajax strives to throw, 806. 
Alarums, stern, 541. 
Aldei-man, forefinger of an, 836. 
Ale, bell.y God send thee good, 946. 

.spicy nut-brown, 785. 
Alexandrine, needless, 806. 
Alike all ages, 232. 

fantastic if too new or old, 806. 
Alive, bliss to be, 490, 

1029 



E&- 



& 



a- 



1030 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



r] 



All chance direction, 489. 

discord, harmony, 189. 

in all, take him for, 721. 

in the Downs, 235, 

is fish thev get that cometh to net, 
672. 

is not lost. 54^0. 

mankind's concern is chai'ity, 398. 

my pretty chickens, 309. 

of death to die, nor, 311. 

other tilings give place, 133. 

places shall be hell, 396. 

that is bright must fade, 793. 

thy ends thy country's, 322. 

we know or dream or fear, .583. 
Allaying Thames, cups with no, li7. 
-Mlies, thou hast great, 922. 
Alliteration's artful aid, apt, 807. 
Allured to brighter worlds, 688. 
Almighty's orders, the, 639. 
Alms for oblivion, 792. 
Aloft, cherub that sits up, 615. 
Alone, all, all alone, 8.55. 

doubly feel ourselves, 248. 

least, in solitude, 813. 

on a wide wide sea, 856. 

that worn-out word, 813. 

■with his glory, 920. 
Alph, the sacred river, 831. 
Alps, perched on, 398. 

that mighty chain, 493. 
Altars, strike for your, 582. 
Alteration finds, when it, 208. 
Amaranthine flower of Faith, 398. 
Amaryllis in the shade, 203. 
Amazed the rustics gazed, 688. 
Amazing brightness, 133. 
Amber scent of odorous perfume, 631. 

snuff-box. .iustly -■rain of, 799. 

pretty to observe in, 815. 

tipped with, 814. 

whose foam is, 720. 
Amber-dropping hair, 869. 
Ambition, fling away, 322. 

ill-weaned, 310. 

loves to slide, 798. 

lowly laid, 676. 

made of sterner stuff, 875. 

of a private man, 575. 

to reign is worth, 799. 

vaulting, 798. 

wars that make, virtue, 722. 
Ambition's ladder, 799. 

monstrous stomach doe-5 increase, 
792. 
Ambrosial sin, 167. 
Amen stuck in my throat, 883. 
American strand, pass to the, 39L 
Amicj gray, in, 490. 
Amid the blaze of noon, 321. 
Amorous causes, springs from, 815. 

delay, reluctant, 711. 

descant sung, 413. 

fond and billing, 205. 
Ampler ether, 399. 
Aniuck, to run, 806. 
Anatomy, a mere, 722. 
Ancestral voices, 834. 
Ancient grudge I bear him, 899. 
Angel, consideration like an, 395. 

death and his Makei-, 739. 

dropped from the clouds, 671. 

Hope, thou hovering, 830. 

in his motion like an, 775. 

ministering, thou, .509. 

presiding o'er his life, 213. 

she drew an, down, 772. 

whiteness, 722. 
Angels, agree as, do above, 399. 

alone enjoy such liberty, 147. 

are painted far, 133. 

fear to tread. 798. 

fell by that sin, 322. 

forgef>me-nots of the, 492. 

holy, guard thj' bed. 76. 

in some brighter dreams, 274. 

laugh too, 979. 

listen when she speaks, 134. 

make the, weep, 813. 

our acts our, are, 797. 

plead like, liis virtues will, 900. 

sad as, for the good man's sin, 395. 

still an, appear, 185. 

su'ig this strain, 576. 

tears such as, weep, 346. 

tliousand liveried, 796. 

tremble while they gaze, 939. 

trumpet-tongued. 900. 
Angel's face shvned bright, 828. 

visits, like, 347, 396. 

wing, feather from an, 908. 
Angle-rod made of a sturdy oak, 672. 
Anguish, here tell your, 348. ' 

wring the brow, 509. 
Animated bust, 306. 
Anna, here thou great, 814. 
Annals of the poor, 300. 



Annihilate but space and time, 205. 
Another and the same, 494. 
Another's woe, teach me to feel, 370. 
Answer echoes answer, 449. 
Answers till a husband cools, 215. 
Anthem, pealing, 306. 
Antliropophagi, the. 145. 
Antidote, bane and, 759. 

sweet oblivious, .347. 
Antres va.st and deserts, 145. 
Anvil, heart an, unto sorrow, 899. 
Anything, what Is worth in, 803. 
Ape, like an angry, 813. 
Apostles twelve he taughte, 697. 

while, shrank, 795. 

would have done as they did, 396. 
Apostolic blows and knocks, 387. 
Apothecary, I remember an, 809. 
Apparel, fashion wears out more, 799. 

oft proclaims the man, 722. 
Apparition, lovely, 128. 
Apparitions, blushing, 723. 

seen and gone, 347. 
Appetite, cloy the hungi-y edge of, 346. 

grown by what it fed on, 205. 

may sicken and so die, 808. 
Applause, attentive to his own, 910. 

of Ustenmg senates, 306. 
Apple rotten at the heart, 797. 
Appliances and means to boot, 762. 
Apprehension, death most in, 310. 

of the good, 346. 
Apprehensions, weakness of our, 899. 
Approach of even or morn, 407. 
Appropinque an end, my days, 309. 
Approved good masters, 145. 
Approving Heaven, 214. 
April day, uncertain glory of, 492. 

proud-pied, 492. 

when they woo, 214. 
Aprille with his shoures, 695. 
Aprons, with greasy, 722. 
Apt and gracious words, 723. 
Arabia, all, breathes, 713. 
Arabs, fold their tents like the, 816. 
Araby's daughter, farewell, 294. 
Artitress, moon sits, 491. 
Arboretl with painted blossoms, 494. 
Arch, triumphal, that flll'st the sky, 494. 
Archer, insatiate, 491. 

mark the, litLle meant, 80.3. 
Argue at their own expense, 809. 

still, though vanquished, 688. 
Argues yourselves unknown, 812. 
Arguing, oivned his skill in, 688. 
Argument for a week, 62. 

for lacE of, 503. 

height of this great, 395. 
Arguments use wagers, for, 803. 
Aristotle and his nhilosopme, 696. 
Ark, hand upon the, 575. 
Arm, sits upon my, 541. 
Arm-chair, old, 101. 
Airmed so strong in honesty, 797. 

thus am I doubly, 769. 

with resolution, 204. 

without that's innocent, 796. 
Armor clashing, brayed, 500. 

is his honest thought, 7.36. 
Armorers accomplishing the knights, 

640. 
Arms against a sea of troubles, 297. 

imparadised in another's 205. 

my soul's in, 541. 

on annor clashing, 600. 

our bruised, hung up, 541, 

our world within our, 206. 

take your last embrace, 899. 
Aromatic plants bestow, 348. 
Arrest, strict in his, death, 309. 
Arrow for the heart, 204. 

o'er the house, shot my, 121. 
Arrows of light, swift-winged, 739. 
Arsenal, shook the, 804. 
Art, adorning with so much, 795. 

adulteries of, 713. 

all the gloss of, 689. 

concealed by, 810. 

ease in writing from, 806. 

her guilt to cover, 3.36. 

is long, time is fleeting, 770. 

is too precise in every part, 713. 

last and greatest, to blot, 806. 

may err, 489. 

nature is but, 489. 

of God, course of nature is, 489. 

tried each, 688. 

want of, hide with ornaments, 807. 
Artaxerxes' throne, Macedon and, 804. 
Artificer, lean unwashed, 722. 
Arts in which the wise excel, 806. 

and eloquence, mother of, 719. 

inglorious, of peace, 539. 

that never slip the memory, 671. 

wheedUng first taught by woman. 

As it fell upon a day, 480, 492. 



Ashes of his fathers. 567. 
Ashes, wonted fires live in our, 305. 
Aside, la«;t to lay the old, 806. 
Ask of the winds, B14. 
Aslant the dew-b, ight earth, 719. 
Asleep in law of legends old, 177. 
Asleep, the houses seem, 678. 
Aspect, sweet, of princes, 321. 
Aspen, light quivering 609. 
Assa-ssination trammel up, 900. 
Assayed, thrice he, 346. 
Assent with civil leer, 910. 
Assert eternal Providence, 395. 
Assume a pleasing shape, 396. 

a virtue if you have it not, 396. 
Assumes the god. 771. 
Assurance doubly sure, 793. 

given by lookes, 904. 

of a man, give the world, 721. 
Assyrian came down, 500. 
Astronomer, undevout, 492. 
Atheism, the owlet, 395. ..^ 
Atheist half believes by nlg-fit, 491. 
Atheist's laugh's a poor exchange, 395. 
Athens, the eye of Greece, 719. 
Atomies, team of little, 836. 
Atoms or systems, 394. 
Attempt and not the deed, 883. 

by fearing to, 800. 

the end and never doubt, 800. 
Attic bird trills, when the, 720. 
Atticus, if, were he, 910. 
I Attii'e, silk, walk in, 155. 

wild in their, 868. 
Attractive kinde of grace, 904. 

here's metal more, 133. 
Attribute to awe and majesty, 798. 
Auburn loveliest village, 686. 
Audience, fit though few, find, 807. 
Aught divine or holy. 803. 

in malice, nor set down, 724^ 

that ever I could read, 250. 
Auld acquaintance be foigot, 119. 

cJaes, gars, 385. 

nature swears, 191. 
Author, choose an, as a friend, 805. 

teaches such beauty, 795. 
Authority, drest in a little brief, 813. 

from others' books, 804. 
Autumn fruit, fel like, 309. 

nodding o'er the plain, 492. 
Autumne, all in yellow clad, 492. 

of adversity, 120. 
Avon, lucid, strayed, 939. 

sweet swan of, 906. 

to the .Severn i-uns, 9.39. 
Awake, or be forever fallen, 540. 
Awakes from the tomb, beauty, 737. 
Away, you're all the same, 271. 
Awe the soul of Richard, 541. 
Awful volume, within that, 397. 
A.xe, many strokes with a little, 802. 
Azure main, from out the, 570. 

Babbling dreams, hence, 541. 
Babe in the house, 107. 

she lost in infancy, 309. 

sinews of the new-born, soft as, 3991. 
Babel, stir of the great, see the, 810. 
Baby brow, bears upon his, 75. 

thinks, who can tell what a, 75. 

wordes fearen, 540. 
Bacchus ever fair and young, 771. 
Back and side go bare, 946. 

harness on our, die with, 541. 

resounded death, 310. 

thumping on your, 121. 

to the field, 574. 
Backwards, yesterdays look, 792. 
Bacon shined, think how, 938. 
Bad affright, the. 345. 

eminence, to that, 723. 
Bade me adieu, so sweetly, 241. 
Badge, nobility's true, 798. 

of all our tribe, 346. 
Baflled oft is ever won, 582. 
Baited with a di-agon's tail, 672. 
Baldric, milky, of the skies, 592. 
Ballad, woful, made to his mistress, 711. 
Ballad-mongers, these same metre, 807. 
Ballot-box, 'tis the, 604. 
Balm from an anointed Bang, 722. 

of hurt minds, 883. 
Banditti, blue-eyed, 98. 
Bane and antidote, 759. 
Banishment, bread of, 346. 
Bank and bush, over, 671. 

and shoal of time, 900. 

I know a, 495. 

moonlight sleeps upon this, 775. 

of violets, breathes upon a, 495. 
Bank-note world, this 677. 
Banner in the sky. 620. 

star-spangled, 593. 

with the strange device, 777. 
Banners on the outward walls, 540. 
BanqueWiall desei'ted, 313. 



I&- 



& 



[& 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1031 



-a 



Banquet song and dance, 582. 
Bar, poverty's aiiconquerable, Sir, 
Barbarians all at play, young, 681. 
Barbaric pearl and gold, 722. 
Barbarous skill, is but a, 795. 
Bard, be that blind, 822. 

more fat here dwelt, 940. 
Bardy, where ish dat, now, 1000, 
Bare, back and side go, 946. 

imagination of a feast, 346. 
Bargain, dateless, to death, 899. 
Barge, di'ag the slow, 802. 
Bai-k and bite, dogs delight to, 108. 

attendant sail, 911. 

drives on and on, 397. 

is on the sea, 920. 

watch dog's honest, 165. 
Barleycorn, bold John, 848. 
Bari-eu sceptre in my gi'ipe, 345. 
Ease envy withers, 327. 

from its firm, this rock shall fly, 655. 

in kind, born to be a slave, 6C1. 
Baseless ''abric of this vision S67. 
Bashful sincerity, 204. 

virgin's sidelong looks, 687. 
Bastai'd valor, 900. 
Bate a jot, 735. 

Bated breath, bondman's key with, 724. 
Bath, sore labor's, 883. 
Bat's back, I do fly, on the, 869. 
Battalions, sorrows come in, 345. 
Battle and the breeze, 629. 

feats of Iroil and, 145. 

for the free, 583. 

freedom's, once begun, 582. 

front of, lour, 573. 

perilous edge of, 540. 

prize of death in, 539. 
Battlements that bore stars, 867. 

sheer o'er the crystal, 725. 
Battles fought, all his, o'er again, 771. 
Battle's magnificently stern array, 51i2. 
Bay of Biscay O, 628. 

the moon, 93. 
Be-all and the end-all, 900. 
Be just and fear not, 322. 601. 

not the first to try, 806. 

nothing which thou art not, 796. 

or not to be, 297. 

she fairer than the day, 193. 

wise to-day, 748. 

wise with speed. 793. 
Beach, thei-e came to the. 578. 
BeadroU, Fame's etemall, 938. 
Beaker full of the warm south, 316. 
Beams, caudle throws his, 797. 

spreads his orient, 490. 

tricks his, 490. 
Bear like the Turk, no brother, 910. 

those ills we have, 297. 

up and ste^r rigut onward, 735. 
Beard of formal cut, 711. 

the lion in his den, 648. 
Bearded like the pard, 711. 
Bears and lions growl, 108. 

his blushing honors, 321. 
Beast that wants discoui-se of reason, 

723. 
Beasts, briiti.sh, thou art fled to, 870. 
Beat this ample field, 792. 

us to the hip, 900. 
Beatific vision, 803. 
Beating of my own heart, 149. 
Beaumont, lie a little f uither off, 905. 

rare, 939. 
Beauteous, all that is most, 399. 

eye of heaven, 726. 

ruin lay, lovely in death, 794. 
Beauties, we just, see, 729. 

you meaner, of the night, 124. 
Beautiful and to be weed, 795. 

beyond compare, 399. 

exceedingly, 721. 

Is night, 491. 

one was, 764. 

thought, thou wert a, 869. 
Beautifully blue, 490. 

less, fine by degrees and, 721. 
Beauty, a thing of, 675. 

all, and without a spot, 123. 

and her chivalry^ 511. 

born of murmurmg sound, 103. 

doth shine alike to all, 796. 

draws us with a hair, 203. 

dwells in deep retreats, 206. 

elysian. 206. 

fadeth by possession, 192. 

immortal awakes from the tomb. 737. 

is its own excuse for being, 461. 

is truth, truth beauty, 719. 

isle of, fare thee well ! 248. 

lines where, lingers, 303. 

making beautiful old rhyme, 122. 

mind diseased of its own, 867. 

much, as could dye, 907. 

of a thousand stars, 134. 

of the good old cause. 814. 



Beauty, ornament of, is suspect, 722. 

provoketh thieves, 133. 

^he walks in, 130. 

smile from ijartial, won, 795. 

such, as a woman's eye, 795. 

thy more than, 796. 

truly blent, 122. 

upon the cheek of night, 721. 

waking or asleep, 203. 
Beauty's cliain, sport with, 816. 

heavenly lay, 720. 
Beaux, where none are, 133. 
Beckoning shadows dire, 830. 
Beckons me hand you cannot see, 311. 
Becoming mirth, limit of, 724. 
Bed by night, a chest by day, 689. 

made his pendent, 720. 

of down, thrice-driven, 539. 

weeping upon his, 348. 

with the lark to, 495. 
Beddes hed, at his, 696. 
Bedlam or Parna.ssus is let out, 805. 
Beds of roses, make thee, 157. 
Bee had stung it newly, 211. 

how doth the little busy, 108, 

where the, sucks, 869. 
Beer, chronicle small, 723. 
Bees innumerable, 493. 
Beetle that we tread upon, 310. 
Beeves and homebred kine, 493. 
Beggar that is dumb, may challenge 

double pity, 204. 
Beggared all description, 712. 
Beggarly account of empty boxes, 809. 
Beggai'S die, when, 899. 
Beggary in love that can be reckoned, 

206. 
Beginning late, choosing and, 204. 

mean and end to all things, 742. 

still, never ending, 772. 
Begot, by whom, 311. 
Beguile her of her tears, 14.5. 

many, beguiled by one, 207. 

the thing I am, 349. 
Behold our home, 626. 

the child, 107. 
Being, hath a part of, 813. 

intellectual, 794. 
Belated peasant, 491. 
Belgium's capital had gathered, 511. 
Belial, sons of, 558. 
Bell, church-going, 738. 

each matin, 308. 

strikes one, 747. 

sullen, knolling a friend, 346. 
Belle, it is vain to be a, 133. 
Bellman, the owl that fatal, 882. 
Bells have kiiolled to church, 347. 

jangled out of tune, 808. 

ring out wild, to the wild sky, 752. 

rung backwards, 108. 

those evening, 716. 
Belly, God send thee good ale, 946. 

shook like a bowl full of jelly, 96. 

with good capon lined, 711. 
Beloved from pole to pole, 807. 

one, face on earth, 705. 
Ben Adhem's name led, 769. 
Ben Jonson, O rare, 939. 
Bench of heedless bishops, 107. 
Bend a knotted oalc, 809. 
Beneath the churchyard stone, 309. 

the milk-white thorn, 385. 

the i-ule of men, 805. 
Benediction of the air, 807. 

perpetual, doth breed, 758. 
Benighted, wallcs under the midday sun, 

796. 
Bent him o'er the dead, 303. 
Beqiieathed by bleeding sire, 582. 
Bei-keley said tliere was no matter, 808. 
Berry, sunburnt Mocha beare, 814. 
Beside the springs ot Dove, 104. 
Best administered is best, 397. 

companions, innocence and health, 
687. 

fools be, who are a little wise, 798. 

laid schemes o' mice and men, 462. 

of all ways to lengthen our days, 205, 

of men was a sufferer, 723. 

of what we do and are, .S98. 

portion of a good man's life, 404, 

riches, ignorance of wealth, 687. 
Beteem the winds of heaven, 206. 
Betray, nature never did, 404. 
Better be with the dead, 311. 

days, we have seen, 347. 

days, if ever looked on, 347. 

fifty years of Europe, 258. 

had they ne'er been born, 397. 

knowledge, against his, 899, 

reck the rede, 796. 

spared a better man, 312. 

than his dog, 255. 

the worse appear, 724. 

to be lowly bom, 347. 

to have loved and lost, 311. 



Better to hunt in fields for health, 671. 

to i-eigii in hell, 799. 
Between the dark and the daylight, 98. 

two dogs, 810. 

t\vo girls, 810. 

two hawks, 810. 

two hoi-ses, 810. 
Beware of desperate steps, 793. 

of entrance to a quarrel, 540. 

the Ides of March, 899. 
Bewilder, leads to, dazzles to blind, 737. 
Bezonian, under which king, 540. 
Bible, burdens of the, 735. 

knows her, true, 397. 
Bid me discourse, 1 will enchant, 803. 
Bids expectation rise, 347. 
Bigger, in shape no, 836. 
Bigness which you see, 805. 
Billows, distinct as the, 608. 

foam, 626. 

never break, where, 309. 

swelling and limitless, 631. 

trusted to thy, 607. 
Bind up my wounds, 540. 
Binding nature fast in fate, 370. 
Binds the broken heart, 809. 
Bird of dawning, 397. 

of the wilderness, 473. 

shall I call thee, 472. 

that shunn'st the noise, 786. 
Birdie, what does little, say, 80. 
Birds, charm of earliest, 206, 490. 

if, confabulate, 495. 

joyous, the, 209. 

melodious, sing madrigals, 157. 
Birth is but a sleep, 758. 

is nothing but our death begun, 308, 
Biscay, bay of, O, 628. 
Biscuit, remainder, dry as the, 803. 
Bishops, heedless, 107. 
Bisier semed than he was, 697. 
Bisy a man, nowher so, 697. 
Bite, the man recovered of the, 949. 
Bitter is a scornful jest, 345. 

memory of what he was, 396. 
Bittei-ness of things, from out the, 348. 
Black is not so black, 806. 

to red began to turn, 490. 
Bladders, boys that swim on, 321. 
Blade, heart-stain on its, 940. 

trenchant, Toledo trusty, 507. 
Blame, in part is she to, 232. 
Blank misgivings of a creature, 750. 

universal, 407. 
Blast, of no, he died, 309. 

of war blows in our ears, 503. 

upon his bugle-horn, 511. 
Blasted with excess of light, 939. 
Blaze of noon, daik amid the, 321. 
Blazon, eternal, must not be, 725. 
Blazoning pens, quirks of, 722. 
Bleeding country, save my, 683. 
Blend our pleasure or our pi'ide, 662. 
Blessed do above, all we know tlie, 390. 

it is twice, 798. 

mood, that, 404. 

with temper, 232. 
Blessedness, single, lives in, 495. 
Blesseth him that gives, 798. 
Blessing dear, makes a, 801. 

1 had most need of, 883. 
Blessings be with them, 42. 

brighten as they take flight, 801. 

wait on virtuous deeds, 398. 

without number, 76. 
Blest, always to be, never is but, 801. 

I have 6een, 207. 
Blind bard, be that, 822. 

dazzles to, 737. 

he that is .stricken, 346. 

love is, 203. 
Blindly, loved sae, 233. 
Bliss, bowei-s of, 910. 

domestic happiness, only, 232. 

heartless and wandering, 203. 

his scanty fund supplies, 603. 

hues of, more biightly glow, 340. 

ignorance is, where, lOS. 

momentary, 108. 

of paradise, 232. 

of solitude, 813. 

or bale, her face resigned to, 721. 

source of all my, 690. 

that earth affords, 729. 

to be alive, 490. 

virtue maljes our, 398. 

winged hours of ,347. 
Blithe, no lark more, .559. 
Blood, beats with his, 583. 

bedew her pasture's grass with, 541. 

charming your, with heaviness, 816, 

cold in, cold in clime are, 205. 

drizzled, upon the Capitol, 899. 

faithful English, 541. 

felt in the, 403. 

freeze thy young, 725. 

hand laised to shed his, 496. 



^ 



S^ 



s 



1032 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIOXS. 



a 



Blood is cold, 868. 

is liquid flame, 899. 

of all the Howards, 781. 

poor cold part o' the, 899. 

prove whose, is reddest, 722, 

stirs to rouse a lion, 670. 

summon up the, 503. 

weltering in his, 771. 
Bloody instructions, 800. 

Mary, image of, 802. 
Bloom of young desire, 205. 

sight of vernal, 807. 
Blossomed the lovely stars, 492. 
Blossoms in the trees, i89. 

of my sin, cut off in the, 310. 
Blot, art to, 806. 

discreetly, 806. 

no, on his name, 574. 

one line he could wish to, 806. 
Blotted from the things that be, 308. 
Blow, bugle, blow, 449. 

death loves a signal, 309. 

hand that gives the, adore, 312. 

liberty's in every, 573. 

themselves mu.st strike the, 581. 

thou winter wind, 316. 

wind! come wrack, 541. 
Blows, apostolic, 387. 

and buffets of the world, 347. 
Blue above and blue below, 625. 

darkly, deeply, beautifully, 490. 

the fresh, the ever free, 625. 
Blunder, free us frae monie a, 486. 

in men this, still you find, 812. 
Blush, grandeur, blush, 797. 

of maiden shame, 494. 

shame, where is thy, 395. 

to find it fame, 797. 

to give it in, 395. 
Blushes, beat av^ay those, 723. 
Blushing honors, bears his, 321. 

like the morn, 209. 
Boast, can Imagination, 489. 

not of wiles more unexpert, 539. 

of heraldry, 306. 

patriot's, such is the, 229. 
Boat is on the shore, 920. 
Boatman, take thrice thy fee, 292. 
Bobbed for whale, 672. 
Bodice aptly laced, 721. 
Bodies, soldiers bore dead, by, 506. 

of unburied men, 495. 
Boding tremblers, 688. 
Bodkin, with a bare, 297. 
Body form doth take of the soul, 730. 

is under hatches, 629. 

meet a body, gin a, 187. 

nature is, 489. 

naught cared this, 108. 

pent, here in the, 3S9. 
Boils, when the nation, 813. 
Bold peasantry, their country's pride, 

687. 
Bolt, sharp and sulphurous, 813. 
Bond of fate, take a, 793. 
Bondage, land of, 372. 
Bondman let me live, 797. 
Bondman's key, in a, 724. 
Bondmen, hereditary, 5S1. 
Bone of my bone thou art, 217. 
Bones are coral made, of his, 869. 

are marrowless, 868. 

cover to our, paste and, 310. 

good is oft interred with their, 875. 

rattle his, over the stones, 341. 

to lay his weary, 345. 
Booby, who'd give her, for another, 232. 
Book and heart never part, 397. 

and volume of my brain, 801. 

credit of his, confounds the, 805. 

in sour misfortune's, 345. 
Book's a book, 805. 

of fate, heaven hides the, 793. 

of knowledge fair, 407. 

shelves admit not any modern, 805. 
Bookes clothed in black, 696. 
Books are each a world, 805. 

authority from others', 804. 

in the running brooks, 489. 

of honor razed quite, 540. 

old, to read, 118. 

tenets with, 814. 

toil o'er, 804. 

were woman's looks, my only, 204. 
Bo-peep, played aV 731. 
Bore without abuse, 797. 
Boreas, cease rude, 628. 
Born, better ne'er been, 397. 

better to be lowly, 347. 

for immortality, 809. 

happy is he, and taught, 736. 

to be a slave, 601. 

to blush unseen, 306. 

to the manner, 814. 
Borne, like thy bubbles, 607. 
Borrower nor a lender be, 121. 
Borrowing dulls the edge, 559. 



BoiTOwing, %vho goeth a, 347. 
Bosom, cleanse the stuffed, 347. 

of his Father and his God, 307. 

of the ocean buried, in the deep, 541. 

thorns that in her lodge, 395. 

was young, when my, 529. 

what, beats not in his country's 
cause, 602. 
Bosomed high in tufted trees, 785. 
Both in the wrong, we are, 121. 

sides, much may be said on, 803. 

thanks and use, 797. 

were young, 764. 
Bottom of the deep, dive into the, 670. 
Boughs, mossy leafless, 721. 
Bound in shallows, 802. 

in those icy chains, 263. 

into saucy doubts and fears, 800. 
Boundless contiguity of shade, 593. 

his wealth, 563. 
Bounds between their love and me, 232. 

of modesty, 723. 

of place and time, flaming, 939. 
Bounties of an hour, 747. 
Boimty, large was his, 307. 
Bourn, from whose, no traveller re- 
turns, 297. 
Bout, many a winding, 786. 
Bow before thine altar, 203. 

unerring, lord of the, 725. 
Bowels of the harmless earth, 506. 
Bower, nuptial, led her to the, 209. 
Bowers of bliss, 910. 

silver, leave, 373. 
Bowl, mingles with my friendly, 814. 
Boxes, beggarly account of empty, 809. 
Boy, a little tiny, 494. 

it is but a peevish, 144. 

love is a, 108. 

stood on the burning deck, 614. 

you hear that, laughing, 979. 
Boyhood, conceive in, pursue as men, 

867. 
Boyhood's painless play, 99. 
Boyish days, even from my, 146. 
Boys, like little wanton, 321. 

wooing in my, I'll go, 215. 
Braggart with my tongue, 346. 
Braids of lilies, 869. 
Brain, coinage of your, 808. 

fiddy, turns up my, 899.' 
rail fibre of her, 899. 

heat-oppressed brain, 882. 

out of the carver's, 726. 

poet's, possess a, 938. 

vex the, with researches, 805. 

volume of my, book and, 801. 

woman's gentle, 795. 

ivritten troubles of the, 347. 
Brains, lovers have such seething, 806. 

when the, were out, 868. 
Branch-charmed by the stars, 494. 
Branded o'er yet still believed, 558. 
Branksome hall, custom of, 814. 
Brave days of old, 570. 

deserves the fair, none but the, 771. 

home of the, 593. 

how sleep the, 563. 

on ye, who rush to glory, 513. 

toll for the, that are no more, 612. 

unreturning, grieves over the, 512. 
Bravery, all her, on and tackle tiim, 631. 

of his grief, 725. 
Breach, imminent deadly, 145. 

more honored in the, 814. 

once more unto the, 503. 
Bread and butter, smell of, 107. 

he took and brake it, 393. 

in sorrow ate, .348. 

of banishment, 346. 
Break it to our hope, 345. 

of day, eyes like, 263. 
Breakers, wantoned with thy, 607. 
Breaking waves dashed high, 587. 
Breast, feeble woman's, 203. 

hope eternal in the human, SOL 

one master-passion in the, 799. 

on her white, 128. 

power that sways the, 809. 

soothe a savage, 809. 

sunshine of the, 793. 

tamer of the human, 345. 

that in me bleeds, 271. 

thine ideal, 869. 

toss him to my, 395. 

two hands upon the, 295. 

where learning lies, 805. 

within his own clear, 796. 
Breastplate, what stronger, 796. 
Breath, bated, 724. 

call the fleeting, 306. 

can make them, 687. 

lightly draws its, 87. 

of kings, princes are but the, 386. 

of morn, 206, 490. 

rides on the posting winds, 811. 

smell's wooingiy, heaven's, 720. 



Breath, summer's ripening, 492. 

to the wind, melted as, 868. 

weary of, one more, 335. 
Breathe, thoughts that, 867. 
Breathes there the man, 563. 
Breathing household laws, 814. 

of the common wind, 922. 
Bred, where is fancy, 125. 
Breeches are so queer, 323. 
Breeds by a composture, 489. 
Breeze, far as the, can bear, 62G. 

refreshes in the, 489. 
Brevity is the soul of wit, 803. 
Bridal chamber, come to the. Death, '&% 

of the earth and side, 301. 
Bride, wife is dearer than the, 215. 
Bride-bed to have decked, I thought 

thy, 311. 
Bi-idegroom, fresh as a, 506. 
Bridge of sighs, in Venice on the, 720. 
Brief as the lightning, 250. 

as woman's love, 207. 

authority, drest in a little, 813. 

'tis, my lord, 207. 

unto as large a volume, 107. 
Bright as young diamonds, 345. 

honor, pluck, from the pale-faced 
moon, 670. 

must fade, all that is, 793. 

pai-tlcular star, love a, 242. 

waters meet, where the, 721. 
Brighten, blessings, as they take their 

flight, 801. 
Brightens, how the wit, 812. 
Brightest and best of sons of morning, 
397. 

still the fleetest, 793. 
Bright-eyed Fancy, 867. 
Brightness, amazing, 133. 

recall her native, 867. 
Bring the day, Phosphor, 489. 

the rathe primrose, 494. 

your wounded hearts, here, 348. 
Bringer of unwelcome news, .346. 
Britain at Heaven's command, -570. 
Britannia needs no bulwai-ks, 629. 

mles the waves, 576. 
Brither, lo'ed him, like a vera, 847. 
Britons never shall be slaves, 576. 
Broad-based upon her people's will, 632. 
Broke the die in moulding Sheridan. 940' 
Broken, love vow and heart can be, 271. 
Broken-hearted, ne'er been, 233. 
Brokenly live on, 512. 
Broil and battle, feats of, 14,5. 
Brook and river meet, where, 104. 

can see no moon but this, 491. 

fast by a, 493. 

noise ID^e of a hidden, 858. 

sparkling with a, 489. 
Brooks, books in the running, 489 

in Vallombrosa, 494. 

make rivers, 493. 

shallow, rivers wide, 785. 

sloping into, 493. 
Brother followed brother, 309. 

hurt my, 121. 

near the throne, bear no, 910. 

we are both in the wrong, 121. 
Brotherhood, work in noble, 541. 

of venerable trees, 494. 
Brothers, forty thousand, 206. 
Brow, anguish wrings the, 509. 

grace was seated on this, 721. 

O noblest, and dearest, 37.3. 
Brows, now are our, bound, 541. 

gathering her, 847. 
Bruise, parmaceti for an inward, 506. 
Bruised with adversitj', 345. 
Brushing with hasty steps the dews, 306. 
Bratus is an honorable man, 875. 
Bubble, honor but an empty, 772. 

on the fountain, 283. 

reputation, seeking the, 711. 

the world's a, 792. 
Bubbles, borne like thy, onward, 607. 

the earth hath, 868. 
Bubbling cry of a strong swimmer, CS2. 

groan, 607. 

loud hissing urn, 810. 

tales, wave still tells its, 720. 
Bucket, old oaken, iron-bound, 100. 

moss-covered, 100. 
Buckingiiam, so much for, 899. 
Bud, like a "worm in the, 251. 

to heaven conveyed, 107. 

worm is in the, of youth, 308. 
Budding, rose is fairest when 'tis, 20-i 
Buds the promise, 398. 

dew wont to swell upon the, 494. 
Buffets and rewards. Fortune's, 112. 

of the world, 347. 
Bugle horn, one blast upon his, 511. 
Build, not boast, he lives to, 812. 
Builded better than he knew, 736. 
Building, life of the, 900. 

wilderness of, 867. 



t& 



■ff 



e^ 



INDEX OP POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1033 



-a 



Builds a church to God, 797. 
Built God a church, 390. 
BuUen's eyes, dawned from, 397. 
Bulwark, iirra connected, C32. 

native, of the pass, 719. 
Bulwarks, Britannia needs no, 620. 
Burden or his song, 81C. 

of the mysteiy, iOi. 

of three-score, 232. 
Burdens of the Bible old, 735. 
Burn, words that, 867. 
Burnuig deck, boy stood on the, 614. 
Burnished dove, livelier ii-is on the, 254. 
Burns -ivith one love, 120. 
Burrs, conversation's, 803. 
Bush, in the, with God may meet, 744. 

the thief doth fear each, 725. 

through, through brier, 869. 
Business^ prayer all his, 399. 
Bust, animated, 306. 
Busy bee, how doth the little, 108. 

companies of men, 719. 

hammers closing rivets, 540. 

hum of men, 786. 
Butchered to make a Roman holiday, 

681. 
Butterflies show not mealy wings, 121. 
Butterfly upon a wheel, breaks a, 909. 
Button oil Fortune's cap, 347. 
Buttoned down before, coat that, 976. 
Buy it, they lose it that do, 803. 

Cabined cribbed confined, 800. 
Cadmus, you have the letters, gave, 581. 
Ccesar, great, fell, 876. 

hath wept, 876. 

I come to bury, 875. 

in every wound of, a tongue, 877. 

more dangerous than danger, 899. 

with a senate at his heels, 781. 

yesterday the word of, 87B. 
Ceesar's spirit ranging for revenge, 539. 
Cage, nor iron bars a, 147. 
Calamity man's true touchstone, 348. 

of so long life, 297. 
Caledonia stern and wild, 575. 
Call for the robin-redbreast, 495. 

it holy ground, 587. 

me early, mother dear, 327. 

to-day his own, 793. 
Called so loud that hell resounded, 540. 
Calling shapes, fantasies of, 830. 
Calm as a summer sea, 631. 

disdain, forsaking with a, 940. 

for those who weep, 794. 

so deep, I never felt, 678. 

thou mayst smile, 807. 
Calmness, law made in, 540. 

thy current's, 720. 
Cambuscan bold, story of, 787. 
Camilla scours the plain, 806. 
Can imagination boast, 489. 

this be death, 365. 
Candid friend, save me from the, 121. 

where we can, be, 807. 
Candied tongue, let the, 111. 
Candle, out out brief, 792. 

throws his beams, 797. 
Candles, night's, are burnt out, 490. 
Cane, clouded, conduct of a, 799. 
Canker and the grief are mine, 250. 
Cannibals that each other eat, 145. 
Cannon to right of them, 517. 
Cannon's mouth, even in the, 711. 
Canon 'gainst self -slaughter, 311. 
Canopied by the blue sky, 765. 
Canst not say I did it, 868. 
Cap whiter than driven snow, 708. 
CababiUty and godlike reason, 808. 
Capitol, drizzled blood upon the, 89D. 

who betrayed the, 795. 
Captain ill, good attending, 398. 
Captive, good, attending ill, 398. 
Caravan, innumerable, join the, 307. 
Carcase, fit for hounds, 900. 
Card, reason the, passion the gale, 792. 
Cai-e adds a nail to our coffin, 798. 

for nobody, if nobody cares, 816. 

humbler harmonist of, 940. 

in heaven ? is there, 373. 

leaden footstep of, 604. 

life of, weep away the, 317. 

ravelled sleave of, 883. 

■what, I how fair she be, 393. 

will kill a cat, 816. 

wrinkled, sport that, derides, 785. 
Care-charming sleep, 816. 
Cai-eless childhood, 108. 

shoe-string, 713. 

their merits or faults to scan, 688. 
Cares, heart depressed with, 795. 

dividing, doubling his pleasures and 
his, 212. 

fret thy soul with, 204. 

humble, and fears, 231. 

nobler loves and, 421. 

that infest the day, 816. 



Cares, that wait upon a crown, 136. 

Cai'ess, wooing the, 814. 

Carols rude, owns in, 559. 

Carnage and his conquest cease, 54L 

Carpet knight, some vain, 656. 

Can-y gentle peace, .322. 

Carve him as a dish fit for gods, 900. 

Carved not a line, we, 920. 

■with figures strange, 726. 
Carver's brain, out of the, 726. 
Casca, the envious, 876. 
Case, lady's in the, when a, 320. 
Casement slowly grows, 315. 
Casements, charmed magic, 317. 
Cassius has a lean and hungry look, 722. 
Cast of thouglit, 297. 

set my lite upon a, 802. 
Casting a dim religious light, 787. 
Castle liatli a pleasant seat, 720. 
wall, bores through his, 308. 
Castled crag of Drachenfels, 446. 

Rhine, dwelleth by the, 494. 
Castles in the clouds that pass, 831. 
Casuists, soundest, doubt, 803. 
Cat, care wUl kill a, 816. 
harmless, necessai-y, 496. 
i' the adage, 800. 
Cataract, sounding, haunted me, 404> 
Cataracts, silent, 377. 
Catch him tripping if you can, 724. 
the conscience of the king, 804. 
the manners living as they rise, 807. 
Caters for the sparrow, 394. 
Cathay, cycle of, 258. 
Cato give his senate laws, 602, 910. 
indifferent to sleep or die, 310. 
Caucasus, on the frosty, 346. 
Caught by glare, 215. 
Cauld, there's neither, nor care, 296. 
Cause, good old, homely beauty of, 811 
grace my, little shall 1, 145. 
great first, 370. 
magnificent and awful, 575. 
Cause of policy, turn him to any, 723. 

report me and iny, aiight, 811. 
Causes which conspire to blind, 799. 
Caution's, cold-pausing, lesson scorning, 

108. 
Caverns measureless to man, 8.34. 
Caves, dark unfathomed, of ocean, 306. 
Cease every joy to glimmer, 800. 

rude Boieas, 628 
Celebrated, Saviour's birth is, 397. 
Celestial hai mony of likeiy heai'ts, 206. 

rosy red, 203. 
Cell of fancy, internal sight, 209. 
Cement of the s-oul, friend.- liip, 120. 

of t'vvo minds, friendship, 120. 
Censure, mouths of wisest, 811. 

take each man's, 815. 
Centre, faith has, everywhere, 397. 
Centuries fall like grains of sand, 604. 
Ceremony, enforced, 206. 
Certainty to piease, that charm the, 212. 
Chain, hanging in a gulden, 492. 

lengthening, drags a, 248. 
Chains, bound m tlioae icy, 263. 

untwisting all the, 786. 
Chair, has one vacant, 272. 
rack of a too easy, 724. 
Chalice, ingredients of our poisoned, 800. 
Challenge to his end, 193. 
Chamber carved so curious'y, 726. 
come to the bridal. Death, 545. 
where good man meets his fate, 309. 
Chance, all, direction, 489. 

by happy, saw a twofold image, 494. 
Chancellor in embiT", 107. 
Chances, most disastrous, 145. 
Change a mind with eveiy minute, 813, 
came o'er my dream, 765. 
of many-colored life, 905. 
old love for new, 207. 
ringing groo\es of, 258. 
such a, the sky is charged and, 686. 
the place, but keep the pain, 7S9. 
Changeful dream, fickle as a, 813. 
Changes, owe their channs to their, 723. 
Chanticleer, crow Kke, 810. 
strutting, strain ot, 869. 
Chaos and old night, 725. 
Chaos-like, together crushed, 815. 
Chai actei-s from high life drawn, 812. 
Charactery, fairies use flowers for, 869. 
Charge, Chester, charge, 510. 

is prepared, the lawyers met, 723, 
Chariots, wheels of brazen, 500. 
Cha' ities that soothe, 398. 
Charity, a little earth for, 346. 
all mankind's concern is, 398. 
hand open for, melting, 724. 
pity gave ere, began, 688. 
Charm of earliest birds, 206, 490. 
of poetry and love, 495. 
one native, more dear, 680. 
overcome ■with female, 899. 
power to, nor witch hath, 397. 



Charm that lulls to sleep, 139. 

to stay the morning star, 376. 

woman's chiefest, a gentle voice, 795. 
Charmer siimer it, whether the, 805. 

were t'other dear, away, 134. 
Charmers, Uke other, wooing, 814. 
Charming, ever, ever new, 444. 

your blood with heaviness, 816. 
Chamis, music hath, to soothe, 809. 

solitude, where are the, 738. 

stx-ike the sight, 203. 
Charter large as the wind, 602. 
Chartered libertine, air a, 723, 
Chase, tears in piteous, 496. 

the sport of kings, 671. 
Chasm, horrid, disclosed, 948. 
Chaste as morning dew, 106. 

as the icicle, 493. 
Chastises whom m ft he likes, 347. 
Chastity my brother, 796. 

saintly, so dear is, 796. 

she that hath, clad in steel, 796. 
Chatham's la guage his tongue, 575. 
Chaucer, leained, more nigh to, 939. 

lodge thee by, 905. 

well of English undefyled, 938. 
Cheat, life 'tis all a 793. 
Checkered p ths of joy and woe, 226. 
Cheek, fe d on her damask, 251. 

he that loves a rosy, 141. 

of night, hangs upon the, 721. 

o'er her warm, 205. 

pale grew thy, and cold, 241. 

iron teai-s down Pluto's 787. 

viUatn with a smiling, 797. 
Cheeks, blow, winds, i rack your, 491. 

stain my man's, 346. 
Cheer, but not inebriate, cups that, 810. 

of vigor born, 793. 

make good, play and, 232. 
Cheerful dawn. May-time and the, 128. 

godliness, 907. 

ways of men, cut off from, 407. 

yesterdays, 793. 
Cheerless being sole and sad, 271. 
Cherish, those heai'ts that hate thee, 322. 
Cherries that none may buy, 123. 
C herry, like to a double, 38. 

ripe, cry, 123^ 134. 
Cherub, sweet In tie, up aloft, 615. 
Cherubms, young-eyed, 775. 
Chest of drawers by day, 689. 
Chewing the cud ot fancy, 813. 
Chian strand, blin.i bard on the, 822. 
Chickens, all my pretty, 309. 
Chief a rod, 780. 

hail to the, who in triumph, 519. 
Chiefs out of war, 814. 
Chiel's amang ye takin' notes, 805. 
Child, 1 1 ave . een a curious, 631. 

a naked new-born, 78. 

a simple, 87. 

a three years', 108. 

as yet a, 107. 

behold the, 107. 

in simplicity a, 724. 

is father of the man, 432. 

like a tired, lie down, 317. 

listens like a three years', 108. 

meek nature's, 940. 

of many prayers, 104. 

of suffering, 347. 

of the skies, .588. 

room of my absent, 107. 

Shakespeare, fancy's, 780. 

spoil the, spare the rod and, 108. 

thankless, to have a, 348. 

waters wild went o'er his, .339- 
Childhood, careless, 108. 

fleeted by, 108. 

first dawn of, 490. 

in my days of, 274. 

shows the man, 107. 
Childhood's hour, from, 251. 
Childish ignorance, 93. 

tremble, turning towards, 711. 
Childishness, second, and mere obliv- 
ion, 711. 
Childlike and bland, smile that was, 987. 
Children blessings seem, 108. 

like bells run backwards, 108. 

of a larger growth, men but, 107. 

through the mh-thful maze, 232. 
Chill penury, 306. 
Chimseras dire, Hydras and, 868. 
Chime, to guide their, 626. 
Chimney-pots, what tiles and, 630. 
Chimney-sweepers come to dust, 301. 
Chin, new-reaped, 506. 
China fall, though, 231. 
Chinks that time has made, 754. 
Chivalry, beauty and her, 511. 

chai-ge with all thy, 513. 
Choice word and measured phrase, 807. 
Choke one with unuttei-able joy, 725. 
Choose an author as a friend, 805. 

not alone a proper mate, 215. 



fg^ 



-w 



G 



1034 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



-a 



Choose thine own time, 303. 

where to, their place of rest, 32L 

which of the two to, 370. 
Choosing and beginning' late, 204 
Chord, smote the, of self, 255 
Chords, smote on all the. 255. 

that vibrate sweetest pleasure, 204. 
Chorus, laudloi-d's laugh was ready, 8i7. 
Christ, ring in the, that is to be, 752. 
Chi-tstian, highest style of man, 399. 
Chri.stia.ns have burnt each other, 396. 
Christmas comes once a year, 232, 816. 

'twas the night before, 96. 
Chronicle small beer. 723. 
Chronicler, such an honest, 811. 
Chrysolite, one perfect, 723. 
Church, built God a, 396. 

unseen at, 721. 

who builds a, to God, 797. 
Church-going bell, sound of the, 738. 
Churchyard mould, verge of the, 802. 

stone, lie beneath the, 309. 
Churchyards yawn, time when, i91. 
Ch3'niist, fiddler, statesman, 909. 
Cigar, give me a, 814. 
Cimmerian dai'kness, 743. 
Cinnamon, tinet with, 179. 
Circle, thy firmness makes my, just, 248. 
Circumstance of glorious war, 722. 

without more, at all, 241. 
Cisterns, cool, of the midnight air, 416. 
Cities, far from gay, 489. 

towered, please us then, 786. 
Civility, I see a wild, 713. 
Clad in complete steel, 796. 
Claims of long descent, 263. 
Clamors, Jove's dread, 722. 
Clasp his teeth, drunkard, 558. 
Classic ground, seem to tread on, 807. 
Clay, porcelain of human, 309. 

tenement of, 908. 

turf that wraps their, 563. 
Cleanse the stuffed bosom, 347. 
Clear, deep yet, 723. 

in his gi-eat offiee, 900. 
Clerk ther was of Oxenforde, 696. 
Clicked behind the door, 689. 
Cliff, as some tall, 688. 
Climb, how hard it is to, 812. 
Clime, cold in, cold in blood, 205. 

deeds dons in their, 451. 

in every, adored, 370. 

in the eastern, advancing, 490. 

soft as her, sunny as her skies, 721. 

some brighter, 304. 
Climes, humors turn with, 814. 
Clink of hammers, closing rivets up, 5-iO. 
Clip an angel's wings, 808. 
Cloa'tv, martial, around him, 920. 
Clock, linger of a, fancy like the, 810. 

worn out with eating time, 309. 
Close against the skj', 93. 

of the day, at the, 737. 
Clothe my naked villainy, 396. 
Clothed in black or red, 696. 
Clothes, through tattered, 802. 

liquefaction of her, 126. 

wantonness in, kindles a, 713. 

when he put on his, 948. 
Clotliiag the palpable, 490. 
Cloud, lessening, 719. 

sable, turn her silver lining, 491. 

tJirough a fleecy, 787. 

to cloud ths lightning's lage, 494. 
Cloud-capped towers, 867. 
Clouds, behold those everlasting, 495. 

castles in the, 831. 

e.xalted with the threatening, 631. 

fought upon the, 899. 

hooded like friars, 494. 

looks in the, 799. 

plighted, play in the, 869. 

robe of, in a, 493. 

sees God in, 399. 

that gather round, 759. 

that lo\ve.red, 541. 

thy, dispel all other, 814. 

trailing, of glory, 758. 
Cloy the edge of appetite, 346. 
Coast, rock-bound, 587. 
Coat buttoned down before, 976. 
Coats, hole in a' your, 805. 
Cobwebs, laws like, in all ages, 810. 
Cock that is trumpet to the morn, 868. 
Coffin, adds a nail to our, 798. 
Cotre, litel gold in, 698. 
Cogibundity of cogitation, 808. 
Cogitative faeuUies immersed, 808. 
Cohorts were gleaming, 600. 
Coigne of vantage, 720. 
Coil, not worth this, 348. 

shuffled off this mortal, 297. 
Coinage of your brain, the very, 868. 
Cold in blood, cold in clime, 205. ^ 
iron, man that meddles with, 540. 
sweat tlirills my limbs, 725. 
the changed —the dead, 271. 



Colder thy kiss, 241. 

Coldly heard, that word so, 813. 

sweet, so deadly fair, 303. 
Cold-pausing caution's lesson scorning, 

108. 
Coliseum, when falls the^ 682. 
Coined night, lightning in the, 250. 
Cologne, wash your city of, 954. 
Colors, live in the, of the rainbow, 869. 
Columbia, happy land, 603. 

to glory arise, 588. 
Combat deepens, the, on ye brave, 513. 

wit in the, as gentle as bright. 940. 
Combination and a form indeed, 721. 
Come and trip it as you go, 785. 

as the waves come, 618. 

as the winds come, 618. 

death will, when it will, 310. 

gentle spring, 492. 

like shadows, so depairt, 868. 

live with me and be my love, 157. 

one come all, G55. 

perfect days, then if ever, 424. 

to the bridal chamber death, 682. 

unto these yellow sands, 869. 

what come, may, 791. 

what may, I have been blest, 207. 

when the heart beats high, 582. 

when you do call for them, 812. 
Comes, the blind fury, 812. 

to be denied, comes too near, that, 
232. 

unlocked for if at all, 811. 
Comets, no, seen, when beggars die, 899. 
Comfort, be, to my age, 394. 

continually in a face, 904. 

finds, in himself, 540. 

flows from ignorance, 7.30. 
Coming events cast their shadows, 574. 

through the rye, 187. 
Command success, not in mortalsto, 802. 
Commends the ingredients, justice, 800. 
Comment, meek nature's, 491. 
Commentators, plain, give me, 805. 
Commer.'ing with the skies, 786. 
Commit oldest sins, the newest ways, 395. 
Common as light is love, 206. 

men, crowd of, 308. 

men, roll of, 812. 

people of the skies, 124. 

sun the air the skies, 489. 

walk, privileged beyond the, 309. 
Commonplace of nature, 495. 
Communicated, good the more, 398. 
Communion with her visible forms, 307. 
Compact, imagination all, 803. 
Companies, busy, of men, 719. 
Companions, his best, innocence and 
health, 687. 

I have had, playmates, 274. 

musing on, gone, 248. 

of the spring, 472. 
Company is mixed, 814. 
Compare, beautiful beyond, 399. ] 
Comparisons are odious, 795. 
Compass, I mind my, and my way, 742. 

narrow, 125. 
Compassed by the inviolate sea, 632. 
Compasses, as stiff twin, are two, 248. 
Compassion, courage and, joined, 539. 
Competence, health peace and, 815. 
Complete steel, clad in, 796. 
Complexion, mislike me not for my, 722. 
Complies against his will, 803. 
Compliments banish all but truth, 134. 
Composture from excrement, 489. 
Compound for sins, inchned to, 387. 
Compunction, strong, wrought, 797. 
Compunctious visitings of nature, 900. 
Compute, what's done, 784. 
Conceal the mind, talk only to, 804. 
Concealment like a worm i' the bud, 251. 
Conceive in boyhood, pursue as men, 807. 
Concentred in a life intense, 813. 
Concerted harmonies, 243. 
Conclusion, lame and impotent, 723. 
Concord holds, devil with devil finu, 815. 

of sweet sounds, 776. 
Condemn the wrong, 395. 
Condemned, the wretch, on horie relies, 

347. 
Condense thy soul, 726. 
Conduct ancf equipage, 142. 

of a clouded cane, 799. 
Confabulate, if birds, 495. 
Confidence, inspired with filial, 600. 

of reason, give, 797. . 
Confident to-morrows, 793. 
Confine, erring spirit hies to his, 868. 
Confirm the tidings as they I'oll, 370. 
Confli'mations strong as proofs, 207. 
Conflict, dire was the noise of, 500. 

heat of, through the, .540. 
Confusion made his masterpiece, 900. 
Confusion worse confounded, 72.5. 
Congenial to my heart, charm, 689. 
Conjectures, I am weoiy of, 759. 



Conjugal petard, scolding the, 215. 
Conquer Love, they that run, 205. 

twenty worlds, mine arm, 308. 

we must, our cause it is just, 593. 
Conqueror, proud foot of a, 603. 
Conquerors, a lean fellow beats all, 308. 
Conscience avaunt, 541. 

does make cowards of us all, 297. 

have vacation, why should not, 395. 

is corrupted, 796. 

of her worth, virtue and the, 209. 

of the king, catch the, 804. 

wakes despair, ,896. 
Conscious water blushed, 362. 
Consent, I will ne'er, 205. 
Consequence, betray us in deepest, 396. 

trammel up, and catch success, 900. 
Consideration like an angel, 395. 
Constancy in wind, hope, 806. 
Constant as the northern star, 492. 

become more, as they cool, 795. 

were man but, he were perfect, 271. 
Constellations, happy, shed, 200. 
Consummation devoutly to be wished, 

297. 
Consumption's ghastly form, 682. 
Contagion to this world, 491. 
Contemplation, formed for, 711. 
Content, farewell, 722. 

humble livers in, 347. 

thyself to be obscurely good, 601. 

to dwell in decencies, 232. 
Contentment springs from health, 5-59. 
Contests rise from trivial things, 815. 
Conthraries, dhrames always go by, 197. 
Contingencies of pomp, 867. 
Contiguitj' of shade, boundless, .593. 
Continual plodders, small have won, 804. 
Contradiction, woman's a, 795. 
Contrive, let those, who need, 539. 
Controls them and subdues, 539. 
Controversy, stemming it with hearts 

of, 671. 
Conversation coped withal. 111. 
Conversation's burrs, stick on, 803. 
Converse, formed by th3', 911. 

if much, thee satiate, 814. 

with the mighty dead, 8(KJ. 
Conversing I forget all time, 206. 
Conveyed, the bud to heaven, 107. 

the dismal tidings, 688. 
Convolutions of a shell, C31. 
Cooks, man cannot live without, 814. 
Cool, more constant as they, 795. 

sequestered vale, 306. 
Copy, leave the world no, 122. 
Corages, nature in hir, 695. 
Coral, his bones are made, 869. 

lip admires, 141. 
Cordial, gold in phisik is a, 809. 
Core, in my heart's, 112. 

fever at the, 798. 
Corn, unbending, flies o'er the, 806. 
Coronets, more than, 268. 
Corporal suffrance, 310. 

what seemed, melted as breath, 868, 
Corruption, honor from, 811. 

wins not more than honesty, 322. 
Corse, slovenly unhandsome, 606. 
Cortez, like stout, 805. 
Costly thy habit, 722. 
Cottage might adoi-n, 690. 

of gentility, 949. 

the soul's dark, 754. 

with double coach-house, 949. 
Couch, drapery of his, .308. 

fro^vsy, ui sorrow steep, 346. 

grassy, they to their, 413. 

of war, steel, 539. 
Could I fly, I'd fly with thee, 472. 

we forbear dispute, 399. 
Counsel her own virtue be, 193. 

sometimes, take, 814. 
Counsels perplex maturest, 724. 

monle, sweet, 847. 
Count time by heart-throbs, 742. 
Counterfeit a gloom, 787. 

presentment, 721. 
Countless thousands mourn, 332. 
'Country, die to save our, 601. 

God made the, man the town. 672. 

he sighed for his, 578. 

his first best, ever is at home, 229. 

my bleeding, save, 683. 
Country, the undiscovered, 297. 
Country's cause, bosom beats in his, 602. 

wishes blessed, 663. 
Coui-age and compassion, 639. 

is as little as his wit, 140. 

mounteth with occasion, 541. 

never to submit, .540. 

screw your, to the sticking place, 802. 
Coui'.se of nature, the art of God, 489. 

of one revolving moon, 909. 

of true love never ran smooth, 250. 

westward the, of empire, 587. 
Courses, steer their, 807. 



^ 



— ff 



INDEX OE POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1085 



a 



Courted by all the ■winds, 631. 

in your girls acain, 215. 
Courtesy, veiy pimc ot, 721. 
t ourts, other, of the nation, 395. 
Courtsicd, when you have, 869. 
Cover the friendless bodies, iG5. 
( oveit, yield, try what the, 792. 
Cowards, all mankind is! of these, 900. 

conscienee niatcii, of us all, 29Y. 

die many times, 310. 
Cowslips, and all her i^e.iisioners be, fi69. 

wan that hang the pen:;ivo head, 494. 
Cowslip',-; bell, in a, I lie, 809. 
Coy and hard to please, CC9. 

subniis.'iion, yielded with, 711. 
Cozenage, strange, 793. 
Crack of doom, stretch out to the, 725. 

your cheeks, blow wind, i9L 
Cradle, curst fron^ his, S20. 

procreant, pendent bed and, 720. 
Cradled into poetry, 806. 
Cradles rock us nearer tomb, SOS. 
Cranny, every, but the right, 802. 
Crape, saint in, twice a saint in lawn, 812. 
( reated half to rise, 792. 
Creat.on, amid its gay, 489. 

fa.se, from heat-oppressed brain, S82. 

new, rescued from his reign, 632. 

of some heart, 869. 
Crer.ticjn's blot, creation's blank, 797. 

down beheld, such as, 607. 

fairest of, 216. 
Creator drew his spiiit, 309. 
Creature, every, shall "be purified, 396. 

misgivings of a, 759. 

not too bright or good, 123. 
Cre.atures base, heavenly spirits to, 373. 

millions ot spiritual, 868. 

of the element, some gay, 869. 

these delicate, and not their appe- 
tites, 207. 
Credit his own lie, 797. 

of his book confounds, 805. 

who breaketh his, 802. 
Creditor, glory of a, 797. 
Creed, outworn, suckled in a, 403. 
Creeds^ more faith in doubt than, 397. 
Creep uito study of imagination, £01. 

wit that can, 910. 
Crcepeth o'er ruins old, 465. 
Creeping IDce snail to school, 711. 

where no life is seen, 466. 
Creeps in this petty pace, 792. 
Cribbed confined, cabined, 800. 
Cricket on the heaitli, 787. 
Crime, now madden to, 451. 

numbers sanctified the, 541. 
Cristes lore and his apostles, 697. 
Critical^ nothing if ni, t, 723. 
Ci iticismg elves, spite of, 804. 
Critics, before you trust m, 806. 

not e'en, criticise, 810. 
Critic's ej'e, nut view me, 107. 
Critique on the last, each day a, 798. 
Cromwell damned to fame, 93'J. 

guiltless of his country s blood, 306. 

restless, 539. 
Cror.y, trusty, drouthy, 847. 
Crook, by hook or, 671. 

the pregnant hinges. 111. 
Crrpsthe ll.iwcry food, 40B. 
Cross, last at his, earliest at grave, 795. 

nailed on the bitter, 397. 

sparkling, she wore, 123. 
Crossed with adversity, 345. 
Crosses, fret thy soul with, 204. 

relic-, crucifixes, 396. 
Crow like chanticleer, 810. 

sings S"sveetlv as the lark, 496. 

that flies ui heaven's air, 722. 
Crowd, far from the madding, 306. 

not on my soul, 868. 

of common men, 308. 
Crown, better than his, 798. 

fruitless, upon my head, 345. 

head that wears a, 768. 

cf soriow, sorrow's, 255. 

old wintei-'s head, 193. 
Crowning good, 599. 
Crowns, bloody, of mothers' sons, 541. 
Ci-ow-toe, tufted, 494. 
Crucifives bends pictures, 396.' 
Cruel as death. 310. 
Crush of worlds, 759. 
Ci-utch, .shouldered his, 688. 
Cry, bubbUng, of some swimmer, 632. 

havock, and let slip, 539. 

is still, they come, 640. 

no language but a, 392. 
Cud of sweet and bitter fancy, 813. 
Cunmor Hall, the walls of, 491. 
Cunning stagers, 803. 
Cunning'st ]:)attern, 900. 
Cup, kiss but in the, leave a, 125. 

of kindness j'et, we'll take a, 118. 

of water, little thing to give, 770. 

to the dead already, 898. 



Cupid, bolt of, fell, 836. 

is ijainted blind, 203. 
Cups run swiftly round, 147. 

that cheer, not inebriate, 810. 
Curded by the frost, 493. 
Cure cheap and universal, hope, 800. 

for life's won t ills, 348. 

on exercise depend, 671. 
Curfew tolls the knell of parting day, 305. 
Curious child, 1 have seen a, 631. 
Curled darlings of our nation, 722. 
Current of domestic joy, 807. 

of the soul, genial, 306. 

that with gentle murmur glides, 493. 
Current's calmness beneath it sweeps, 

720. 
Currents turn awry, 297. 
Curs of low degree, 949. 
Ciu'se on all laws, 215. 

primal eldest, 900. 
Curses not loud but deep, 794. 
Cui-sing like a very drab, 725. 
Curst be the verse, 781. 

by heaven's decree, 690. 

from his cradle, 320. 

the spot is, 661. 
Curtains, fringed, of thine eye, 721. 
Cushion and soft dean invite to rest, 396. 
Custom more honored in the breach, 874. 

of Branksome Hall, 814. 

stale her mfinite variety, 712. 

tyrajit, 306. 
Customed hill, missed him on. 306. 
Cut, most unkindest, of all, 876. 
Cutpm-se of the empire, £13. 
Cycle, let the new, shame the old, 604. 

of Cathay, 258. 
Cynosure of neighboring eyes, 7S5. 
Cypress and myi-tle, land where the, 451. 

droops to death, 312. 
Cytherea's breath, Juno's eyes or, 495. 

Bacian mother, there was their, 681. 
Daffiedfhe v/orld aside, 793. 
Daffadills, fair, we weep to see, 464. 
Daffodils before the swallow, 495. 
Dagger, air-drawn, 868. 

I see before me, is this a, 882. 

of the mind, a false creation, 882. 

srniles at the drawn, 759. 
Daily Ufe, before us lies in, 798. 
Daintie flowre or herbe, 494. 
Dai.sie, the eye of the day, 462. 
Daisies, myriads of, have shone forth, 
495. 

pied, meadows firm with, 785. 

soch that men callen, 462. 
Daisy protects the dew-drop, 89. 

oft I talk to thee, 495. 
Dale, hawthorn, in the, 785. 
Dalliance, primrose path of, 809. 
D.allies with the innocence of love, 20,5. 
Dame of Ephesus mouined her love, 204. 

sulky sullen, where sits our, 847. 
Dames, ah gentle, 847. 

of ancient days, 232. 
Damn with faint praise, 910. 
Danmable deceitful woman, 795. 
Damnation of his taking oft', 900. 

round the land, deal, 370. 

we drink, 558. 

wet, to run through 'em, 558. 
Damned be him that fii-st cries, Hold, 
enough, 540. 

to cvenastlng fame, 939. 
Damning those they have no mind to, 387 
Damsel with a dulcimei', £.'54. 
Dan Chaucer, well of EngUsh undef yled, 

938. 
Dance, Gill shall. Jack shall pipe and, 816. 

on with the, 511. 

respondent, shook to music, 672. 

when you do, 134. 

who le.irned to, move easiest, 806. 
Dances, midnight, and public show, 312. 

such a way, O she, 211. 
Dancing in the checkered shade, 785. 
Danger on the deep, 632. 

out of this nettle, pluck safety, 671. 

send from east to west, 670. 
Dangerous, delays are, .539. 

thing, a little learning is a, 805. 
Dangei-s, loved me for the, 145. 

1 would not wait upon, 800. 

of the seas, little think upon the, 632. 

sing tlie, of the sea, 628. 
Danger's troubled night, 629. 
Daniel come to .iudgment, 723. 

a second, a Daniel Jew, 804. 
Dappled morn, greets the, 671. 
Dare do all that may become a man, 800. 

stir abroad, no spirit, 397. 

to chide me, who shall dare, 101. 
Dares think one thing, another tell, 797. 

who, greatly does greatly, 671. 
Darien, silent upon a peak in, 805. 
Dai-ing in full dress, 814. 



Dark amid the blaze of noon, .321. 

and doubtful, from the, 80.5. 

and lonely hiding-place, 395. 

as Erebus, affections, 776. 

blue sea, glad waters of, 626. 

cottage, the soul's, 754. 

ever-during, surrounds me, 407. 

eye in woman, lovely as light of a, G86. 

illumine what in me is, 395. 

mournful ru.stling in the, 801. 

unfathomed caves of ocean, 306. 

ways that are, 987. 
Darkest day will have passed away, 7S3. 
Darkly deeply beautifully blue, 490. 
Daikness, Cimmerian, 743. 

dawn on our, lend us thine aid, Sd7. 

instruments of, tell us truths, 390. 

jaws of, devour it, 2o0. 

raven down of, 726. 
Darling sin is pride that apes, 396. 
Dai-lings, wealthy curled, 722. 
Dart, like the poisoning of a, 795. 

on the fatal, his own feather, 800. 

time shall throw a, at thee, 907. 
Dateless bargain to death, 899. 
Daughter, still harping on my, 203. 

of the voice of God, 797. 

this old man's, ta'en away, 145. 
Daughter's heart, preaching down a, 256. 
Daughters, Eve fairest of her, 712. 
Daw, I am no wiser than a, 810. 
Dawn, belong not to the, 36.3. 

golden exhalations of the, 490. 

May-time and the cheerful, 128. 
Dawning, bird of, singeth all night, 397. 

of morn, sorrow returned with, 629. 
Day, as it fell upon a, 480, 492. 

at the close of the, 737. 

closing hour of, 490. 

count that, lost, 398. 

dearly love but one, 198. 

ere the first, of death is fled, 303. 

eye of, liquid notes that close the, 495. 

hand open as, for charity, 724. 

harmless, entertains the, 737. 

in June, what so rare as a, 424. 

is done and the darkness falls, 490. 

jocund, stands tiptoe, 490. 

joint laborer with the, 559. 

knell of parting, curfev,- tolls the, 305. 

Ught of common, fade into the, 758. 

maddest merriest, 327. 

merry as the, is long, 724. 

morning shows the, 107. 

not to me returns, 407. 

now's the, now's the hour, 573. 

of nothingness, first dark, 303. 

of woe the w atchful night, 309. 

or starlight from my Ui-st dawn, 4S0. 

pastime of a drowsy summer, 70. 

powerful king of, yonder comes, 490. 

raineth every, the rain it, 494. 

suffering ended with the, 537. 

summei-'s, happy soul hath a, 724> 

sweet, so cool so calm, 301. 

betwixt a Saturday and Monday, 198. 

that is dead, tender grace of a, 315. 

time runs through the roughest, 79L 
Day-star, so sinks the, 490. 
Days among the dead, 806. 

ai-e in the yellow leaf, 250. 

begin with trouble here, 308. 

best of ways to lengthen our, 205. 

boyish, even from my, 145. 

degenerate, men in these, 794. 

dwindled to the shortest span, 340. 

ebbing, waves of, 719. 

fallen on evil, though, 348. 

flight of future, 801. 

in the brave, of old, 570. 

live laborious, scorn delighte, 813. 

long as twenty, are now, lOS. 

melancholy, ai-e come, 4C6. 

my, are dull and hoary, 274. 

o' auld lang syne, 118. 

one ot those heavenly, 490. 
Days, perfect, then if ever come, 424. 

sun of the stately, 604. 

sweet childish, that were as long, 108. 

that are no more, 315. 

that boriow no good morrow, 198. 

to loose good, 204. 

winding up, with toil, 559. 

with God he passed the, 399. 
Day's march nearer home, 389. 
Daze the world, sudden visitations, 812. 
D.a2zles to blind, 737. 
Dead, a cup to the, already, 898. 

bent him o'er the, he who hath, 303. 

better be with the, 311. 

day that is, tender grace of a, 315. 

days among the, 806. 

fading honors of the, 675. 

he mourns the, who lives, 312. 

mournings for the, 272. 

not, but gone before, 311. 

of midnight, noon ot thought, 43L 



^ 



rB^. 



1036 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



^a 



Dead past bury its dead, let the, 770. 

vast and middle of the nigh, 491. 
Deadly fair, so coldly sweet so, 303. 
Deal damnation round the land, 370. 
Dear as remembered kisses, 315. 

as the light that visits, 206. 

as the ruddy drops, 206. 

as the vital warmth, 206. 

as these eyes that weep, 206. 

beauteous death, 27i. 

charmer away, were t'other, 134. 

five hundred friends, asks her, 814. 

hut our home, 226. 

son of memory heir of fame, 906. 

too, for my possessing, 239. 
Dearer than his horse, 255. 
Dearest thing he owed, throw away, 309. 
Dearly let or let alone, 214. 
Dears, lovelj', auld Nature swears, 191. 
Death a necessary end will come, 310. 

aims with fouler spite, 309. 

and his brother Sleep, 714. 

back resounded, 310. 

bad man's, is horror, 311. 

begun, our birth is nothing but, 308. 

brother to sleep, 816. 

but the sounder sleep, 310. 

calls ve to the crowd, 308. 

came" with friendly care, 107. 

can this be, 365. 

cold ear of, soothe the dull, 306. 

Cometh soon or late, 567. 

cruel as, 310. 

cruel, is always near, 308. 

dear beauteous, 274. 

dread of something after, 297. 

engrossing, dateless bai'gain to, 899. 

ere thou hast slain another, 907. 

fell sergeant, is strict in arrest, 309. 

first day of, ere the, 303. 

grim, in opposition sits, 310. 

grinned horrible a ghastly smile, 899. 

now wonderful is, 714. 

in battle, gret prize of, 539. 

in, be laid low, 574. 

into the world and woe, 395. 

kisses remembered after, 315. 

lovely in, the beauteous ruinlay, 794. 

loves a shining mark, 309. 

makes men weep, 310. 

man makes a, nature never made,310. 

most in appi-ehension, 310. 

nor all of, to die, 311. 

nothing call our own but, 310. 

of each day's life, 883. 

reaper whose name is, there is a 276. 

rulmg passion strong in, 7S0. 

sets the soul at liberty, 311. 

silent halls of, chamber in the, 307. 

slavery or, which to choose, 570. 

sleep is a, 310. 

sleep of, dreams may come in, 297. 

so noble, quiet us in a, 794. 

speak me fair in, 312. 

studied in his, died as one, 309. 

terrible to the happy, 311. 

the great teacher, 801. 

there is no, 273. 

thou hast all seasons for thine, 308. 

to us, tho' this be play to you, 108. 

urges knells call, 395. 

valiant taste of, but once, 310. 

way to dusty, lighted fools the, 792. 

what should it know of, 87. 

what we fear of, 347. 

where is thy sting, 365. 

whose portal we call, 272. 
Deaths, feels a thousand, 310. 
Death-bed 's a detector of the heart, 310. 

of fame, from the, .574. 
Debate, Rupert of , haughty rash the, 723. 

one eternal tempest of, 215. 
Debt, a double, to pay, 689. 

to nature's quickly paid, .309. 
Decay, unperceived, melts with, 794. 

muddy vesture of, 775. 
Decays, mere glimmering and, 274. 
Decay's effacing finger.i, 303. 
Deceive, if he swears he'll certainly, 232. 
Deceiver, ah sly, 558. 
Deceivers, men were, ever, 271. 
December, mirth of its, 108. 
seek roses in, 806. 

when they wed April when they woo, 
214. 
Decencies, those thousand, 795. 

to dwell in, forever, 232. 
Decency, emblem meet of, 708. 

want of, is want of sense, 805. 
Decide, who shall, when doctors dis- 
agree, 803. 
Declivity of hill, upon a mild, 720. 
Deed, attempt not the, conf oimds us, 883. 
dignified by the doer's, 813. 
go with it, unless the, 797. 
of dreadful note, 900. 
. Ehiues a good, in naughty world, 797. 



Deeds, blessings wait on virtuous, 398. 

devilish, necessity excused his, 601, 

doughty, my lady please, 146. 

foul, will rise, 900. 

live in, not years, 742. 

means to do makes ill, done, 815. 

pure in, perplexed in faith, 397. 

takes not fire at their heroic, 601. 
Deem not framing of a deathless lay, 70. 
Deep and gloomy wood, 404. 

as first love, wild with all regret, 315. 

blue and moonlit, 160. 

damnation of his taking off, 900. 

danger on the, thei'e's, 632. 

dive into the bottom of the, 670. 

drink, or taste not Pierian spring,805. 

embosomed in the, 632. 

home is on the, 629. 

home Oil the rolling, 630. 

in the lowest, a lower, 396. 

malice to conceal, couched with re- 
venge, 396. 

not loud but, 794. 

of hell resounded, all the hollow, 540. 

spirits from the vasty, 812. 

through the frighted, 725. 

yet clear, 723. 
Deeper than all speech, 731. 
Deep-mouthed welcome, 166. 
Deer, let the strucken, go weep, 671. 
Defamed by every ehailatan, 797. 
Defeatures, strange, in my face, 799. 
Defect, fine by, and delicately weak, 723. 
Defence, admit of no, 805. 

awake endeavor foi-, 541. 
Defend your departed friend, 120. 
Defer, madness to, 748. 

not till to-morrow, 793, 
Defiance in their eye, 603. 
Deformed, unfinished, half made-up,938. 
Degenerate days, live in these, 794. 
Degree, curs of low, 949. 
Degrees, fine by, and beautifully less, 721. 

grows up by, 395. 

ill habits gather by, 493. 

scorning tlie base, 799. 
Deit3^ felt presence of the, 491. 

offended, poor exchange for, 395. 
Delay, amorous, 711. 

law's, 297. 

reproved each dull, 688. 
Delays are dangerous, 539. 
Deliberates, woman that, is lost, 796. 
Delicate creatures, call these, 207. 
Delight, lap me in, 814. 

my ever new, 215. 

never too late for, 205. 

over-payment of, 309. 

phantom of, she was a, 128. 

she's my, 134. 

to pass away the time, 938. 

turn, into a sacrifice, S»)4. 

war thou hast thy fierce, 539. 

with liberty, to enjoy, 489. 
Delightful task, 107, 214. 
Delights, hence all ye vain, 315. 

that witchingly instil, 831. 

to scorn, 811. 

violent, have violent ends, 815. 
Delphian vales, the, 917. 
Delusive vain and hollow, 271. 
Demi-paradise, this other Eden, 603. 
Democratic, fierce, 804. 
Democrats, wrinkles the d— d, 794. 
Demosthenes or Cicero fall below, 107. 
Den, beard the lion in his, 648. 
Denied, that comes to be, 232. 
Deny, heart would, and dare not, 794. 
Depressed with cares, heart, 795. 
Depth, far beyond my, 321. 

self-mthdrawn into a boundless, 857, 
Depths and shoals of honor, 322, 
Descant amorous, sung, 413. 
Descent, claims of long, 268. 
Descripti in, beggared all, 712. 

paragons, and wild fame, 722. 
Desdemona seriously incline, 145. 
Desert and illimitable air, 481. 

of a thousand lines, 807. 

of the mind, 816. 

were my dwelling-plae«, 206. 

■BTldernesses, 830. 
Desei-ted at his utmost need, 771. 
Deserts, his, are femall, 150. 

idle, antres vast and, 145. 
Desire, bloom of young, 205. 
fierce, Uveth not in, 203. 
kindle soft, 772. 

nurse of young, hope thou, 800. 
this fond, 759. 
Desolate, no one so utterly, 345. 
Despair, companion of her way, 139. 
depth of some divine, 31.5. 
fiercer by, fiercest spirit now, 348. 
huge as, 720. 
hurried question of, 309. 
infinite, wrath and, 396. 



Despair, message of, waft home the, 397. 
nympholepsy of some fond, 869. 
reason would, 204. 
that slumbered, 395. 
unreached paradise of, our, 867. 
wasting in, 193. 
Despairing, sweeter for thee, 134. 
Despatchtul looks, she turns with, 233. 
Desperate steps, beware of, 793. 
Destiny, shady leaves of, 192. 
Destructive deceitful woman, 795. 
Detector of the heait, death-bed's a, 310. 
Devil can cite Scripture, 797. 

did grin, for his darling sin, 396. 

god or, every man was, 909. 

nath power to assume, 396. 

how the, they got there, 815. 

in all his quiver, 204. 

shame thee, tell truth and, 398. 

stood abashed, 398. 

to serve the, livery of heaven, 797. 

was piqued, 803. 

when r play the, seem a sahit, 396. 

with devil damned, 815. 
Devilish deeds excused, 601. 
Devils being offended, saints in your in- 
juries, 723. 
Devotion, daughter of astronomy, 492. 
Devotion's vi.sage, 390. 
Devour all it sees, 798. 
Devoutly to be wished, a consummation, 

297. 
Dew, chaste as morning, 106. 

diamonds in their infant, 345. 

glistering with, 206, 490. 

morning, as the sun the, 309. 

on his thin robe, 578. 

on the mountain, 283. 

resolve itself into a, 311. 

the same, which upon the buds, 494. 

upon a thought, hke, 805. 

washed with morning, 204. 
Dews, brushing away the, 306. 

mother of, morn, 490. 

of summer nights, 491. 

of the evening, tears of the sky, 491. 
Tievry eve, from noon to, he fell, 725. 
Diadem of snow, 493. 

precious, stole from a shelf, 813. 
Dial, drew a, from his poke, 791. 

more tedious than the, 248. 

to the sun, true as a, 796. 
Diamond, false, set in flint, 166. 
Diamonds, bright as young, 345. 
Diana's temple, hangs on, 493. 
Diapason closing full in man, 775. 
Die because a woman's fair, 193. 

befoi'e I wake, 107. 

being born to, 322. 

but once, pity we can, 601. 

hazard of the, stand the, 802, 

in yon rich sky, 449. 

indifferent in choice to sleep or, SIO. 

landing on some silent shore, 309. 

let us do or, 573. 

taiight us how to, 911. 

try Dy sleeping what it is to, 310. 

wish to, when lie should live, 900. 

who tell us Love can, 206. 

wisest men are glad to, 311. 

with harness on our back, 541. 

young, whom the gods love, 107. 
Dies, nothing, but something mourn."!, 

414. 
Difference-, o the, tome, 105. 
Different men to different ends, 799. 

minds to different objects, 814. 
Digestion bred, sleep from pure, 490. 
Dignified bythe doer's deed, place is, 313. 
Dignifies humanity, aught that, 348. 
Dignity, in every gesture, 209. 
Diligently slow, 632. 
Dim and pei-ilous way, 808. 

religious light, 787. 

the sweet look, 490. 
Diminished heads, hide their, 719. 
Dine, that jurymen may hang, 719. 
Dining, live without, 814. 
Dire was the noise of conflict, 500. 
Directs the storm, 539. 
Diieness cannot once start me, 9C0. 
Dirge is sung by forms unseen, 5C3. 
Dirt, loss of wealth is, loss of, .347. 
Disagi-ee, men only, 815. 
Disaster, laugh at all, 631. 
Disastrous chances, 14,5. 
Discontent, w.aste nights in pensive, 204. 

what more miserable tha.T, 799. 

winter of our, now is the, 541. 
Discord, braved horible, .500. 

hai'mony not undei-stood, 489. 
Discourse, bid me, 803. 

more sweet, 808. 

of reason, beast that wants, 723. 

such large, 808. 

sweet and voluble is Iiis, 723. 
Discreetly blot, 806. 



t& 



^ 



INDEX OP POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1037 



a 



Disdain, beautiful, in eye and nostril, 1 2o. 

more love or more, lH. 
Dish fit for tlie gods, carve him as a, 900. 
Dislike, hesitate, 910. 
Dismal tidings, convey'd the, 688. 

treatise rouse and stir, 900. 
Dismissing the doctor don't always suc- 
ceed, 809. 
Disobedience, man's first, 395. 
Disorder, sweet, in the dress, 713. 
Dispaires, comfortlesse, 20i. 
Dispensations and gifts, 39fi. 
Dispraised no small praise, 811. 
Dispute, .could we forbear, 399. 
Dissension between hearts, 264. 
Distance lends enchantment to the view, 
218. 
notes by, made more sweet, 7i3. 
smooth at a, 201. 
Distant views of happiness, 801. 
Distemper, of no, he died, 309. 
Distinct as the billows, 60S. 
Distingruish and divide a hair, 945. 
Distraction soothe almost despak-, 809. 

waft me from, 685. 
Distressed, griefs that harass the, 3-15. 
Distressful stroke of my youth, 115. 
Distrest by poverty no more, 802. 
Distrusting, heart, asks if this be joy, 689. 
Diver, adventure of the, 801. 
Divide, distinguish and, 915. 
Divine, all save, the spirit of man is, 451. 
enchanting ravishment, 72u. 
hand that made us is, 378. 
how, a thing a woman may be, 723. 
human face, 407. 
in hookas, glorious in pipe, 814. 
philosophy, 397. 
to forgive, 798. 
vision and the faculty, 760. 
Diviner air, an ampler ether a, 399. 
Divinity doth hedge a king, 722. 
that shapes our ends, 7'JJ. 
that stii'S within us, 759. 
Djhin's wild-streaming swarm, 858. 
Do good by stealth, 797. 

or die, let us, 673. 
Doctor shook his head, 803. 
Doctors disagree, when, 803. 
Doctrine from women's eyes, 133. 

orthodox, prove their, 387. 
Doctrines clear, what makes, 809. 
Dog, faithful, shall bear him company, 
399. 
hunts in dreams like a, 256. 
it was that died, 949. 
something better than his, 255. 
to gain his private ends, 949. 
Dogs bark at me, 938. 
between two, 810. 
delight to bark and bite, 103. 
little, and all, S'iO. 
of war, let slip the, 539. 
Doleful sound, from the tombs a, 310. 
Dolphin, day dies like the, 490. 
Dolphins, pleased to see the, 742. 
Domestic happiness thou only bliss, 232, 

joy, smooth current of, 807. 
Done quickly, if it were done, 900. 
we may compute what's, 7S4. 
what's, is done, 792. 
Doom, tlie crack of, 725. 

had an early, love that, 271. 
Door, clock that ticked behind the, 689. 

shut shut the, 805. 
Dotes yet doubts, 207. 
Dots and underlines, yielded in, 254. 
Double debt to pay, 689. 
Doublet, carving fashion of a new, 203. 
Doubling his pleasures, 212. 
Doubly feel ourselves alone, 248. 
Doubt, faith in honest, 397. 
never, I love, 206. 
never stand to, 800. 
once in, to be, 207. 
thou tlie stars are fire, 206. 
truth to be a liar, 20G. 
who read to, better ne'er been born, 
397. 
Doubts, oui', are traitors, 800. 

saucy, and fears, 800. 
Doughty deeds, if, my lady please, 146. 
Douglas in his hall, 64S. 
Dove, burnished, iiis on the. 254. 

spi-ings of, beside the, 104. 
Doves, moan of, 493. 

will peck in safeguard, 798. 
Down, bed of, thrice-driven, 539. 

he that is, needs fear no fall, 347. 
Downs, all in the, 235. 
Drab, cursing like a very, 725. 
Drachenfels, castled crag of, 446. 
Drag the slow barge, 802. 
Drags at each remove a lengthening 
chain, 248. 
slo\v length like a wounded snake. 



Drames go by conthraries, 197. 
Drapery of his couch about him, 308. 
Draught, bitter, make sweet, 672. 
Draughts, shallow, intoxicate, 803. 
Draw it mild, 967. 
Drawers, chest of, by day, 689. 
Draws us with a haii-, 203. 
Dread and fear of kings, 798. 

of something after death, 297. 
whence this secret, 769. 
Dreadful ura, those, 803. 
Dream, a hideous, 900. 

all night without a stir, 494. 
forgotten, hunt for a, 661. 
life is but an empty, 769. 
love's young, 262. 
of things that were, 792. 
perchance to, to sleep, 297. 
silently as a, the fabric rose, 493. 
spirit of my, change came o'er, 765. 
Dreams and slumbers light, 816. 
babbling, hence 541. 
books are each a world, 805. 
empty dreams, 791. 
hunts in, like a dog, 256. 
in some brighter, as angels, 274. 
pleasant, lies down to, 308. 
such stuff as, are made on. 867. 
that wave before the eye, 831. 
Dreamt of in j'our philosophy. 808. 
Dreary intercourse of daily life, 404: 
Dress beyond the i)omp of, 795. 

sweet disorder in the, 713. 
Drest, still to be neat still to be, 713. 
Drink damnation, 558. 
deep or taste not, 805. 
nor any drop to, 855. 
to me only with thine eyes, 125. 
to the lass, let the toast pass, 131. 
who always, they never taste. 803. 
with him that wears a hood, 946. 
ye to her that each loves best, 205. 
Driiiliing largely sobers us, 805. 
Drinks and gapes for drink, 493. 
Drip of the suspended oar, 68.5, 
Drop into thy mother's lap, 310. 
last, in the well, 929. 
nor any, to drink, 855. 
that falls cold and ceaseless, 248. 
Dropped manna, though Ms tongue, 724. 
Drops, dear as the ruddy, 206. 
ti'om off the eaves. 787. 
his blue-fringed lids, 395. 
the light drip of the oar, 68.5. 
what precious, are those, 345. 
Dropt from the zenith, 725. 
Droghte of March, 695. 
Drowned honor, pluck by the locks, 670. 
Drowsyhed, land of, 831. 
Druid lies in yonder grave, 940. 
Drum, .spirit-stii-ring, 722. 
was heard, not a, 920. 
Drums, hearts, like muffled, beating, 770. 
Drunlcard clasp his teeth, not undo 'em, 

558. 
Dry as summer dust, 309. 

as the remainder biscuit, 803. 
Drydeii, copious, wanted or forgot, 806. 
Duck or plover, aimed at, 671 . 
Dukedom, my libi-ary was, enough, 805. 
Dulcimer, damsel with a, 834. 
Dull as night, the motions of his spirit, 
776. 
cold marble, sleep in, 321. 
gentle ^et not, 723. 
tame snore, never wa-s on the, 625. 
Dulness, gentle, loves a joke, 803. 
Dumb, beggar that is, 204. 

forgetfulness, a prey to, 300. 
Duncan, hear it not, 882 
Dunce sent to roam e.xcels, 793. 
Durance vile, wake and weep in, 346. 
Dusky race, she shall rear my, 257. 
Dust, dry as summer, hearts, 309. 
heap of, alone I'cmains, 310. 
pride that licks the, 910. 
provoke the silent, honor's voice, 300. 
resign his very, 794. 
seek for thy noble father in the, 308. 
something of his glory in the, 311. 
tliatis a little gilt, more land to, 811. 
the knight's bones are, 639. 
vile, from whence he spning 563. 
Duties, primal, shine aloft like stai-s,398. 
Duty, I've done my. and no more, 797. 
love a simple, 796. 
such, as the subject owes, 215. 
Dwell in decencies forever, content to, 

232. 
Dwelling of his thoughts, 808. 
Dwelling-place, desert were my, 206. 
Dwelt all that's good all that's fair, 125. 
Dyer's hand, subdued like the, 722. 
Dying eyes, unto, casement grows, 315. 
niau to dying men, 395. 

Each in his narrow cell forever laid, 305. 



Each particular hair to stand on end, 725. 
Eager for the f lay, my soul's in arms, 541. 

heai't the kindlier hand, 752. 
Eagle, so the struck viewed his feathers, 

800. 
Eagle's fate and mine are one, 134. 
Eagle's wings, scandals fly on, 811. 
Ear, applying shell to his, 631. 
dull, of a drowsy man, 799. 
enchant thine, bid me discourse I'll, 

803. 
give every man thine, 815. 
like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's, 721. 
more meant than meets the, 787. 
of Death, dull cold, 306. 
of faith, 631. 

word of promise to our, keep the, 315. 
Eare, one, it heard, 108. 
Earliest at his grave, 795. 
Early bright transient chaste as dew, 106. 
Ear-piercing life, 722. 
Ears, aged, play truant at his tales, 723. 
lend me your, 875. 
of flesh and blood. 725. 
polite, never mentions hell to, 396. 
she gave me 231. 
with ravished, 771. 
Earth a stage, 792. 

aslant the dew-bright, 719. 
bowels of the harmless, 600. 
bridal of the, and skle, 301. 
felt the wound, 899. 
fuming vanities of, 491. 
gave sign of gratulation, 209. 
give him a little, 346. 
glory passed from the, 767. 
has no sorrow heaven cannot heal, 
348. 
Earth hath bubbles as the water, 868. 
heaven on, 719. 

heaven tries the, if it be in tune, 424. 
inhabitants of the, not like, 868. 
is a thief, 489. 
lap of, upon the. 307. 
lai-ds the lean. Falstaflf, 722. 
lay her i' the, 311. 

merit heaven by making, a hell, 396. 
man marks the, with ruin .small, 607. 
more things In heaven and, 808. 
naught beyond, O, 311. 
nightly to the listening, 376. 
of majesty, this, 603. 
on the bare, exposed he lives, 771. 
one beloved face on, 765. 
overwhelm them, though all the. 900. 
poetry of, is never dead, 485. 
proudly wears the Paithenon, 736. 
small model of the barren, 310. 
so much of, so much of heaven, 440. 
soaks up the rain, 494. 
sovereign'st thing on, parmeceti, 600. 
sure and flrm-set, 882. 
truth crushed to, shall rise agaui,534. 
two paces of the vilest, 310. 
with her thousand voices, 377. 
with orient peai'l, sowed, 490. 
Earth's noblest thing, a woman, 723. 
EarthUer happy is the rose, 495. 
Eai-thly god-fathers, these, 804. 

power show hkest God's, 798. 
Ease, age of, youth of labor, 687. 
and alternate labor, 214. 
in writing comes from art, 806. 
live at home at, 632. 
Baser of woes, care-charming sleep, 816. 
East, golden progi'ess in the, 816. 

\vhere the gorgeous, 722. 
Easter-day, no sun upon an, 211. 
Eat and drink as friends, 121. 

I cannot, but little meat, 946. 
Eating time, worn out with, 309. 
Eaves, minute drops from off the, 787. 
Echo answers — where, 309. 

sound seem an, to the sense, 806. 
Echoes dying dying, 449. 

roll from soul to soul, 449. 
set the wild, flying, 449. 
Ecstasy cf love, tliis is the very, 203: 
seraph-wings of, 939. 
to lie in restless, 311. 
waked to, the living lyre, 306. 
Eden, through, took then- soUtary way, 
321. 
this other, semi-paradise, 603. 
Edge, cloy the hungr.y, of appetite, 340, 
of husbandry, dulls the, 559. 
perilous, of battle, 540. 
sharper than the sword, 811. 
Education forms the mind, 804. 
Educing good from seeming evil, 418. 
Eftsoons they heard melodious sound, 

829. 
Egeria ! sweet creation, 869. 
Eie did see that face, was never, 904. 
Eld, weak with, 492. 
Elder, let the woman take an, 215. 
Elegant sufficiency, content an, 214. 



I& 



& 



&-*' 



1038 



INDEX or POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



^a 



Element, gay creatures of the, 869. 

lowering, scowls, iOl. 

one God, one law one, 394. 
Elemental war, dissolved in furious, 494. 
Elements, war of, unlim-tamid the, 759. 
Elf, thou haiDpy, 93. 
Elms, doves in immemorial. 493. 
Eloquence charms the soul, 803. 

resistless, those ancient w-hose, 804. 

social, man of wit and, 940. 

to woe, truth denies, 343. 
Eloquent, old man, 939. 

proportions, 735. 
Elves, spite of criticising, 804. 

faery, whose midnight revels, 491. 

whose little eyes glow, 134. 
Elysian beauty, 203. 
Elysium on earth, if there be an, 203. 
Embalmed in tears, lovehest wiien, 204. 
Embers, glowing, througli the room, 787. 
Emblem rifjht meet of decency, 703. 
Emblems of deeds in their clime, 451, 
Enibosomed in the deep, 632. 
Embrace, silent in a last, 255. 
Embroidery, wears sad, 491. 
Embryo, chancellor in, 107. 
Emelie, up rose the Sonne and, 490. 
Eminence, raised to that bad, 722. 
Empii-e, cutpurso of the, 813. 

l-od of, might have swayed, 306. 

scoops out an, 632. 

sui-v-ey our, and behold our home, 
C2li. 

sweetest, is to please, 123. 

westward the course of, 537. 
Empires, lone mother of dead, 720. 
Employment, wishing theworstof, 801. 
Empress and floure, 462. 
Empty boxes, beggarly account of, 809. 
Empty-vaulted niglit, through the, 726. 
Enamelled eyes, all your guaint, 494. 

stones, sweet music with, 493. 
Enamored, hung over her, 203. 
Enchant thine ear, I will, 803. 
Enchanting ravlshiient, divine, 726. 
Enchantment, 'tis distance lend"., 248. 
Encounter, keen, of our wits, 803. 
End, attempt the, 800. 

found us in wandering mazes, 808. 

means unto an, life but a, 74;j. 

original and, 394. 

served no private, 120. 
End-all, might be the, 900. 
Endeavour, too painful an, 233. 
Ending, never, still beginning, 772. 
Endless night, closed ms eyes in, 939. 
Ends of verse, cheei-ed himself with, 349. 

thou aimest at, be thy country's, 322. 

violent, violent delights, 815. 
Enemies, make, of nations, 594. 

naked to mine, left me, 322. 
Enemy, weak invention ot the, 539. 
Energies, toil of gathering, 807. 
England, ye mariners of, 629. 

meteor flag of, 629. 

never at foot of a conqueror, 603. 

roast beef of old, 575. 

slaves cannot breathe in, 594. 

this realm, this, 603. 

with all thy faults I love thee, 575. 

ye gentlemen of, 632. 
English air, sweet as, could make, 721. 

dead, close up the wall up with. 503. 

undefyled, Dan Chancer, well of, 933. 
Engrossing death, bargain to, 839. 
Enrobe the waters \\'ith my silks, 632. 
Ensample, this noble, to his sheep he 

yaf , 097. 
Ensign, imperial, high advanced, 725. 

tear her tattered, down, 620. 
Enterprises of pith and moment, 297. 
Enteitains the harmless day, 737. 
Enthroned in hearts of kings, 793. 
Entrance to a quarrel, b ;war3 of, 540. 
Entrances and e.xits, have their, 711. 
Entuned in hir nose, 69S. 
Envious tongues, to silence, 322. 
Envy, here n i, swells, 311. 

of less happier lands, 603. 
Ephesus, danie of, so mourned the, 204. 
Epic's stately i-hyme, 915. 
Epicure would say, 704. 
Epitaphs, let's talk of, 310. 
Epitome, al I manldud's, 909. 
Ere I was old, 120. 

sin could blight, 107. 
Erebus, affections dark as, 776. 
Erect himself above himself, SOR. 
Erected look, men met with, 725. 
Eremites and friars with all their trum- 
pery, 397. 
Erin, exile of, 578. 

mavourneen Erin go bragh, 579. 
Err, art may, nature caainot miss, 439. 

to, is human, 798. 
lirrini? sister's shame, 267. 

spirit, extx-avagaut and, 868. 



Error wounded writhes in pain, 534. 
Error's wreich, 310. 
Err jrs, some female, fall, 123. 
Espied a feather of his own, 134. 
Estate, fallen from his high, 771. 
flies of, and sunneshine, 121. 
Estranged, God's providence seeming. 

Eternal, blazon must not be, 725. 

frost, flowers that skiit the, 377. 

home, draw near to their, 754. 

hope springs, in human breast, 801. 

now does always last, 793. 

smiles his emptiness betray, 910. 

summer gilds them j'et, 580. 

summer shall not fade, 134. 

sunshine settles on its head, 688. 
Eternities, two, the past, the future, 793. 
Eternity, fr.endship's the image of, 120. 

heaven intimates, to man, 759. 

mourns that, 348. 

passing through nature to, 308. 

thou pleasing dreadful thought, 759. 

wanderers o'er, 397. 
Ether, an ampler, o99. 
Ethereal mildness come, 492. 
Ethiop's ea:', jewel in an, 721. 
Etrurian shades imboiver, 494. 
Eve, fairest of her daughters, 712. 

from noon lo dewy, 725. 
Even, gray-hooded, like sad votarist, 830. 

ushers in the, full star that, 491. 
Even-handed justice, 800. 
Evening bells, those, 716. 

dews of the, shun, 491. 

grateful, mild, 206, 491. 

now came still, on, 413. 

shades prevail, soon as the, 376. 

welcome peaceful, 810. 
Evening's close, hie him home, 232. 
Event, one far-off divine, 394. 
Events, coming, cast shadows, 574. 

spirits of great, 800. 
Ever charming ever new, 444. 
Ever-diii'ing dark surrounds me, 407. 
Everlasting yawn confess, heaid thy, 

724. 
Every clime adored, Father in, 370. 
Every-dayness of work-day world, 21.5. 
Everytliing by starts notliing long, 909. 
Everywhere, out of the, into here, 78. 
Evil, be thou my ^ood, 395. 

days, th jugh f alien on, 348. 

death can show, no, 794. 

from seemmg, educing good, 418. 

good for, God bids us do, 396. 

goodness in things, some soul of, 80", 

IS wrought by want of thought, 798. 

partial, universal good, 489. 

that men do lives after them, 875. 
Example you with thievery, 489. 
Excel, useless to, where none admire, 133. 
Excellence, a fair divided, 232. 
Excellent thing in woman, 723. 

to have a giant's strength, 813. 
Excess of light, blasted with, 933. 

wasteful and ridiculous, 726. 
Excrement, general, stolen from, 489. 
Excuse, fault worse by tlie, 815. 

for the glass, she'll prove an, 131. 
Excused his devilish deeds, 601. 
Execute their airy purposes, 868. 
Executes a freeman's will 604. 
Exempt from pubUc haunt, 489. 
Exercise, for cure depend on, 671. 
Exhalation, like a bright, 306. 
Exhalations of the dawn, golden, 490. 
Exhaled and went to heaven, 106. 

he was, 309. 
Exhausted worlds and imagined new,905. 
Exile of Erin, poor, 578. 
Exits and entrances, have their, 711. 
Expatiate free o'er all this scene, 792. 
Expectation fails, oft, 801. 

makes a blessing de ' r, 801. 
Experience, till old, do<ittaui, 787. 

tells in every soil, 812. 
Expense, argue at their own, 809. 
Expose thj'self to feel what wretches 

feel, 802. 
Expressed in fancy, but not, 722. 
Expres.5ive silence muse his praise, 418. 
Exquisite, jovs too, to last, 801. 
Extenuate, nothing, 724. 
Externals, not place content in, 815. 
E.xtravagant and erring spirit hies, 868. 
Extreme, perplexed in the, 724. 
Extremes, falsehood of, 602. 

heard so oft in worst, 540. 

in man and nature, 799. 
Extremity, man's most dark, 348. 
Exultations agonies, friends are, 923. 
Eye and prospect of his soul, 801. 

defiance in their, 003. 

fire in each, 805. 

fringed curtains of thine, 721. 

great, of heaven, 828. 



Eye, great task-master's, 395. 
heaven in her, 209. 
in a fine frenzy rolling, 722. 
in my mind's, Horatio, 867. 
inward, cleared their, 814. 
inward, the bliss of solitude 815. 
lack-lustre, 791. 
like Blars, to threaten, 721. 
looks with a threatening, 801. 
lords of the visionary, 868. 
meek brown, maiden with the, 104. 
natu.e's walks, S07. 
of day, 462, 496. 
of Greece, Athens, the, 719. 
of heaven, beauteous, 726. 
of nature, lived in, let him die, 489. 
precious seeing to the, adds a, 203. 
sublime declared absolute rule, 711. 
tear in her, 176. 
thou'st a thief In either, 148. 
unborrowed from the. interest, 404. 
unkindness' altered. 899. 



where feeling plays, 721. 

white wench's black, 721. 

who .sees with equal, 394. 

will mark our coming, 106. 
Eyebrow, ballad to his mistress', 711. 
Eyelids, crown god of sleep on your, 816^ 

of the morn, 490. 

weigh my, down, 762. 
Eyes are homes of silent prayer, 399. 

dear as these, 206. 

drink to mo only with thine, 125. 

enamelled, all your quaint, 494. 

history in a nation's, 306. 

ladies whose rain influence, 786. 

lids of Juno's, 495. 

light in woman's, 203. 

light that visits these sad, 206. 

Uke break of day, 263. 

like stars from their spheres, 725. 

look your last, 899. 

looked love to eyes, 511. 

make pictures when shut, 807. 

neighboring, cynosure of, 785. 

not a friend to close his, 771. 

pretty flowrcts', 494. 

revengeful, fix on murderers, 900. 

sans, .sans taste, sans everything, 711. 

she gave me, 231. 

show his, and grieve his heart, 868. 

sought the west afar, her blue, 491. 

soul sitting m thine, 786. 

speculation in those, no, 868. 

the glow-worm lend thee, 1.34. 

turn my ravished, where; oe'er 1,807. 

unto dying, the casement grows, 315. 

were made for seeing, 461. 
Eyesight, treasure of his, lost, 316. 

Fables, worse than, yet have feigned, 868. 
Fabric, baseless, of this vision, S67. 

rose silently as a dream, 493. 
Face, call it fair not pale, her, 721. 

continuall comfort in a, 904. 

divine, human, 407. 

familiar with her, 123. 

finer form or lovelier, 721. 

give me a, 713. 

his morning, day's disasters in. 688. 

honest labor bears a lovely, 550. 

look on her, 128. 

manners in the, saw the, 940. 

mighty mother did unveil her, 939. 

music breathing from her, 133. 

my, is my foi'tune, 958. 

nose upon Ms, assert his own, 724. 

one beloved, on earth, 765. 

recalls some face once seen, SOL 

resigned to bliss or bale, 721. 

shining morning, 711. 

some awful moment, 539. 

strange defeatm-es in my, 799. 

transmitter of a foolish, 812. 

truth has such a, 398. 

visit her, too roughly, 206. 

was never eie did see that, 904. 
Faces, old familiar, all are gone, 274. 
Facing fearful odds, die better than, 567. 
Facts and the laws, 810. 
Faculties, hath borne his, so meek, 900. 
Faculty abides within the soul, 867. 

divine, vision and the, 766. 
Fade, all that's bright must, 793. 
Fading are the joys we dote upon, 347. 

honors of the dead, 676. 
Faery elves, whose midnight revels, 491, 
Fail, if we should, 802. 

no such word as, 802. 

we will not, 802. 
Failing, every, but their own, 267. 
Failing-s leaned to virtue's side, 688. 
Fails, oft expectation. 801. 
Faint 'ind fear to live alone, 309. 

with cold and weak with eld, 492. 



^ 



^ 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1039 



Fair and fairer than that word 133. 
as a star when only one, lOo. 
daffadils, 404. , „,, 

good-niglit to all to each, 81G. 
flow near to good, 711. 
in death, speak me, 312. 
is she not passuig, 133. 
KlJf^lS|;f^^ view, 675. 

a^teh^^^vrdlgl^e|g-771. 
quiet have I found thee, 719. 
round belly, 711. 
science frowned not, 3U7. 

spoken and Pe/s"^,'^.".?^'. 135 
to foul, from .foul to lau, -35. 
to outward view, 12tf. 
trains of imagery, bbl. 
women and brave men, 511. 

fSifer^s^tro'i^e'welcome shade, 910, 

than the evenmg air, 134. 
Fairest of creation, 21b. 

of her daughtere Eve, a-!. 

of stars, lalt in train of night, 363. 

of the rural mauls, 13U. 
Ti-airies' midwife, she is the, 836. 
^"^ule flowers for charaetery. 809. 
Fau-ness of all that if^^Jf^^^^- ^^^ 809. 
TTQiiTips^se draw lOlK xu ii<-/ veil i^j." 
f Sry hancls, their knell is rung by, 563. 
takes nor witch, i\)l. 

mid morals Milton held, 602. 
a passionate mtuition, 397. 

l^naUc! once wedded fast 397. 
has centre everywhere, 39/. 
Srf rieiidship the noblest Part, 120. 
iu honest doubt, lives more, 397. 
in some nice tenets, 398. 
modes of, zealots fight for, 3a;. 
of many made for one, 397. 
plain and simple, 206. 
pei-suasion ripened into, 397. 
welcome pure-eyed. b30. 
Faith's defender, the name o*,'.^"^- 
Faithful only he, a,mong ta tllle^b, 3i>,. 
below he did his duty, 6-9- „„, 
dog shall bear him company, 399. 

in action, 120. . _„„ 

Falcons, hopes like towermg, 730. 
Fall, it had a dying, sOb. 

he that is down needs fear no, 347. 
successive, 792. 
what a, was there, 876. 
■ Fallen, awake,.arise or be for ever, 540. 
from his high estate, 7(1. 
into the sear the ye low leaf, /94. 
Falling with a falling «tate, 602 
Fallings from us vanishings, /aJ. 
Fallow-deer, tiger for the, 7^i. 
Falls as I do, 759. 

early or too late, 793. 
from all he knows of, 271. 
like Lucifer, 321. 
False and hollow, all was, 724. 

philosophy, vain wisdom and, 80!> 
science betrayed, 737 „„. 

Falsehood hath a goodly outside, 797. 
of extremes, 602. 
stings of, 899. 
under saintly shew, 395. 
wedded to some deal-, 39/. 
Falstaffi sweats to death and lards the 

lean earth, 722. ^„. ma 

Fame, damned to everlasting, 939. 
death-bed of, 574. 
elates thee, 237. 
field of generous, 601. 
fool to, nor yet a, 107. 
glory but the blaze of, 81L 
great heir of , 906. 

honest, grant an, 811. , , 

is no pllnt that grows on mortal 

soil, 812. 
is the spur, 812. 

Sf so mu?h! expect thy meed, 812. 

?:JiSJ?^.ftofoi:U"-,andto.S07, 

wliat is the end of, 811. 
Fame's eternall bead-roll, 93 

proud temple, 812. 
Familiar as his garter, (23. 

be, not vulgar, 121. 

faces, old, 274. 

>vith his hoary locks, 919. , 

Fainine and the 4iie e-^* "lem up, o40. 

his, should be hlled, 899. 
Famous by my «w™'d l.iO. 

orators, repair to the, b04. 

victory, it was a, 538. 
Famousecl for fight, .'WO. 
Fan me while I sleep, 594. 
Fancies, our, are more gxddy, 53. 



. ,„r I Feather on the fatal dart, 800. 

Fancy bred, where is, 125. ^ whence the pen, 908. 

*biVt-eyed, hovering o'er, 857. Ueate of broil aA^d battle. 145. 

cell of, internal sight, 2OT. |,^' ^ toj. for a nauseous draught, 671 

fed, gay hope is theirs by, 793. i '-^^°g without a, 809. , ^„^ 

free, maiden meditation, 836. ^ged fSt the ancient grudge 899. 

home-bound, runs her baik abnoie, i^eeu i „ge if nothing else, i 

867. ~- 



like the finger of a clock, 810. 

not expressed in, 722. 

point of his own, 310. 

sweet and Litter, en(l of, 813. 

young man's, turns to love, Z>i. 
Fancy's rays the hilis adornmg, 108. 
F^nnv's call it only pretty, way, 134. 
fSies, thonsanrf, throng into my 

FaiitS°^lfke,'l^ too new or old, 806. 

as a woman's mooo, »13. 

summer's heat, 346. 

toe, trip it on the light, 785. 

tricks, plays such, 813. 
Fantasy's hot fire, 203. 
^"^f?;rt^f/mfldinf crowd's ignoble 

strite,306. 
Far-spent night of sorrow, 193. 
Fardels bear, f 1^° '"^^'j)!;.' ^ ver 238 
Fare the well ! and A,^°}JZfI;ti^k 



my revenge, if nothing else, 899. 
on flowres, 489. 

FeeranoTer'^Woe, teach me to, 370. 

like one who treads alone, 318. 
Feel ill deeper than al tliought,731 

he£i-ts touch them but rightly, 213. 

infinite, stirs the, 813. 

of .sadness and lo"png, 813. 
TTppUne-s great, came to them, 740. 
Feels ft ell>h thread aiid hves along the 

line, 496. x, „j- :rio 

the iwblest acts the best, 742. 

Feet beneath her petticoat stole, 211. 
S»?ut'h?s,man'sbestthings,741. 
like snailes did creep, /21. 
nailed on the bitter cross, 397. 
slippers thrust upon contraiy, 722. 
stiinding with reluctant, 104. 
tS-ougli faithless leather wet, 347. 
to the foe, 574. 



Fare the well! and it foi eve^ 2«^ Felicitie, what more, can fall, 489, 

Farewell, a long, to ail inygieatness,a-i- pliicity, our own, we.make, 807. 



reweii, a lu'ig, "" "■* ■■ —.jf. 
a word that must be, 241 
content, 723. 
goes out sighing, 792. 
1 only feel, 23S: 
if ever fondest prayer, 238. 
the neighing steed, 722. 
the plumed troop, (22. 
the tranquil mind, 722. 
to the Araby's daughter, 294. 
Farewells should be sudden, 211. 

to the dying, 272. 
Farther ofli from heaven, 93. 
Fashion, a fool in, 799. /.„-„,,, yw 

glass of, and the mould of form, 7-2. 
Sf a new doublet, 203. 
wears out more appare , (9J. 
Fashion's brightest arts, 689. 
Fashioned so slenderly, .«5. 
Fashions, in words as, 806. 
Fast and furious, 848. 

by the or.acle of God, 399. .<, 

Fat teed, the ancient grudge I bear, 899 

more, than bard beseems, 940. 
Fatal bell-man, the owl that, 882. 
Fate, book of, heaven hides the, 793. 
cannot harm me, 1013. 
good man meets his, 309. 
he either fears his, too much, 150. 
heart for any, 770 
heart for every, 920. 
nature fast in, 370. 
seemed to wind him up, 309. 
storms of, struggling in, 602. 
take a bond of, 793. 
Fates, men are masttjrs of their, imh. 
Father feeds his flocks, 650. 
matter and copy of the, 107. 
methinkslseemy,867. 
my, and my Friend, 394. 
of all in every age, 370. 
of the man, child is, 432. 
thy wish wks, to that thought, 800. 
Fathers, ashes of his, and the temples of 

Fathom' fv5uU,- thy father lies 869 
Fault, excusing of. a, make worsg bio. 

does one, and lies to hide it, 39.J. 

hide thee, I see, teach me to, 370. 

is not in our stars, 793. 

just hint a, 910 



Feliciue, n ji^i- i.iv^i^, . — - ,:" ,!,,7 
Fehcity, our own, we.make, 807. 
Fell, like autumn fruit, 309. 

of hair would rouse and stir, 900. 

nurnose, shake my, 900. . 

Fem)W ma market-town most musical 
cried razors, 954. 

In the firmament, 492. , j -f,(! 

many a good tall, had destroyed, o06. 

touchy testy pleasant, 721. 

want of it the, 781. . 

Fellow-leeUng makes v/ondrous land, 

Felt along the heart, 403. 

in the blood, 403. 
Female charm, overcome with, bUJ. 

errors fall to her share, 12o. 
Festus I plunge, 801. 
Fever, after lite s fitful, 311. 
at the core, 798. 
of the world, 404. 
so when a ragmg, burns 799. 
Fevers into false creation, bOi. 
Few and far between, 347. 

shall part where many meet, ol3. 
Fibre, fraU, of her brain, 899. 
Fickl4 as a changeful dream, 813. 

fierce and yam, 813. 
Fiction, truth is stranger than, 805. 
Field, accidents by fiood and, 14a. 
action in the tented, 145. 
back to the, 574. 
beat this ample, 792. 
of generous fame, 601. 
of his fame fresh and gory, 920. 
Fields beloved in vain, 108. 
better to hunt in, 671. 
poetic, encompass me, 807. 
showed how, were won, 688. 
Fiend doth close behind him, 859.' 
Fiends, sport of mocking, 5o8. 

these juggling, 345. 
Fierce democratic, 804. 

in native hardiness of soul, 602. 
repent.ance, 799. 
Mir.rPe|a^uMTil>n'andwinda671. 

soul working out its way, 908. 
KSSlr^-^tflymay,64a 
famoused for, 540. 
for love as men may do, 79.) 



FaX?^h^my,Ilovett,^still^g5. | ^JSlXl^^^^y^^^^^ °^'^'"' 
He gently oiihin^somayh^ie^BlS; ^^still^stid d.sJ.o^ni^jJ^2^^^ 



to scan, careless then —■-- ;,,i 
Favors are denied, patient \\ hen, 22b 
wretched that hangs on prince s,321. 
sacred sweet and precious, b±(. 
Fawne and crouch, 204. 
Fawning, thi'ift may follow. 111. 
Fear bloodshed miserable train, 539. 
forget the taste of, 900. . . 
is attront and jealousy injustice, 79o. 
pamting of your, 868. 
thy nature, I do, (24. 
to live alone, 309. 
Feai-ful odds, facing, 567. 
summons, upon a 868. 
thing, the love of women, 203. 
Fearing to attempt, lose good by, 800. 
Fears, saucy doubts and, 800. 

cares aid delicate, she gave me, 231. 
his fate too much, 150. 
no, to beat away, 206. 
Feast, as you were going to a, 713. 
imagination of a, 346. , „, 

of reason and the fio w of soul, 81A 
Feather, a wit's a, 780. 

is wafted downward, 490. 
of his own, espied a, 134. 



Sllll aim ai.1'1 V....... -^ °u„ .-,m 

Fights and mns away, he who, .>10 
Figure the thing we like, we, b0(. 
Figures strange and sweet. 72b. 
Filches my good name, 8U. 
Files of time, foremost, 2a8. 
Filled with fury I'apt inspired, .773. 

lllSW^ki§'S^«weak,m 

by degi-ees and beautituUy less -21. 

frenzy rolling, P.oet's;eye in, 722. 
Finer form or loveliei-faee, 721. 
Finger of a clock, like "he, 810. 

points to heaven, 396. 

slow umnoving, 72o. 
Fingers wc ary and worn, 3.57. 
Fire in antique Roman urns, 20d. 

in each eye, 80d. 

Uttle, quickly trodden out, 815. 

muse of, O for a, 867. 

Promethean, 133. 
ITires, wonted, e'en m our ashes, 306. 
Fireside happiness, 212. 
Firi'ii"2fn?c^-d"'^oidt'-dovU with devil 
damned, 815. 



-^ 



iS--. 



1040 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



n 



Firm united let us be, 603. 
Fii-mament, no fellow in the, i92. 
now glowed the, il3. 
spacious, on high, 376. 
Firmness, Nature shakes off wonted, 310. 

thy, malies my circle just, 248. 
Firm-set earth, thou sure and, 882. 
Fii'st by whom the new are tried, 806. 
true gentleman that breathed, 723. 
who came away, my dear I was, 215. 
Fir-trees, dark and high, 93. 
Fish, all's that cometh to net, 672. 

no, ye're buying, 55i. 
Fisher, patient, lakes his stand, 672. 
Fishes that tipple in the deep, 117. 
Fit audience find though few, 807. 
Fitness of his song, rounded, 66. 
Fits and stirs of his mind, 241. 

'twas sad by, 773. 
Fittest place man can die, 602. 
Five hundred friends, her dear, 81i. 
Fixed figure, to make me a, 725. 
Flag has braved a thousand years, 62D. 

of the free heart's hope, .592. 
Flame, my blood is liquid, 899. 
nurse a, if you, 205. 
vital spark of heavenly, 365. 
Flat and unprofitable, stale, 316. 
Flattered, being then most, 811. 
to tears this aged man, 176. 
Flatterers besieged, by, 910. 

when I tell him he hates, 811. 
Flattering tale, hope tells a, 271. 
Flattery is the food of fools, 810. 
ne'er lost on poet's ear, 810. 
never seems absurd, 810. 
Flea has smaller rteaa that prey, i96. 
Fled from her wish, 723. 

murnmring, i90. 
Fleet, moored all in the Downs, 235. 
Fleetest, brightest still the, 793. 
Fleeting show, the world is all a, 399. 

some good that mocks me, 396. 
Flesh and blood, strong as, 805. 
fair and unpolluted, 311. 
is heir to, shocks that, 297. 
tliat this too solid, would melt, 311. 
Flies, hope, with swallows' wings, 800. 

of estate and sunneshine, 121. 
Flight of ages pa-st, 308. 
of future days, 801. 
of years, unmeasured by the, 399. 
selfsame, the selfsame way, 803. 
Flighty purpose never is o'ertook, 797. 
Fling away ambition, 322. 
1- lint, diamond set in, 166. 

weariness can snore upon the, 816. 
1' Imty and steel couch, 539. 
Float double swan and shadow, 493. 
Flock however watched, 272. 
tainted wether of the, 218. 
Flocks, my father feeds his, 650. 
I'lood and field, accidents by, 145. 
leap into this angry, 670. 
taken at the, 802. 
through, through fire, 869. 
Floodgate, opes the, 775. 
Floods, unbroken, and torrents, 494 
Floor nicely sanded, 689. 

of heaven is thick inlaid, 775. 
Flour of wifly patience, 231. 
Floure of floures, 462. 
Floures in the mede,462. 

white and red, 462. 
Flourish in immortal youth, 759. 
I'low like thee, could 1, 723. 

of soul, feast of reason and the, Sli. 
Flower, a little western, 836. 
amaranthine, 398. 
born to blush unseen, 306. 
dear common, 495. 
every, enjoys the air, 495. 
every leaf and every, 492. 
every opening, 108. 
meanest, that blows, 759. 
prove a beauteous, 492. 
safety, pluck this, 671. 
sculptured, beyond the, 309. 
that smiles to-day, 752. 
Flowers and fruits of love are gone 250 
are lovely, 120. 
chaliced, that lies, 474. 
dight in leaves of, 492. 
fairies use, for characteix 869. 
purple with vernal, 494. 
that skirt the eternal frost, 377. 
Floweret of the vale, 489. 
Flowery meads in May, 193. 
Flowing cups run swiftly round, 147 
1 lown with insolence, 558. 
Flowre, no daintie, 494. 
Flung i-ose flung odore, 209. 
Flutters in blood, 671. 
Fly after summer merrily, 869. 
betimes, 205. 

for those that, may fight, 640. 
that sips treacle, 205. 



Fly they that need to fly, 540. 

with thee, could I fly, I'd, 472. 
Flying-chariot through the air, 802. 
Foam is amber, streams whose, 720. 

of perilous seas, 317. 

on the river, 283. 
Foe, feet to thee, 574. 

insolent, taken by the, 145. 

manly, give me the, 121. 

one worthy man my, 781. 

overcome but half his, 815 

the, they come, 512. 

to love. Fortune an unrelenting, 205. 
Foemen worthy of their steel, 655. 
Foes, long-inveterate, saluted, 726. 

tin-ice he routed all his, 771. 
Fold, like the wolf on the, 600. 
Folks, them unhappy, on shore, 630. 
Follow as the night the day, 797. 

what to, is a task, 808. 
Folly as it flies, shoot, 807. 

glide into, mirth can, 395. 

grow romantic I must paint it, 805. 

IS all they've taught me, 204. 

shunn'st the noise of, 780. 

sweetest, is love, 140. 

to be wise, where ignorance is bliss, 

woman stoops to, when lovely, 336. 
Fond recollection, 100. 
Fondest hopes decay, 2.51. 
Food, smiles are of love the, 204. 

crops the flowery, "496. 

human nature's daily, 128. 

of fools, flattery is the, 810. 

of love, if music be the, 808. 
Fool at forty is a fool indeed, 793. 

imaginations, 310. 

in fashion, nothing exceeds a, 799 

must now and then be right by 
chance, 780. 

play the, wise enough to, 798. 

resolved to live a, 939. 

to fame, 107. 

with judges, amongst fools a judge. 

Fooled with hope, 793. 
Fools are my theme, let satii-e be mv 
song, 806. ^ 

best, a little wise, 798. 
food of, flattery is the, SIO. 
for arguments use wagei-s, 803 
for forms of government, 397. 
I laugh at, not fear them, 798. 
ink of, notliing blackens like, 811 
never-failing vice of, pride the, 799. 
positive persisting, 798. 
rush where angels fear to tread 798 
so deep contemplative, 810. 
supinely stay, in idle wishes, 798 
they are, who roam, 226. 
who came to scoff, 688. 
Foot and hand go cold, 946. 

it featly here and there, 869. 
more light, step more true, 721 
of time, 117, 791. 

upon a worm, needlessly sets, 782 
Footprints on the sands of time, 770 ' 
Footsteps in the sea, plants his, 632 
[•op, solemn, significant and fudge, 724 
Forbear, occasion to, 215. 
Force, who overcomes by, 815. 
Forefathers of the hamlet, 305. 
Forefinger of all time, 807. 

of an alderman, 836. 
Forehand and vantage of a king, 559. 
Forehead of the morning sky, 490 
Foreknowledge absolute, SOS. 
Forelock, from his parted, manly, 71L 
Foresight, blest son of, 792. 
Forest primeval, this is the, 453. 
Forests are rended, 518. 
Forget all time, with thee, 206. 
do all things but, 248. 
the human race, 206. 
to, the hardest science, 248. 
Forgctfulness, to dumb, a prey, 305. 
not in entire, 758. 
steep my senses in, 762. 
sweets of, 737. 
Forget-me-nots of the angels, 491. 
Foi-give, divine to, 798. 

the crime, 117. 
Forgiveness to the injured, 79S. 
Forgot, the ta.ste of fear, 900. 
Forgotten dream, hunt for a, 661. 
Form, mould of, 722. 

of grace, the essential, 940. 
was of the manliest beauty, 629 
Formal cut, beard of, 711. 
Formed by thy converse, 911. 
Forms of government, fools contest, 397 
of things unknown, 867. 
the sculptor's soul hath seized, S67. 
unseen, their dirge is sung by, 5G3. 
Forsake me at my end, 394. 
Forsworn, lips that so sweetly were, 263. 



Fortress built by nature, 603. 
I<oitune and to fame unknown, 307 
doth give too much to many, 801 
lor ever wilt thou prove, 205. 
I care not, what you me deny, 489 
leads on to, 802. 
means to men most good, 801 
my face is my, 958. 
outrageous, slings and arrows of, 297. 
Fortune's buffets, 112. . 

cap, very button on, 347. 
finger, pipe for, 113. 
ice prefers to virtue's land, 798. 
power, not now in, 347. 
Fortunes, manners with, 814. 

my pride fell with my, 347. 
Forty, fool at, is a fool indeed, 793 
parson power, 809. 
pounds a year, rich with, 688. 
Forward and frolic glee, 670. 
Foster-child of silence, 718. 
Fou for weeks thegither, S47 
Fought all his battles o'er again, 771 
Foul deeds will rise, 900. 

descriptions are offensive, 805. 
to fair fair to foul, 735. 
Found'st me poor keep'st me so, 690. 
Fountain, broken at the, 627. 
bubble on the, 283. 
heads and pathless groves, 316. 
of sweet tears, 231. 
troubled, like a, 725. 
Fountain's murmuring wave, 493 

sliding foot, 719. 
Fox barks not when he would steal 724. 
Fragrance after showers, 206. 

smells to heaven, 226. 
Frail a thing is man, so, 30S. 

as glasses, women are, 232. 
Frailties from their dread abode, 307. 
Frailty thy name is woman, 207. 
Frame, quit this mortal, 365. 
this univei-sal, began, 775. 
Framed to make women false, 207 
Framing of a deathless lay, 70. 
Frauds and holy shifts, 396. 
Fray, eager for the, 541. 
Free, land of the, 593. 
must be, or die, 602. 
nature's grace, rob me of, 489. 
who would be, must strike, 581 
Freedom broadens slowly down 003 
from her mountain height, 592 
has a thousand charms, 602. 
in my love, if I have, 147. 
of old sat, on the heights, 602. 
shall awhile repair, 563. 
shrieked as Kosciusko fell, 583. 
to worship God, .587. 
Freedom's banner streaming, 592 
battle once begun, 582. 
cause, fought and bled in, 603. 
soil beneath our feet, 592 
Freeman whom truth makes free, 600 
Freeman's will, executes a, 604. 
Freeze thy blood, harrow thy soul 725 
Frenssh she spake ful faire, 696. 

of Pai-is was to hire unknowe, 696 
Frenchman's darling, 495. 
Frenzy, eye in fine, rolling, 722. 
Frenzy's fevered blood, 813. 
Fresh as a bridegroom, 506. 

gales and gentle airs, 209. 
Freshly j'an he on, 309. 
Fret thy soul with crosses, 204. 
Fretful stir unprofitable, 404. 
Fretted the pygmy-body, 908. 

vault, long-drawn aisle and, 306. 
Friar of orders gray, 187. 
Friars, eremites and, 397. 

hooded clouds like, 494 
Friend after friend departs, 114. 
as you choose a, an author, 805. 
candid, save me from the, 121. 
departed, defend your, 120. 
gained from heaven a, 307. 
house to lodge a, 121. 
in my retreat, 120. 
knoUing a departed, .346. 
more a, than e'er an enemy, 115. 
of all who have no friend, 311. 
of my better days, 937. 
of pleasure wisdom's aid, 774. 
of woe, sleep the, 816. 
philosopher and, my guide, 911. 
I'arely find a, 121. 
thou art not my, 311. 
to close his eyes, 771. 
to himself, look if he be, 121. 
who hath not lost a, 114. 
who lost no, 120. 
Friendliest to sleep and silence, 816, 
Friend's infirmities, should bear his, 121. 
Friends are exultations agonies, 922. 
dear five hundred, 814. 
defend me from my, 782. 
eat and drink as, 13L 



B- 



6 



fl- 



INDEX OF POETICxVL QUOTATIONS. 



1041 



^ 



Friends, Tnultitude of, 120. 

never-failing, are they, 806. 

old, like old swords trusted, 12L 

old, to talk, 118. 

out of sighc, as we lose, 120. 

the poor make no new, 292. 

like summer, 121. 

Romans countrymen. 875. 

thou hast, grapple the, 131. 

to bless the pi-eseut scene, 120. 

to congratulate their, 725. 

troops of, 79i. 

were poor but honest, 796. 

women And few real, 795. 
Friendship above all ties, 120. 

cement of the soul, 120. 

cenient of two minds, 120. 

constant save in love, 121. 

faith noblest part in, 120. 

image of eternity, 120. 

is a sheltering tree, 120. 

like love is but a name, 121. 

might divide, 120. 

no cold medium knows, 120. 

O summer, 120. 

sudden, springs from wine, 121. 

what is, but a name, 139. 
Friendship's laws, true, 121. 

name speak to thee in, 121. 
Frightful flend behind him, 859. 
Fringed curtains of thine eyes, 721. 
Fringing the dusty road with gold, i95. 
Front, fair large, and eye sublime, 711. 

of battle lour, 573. 

of Jove, 721. 

of my offending, head and, U5. 
Frost a killing frost, 321. 

curded by the, icicle, 493. 

skirt the eteriial, flowers that, 377. 
Frosts, encroaching, 948. 
Frosty Caiica-siis, thinking on the, 31S. 
Frown at pleasure, 799. 

at a, they die, 510. 

ti-ick of his, 107. 
Frowns, her very, are fairer far, 129. 
Frugal mind, she had a, 959. 

s^vain, wliose constant cares, 650. 
Fruit from such a seed, 800. 

like Autumn, fell, 309. 

like ripe, thou drop, 310. 

of sense is i-arely found, 803. ■ 

of that forbidden tree, 395. 

that can fall, 205. 

the ripest, first falls, 309. 

which tlie earth had yold, 492. 
Fruitless crown upon my head, 315. 
Fruits of love are gone, 250. 
Full fathom Ave thy father lies, 809. 

many a flower, 306. 

many a gem, 300. 

of sound and fury, 792. 

of strange oaths, 711. 

of sweet dayes and roses, 302. 

of wise saws, 711. 

well the whisper cii'cling round, 088. 

well they laugh'd, 088. 

without o'erflowing, 723. 
Fulmined over Greece, 804. 
Fun grew fast and furious, 848. 

you think he's all, 979. 
Funei'al marches to the grave, 770. 

not a, note, 920. 
Funny as I can, dared to write as, 975. 
Furnace, sighing like a, 711. 
Fury, filled with, 773. 

like a woman scorned, no, 207. 

witli the abhori-ed sliears, comes, 812. 
Fust in us unused, 808. 
Future, prophets of the, best of, 793, 

Gadding vine, o'ergrown, ■vvith, 495. 
Gadire or Javan, isles of, 631. 
Gain or lose it all, 150. 

the timely inn, 491. 
Gained from heaven a friend, 307. 
Gait of a sliufHing nag, 807. 
Gale, catch the driving, 489. 

partake the, 911. 

passion is the, 792. 

scents the evening, 385. 
Gales and gentle aii-s, 209. 

that from ye blow, 108. 
Galileo with his woes, the starry, 938. 
Gallant came late, 175. 
Galligaskins that long withstood, 948. 
Game, all the pleasure of the, 730. 

war is a, 541. 
Games imitative of the chase, 672. 
Gang a kennin' wrang, 784. 

aft a-gley, schemes o' mice, 468. 
Gaping age, holds its mirror to a, 804. 
Garden in lier face, thei'e is a, 123. 

of girls, the rose-bud, 153. 

was a wild, 204. 
Garden-state, happy, 813. 
Gardener, grand old, 268. 
Gardens trim, pleasure in, 786. 



Garish sun, worship to the, 134. 
Gai'land, sweetest, to sweetest maid, 134. 

vile that was your, 813. 
Garment of the night; 410. 
Garments, stuff out his vacant, 107. 
Gars auld claes, 385. 

me greet, 847. 
Garter, familiar as his, 723. 
Gates of hell, detests him as the, 797. 

of light mibarred, the, 490. 

of mercy shut on mankind, 306. 
Gatlier ye rosebuds while ye may, 754. 
Gathering her brows, 847. 
Gaudy, rich not, 722. 
Gave to misery all he had, a tear, 307. 
Gay, from grave to, 911. 

gilded scenes, 807. 

grandsire skilled in gestic lore, 232. 

liope is theirs, 793. 
Gaze, before thine inner, 72. 
Gazelle, never nursed a dear, 251, 
Gazing rustics, amazed the, 688. 
Gem of purest ray serene, 300. 
Gems of heaven, her starry train, 491. 

rich and rare were the, she wore, 721. 
Generous and free, 143. 

friendship no cold medium knows, 
120. 
Genial current of the soul, 306. - 
Genteel in personage, 142. 
Gentil knyght, a verray parfit, 696. 
Gentle airs, fresh gales and, 309. 

and low her voice, 733. 

dulness ever loves a joke, 803. 

rain from heaven, 798. 

yet not dull, 723. 
Gentleman, first true, that breathed, 723. 

grand old name of, 797. 

who was then the, 559. 
Gentlenien of England, 632. 
Gently scan your brother man, 781. 

upon my heart, 794. 
Gestic lore, skilled in, 232. 
Gesture, in every, dignity, 209. 
Get place and wealth, 80,3. 
Gettmg and spending, 403. 
Ghost, like an ill-used, 396. 

vex not.his, 346. 
Giant dies, pang as great as when a, 310. 
Giant's strength, excellent to have a, 813. 
Gibbets keep the lifted hand in awe, 511. 
Giddy and unfirm, our fancies more, 215. 
Gift, God has given, true love's the, 203. 

Heaven's last best, 215. 

of heaven, good sense the, 798. 
Giftie gie us, wad some power the, 486. 
Gild reflned gold, 726. 
Gill shall dance. Jack shall pipe and, 816. 
Gilpin long live he 962. 
Gilt, dust that is a little, 811. 

o'erdusted, inin'o land than, 811. 
Girls, be courted in your, 215. 

between two, 810. 

rose-bud garden of, 153. 

that are so smart, of all the, 198. 
Girt with golden wings, 830. 
Give a cup of water, little thing to, 770. 

every man thine ear, 815. 

his little .senate laws, 602, 910. 

it an understanding, 81.5. 

lettered pomp to teeth of time, 915. 

me a cigar, 874. 

me a look, 713. 

me another horse, 540. 

thee all— I can no more, 795. 

thee sixpence, 953. 

what this riband bound, 125. 

what thou canst, 394. 
Given unsought is better, 205. 
Glad me with its soft black eye, 251. 

waters of the dark blue sea, 026. 
Gladiator, I see the lie, 681. 
Gladlier grew, touched by tendance, 205. 
Gladly wolde lie lerne, 697. 
Glance from heaven to earth, 723. 

of the mind, how fleet, 739. 

sparkling, soon blown to fire, 670. 
Glancing in the mellow light, 491. 
Glare, maidens are ever caught by, 215. 

oi^ false science, 737. 
Glass, excuse for the, 131. 

of fashion, mould of form, 723. 
Glasses itself in tempests, 607. 
Glassy essence, his, 813. 
Gleams purpureal, fields with, 399. 
Glides the smooth current, 807. 
Glimmer on my mind, 800. 
Glimmering and decays, mere, 274. 

square, casement grows a, 315. 

tapei-s to the sun, 805. 

through the dream, 793. 
Glistering grief, perked up in, 347. 

with dew, 206, 490. 
Globe, all that tread the, 307. 

annual visit o'er the, 472. 

in this distracted, 801. 

itself shall dissolve, 867. 



Globe, radiant line that girts the, 631. 
Gloom, each light to counterfeit a, 787. 
Gloi'ious by my pen, I'll malce thee, 150. 

in a pipe, 814. 

works, these are thy, 363. 
Glory, air of, walkijig in an, 274. 

alone with his, 920. 

beyond all glory ever seen, 807. 

but the blaze of fame, 811. 

crowned with surpassing, 719. 

full meridian of my, 346. 

full-orbed, moon in, 491. 

jest and riddle of the world, 792. 

of a creditor, 797. 

of an Api-il day, 490. 

of the coming of the Lord, 594. 

of this world, vain pomp and, 321. 

or the grave, 513. 

passed from the earth, 757. 

paths of, lead but to the grave, 306. 

peep into, 274. 

sea of, many summers in a, 321. 

set the stars of, 593. 

traiUng clouds of, 758. 

trod the ways of, 321. 

visions of, spare my sight, 868. 
Gloss of art, more dear than all the, 689. 
Glows in every heart, love of praise, 810. 

in the stars, 489. 
Glow-worm lend thee, her eyes the, 134. 

shows the matin, 490. 
Go boldly forth my simple lay, 807. 

lovely rose, 125. 

where glory waits thee, 237. 
Goal, good the final, of ill, 392. 
God alone was to be seen, 765. 

an attribute to, himself, 798. 

art of, course of nature is, 489. 

assumes the, 771. 

bids us do good for evil, 396. 

conscious water saw its, 362. 

court the vapoiy, 816. 

eternal years of, 534. 

from, we spring to God we bend, 394. 

had I but served my, 322. 

hatii made this woild, 399. 

himself scarce seemed there, 860. 

in clouds, sees, 399. 

in, is our trust, 593. 

is love, 394. 

justify the ways of, 395. 

long as thy, is God above, 604. 

made country, man the town, 672. 

may be had lor the asking, 434. 

mills of, grmd slowly, 747. 

moves in a mysterious way, 632. 

my Father and my Friend, 394. 

noblest work of, an honest man, 780. 

of life and poesy and hght, 726. 

of storms, 620. 

or devil, every man was, 909. 

oracle of, f a.st by the, 399. 

save the king, 603. 

send thee good ale enough, 946. 

servant of, well done, 395. 

sun-flower turns to her, 174. 

takes a text, 304. 

the Father God the Son, 394. 

the varied, these are but, 417. 

vindicate the ways of, 807. 

voice of, daughters of the, 797. 

will be our king tills day, 602. 
God's dear power, 807. 

first temples, groves were, 453. 

providence seeming' estranged, 335. 
Gocfdess, Nature like a thrifty, 797. 

night, sable, 491. 
Godfathers of heaven's lights, 804. 
God-like reason, capability and, 80S. 
Godliness, cheerful, 907. 
Gods approve the depth of the soul, 206. 

dish fit for the, 900. 

goods the, provide, 772. 

fix revengeful eyes, 900. 

kings it makes, 800. 

love, whom the, die young, 107. 

makes men look like, 723. 
Goeth borrowing goeth sorrowing, 347. 
Gold bright and yellow, 802. 

but litel in cofre, 696. 

gild refined, 726. 

illumined with fluid, 719. 

in piiisik is a cordial, 809. 
Golden exhalations of the dawn, 490. 

lads and girls, 301. 

mean, he that holds fast the, 815. 

numbers, 550. 

opinions, bought, 810. 

sorrow, wear a, 347. 
Gone and forever, 283. 

before, not dead but, 311. 
Good and ill together, 792. 

apprehension of the, 346. 

are better made by 111,348. 

deed in a naughty world, 797. 

die first, the, 309. i 

evil be thou my, 395. 



©■ 



i 



1042 



Ix\DEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



Good, finds his own in all men's Eii 
gi-eat man, 739. ' 

hold thou the, 397. 
how near to, is w liat is fair, 711 
in everythiiig, i59. 
learn thu luxury of doinff.sgs 
man's siai, tad ioi' the, 395. 
man's smile, to sliare the, 688 
nanis in man and woman, 811 
nature and good sense join, 798 
nig-ht, say not, 304. 
night till it be morrow, say, 2il 
noble to bo, 'tis only, 2(-s 
old cause, homely beauty of the 814 
parent of, 303. ' 

sense only the gift of Heaven, 7D8 
some fleeting, that mocks me, 396' 
still educing, fi'om evil, 418 
sword rust, 539. 

the goda provide thee, talce the 77" 
■ the more communicated, 398 ' "' 
things will strive to dwell 133 
nniversa', all partial evil, 4S9 ' 
we oft might win, lose the, 800 
tood-bye, jjroud world, I'm going 311 
Good , est man of men, kdam the 71" 
Goodly outside, falsehood hath, 797. 
&oodiie-;s, how av.ful, is, 398 

in things cvi , some soul of, 802 
lead him not, if, 395. 
G-ordian knot of it unloose 7"3 
(xorgeous east with richest' land, 723 
Gorgons Hydras ChimEeras dire 86S' 
Gory locks, never shake thy, at me 8 
Gospel books, lineaments of, 9o' ' 
Gospel-light from EuUen's eyes,"397 
Govern those that toil, 813. 



Government, forms of, f.iolsoontpcif- <;q7 r.,.;, P°'^'i',^''"S'iedin, 10 
Gown, plucked, to share the!-n?ilf«'.f'^- ^"^ .'"'^^^ o^, is dead, 976. 



Crl'Z' I'il"=l^<ld, to Share the snSef68 
Grace, attractive kindt- of, 9C-t 

essential form of, 940 

free nature's, rob me of, 489 

melancholy, 203. 

my cause, little shall I, I4j 

naave, 79.3. 

pov. cr of, the magic of a name, 830 
purity ot, the light of love the 133 
seated on this brow 7"i 
simplicity, a face that makes, 713 
swears with .=0 much, 20' 
sweet attractive, softness and, 711 
was m all her steps, 20T 

r^o^ 1''^'^ ^°^'? ""I'^es for tiiee, 495. 

Graceless zealots light, 397. 

Graces, mingles both their 214 
peculiar, shot forth, 203 

^!'?'"Pf ? ^""^' f'^eds his (locks on C30 

Grand old gardener and his wTfe;26; 
old name ot gcintlcnian, 79- 



Greece, Athens the eye of 719 

but living Greece no niore'sos 

early, she sung, 773 "■"'■"5"■^• 

sad relic of departed worth Bsi 

fulmmed over, to Macedon 8(m 

Gre»^^,--^^ 

§^SMi^1^^!iS»--. 

be the turf above thee 937 
grassy turf is all I crave 49'? 
in youth, 792. "'^^e,4yj. 

nlt^ijf^ perished in the, 309. 

one red, making ihe 883 
Greenland's icy mount!{ini^-395 
Gieen-robed senators of mighty 494 
GrleHnT'^ ^'''^' ""''er the,^63h.^' *'^^- 
rrpvi^^^ 7^*^''® ^^ kindness is, 40^ 
GSnreV;^?1if^'e?5«'-'ii^J-;503. 

filltThS''^ °''''' niiitera, 345. 
nils the i-oom up 107 
gave his father, when he died l"-) 
perked up in a glist'ring-, 347 ' 
no greater, than to remlmber fiR 
patch, with proverbs 313 ' " 

siJent manliness of 690 ' 
smiling at, patience, 251. 
that does not speak, 312 
ti'eads upon the heels, 214 
^ ^^•hat, I should foro-et Rwi 

,1^^''*^"' opposition sits 310 
1 epose, hushed in, 108. 



— ^ 



kindlier, eager htait the 75? ''^^*'- 
aid my, upon thy n.ane '6O7 " 
licks the, just 1 aistd m 
may no rude, dciaceit ^iti 
morn with rosy, unlar'rpti icin 

sweet and euiming 12'" 
that made us is divine7376. 

time s deformed, 799 

touch of a vanished, ,315. 

imon'fhl^ wrenched with an, 345. 

upon the Ocean's n:aiie, 919. 

■waved herlily, 235. 

with my heart in't,205 

you cannot see I spp n ii 1 
S^^JjJtetoward my LlTm!' 
iiands, knell is rung by fail v 563 

never made to fear.ios ' 
promiscuously applied, 814. 



Giini-visaged war, 641. 

Grin, every, so merry drawq one 7r>'{ 

^"?l'ilSS;f'Sf£'jj^j;i^\,3 

Groh?ei'lbi'''>?' ^"'ks witht 607.'''- 
(jiomed the aisles of Kome TV> 
Grooves of change, rinSno-' 253 
Ground, call it holy, 687 ^' ^°^- 
let us sit upon the, 310 

Gro'v'cf?n*d°fl*^fc?^15T''''''^'''''<'^- 

Sfmyl^fe"!*^'^"""^'^^"- 
this tufted, 491. 

°pat\rc!s^r3?0°''''^ *^"^* *-^P^-«' «3. 
Grf:^S,^X";?^Ufjf^1on,205. 



Grandsire,gay,Elcilledingestlclore 23" rrnrw'JI'^.i'J?'l''f'''e" of larger 107 
Grant an honest fame or none, 811 ' ' GunrSrJnl^t'' f?' "^"^ ancient, 899 ' 
Grapple them to thy soul, 121 I ^"'^".^ our native seas, ve niArin, 



G rnS? T?l°T?o '"'",' ^-"h niy span, ms. 
ij-iass, lil Dorado in the, 495 
Graieful evening mild, 208 491 
^;''\tif 10. I hoUl the world 80^" 
Giatulation, eartli gave sip-n of "OT 
Grave, ob.scurc, kingdom tor an "sic 

an untimely, 309? •"',010. 

dai-k and silent, 745. 

dread thing-, 310. 

Druid lies iii yonder, 940 

earliest at his, last at his eros<! 79-; 

hungry as tlie, 310. ' ' 

lowlaid inmy, 348 

nr^!^onl"'i' ''''""" ''°"'" on the, 737. 
or mellov,% humors wliethcr 72t 
™- ftS'^Jf'""'^ lead but to the, SOG. 
1 'ft }° g'oiT or the, 513. 

sSd^Si^^'ln"'''^'^"^'^'^^^- 

^s?'is'th?,!j^^?^^?r^-«'«"- 

Gravcfa'?'e',5i"H!'"l'''''^''"''*™'«"'^<:l-607. 
^S':J^^V■Pl.■■--'^^rmes, such, 917 
lei. stalK of, 310. ' 

of memory, wet with tears, 410 
of your sires, stiikc f, r .green 58" 
r,.nf "^'■■,'"?""^'^ o'er with:490. ' 
Great r°n''f"' /""■"' ^^■'° '^ votarist, 830. 

none unhappy but the, 347 
01 o d, wo ship of tbc 6S1 
princes have gi-cat plavthin-^s n\l 

'ttmcts%4r^' '"^''"»« like in- 

wits to madness allied 900 

OreaS^!""r-f-?''^='"'"er?^-.939. 
ititaitht joAo ol hie appears 75*; 

"-'"ti^^iY^S^i^^'-^r'^^^--^^^- 

highest point of ail my 346 
GreiS^^^r&^^'^;^^^Ws.321. 



„,, thy bedrfior/.^i'illlf^o"""""'^' '^^^• 
Guardian angel o'er life presiding 21" 
r„rft?P^^- sung the strain, I7C ^' ^^'- 
Gudeman's awa', when the "46 
Guerdon, fair, hope to find the 81" 
Guest, speed the parting 121 " '' 
r!^;??-P^^'^<^," not the cooks 805 
Guide m smoke and ilame, 37i' 
philosopher and friend, 911. 
P„;Piovidenee their, .321. 
Guilt, If, IS m that heart, 185 

GumJ'^hr' "1^ T^'y «■' t lie>-. 336. 
Guilty thing, started like a, 868. 

tning surpiised, 759. 
Guinea jingling of the 255 
VuT^^ ftamp.rankis bntthP 341 
Gum, medicinal, trees theh- 7"-. 
Guns, but for these vile, 500. 

Habit, costly thy 7"" 

irSi^'l°='}v,^°'=J'' ^"'i ^ name, 807 
rfS ,f ' gather by unseen deg -ee 4- 
H« n^i"'''^-'" ^"J"'^ «ae kincTlvra 3 
ha»r4^fPP^^^"'''«»- 
to the chief who in triumph 510 
H?!;^^^Z°'J^°':-!^<^'^..nianX^^l. 



^^^'fcaut'f ri",!^n''°Pl''"^'' '■■'^'i" orthyt 869 Harvest'fff'l?'^ ^day, let W^^'" ' 
Dcauty draws us vith a. 203. Wo«t ^ V^ ^^ new-mown Lay 493. 



Satan finds lor idle, los' 
shake, with a king, 603. 
two, upon the breast, ?F5 
HaSi'^J?^^SS^-|^iWe-ap,734. 

HaJJS"^ in .a golden' chain , 492. 

on n,^."'''!'^> temple, icicle that, 493, 

on prince's favors, 321 ■^".^^o. 

Happiness, distant views of 801 

domestic, thcu only bliss, 232 

fireside, to hours of ease, 212. 

first fruits of, hope, 860. 

glimpse of, saw a, 221. 

meant to all n^en, 815 

not m multitude of fiiends 120 

too swiftly files, 108 "'^"°^'^'^"' 

Virtue alone is, tclow,398. 
Happy as a lover bg 

could I be v/itli cither, 134 

garden-state, 813 

whose nanie has bet n well spelt 811 

js lie born and taught, 736. 
make two lovers, 205 

?ouI*Jw ?M ^f PPy '''^yS' 108- 
soul tliat ail the way, 724 

Harass the distrest, griefs that vn 
Hard to part when'friends a edear 304. 

Im-k'fhiT"^^* "l ?°^^*"1 ^ound 310 *• 

iiaik the lark at heaven's pate, 171. 

the shrill trun;];et, 541. ^ ' ^ 

they whisper, £65. 
warm to win us to cur, 396 
Harmless necesf.ary cat, 496. 
"ai monies, concerted 243 
Harmonious numbers, 407' 
Harmon V* S,* ^"''e' t^at humbler, 940. 

hidden soul of, 786 

m immortal souls '775 

like deep, tongues of tppti -^in 

not understock, all dil^oi^lm 

of ii'^^^^y ^"'^' '■"■ love is a, 2U0. 

of shape, air and, 721. 

to behold in wedded pair 795 

to harmony, 775 

touches of sweet, 775 

-"'^7' in diyers tones, ipings to one 399 
of life, love took up trie,255. ' 
of thousand strings, 794 
open palm upon his! 794! 
that once through Tara's halls W7 

&w^„Tt',"^ daughter, still, 203: 
wariowun thy soul, 725. 
Hai-ry wit^i his beaver on, voung 671 
Sfit.^ll^g'i"..?'! play, let the?6n ^' ^'^ 



distinguish nnd divide a O^ 

each particular, to stand on end 7"-. 

every a soul doth bind 203 ' 

rr.,;'"/ 'ell of would rouse, 900." 

Hair-breadth 'scapes, 145 

Half broken-hearted, we parted 241 

mrt of n'^a"' ^T"^" 's but 'il"- 
part ot a blessed man ^ 



ijanovvea and so gracious 3' 7 
Hainlet still at thi close of the day 7"7 

rude forefathers of the 305 ^ ' 
Hammer, no sound of 493 

saw a .smith stand with h!« 7"" 
Hammers, busy, closing rivete'un-V,. 
Hampden, some village, 306. ' ' ■'^*'- 



v^li-Z J ■- . '° "cw-mow 
-Uaste, delicious to, you, ism 

married in, repent at leisure 214. 

now to my setting, 346 ' 

thlrewn'lPmS,"'**?' '"?^'^'«h thee, 785. 
iiiere was mounting in hot SI" 
Hastening ills, a prey to, 68 7 ' ' 

oVd t, rl'^°'''^ ^°'- wear ,961. 

om three-cornered, 323 
Hate, immortal, 540 

in the hke extreme, 207. 

of If}^' 'lowered with the, 807. 
•K^■^S, "^"'^S below, look on tl e, 813 
Hated, needs but to be seen to 1-e 39H 
Hating no one love but her 206 '' 
Haughtiness of soul, pride an I 799 
Haunt, exemnt frompubliV, jpg' 
Haunted me like a passion, 4M." 



e 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1043 



■*-a 



Having and his holding, all his, £15, 

nothing, yet hath all, 737. 
Havock, cry, let slip dogs of war, 539. 
Hawks, between two, 810. 
Hawtliorn bush with seats, 686. 

under the, in the dale, 78.5. 
Hay, harvest of the new-mown, i92. 
Hazard of concealing, 396. 

of the die, 803. 
He either fears his fate, 150. 

for God only, 711. 

jests at scars that never felt, 3i5. 

knew what's what, 808. 

koude songes make, 696. 

that loves a rosy cheek, lil. 

that rans may read, 398. 

took the bread and bralce it, 398. 

was the word and spake it, 398. 

who fights and runs away, oiO. 
Head and front of my offending, 145. 

good gray, which all men knew, 9i0. 
ang the pensive, cowslips that, i9i. 

off with his, 899. 

one small, could cari-y all, 688. 

plays i-ound the, 731. 

precious jewel in his, 348. 

repairs his drooping, 490. 

tell the wise the reverend, 308. 

that wears a crown, uneasy lies, 763. 
Heads beneath their shoulde. s, 145. 

hide their diminished, 719. 

houseless, and unfed sides, 404. 
Health consists with temperance, 815. 

contentment springs from, 589. 

first symptom of a mind in, 232. 

peace and competence, 815. 

unbouglit, hunt in fields for, 671. 
Heap of dust alone i-emain-;, 311. 
Hear by tale or history, 250. 
Heard melodies are sweet, 718. 
Hearings, younger, quite ravished, 723. 
Hearse, underneatb this sable, 907. 
Heart an anvil unto sorrow, 899. 

and lute are all the store, 795. 

arrow for the. like a sweet voice, 204. 

beating of my own, all I heai-d, 149. 

binds the broken, 809. 

comes not to the, 781. 

congenial to my, 689. 

detector of the, a death-bed's a, 310. 

detests him as the gates of hell, 797. 

did break, but some, 345. 

distrusting asks, 689. 

drawn in by vanity, 799. 

felt along the, sensations, 403. 

for any fixte, 770. 

for every fate, 930. 

give me back my, 334. 

glows in every, love of praise, 810. 

grieve his, show his eyes and, 868. 

grow fonder, absence makes the, 248. 
ath 'scaped this sorrow, 271. 

in husband's, sways she level, 215. 

in my hand, 205. 

incense of the, whose fragi'ance, 226. 

meet a mutual, 205. 

neiv-opene 4, feel my, 321. 

o'er-fra>ight, whispers the, 312. 

of a man is depressed, 795. 

of a maiden is stolen, 205. 

of heart, wear him in my, 112. 

of nature rolled out from the, 735. 

on her lipi, 731. 

orphans of the, 720. 

rends thy constant, sigh that, 140. 

responds unto his own, 345. 

rotten at the, 797. 

send ma back my, 146. 

set my poor, free, 263. 

tenderest, noi' even the, knows, 309. 

that has truly loved, 174. 

that is broken, soothe a, 803. 

to eate thy, 204. 

to heart and mind to mind, 203. 

unpack ray, with words, 725. 

untainted, what stronger than a, 796. 

untravelled, turns to thee, 248. 

was kind and soft, 629. 

weighs upon the, perilous stuff, 347. 

with heart in concord beats, 206. 

with strings of steel, 399. 
Heart-ache, end the, 297. 
Heart's core, wear him in my, 112. 
Hearth, cricket on the, 787. 
Hearts, brin^ your wounded, 348. 

cherish those, that hate thee, 332. 

dry as summer's dust. 309. 

feeling, touch them but rightly, 213. 

kind, are more than coi-ouets, 2B8. 

of controversy, 671. 

of oak are our ships, 631. 

steal away your, 876. 

that once beat high, ,577. 

that the world has tried. 204. 

thousand, beat happily, 511. 

to live in, is not to die'. 788. 

two, that beat as one, 205. 



Heart-stain, carried a, on its blade, 940. 
Heart-throbs, count time by, 742. 
Heat of conflict, through, 540. 
Heathen Chinee is peculiar, 987. 
Heaven, all that we believe of, 133. 
alone that is given away, 4Si4. 
and happy constellations, 209. 
approving, progressive virtue, 214. 
beauteous eye of, 726. 
befoie high, fantastic tricks, 813. 
cannot heal, no sorrow that, 348. 
care in, is there, 373. 
commences ere world bo past, 687. 
each passion sends, 799. 
face of, make the, so fine, 134. 
floor of, is thick inlaid, 775. 
fragrance smells to, 236. 
from yon blue, above us bent, 268. 
further oil from, 93. 
gems of, her stairy train, 490. 
gentle ra n from, 798. 
gift of, good sense only the, 79S. 
gives us friends, 120. 
God alone was to be seen in, 765. 
had made her such a man, 145. 
has no rage like love to hatred 

turned, 207. 
has not power upon the past, 792. 
he gained from, a friend, 307. 
hell I suffer seems a, 396. 
hides the book of Fate, 793. 
his blessed part to, and slept, 311. 
in her eye, 208. 
in hope to merit, 396. 
in\-ite3, hell threatens, 395. 
is love, 303. 

is not always angry, 347. 
it came, to heaven returneth, 206. 
kind of, to be deluded, 204. 
Icindred points of, and home, 474. 
leave her to, 395, 
led the way to, 910. 
lies about us in our Infancy, 758. 
more things in, and earth, 808. 
nothing true but, 399. 
of hell, 799. 
of invention, 867. 
on earth, 719. 

opening bud to, conveyed, 107. 
permit to, how long or short, 794. 
points out a hereafter, 759. 
silent finger points to, 396. 
smells to, offence is rank it, 900. 
spires point to, 396. 
spirit that fought in, 348. 
stole the livery of, 797. 
steep and thorny way to, 809. 
to be young was very, 490. 
to gaudy day denies, light, 130. 
tries the earth, 424. 
verge of, quite in the, 309. 
was all tranquiUity, 264. 
were not heaven if we know, 801. 
will bless your store, 340. 
winds of, visit he i- face, 206. 
Heaven's applause, 540. 
best treasures, 659. 
breath smells wooingly, 720. 
decree. Luxury thou curst by, 690. 
eternal year is thine, 311. 
first law, order is, 813. 
gate, sings, the lark at, 474. 
just balance equal will appear, 800, 
las-t best gift, 215. 
lights, godfathers of, 804. 
pavement, riches of, 803. 
sweetest air, crow that flies in, 722. 
wide pathless way, 787. 
Heaven-born band, hail ye heroes, 603. 
Heaven-kissing hill, new-lighted, 731. 
Heaven-taught lyre, muse employed, 

805. 
Heavenly blessings, without number, 76. 
days that cannot die, 490. 
maid was young, when music, 773. 
paradise is that place, 123. 
Heavens blaze deatli of princes, 899, 
perpetually do move, 791. 
spangled a shining fr.ame, 376. 
Heaviness, pleasing, charming with, 816. 
Heel, tread each other's, 345. 
Heels of pleasure, grief upon the, 214. 

senate at his, Cfesar with a, 781. 
Height, measure your mind's, 808. 
objects in an airy, 730. 
of this great argument, 39.5. 
turned on the horse his armed, 671, 
Heights, other, in other lives, 399. 
Heir of all the ages, 358. 

of fame, son of memory, 905. 
sh .cks that flesh is, to, 297. 
Heirs of truth and pure dehght, 42. 
Helen, like another, flred Troy, 772. 
Hell, all places shall be, 396. 
better to reign in, 799. 
breathes out contagion, 491. 
gates of, detests him as the, 797. 



Hell has no fury liko a woman, 207. 
hollow deep of, resounded, 540. 
I suffer seems a heaven, 396. 
injured lover's, jealousy the, 207. 
it is in suing long to bide, 204. 
loom of, piepare, 540. 
making earth a, 396. 
of heaven, 799. 
of waters, 720. 

of witchcraft lies in one tear, 204. 
threatens, heaven invites, 895. 
to cars polite, never mentions, 396. 
trembled at the hideous name, 310. 
way that out of, leads, 395. 
which way I fly is, 396. 
within him, 396. 
Hell's concave, shout that tore, 725. 
Helm, pleasure at the, 108. 
Hence all ye vain delights, 315. 
babbling dreams, 541. 
horiible shadow, 868. 
Hender, no one nigh to, 993. 
Herald Mercury, station like the, 721. 

no other, after my death, ,311. 
Heraldry, boast of, pomp of power, 306. 

Herbs and other countiy messes, 785. 
Herd, lowing, winds slowly, 305. 
Here in the body pent, 389. 

's to maiden of bashful fifteen, 131. 

is to the widovi^ of fifty, 131 

lies our sovereign lord the king, 939. 

will we sit, 775. 
Hereafter, heaven points out a, 759. 
Hereditary bondsmen, know ye not, 584. 
Heritage, noble by, 142. 

of woe, lord of himself that, 346. 

the sea, our, 636. 
Hermit, Man the, sighed, 304. 
Hermitage, take that for a, 147. 
Hero and the man complete, 539. 

perish or spariow fall, 394. 
Herte, priketh every gentil, 492. 
Hesitate dislike, hint a fault and, 910. 
Hesitation admii-ably slow, 734. 
Hesperus that led the stari-y host, 413. 
Heven, draw f olke to, by fairnesse, 809. 
Hew and hack, somebody to, 507. 

him as a carcase for hounds, 900. 
Hie jacet, its forlorn, 311. 
Hidden soul of harmi 'ny, 786. 
Hide the fau t I see, 370. 

their diminished heads, 719. 

those hills of snow, 263. 

want of art with ornaments, 807. 

your diminished rays, 797. 
Hides a dark soul and foul thoughts, 796. 
Hiding-place, forth from his dark, 395. 
Hies to his confine, the en ing spirit, 868. 
High ambition lowly laid, 676. 

characters from' higli life drawn, 812. 

mountains are a feeling to me, 493. 

on a thi-one of i-oyal state, 723. 

over-arched imbower, 494. 

thinking, plain living and, 814. 
Hill, customed, missed him on the, 306. 

declivity of, 720. 

heaven-kissing, 731. 

over, over dale, 869. 

retired, •■■at on a, 808. 

that skirts the down, 493. 

which lifts him to the storms, 60S, 

wind-beaten, 578. 
HOIs, beats strong amid the, 489. 

happy, all pleasing shade, 103. 

of snow, hide those, 263. 

over the, and far away, 493. 

that look eternal, 794. 
Hind mated I y the lion must die, 242. 
Hinders needle nnd thread, 3SS. 
Hinges, pregnant, of the knee. 111. 
Hint a fault and hesitate dislike, 910. 

to speak, it was my, 145, 

upon this, I spake, 145. 
Hip, beat us to the, 900. 

I have thee on the, 804. 
Hippocrene, the true the blushful, 310. 
Hissed along the polished ice, 673. 
History, portance in my travel's, 145. 

strange eventful, scene that ends,711. 
Hoard or maxims, with a little, 256. 
Hoarse rough verse like the torrent, 806. 
Hold, damned that first cries. .540. 

high converse with might.vdead, 800. 
Hole in a' your eoats, if there's a, 80.5. 
Holidays, if the year weie playing, 108. 
Holland, in the deep where, lies, 632. 
Hollow murmurs died away, 773. 

pauses of the storm, 632. 
Hollybranch shone on old oak wall, 891. 
Holy angels guard thy bed, 76. 

ground, call it. ,587. 

something, in thnt breast, 726. 

text around she strews, .306. 

writ, strong as proofs of, 207. 

writ, stolen forth of, 396. 
Home, best country ever is at, 229. 

dear hut our, 236. 



U- 



fl] 



1044 



INDjrX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



~~^~Si 



Home, draw near to their eternal 75i 
IS on the deep, her, 629. 
its warm wonted, 310. 
up place like, ever so humble, 235. 
of the brave, land of the free, 593 
on the rolling deep, 630. 
pleasure felt at, 233. 
sweet home, 225. 

they brought her wari-ior dead 290 
warm a hovel to a, 215. 
•^"'"tJi""'^'* Fancy runs bark ashore 
Homes of silent prayer, her eyes, 399 
Honest labor bears an honest face, 560 
man's aboon his might, 341 
man's the noblest work of God 780 
my friends were poor but, 796 ' 
tale speeds best, plainly told, 803 
Honesty, armed so strong in, 797 
Honey, gather, all the day, 108 
Honey-dew, he hath fed on, 835 
Homed showers, suck the, 494 

'^°rise"ref'^^™'* *'"°'^ "° condition 
books of, razed quite from, 640 
but an empty bubble, 772. 
clear, in action faitlif ul and in I'O 
dangerous, 541. 
depths and shoals of, 322. 
from corruption, keep mine, 811 
guinea helps the hurt that, ^eels 256 
jealous m^ sudden and quick, 711 
love obedience, troops of friends! 794. 
loved I not, more, 235. 
new-made, forget men's names, 812 
p uck bright, from the moon. 670 
pluck up drowned, by the locks 670 
post ot, IS a private station, 601 
sin to covet, if it be a, 811 ' 

there all the, lies, 781. 
Honored m the breach, more, 814 
Honors, bears his blushing 301 " 

gave his, to the world again, 311 
Hood, drijik witn him that wears a 94B 
Hooded clouds like friars, 494 '"'''*'"*''• 
Hook or crook, her to attain by, 671 
Hookas, divine in, glorious in pipe, 814 
wS.°,^ steel grapple to soul with lii. 
Hoop s bewitching round, 134 
wootin^ at the glorious sun, 395. 
Jiopi, all abandon who enter here, 396 
bade the world farewell, 583 ' 
break it to our, 345 
brother of Faith, 800. 
constancy in wind, 806. 
taith and, world will disagree in 398 
fare^vell and with hope flar;395 
firsWruits of happiness, 800 
fooled with, men favor deceit 793 
gentle dawning of success, 800 

'"te^ri!llT '"^"^ " '^■■''■'''^ from 

is there no, 809. ' 

light of, leave behind, 800. 

like a cordial innocent tho' strong, 



Host universal, up sent a shout 72.T I tt,,*- 1 

Hot haste, there was mounting i„ 512 '' ^"""^ '" ^' 205- 

Ho jnds, carcase fit for, 900. ^ ' ^^^- w.-. „"''<fe^"'*^i ^^^^ dear, 226. 
I Hour^taendUest to sleep a^d silence, ( g^Sn'"cferai!'"^ '='"^^*^'-^^' ^^l- 

I am no orator as Brutus is, b,o. 
fov'l h°\ ^"'^"dy, no not'l, 813. 
love It, I love it, 101 
only speak right on, 876. 
T„^ '■^"leinber, 1 remember, 108 931 
Ice, Fortune's, prefers to Virtue's knd. 



from childhood's, O ever thus. 251 
I have had my, 792 ' 

impr.jve each shining 108 
inev table, await allklj the, 306 
now s the, now's the day and .WS 
Pensioner on the bounties of ^.1,747 
welKT"'^'' ^*°^*^ years 'oS- 

time and the, 791 

to hour we ripe and ripe, 791. 

w,'?i',r'S?' Sgou'-ge and, 345, 396. 

watch the, if we do but, 899 

w^-^H ^°^%'^^' ■>^'J-«'s seem sweet, 491. 

wonder of an, 792 
Hours, circling, waked by the, 490 

for months, love reckons, 248 

nf h-^'i'^'''^- °" Pi-opi«ous ilay, 496. 

of aif ' '""§^ed, f ew far between, 347 

of ease, woman in our, 509 

unheeded flew, 117 

''"''lAe'Z'^.J;^?' '^ ^ -eU-sprlng of 

little pleasui-e in the, 246 

nae luck about the, 246 

prop that doth sustain my, 347 

to be let tor life or years, 214. 

to lodge a friend, 121. 

wl^ Tt ^'^'■'^ welcome to our, 121 



hissed along the polished, 672 

iSSIs Phfihnl*^''' '^"I'ied by frost 493. 
Idea of hP,-^?S^ /^;? ^^'^'■'^e thaws, 722. 
laea ot her Ufe shall sweetly creen Sfll 

Tde. of Mi^^lJ'S^"^' ^^-^ to shootfllt 
Tdfnf t« w"''?f beware the, 899. ' 
idiot, tale told by an, 792. 
Idle as a painted ship, 855. 

w'^^fo ^f $^' *ni?chief still for, 108. 
waste of thought, 808 
wind, pass by me as the, 797 
T^7„'*"'^"'^^' ^<^°1^ supinely stay, in 798 
Id eness, pains and penalties of 724 
Idler IS a watch that wants hands 724. 
Tf ? ^^"^^J"' ^'""^ *i"^i word so" sis 
It It were done 'twere well quickly 900 

^''of'^'we^^lj? "i^^^loUy to ^e wis^,'lO&- 
01 wealth his best riches, 687 
„ .-_ .^^j ..ciuuiue 1,0 our 121 I To..,^'"^ eomtort flows from, 730. 

^pU^'s.™^' -^- ^- ^^^ t^« ter|;,°ofi:?e"*b^tti"SeX"^^4i'*^'- 



prop, 347. 
Houseless heads and unfed sides 494 
Houses f er a-sonder, 697 ' 

the very seem asleep, 678. 
Housewife that's thrifty, here's to l^T 
Hovel, warm to a home, 215. ' ^ 

How blest IS he who crowns 687 

can man die better than 'faeliig odds, 

flZl?^ « *'^'Per a woman, 723 
in'i^.f 1 ""^'? *°"^^ °" shore, 630. 
loved how honored, 311 

sWn /h^K despair resent, 248. 
sleep the brave, 563 

tZ^!il°J-Hl^^^ ^^'^^n hearts, 807 
«r,H^^ « they got there, 815. ' 
style refines, the wis brightens sip 
the world wags, 7sil "^'^"'^''^s, 812, 



like the glimmering taper, 800 

'' dwell°3S''' ^^^'■''' ^'''^'' can'never 

no other medicine but 347 

none without, e'er loved 204. 

nurse of young desire. 800. 

repose In trembling, 307 

springs eternal, 801 

still on, relies, 347. 

tells a flatternig tale, 271 

th? r.h''i^^^°*■' ^>^ Puts'forth, 321. 
ine cheap and universal cure, 800 
though hope were lost, 800. ' 
Hope to merit heaven, 396 
true. Is swift, 800. 
whence this pleasing, 759 
while there'sllfe there's, 347, 794 
M'lutehanded, hovering anerel sw 

humbly, presumes it may be so 724 
aid waste, all that poets sing oi' 813 
vrJ^^^ towermg falcons aim, 730 ' 
Horatio, thou art as just a man, ill 

in .my mind's eye, 867. 
Horatius kept the firl'dge, how well 570 

PanTend^Sr°"'^'^'"^i''^^^"'6^^^^^^ 

HS^^--2'a. 

HoSe ^iel?t7, ^"PE?<i f"" "^th, 900. 
■o-oi oe, aearor than his, 255 

give me another, 540 

my kingdom for a, 540 

Hose a world too wide 711 
Hospitable thoughts intent, on 232 
Hosfc, Hesperus tliat led the stany, 413. 




Howards, not all the blood of all the 781 

or 1 esolution, native, 297 
w,,^ e3^ rainbow, add a, 726. 
Hues of bliss brightly glow 3« 
Hug all wretcheSnesl 243 
Hugged by the old, gold, 802. 
XT ,j ^ offender forgave offence 9nR 
Huldy all alone, there sot, 993 ' 
Hum, busy, of men, 786 

of human cities torture 493 
Human creatures' lives, wearing out 338 
I face divine, flocks or herds or 407 
hearts endure, how smaU that 807 
nature's daily food, 128 ' '^• 

race, that I might all forget the 206 
soul Uke wing°fearf ul tof ee the 70^' 
to err is, to forgive divine, 798 ' 
to step aside is, 784. 
Humanity, aught that dignifies 348. 
music of, till sad, 404. ' 

O suffering sad, 345. 
Humanized a world, 806 
Humankind, lords of, pass by 603 
Humble cares and fears 231 ' 
uvers In content, 347. ' 
"'and, m'. "^^^P<^i-"'g. bated breath 

^^" nWH jljP'i'*'^'^* stillness and, 503 
Pnde that apes, 396, 949 

^•^Ta^'lt^r^i^^T^Si^^te^^^^^ 

^Tu^';f'-tii%^Ser^,7-'-z^:?2^^^^ 

Hung over her enamoured 203 

gs;i?;-4"rhfii^i,^?o^^^-^^ed,492. 

lean-faced villain, 723. 
^"■Jt for a forgotten dream 661 
in flelds for health, 671 ' 

fci'^fitekiif^f^^^^^^^^ 

Husband cools, ne'er arTswers till a 215 
duty woinan oweth to hei-, 216 ' 
lover m the, lost, 214 ' ' 

them so well they sliall go far KO 

HusbanrtvV^""* '■?*'l'-" au% say'^'sf • 
Husbandry, borrowing dulls edo-p nf <^ca 
gush my dear lie still and slumber Vf' 
Hushed every thought that springs 348 
m grim repose expects his prey io8 



;];„? 1 »jci,i,t;i- inaae uy, 348. 

deeJs done, sight of means makes, 

fares the land where wealth, 687 
ftnal goal of, good the, 392. 
nabits gather by degrees 49^ 
nothing, dwell in su?h a temple 13X 
repressing, crowning good 699 
IllinYi^nh,'"''!'^ ^"""^ t" good, 802 
I liinitable air, desert and, 481. 

'hpHH?" ^''^^' "\°«° ^^'e kave, 297. 

betide, resigned when, 226 

love on through all, 203. 

?h "h '7"^?°"''"s o'er a' the, 848. 
I|lu!Sin^^'^^§^i^-'to,687. 
Illusion, for man's, given 399 ' 
Image of eternity, friendship's the, 120. 

ot Good Queen Bess, 802 

tX.^f^L^'';'''^^"* "s guilt, 671. 
7mnZr^^'K '^^PPy chance a, 494. 
imagery, fair trains of, 867 
images and precious thoughts 801 
1 nagined right, true to. 603 ' 

"'^poft of, fdi '^^"^l^''^^*' l"^"^"" lo^e^- 
bare, of a feast, 346 
bodies forth the form, 867 
?wl' ?i°'^'^* ^"^^ "''''* her's,"489. 
Imaglillte'^flfonfo^''^ '^^"'^^ ""' ''^ 

immensities, all musical in 'its 726 
Imminent deadly breac-h, '"capel tJi 145 
Immodest words sdmit 10 def encS' 805' 
IS™°j;fl thought, not one° 806. ' **^- 
iminortal as they quote, 604. 
hate and courage, 640 
names, one of the few, 583 
scandals fly on eagles' wing<! 811 
sea, our souls havl sight ot tiiat 769 
though no more, fair Greece75si 
T,v, ^erse married to, 786, S06. 
immortality, proof were born for 809 
longmg after, 769. ' ' 

lmgartiinaws\?"^ another's arms, 205. 
jiiiparciai laws were given 910 
TmSIn-''^ °1 ^"^'7 '«^»t and floWer, 492 
' ?,'.;i^°*?' ."^^""t' to marriage of 
true minds, 208 
Imperceptible water, hands in 724 
Imperfect ofifices of piaj'er 399 
Imperfections on my head,'all niy. 310 

pass my, by, 107. ■'' 

Imperial ensign full high advanced 72.5 
Impious in a good man to be sad.^V^- 

men bear sway, 601. 
Important triflers have more smoke 568 
Impossible she, that not, jgg'^ ^'""'^e, oos. 
impossibilities seem just, 810 
impotent conclusion, lame and, 723 
TmS,';?r/'"'^ shining hour, loi 
impulse from a vernal wood, one 494 
Inanimate, if aught, grieves 51? 
Inaudible noiseless fo^o" of time,- 791 
incense of heart whose fragrance 226 

InPh"«t^^^"V?^ '"°™. t-'-^ll 0^305 
inch, every, a king, 721 

income tears, rent is sorrow and 2U 

Inconstancy, name to fright lover!: 271. 



^ 



ifi^ 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1045 



a 



Inconstant moon, swear not by the, 2D7. 
Increase of appetite, 205. 
Independence, let, be our boai.t, OOi. 
India'scoral strand, 395. 
iSdian, like the base, threw a pearl, 72i. 
lo! the poor, 399. 
summer, mild sweet day of, 719. 
Indignation, scarlet, 541. 
Industry, languid, 70. 
Inebriate, cheer but not, 810. 
Inevitable hour, await alike the, 305 
Infancy, heaven lies about us in our, 7oS. 
Infant crying for the light, 392. 
crying in the night, 393. 
mewling and puking, 711. 
infection and the hand of war, 603. 
Infidels adore. Jews iiught kiss and, 128. 
Infinite riches in a little room, 7ao. 
variety, custom state her, lU. 
Infirmol'purpose,883. . 
Infirmities, bear his friend's, 131. 
iSflrm.ty of noble mind, fame last, 812. 
Infiuence, shed their selectest, 209. 
Inglorious arts of ijeace, 639. 

Milton, some mute, 306. 
Ingratitude, unkind as man s, 316 
Ingredients, justice commands the, buo. 
Inhabit this bleak world alone, «5. 
Inhabitants o' the earth, not like, 8CS 
Inherit, all wliich it, shall dissolve, 867, 
Inhumanity to man, man's, .332. 
Injured, forgiveness to the, 79S. 
lover's hell, jealousy the, 207. 
Injuries, saints m your, 723. 
Ink, dipped one m, what sin, 805. 
of fools, blackens like the, 811. 
small drop of, falling like dew, 80d. 
Inn, gain the timely. i91. 
the world's sweet, 311. 
Innocence glides in modest, away, /9i. 
mirth and, O milk and water, 103. 
of love, dallies with the, 205. 
our fearful, our peace, 814. 
thy sister dear, 719. 
Ijinocent sleep, 883. n.v,„,.,„ 70R 

within, armed without that s 796. 
Innumerable as the stare of night, 493. 

bees, murmuring of, 493. 
Insatiate archer, could not one suffice, 

491. 
Insect of renown, 810. . 

Insolence, llown with, and wme, juS. 

of office and the spurns. 297. 
Insolent foe, of being, taken by the, 

145 
Inspiring bold John Barleycorn, 818. 
Instances, full of saws and modern, 711. 
Instil a wanton sweetness, S31. 
Instincts, feelings like, unawares, 740^ 
Instructions, we but teach bloody, 800. 
Instruments, mortal, m council, 900. 

of d irkness, tell us truths, S93. 
Insubstantial pageant, faded li'^e, 867. 
Insurrection, suffers the nature 01, 9TO. 
Intellectual power went sounding, 80S. 
Intent, on hospitable thoughts, 232. 
Is in our power not the deed, 671. 
prick the sides of my, 798. 
Intercourse of daily lite, dreary, «*• 
Intimates eternity to man, heaven, 759. 
Intuition, faith become pivssionate 397. 
Invention, brightest heaven of, 867. 

of the enemy, a weak, 539. 
Inventor, return to plague the, 800 
Inverted year, wiiiter ruler of tnf. *92. 
Inviolate sea, compassed by the, biZ. 
Invisible and creeping wind, 631. 

soap, his hands with, 721. 
Inward eye, cleared their, 814. 

eye which is bliss of solitude, 813. 
Iris, livelier, in tlie spring a, 254. 
Iron bars a cage, n^r, 147. 

did on the anvil cool, wlulst his, 722. 
meddles with cold, man that, 540. 
sleet of arrowy shower 540. 
tears down Pluto's cheek, drew, 787. 
Iron-bound bucket that hung in the 

well, 100. . ^„^ 

Is she not passing fair, 1,33 
Island, right little tight htt e, 602. 
Isle of Beauty, fare thee well, 248. 

this sceptred, 603. 
Isles, throned on her hundred, 730. 

of Greece, 580. 
Israel of the Lord beloved, 372. 
Issues good or bad for humankind, 539. 
Isthmus, narrow, 'twixt two seas, 793. 

might have been, 159. 
Itching palm, condemned to have, 797. 
Ivy green, rare old plant is the, 46b. 

Jack, life of poor, 615. 

siiall pipe and Gill shall dance, 816. 
Javan or Gadire, isles of, 631. 
Jaws of darkness devour it up, 250. 
Jealous in honor, 711. 

not easily, 724. 



Jealousy believes what phrenzy die 
tates, 207. 

beware of, 207. 

is injustice, 795. 

my tribe defend from, 207. 

the injured lover's hell, 207. 
Jelly, belly shook like a bowl tull of, 96. 
Jessamine, crow-toe and pale, 494. 
Jest and riddle of the world, ;92. 

and youthful joUty, 785. 

life Is a, and all thmgs show it, 792. 

mostb.iter is a scornful, 345. 

put his whole wit in a, 939. 
Jew, 1 thank thee, 804. -,,,01 

Jewel, in an Ethiop's ear, like a r:ch, 721 

in his head, wears a precious, 348 



in his head, wears a precious, 010. 
of the just, beauteous death the, 274. 
of their souls, the immediat , 811. 
rich in havmg such a, 215. 
Jewels five-words long, 807. 
Jews might kiss, cross which, 128. 
Jingling of the guinea, 256. 
Jocund day stands tiptoe, 490. 
Joint laborer with the day, night, 559. 
Joke, dulness ever loves a, 803. 

many a, had he, 688. 
JolliLy, bring jest and youthful, 78j. 
Jolly miller, there was a, 5o9. 
place in times of old, 661. 
Jonson, O rare Ben, 939. 
Jonson's learned sock, 786. 
Jot, nor bate a, 733. 
Jove, all-judging, 812. . . 

laugh at lovei-s' perjuries, 207. 
some christen'd, adorn, 396. 
the front of, himself, 721. 
young Phidias brought, i.35. 
Jove's dread clamors counterfeit, 722. 
Joy asks if this be, heart distrusting, 689. 
current of domestic, smooth, 807. 
eternal, and everlasting love, 133. 
for ever, thing of beauty is a, 675. 
heartfelt, calm sunshine and, 796. 
let, be unconflned, on with dance, 511 
pay his wisdom for his, 800. 
rises me like a summer morn, 492. 
smiles of, the tears of woe, 399. 
that's left behind us, 268. 
thing of beauty is a, forever, 675. 
unutteral)le, tears choke with, 725. 
which warriors feel, the stern, 600. 
Joyful school-days, in my, 274. 
Joyous the birds, fresh gales and gentle 

airs, 209. ^ ,., ,„ 

Joys came down shower-like, 120. 
departed, i-emembranee of, 346. 
of other years, where sleep the, 416. 
of sense, reason's pleasure the, 81j. 
too exquisite to last, 801. 
we dote upon, 347. 
Judge, O wise young, 723. 
Judges alike of facts and laws, 810. 
all range,!, a terrible show, 722. 
fool with, among fools a judge, 724. 
hungry, the sentence sign, 810. 
Judgment, a Daniel come to, 723. 
defend against your friend, 120. 
man's erring, conspire to blind, 799. 
reserve thy, 815. 

shallow spirit of, I have some, 810. 
thou art fled to brutish beasts, 876. 
Judgments,with our, as our watches 799. 
Juggling fiends no more believed, 34j. 
Julia, lips of, pointed to, 134. 
July, warmth of its, 108. 
Jump the life to come, 900. 
June, leafy month of, 858. 
seekicein, 806. . 

what Is so rare as a day m, 424. 
Juno's eyes, sweeter than the lids of ,49.5. 
Jurymen dine, wretches hang that, 810. 
Just, be, and fear not, 322. 

hint a fault, and hesitate dislike, 910. 
jewel of the, beauteous death, 274. 
I keeps his glory in the dust, 311. 
Justice even-handed, 800. 
in fair round belly, 711. 
mercy seasons, 798. 
with mercy I shall temper, 394. 
Justify the ways of God, 395. 
Keen remorse with blood defiled, 899. 
Keep probability in view, 805. 

the word of promise to our ear, 345. 
your powder dry, 603. 
Kepen wel thy tongue, 398. 
Keystane o' night's black arch, 848. 
Kick their owners over, 671. 
Kill him boldly but not wrathf ully, 900. 
Kills himself to avoid misery, 90,0- . , 
Kin, one touch of nature makes the 

whole world, 811. 
Kind, base in, born to be a slave, 601. 
fellow-feeling makes one wondrous, 

hearts are more than coronets, 268. 
less than, more than kin and,, 724. 
of heaven to be deluded by him, 204. 



Kind to my remains, be, 120. 
Kindest and the happiest pair, 215. 
Kindle soft desire, 772. 
Kindled by the master's spell, 213. 
Kindles in clothes a wantonness, 713 
Kindlier hand, the eager heart the,7o2. 
Kindly, had we never loved sae, Zid. 
Kindness, greetings where no, is, 404 
milk ot human, too fuU o' the, 724. 
we'll take a cup o', 118. 
Kindred points ot heaven and home, 474. 
King, balm from, an annointed, 722. 
catch the conscience ot the, 804. 
divinity doth hedge a, 722. 
every inch a, 721. 
fai-eweil, 308. 
God save the, 603. 
God win be our, this day, 602. 
he was a goodly, 721. ^ t--^^ am 

here lies our sovereign lord the, 940. 
himself has followed her, 949. 
in sleep, 240. 

of day, powerful, yonder comes, 490. 
Philip my, 75. j n,- , ■^ 

shake hands with a, and thmk it 

kindness, 603. 
under which, Bezonian, 540. 
vantage of a, 559. 
King's name is a tower of stiength, 722. 
Kingdom for a horse, 640. 

like to a little, state of man,900. 
my large, for a little gi ave, 346. 
my minde to me a, is, 729 
Kings, breath of, princes and lords, 386. 
can cause or cure, 807. 
chase the sport of, 671. 
come bow to it, bid, 345. 
death lays his icy hand on, 301. 
It makes gods, 800. 
may be biest. Tarn was glorious, 848. 
this royal throne of, 603. 
setter-iip and puller-down of , 93b. 
stories of the death ot, tell sad, 310. 
would not play, war's a game, 541. 
Kiss but in the cup, leave a, 125. 
colder thy, 241. 
consume as they, 815. 
cross that Jews might, 128. 
long long, of youth and love, 205. 
me sweet-and-twenty, 122. 
snatched hasty from the side-long 
' maid, 672. . . 

to every sedge, giving a gentle, 493. 
traitorous, not she with, 795. 
Kisses bring again, seals of love, 263. 
for, played, my love and 1, 186. 
dear as remembered, 315. 
Kitten, rather be a, and cry mew, 807. 
Knaves, untaught, he called thein, 506. 
Knee, crook pregnant hinges ot the, ill. 

weakest saint upon his, 398. 
Knell is rung, by faiiy hands their, 563. 



never sighed at the sound ot a, i3 
of pai-ting day, curfew tolls the 305. 
that summons thee to heaven, ssz. 
Knells call heaven invites, 395. 

us back, each matin bell, 308. 
Knew thee but to love thee, none, 93b. 

what's what, 808. 
Knife, war even to the, 541. , ,. , „,, 
Knight, a prince can make a belted, 341. 
parfit gentil,696. . 
pricking on the plaine, 827. , 
Knights, armorers accomplishing, 540. 
Knights' bones are dust, 539. 
Knock, never at home when you, 803. 
the breast, nothing to wail or, 794. 
Knocker, tie up the, say I'm sick, 805. 
Knolling a departed friend, bell, ^6, 
Knots of love, wife and children, 232. 
Knotted and combined locks, 725. 
Know it, thought so once, now 1, 792. 
I love thee, whatever thou art, 185. 
me, not to, argues, 812. 
not I ask not if guilt, 185. 
not seems, I, 295. 
not what's resisted, 784. 
not what we may be, 399. 
then thyself, 792. , „„„ 

we loved in vain, I only, 238. 
what we are not what may be, 399. 
ye the land where the cypress, 451. 
Knowledge, her ample page, 306. 
against his better, 899. 
book of, fair, 407. 
is ourselves to know, 398. 
KTiown, what shall I do to be, 811. 
Knows her Bible true, 397. 
Kosciusko fell. Freedom shrieked when, 

583. 
Kubla Khan in Xanadu, 834. 

Labor and to wait, learn to, 770. 
bears a lovely face, 550. 
dire and weary woe, 816. 
ease and alternate, useful life, 214. 
from, health, 559. 



E& 



W 



[fi- 



1046 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



-^ 



Labor of an age in piled stones, 906. 

only, to kill the time, 818. 

profitable, follows the year with, 559. 

we delight iu, 559. 

youth of, with an age of ease, 6S7. 
Labor's bath, sore, 883. 
Laborious days, scorn delights live, 813. 
Labors, lino too, words move slow, SOti. 
Lack of argument, sheathed swords for, 
503. 

of wit, Dlentiful, Hi. 
Lacked and lost, being, 801. 
Lack-lustre eye, looking with, 791. 
Ladder, of our vices, frame a. 399. 

young ambition's, lowliness is, 799. 
Ladies like variegated tulips show, 723. 

whose eyes rain influence, 786. 
Lady doth protest too much, 207. 

here comes the, li5. 

so richly clad ai she, 721. 
Lady's in the case, when a, 133.. 
Lagtcard in love, dastard in war, 175. 
Lagi5 t.ie veteran on the stage, 80i. 
Lamb, no flock but one dead, 272. 
Lame and impotent conclusion, 723. 
Lamely and unfashionable, so, 938. 
Lamenting, he was left 339. 
Lamps shone o'er fair women, 511. 
Lancastrian, and turn, there, 123. 
Lances, glittering, are the loom, 510. 
Laud, deil damnation round the, 370. 

ill fares the, to ills a prey, 687. 

leans against the, ocean, 632. 

of bondage came, out from the, 372. 

of brown heath and wood, 575. 

of drowsyhed, 831. 

of just and old renown, 603. 

of the free home of the brave, 593. 

o' the leal, 295. 

of the mountain and the flood, 575. 

they love their, 603. 

this delightful, 206, i90. 

where the cypress and myrtle, 451. 

where sorrow is unknown, .348. 
Landlady and Tam grew gracious, 847. 
Landlord's laugh was ready chorus, 847. 
Lands, envv of less happier, 603. 

lord ot liir.iself thoughnot of, 737. 
Lamlscape, darkened, i9i. 

love is like a, 204. 

T>'hen will the, tire the view, 444, 
Landsmen, list ye, all to me, 628. 
Language, Chatham's, his tongue, 575. 

nature's end of, is declined, 803. 

no, but aciy, 302. 

O that those lips had, 92. 

quaint and olden, spake in, 494. 
Lap, drop into thy mother 's, 310. 

me in delight, 814. 

me in soft Lydian airs, 786. 

of earth, here rests his head on, 307. 

of Thetis sun in the, 490. 
Lapland night, lovely as a, 311. 
Lards the lean earth, 723. 
Lxr.ije his ijoimty, his soul sincere, 307. 
Lai'k at heaven's gate sing.s, 474. 

crow sings sweetly as the, 496. 

no, more blithe than he, 559. 

rise with the, 495. 
Las ;, drink to the, let the toast pass, 131. 

pL'uniless, wi' a lang pedigree, 300. 
Lasses, then she made the 191. 
Last and best of God's works, 216. 

at his cross earliest at liis grave, 795. 

not least in love 130. 

pleased to tlie, crops flowery food, 496. 

rose of hiimaier, 'tis the, 405. 

scene of aU, 711. 

syllable of ;-oco;-ded time, 792. 

to lay th3 old : .side, 800. ■ ^ 

words of Mar,nion, 510. "i 

Late, choosing and beginning, 204. 
Liiti;d traveller, now spurs apace, 491. 
Latin, small, and less Greek, 905. 
Laud than gilt o'erdusted, more, 811. 
Laugh a siege to scorr., 540. 

an atheist's, is a poor exchange, 395. 

that spokj the vacant mind, 688. 

sans intermisdon, 810. 

sincere, the long loud, 673. 

landlord's, was ready chorus, 847. 

where we must, 807. 
Laughed his word to scorn, 395. 
Laughing, were't not for, I should pity 
him, 732. 

you hear that boy, 979. 
Laughs at lovers' perjuries, Jove, 207. 

fair, the morn, 108. 
Laughter holding both his sides, 785. 
Lave her liM->b-i where nothing hid, 720. 
Law, do as r.,d\'ersaries do in. 121. 

l.iwk'ss science of our, 810. 

order is noaven'.i fir.st, 812. 

rich men i-ulu t'le, 810. 

so'ereign, statr.'s collected will, 599. 

these nieci sharp quillets of the, 809. 
I.aw'3 delay, 297. 



Lawn, saint in crape twice a in, 812. 

sun upon the upland, 306. 
Laws, curse on all, 215. 

for little folk aie made, 810. 

give his Jittle senate, 602, 910. 

giind the poor, 809. 

household, religion breathing, 814.. 

impartial, wei-e given, 910. 

judge i of the facts and the, 810. 

like cobwebs in all ag-es, 810. 

or kings can cause or cure, 807. 
Lawyers are met, 723. 
Lay, fi-aining of a deathless, 70. 

go forth my simple, 807. 

me down to sleep, now 1, 107. 

on Macdutf, 540. 
Lazy lolling sort, 724. 
Lea, standing on this pleasant, 403. 

herd wind.i slowly o'er the, 305. 
Lead, fins of, swims with, 813. 
Leads to bewilder, 737. 
Leaf has perished in the green, thy, 309. 

my days are in the yellow, 250. 

sear the yellow, fallen into the, 794. 

upon the stream, vain as, 813. 
Leafy month of June, 858. 

since summer first was, 271. 

since summer ti-ees were, 138. 
Lean and hungry look, Cassius has 723. 

and slippered pantaloon, 711. 

fellows beats all conquerore, 308. 
Leap into this angry flood, 670. 

easy, to pluck bi'ight honor, 670. 

look ere thou, see ei-e thou go, 214. 
Leaps the live thunder, 686. 
Learn to labor and to wait, 770. 
Learned Chaucer, lie more nigh to, 939. 

doctor's spite, love the wed in, 814. 

length, words of, and thundeiing 
souud, 088. 

to dance, move easiest who have. 806. 
Learning, enough of, to misqxiote, 804. 

haunts the breast where, lies, 805. 

little, is a dangerous thing, 805. 

Ijve he bore to, was in fault, 688. 

some on scraps of, dote, 804. 

whence is thy, 804. 
Leather, feet through faithless, 347. 

or pi-unelia, 781. 
Leave not a rack behind, 867. 
Leaves, ending on the rustling,787. 

have their time to fall, 308. 

of destiny, in shady, 192. 

of iiope, puts forth the tender, 32L 

of memory, seem to make, 801. 

on trees, race of man like, 792. 

thick as autumnal, that strow, 494. 

words ai-e like, 803. 
Leer, assent with civil, 910. 
Lees, the mere, is left, 346. 
Left blooming alone, 465. 
Legends old, asleep in Jap of, 177. 
Leisure, repent at, married iu haste, 214. 

retiied, that in trim gai dens, 786. 
Lend, lend your wings, 365. 
Lender, neither boi'rower noi\ be, 121. 
Length, drags its slow, along, 806. 
Lengthening chain, drags a, 248. 
Leper, room for the, 701. 
Lerne, gladly wolde.he, 697. 
I^ss, beautifully, fine by degrees, 721. 

happier lands, envy of, 603. 

than land, more than km and, 734. 
Let, she must be dearly, or let alone, 314. 

dogs delight to bark and bite, 103. . 

the toast pass, here's to the lass, 131 

us do or die, 57.3. 
Lettei's Cadmus gave, you have the, 581. 
Letting dare not wait upon I would, 800. 
Level, so sways she, 215. 
Levere have at his bcddes heed, 696. 
Lexicon of youth fate reserves, 802. 
Liar, doubt truth to be a, 200. 
Libertine like a puffed reckless, 809. 

the air a chartered, is still, 723. 
Liberty, I must have, withal, 603. 

is in every blow, 673. 

when they cry, 601. 
Liberty's latest daughter, 604. 
Library was dukedom large enough, 305. 
License they mean, they cry liberty, 601. 
Lick absurd pomp, candied tongue, 111. 
Licks the dust, pride that, 910. 

the hand just raised, 496. 
Lids of Juno's eyes, 495. 

unsullied wich a tear, 816. 

veiled, 308. 
Lie beneath the churchyard stone, 309. 

still and slumber, hush my dear, 76. 

to credit his own, 797. 
Lies to hide it, makes it two, 395, 
Life a weary pilgrimage, 793, 

calamity of so long, 297. 

dreai'y intercourse of daily, 404. 

elysian, suburb of the, 272. 

fie upon this .single, 232. 

from high, high characters, 812. 



Life, good man's, be.st portion of a, 404. 

guardian angel o'er his, 212. 

harp of, love took up the, 255. 

hath quicksands, snares, 104. 

his noblest strain, 156. 

idea of her, 801. 

in every limb, feels its, 87. 

is a fort, 900. 

is a jest, and all things show it, 792. 

is all a cheat, 793. 

is but a means unto an end, 742, 

is but a span, 308. 

is but a walliing shadow, 792. 

is but an empty di'eam, 769. 

is in decrease, 308. 

loathed worldly, weariest most, 347. 

love of, increased with years, 756. 

many-colored, each change of, 905. 

May of, is fallen into the sear, 794. 

new, into dull matter, 108. 

nor love thy, nor hate, 794. 

nothing in his, became him, 309. 

o'er all the ills o', victorious, 848. 

of care, weep away the, 317. 

of mortal breath but a suburb, 273. 

of the building, 900. 

on the ocean wave, 630. 

organ of her, every lovely, 801. 

rounded with a sleep, 867. 

set my, upon a cast, 802. 

she was his, 765. 

slave of, thonght's the, 792. 

slits the tliin-spun, blind fui-y, 812. 

story of my, ciuestioned me the, 145. 

siuiset of, gives mystical lore, 574. 

sweat under a weai'y, grunt and, 297. 

tedious as a twice-told tale, 799. 

that dares send a challengej 193. 
Life, tills our, finds tongues, 489. 

time's fool, 793. 

variety's the very spice of, 815. 

voyage of, bound in shallows, 803. 

walks of virtuous, beyond the, 309. 

was In the right. 398. 

went a-maying, 108. 

we've been long together, 304. 

web of our, 793. 

wheels of weary, 309. 

while there's, there's hope, 347, 794. 

whole of, to live, 311. 

wine of, is drawn, 345. ■ 

you take my, 347. 
Life's common way, travel on, 907. 

dull round, whoe'er travelled, 121. 

fitful fever, sleeps well after, 311. 

great end, life long that answers, 794. 

morning march, 529. 

vast ocean, diversely we sail on, 793. 

woret ills, ill cure for, 348. 

young day, lure of, 242. 
Lift her with care, 335. 
Light as air, trifles, 207. 

awakes the world, 490. 

dim religious , casting a dim, 787. 

excess of, blasted with, 939. 

fantastic toe, tiip it on the, 785. 

gates of, unbarred the, 490. 

hail holy, 407. 

leads up t >, out of hell, S95. 

of a d;u-k eye in woman, 686. 

of common day, fade into the, 758. 

of Hope, leave behmd, 800. 

of love the purity i f grace, 133. 

of other days,memory biings the,318. 

of setting suns, dwelling is the, 404. 

of truth, thy bondman in the, 797. 

purple, of love, 205. 

put out the, 900. 

swift- winged arrows of, 739. 

that lies iu woman's eyes, 203. 

that visits these sad eyes, 206. 

teach, to counterfeit a gloom, 787. 

uuconsuming flie of, 867. 

unveiled her peerless, 413. 

within his own clear breast, 796. 
Lightly draws its bi-eath, child that, 87. 
Lightning and the gale, 620. 

does the will of God, 604. 

in the collied night, 250. 
Lightnings, rending, r.age, 494. 
Lights, godfathers of, heaven's, 804. 

that do mislead the morn, 263, 
Like angels' Wsits, 347, 396. 

I shall not look upon his, again, 721. 
Lilies, in twisted braids of, knitthig, 809, 
Lily, to paint the, 726. 
Limb, feels its life in every, 87, 
Limit of becoming mirth within the, 724, 
Luie dying he could wish to blot, 806. 

too Labors, tho words move slow, 806. 
Lineaments of gospell books, 904. 
Linen you're wearing out. It's not, 338, 
Lines, and outwa d air, 711. 

dry desert of a thousand, 807. 

let a lord own the happy, 81?. 

where beauty Imgers, 303. 
Lingering look behind, one longing, 306. 



e 






[& 



INDEX OP POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1047 



a 



Linked sweetness long drawn otit, 788. 
Linnets sing, pipe br.t as the, P.07. 
Lion, beai-d the, in his den, 6i8. 

hind mated by the, 243. 

p.xwing to f i-ee his hinder parts, i9G. 

to rouse a, blood more stir?, 670. 
Lions, winged, marble piles, 7S0. 

two, littered in one day, 890. 
Lip or a coral, admires, 141. 

pretty redness on his, 145. 

reproof on her, smile i'-i her eye, 107. 
Lips, had language, O that those, 03. 

heart on her, 721. 

of Julia, pointed to the, 134. 

poisoned cli^lice to our own, 800. 

severed, with sugar breath, 1"'2. 

smile on her, a tear in her ej-e, 17G. 

soul through my, drew my, 205. 

stooped to the, in misery, 345. 

ta'.ie those, away, 263. 

tlrit are for othei-s, 315. 

that he has pressed, 323. 

truth from his, prevailed, 683. 

were red, and one was thin, 211. 

where my Julia's, do smile, 134. 

whispering with wh te, the foe, 511. 
Liquefaction of her clothes, 126. 
Liquid notes portend success, 496. 
Liquor, he's yet some, left, 811. 
Lisped in numbers for the numbers 

came, 107. 
List of friends, enter on my, 782. 
Litel go'd in cofre, 606. 
Littered iu one day, two lions, 899. 
Little, go far with, 559. 

learning is a dangerous thing, 805. 

man wants but, 139, 794. 

month, a, 207. 

more than a little is too mxich, 815. 

more than kin, less than kind, 724. 

said is soonest mended, 80.3. 

senate laws, give his, 602, 910. 

thing, to give a cup of water, 770. 
Live in hearts we leave behind, 78:'. 

in pleasure when I live In Thee, 79-4. 

not iu myself, 493. 

past yL*ars again, none would, 793. 

taught us how to, 911. 

till t.i-niorrow, the darkest day, 793. 

unblemished, or die unknown, 811. 

unseen l:nkno^\^l, thus let me, 225. 

well what thou liv'st, 794. 

while you live, 794. 

■\rish to, when he should die, 900. 

with thee and be thy love, 158. 

with them is far less sweet, 248. 

without cooks, 814. 
Lived and loved, Ijetter to have, 207. 

to-day, do thy worst, I have, 793. 
Livelier iris, in the spring a, 254. 
Lively to sevei'c, gi'ave to gay, 911. 
Liveried angels lat-ky her, 796. 
Livers, humble, in content, 347. 
Livery of heaven, stole the, 797. 

shadowed, of the sun, 723. 

sober, all things clad in her, 413. 
Lives along the line, 496. 

like a drunken sailor on a mast, 722. 

most, who thinks most, 742. 

of groat men all i-emind us, 770. 

other lieights in other, ,399. 

sublime, we can make our, 770. 
Living, dead man, 722. 

no, with thee or without, 724. 
Lo ! the p II!- Indian, 399. 
Load, lite '.hou art a, a galling, .345. 

wring uii'ier tiie. ot sorrow, ,345. 
IjOan ott loses both itself and friend, 121. 
Loatli to die, wandering on as, 809. 
Loathe the taste of sweetness, 815. 
Loathed worldly life is a paradise, 317. 
Lob.-;ter boiled, like a, 490. 
Loi-al habitation and a name, 867. 
Locked up from mortal eye, 192. 

up in steel, naked tho', 796. 
Locks, hyacintliine, hung clustering, 711. 

knotted and combined, 725. 

never shake thy gorj', at me, 868. 

played with his hoary, 919. 

pluck up drowned honor by the, 670. 

those curious, so aptly twined, 203. 
Lodge a friend, handsome house to, 131. 

in some vast wilderness, O for a, 593. 

thee by Clia.uccr, 905. 
Lofty and sour, 723. 
Lonely, I am very, now Mary, 293. 

so, 'tv/as that God himself, 850. 
I;Onesome road, like one on a, 858. 
Long choosing and beginning late, 204. 

lias it waved on high, 620. 

is the way and hard out of hell, 3S5. 

love me little love me, 141, 207. 

may it wave, ,592. 
Long-drawn aisle and fretted vault, 306. 
Longing after immortality, this, 759. 

and yet afraid to die, 345. 

lingering look behind, 306. 



Longing, wavering sooner lost and won, 

£15. 
Look, dim the sweet, nature wears, 490. 

ere th.ou leap see ere thou go, 214. 

give me a, give me a face, 713. 

lean and huiigi-y, Cassius lias a, 722. 

longing lingeiing, nor cast one, 306. 

men met with erected, 725. 

on her face, you'll forget them, 128. 

upon his like again, 721. 

upon this pictiu-e and on this, 721. 
Looked on bettei' days, if you have, 347. 

unutterable things, 204. 
Looking before and after, 808. 

ill prevail, will, 263. 

well can't move her, 263. 
Looks commercing with the skies, 786. 

in the clouds scorning the, 799. 

puts on pretty, repeats his words, 107. 

the cottage might adorn, 090. 

through nature up to God, SOS. 

with despatchful, she turns, 233. 
Looped and windowed raggeduess, 494. 
Looi>holes of retreat, 810. 
Lord, gloiT of the coining of the, 591. 

of all things, yet a prey to all, 733. 

of himself, 346, 737. 

of the unerring bow, 726. 

of the workes of nature, 489. 

of thy presence ond no land, 346. 

once own tlie happy lines, let a, 812. 
Lord's anointed temple, broke ope, 900. 
Lords of hell, procuress to the, 397. 

of humankind pass by, 603. 

of the -visionary eye, 868. 
Lore, grandsire skilled in gestic, 2,32. 
Lcse it that do buy it with care, 803. 
Loss of the sun, tears of the sky for, 491. 

of wealth is loss of dirt, 317. 
Losses and crosses be lessons severe, 348. 
Lost, count that day, 398. 

in the sweets, fly tliat sips is, 205. 

1 raising what is, makes dear, 312. 

what tliough the field be, 540. 

woman that deliberates is, 796. 
Loud, cui'ses not, but deep, 794. 

huzzas, stupid starers and, 781. 

laugh spoke the vacant mind, 683. 
Love a bright particular star, 242. 

again and be again undone. 796. 

a humble low-boi'n thing, 215. 

alas for, if thou art all o' earth, 311. 

all, is sweet, 206. 

all made of sighs and tears, 201. 

a thing to walk with, 215. 

beggarly in, that's reckoned, 206. 

begins to sicken and decay, 206. 

bow before thine altar, I, 203. 

but her for evev, 233, 242. 

but love in vain, pain to, 204. 

but one day, I dearly, 198. 

can hope, reason would despair, 204. 

celestial harmony of hearts, 206. 

change old, for ne\'', 207. 

comely, bashful sincerity and, 20-4. 

common as light, 203. 

could teach a monarch, 397. 

course of true, 260. 

deep as first, wild with regret, 315. 

divine all love excelling, 393. 

ecstasy of, tliis is the very, 203. 

endures no tie, 207. 

everlasting, etern.al joy, 133. 

expelled by other love, 206. 

fervent, not ungovernable, 206. 

fire of, quench with woi-ds, 203. 

first invented veree, 204. 

flowers and fruits of, 250. 

free as air, spreads his wings, 215. 

freedom in my, if I have, 147. 

friendship burns with one, 120. 

harvest-time of, is there, 20i;. 

he bore learning wa.s in fault, 688. 

idly burns as fire in antique urns, 205. 

in a hut, 205. 

iu heavenly spirits to creature's 
face, 373. 

inly touch of, 203. 

innocence of, dallies with the, 205. 

is a boy by poets styled, 103. 

is all she loves, 796. 

is blind and lovers cannot sec, 203. 

is flower-like, 120. 

is iieaven and heaven is love, 203. 

is indestructible, 200. 

is like a landscape, 204. 

is like a red red rose, 234. 

is not love which alters, 208. 

laggaid in, 175. 

last not least in, 120. 

let thy, be younger than thyself, 215. 

levels all ranks, 203. 

light and calm thoughts, 7.39. 

liglit of, the purity of grace, 133. 

looks not with the eyes, 203. 

me little love me long, 141, 207. 

mighty pain to, it is, 201, 



Love, more, or more disdain, 144. 

more than, we, 711. 

mounts the warrior's steed, 2C2. 

music be the food of, play on it, 808. 

never told her, she, 251. 

now wlio never loved, let those, 207. 

O, O fire, once he drew, £05. 

of life Inci'eased with years, 756. 

of love, 807. 

cf nature, him who in the, 307. 

of prai e howc'cr concealed, 810. . 

of the turtle, 451. 

of v.'ome'i, alas the, 203. 

oSce and ad'; irs cf, ICI. 

on through all ills, till they die, 203. 

pains of, be sv.'eeter far, 145. 

pangs of despised, £97. 

pity melts the niir.d to, 772. 

IJity sv.-ells the tide of, 7S4. ) 

pleasant enough to, you, 204. 

prove likewise v.aiiable, 207. 

purjjle light of, 2:}5. 

reckons hours f cr months, 248. 

itilcs the court. Hie camp, 203. 

scorns degi-ecs, ICS. 

seals of, but sealed in vain, 263. 

seldom haunts the breast, 805. 

sidelong looks of, 6C7. 

silence in, bewrays more woe, 204. 

smiles are of, the food, £04. 

soft eyes looked, 611. 

sought is good. 205. 

spi iiig of, 492, £57. 

such, as spirits feel, 206. 

sweetest joy wildest woe, 204. "i 

that took an eai'iy root, 271. 

thee dear so much, could not, 235. ' 

thyself last, n£2. • 

to hatred turned, no rage like, 207. 

too much, who, hate, 207. 

took up the harp of lire, 255. 

tunes the shepherd's reed, 202. 

who quake to say they love, 144. 

who can show his, loves lightly, 204. 

Vihom none can, none thank, 797. 

woman's ^^■hole existence, 795. 

worthy of your, he will seem , 205. 
Love's devoted flame, it I nicntio!). 121. 

pro])er hue, celestial rosy red, 203. 

sensual empiric, 135. 

young dream, nothing so sweet, 262. 
Loved and lost, betrer to have, .311. 

and still lovts, 311. 

at first sight, who loved but, 203. 

but one, sighed to many, 134. 

I not honor more, 235. 

in vain, I onlj' knov/- we, 238. 

me fertile dangers I had passed, 145. 

needs only to be seen, to be, .393. 

not wisely but too well, 724. 

sae blindly sae kindly, 233. 

v.'ho never, before, 207. 
Lovelier face, finer f oi'in or, 721. 

things have mercy shown, 267. 
Loveliest, last still, till 'tis gone, 490. 

of lovely things are they, 309. 
Loveliness, confess the majesty of, 720, 
Lovely and a fearful thing, 203. 

in deoth the beauteous I'uin lay, 794. 

in your strength, strong yet, u'S6. 

Thais sits beside thee, 772. 
Lover and the poet, the lunatic, 800. 

happy as a, 539. 

in the husband lost, 214. 

loves her, in fii'st passion, 796. 

of the good old school, 795. 

sighing like furnace. 711. 

to listening ina.id might breathe, 494. 
Lovers have such seething brains, SOG. 

love the western star, 491. 

make two, happy. 205. 

seats for whispering, made,6.''6. 
Lovers' absent hours more tedious, 248. 

hours are long, 205. 

Jove laughs at, perjuries, 207. 

vows seem sweet, hour when, 491. 
Loves, nobler, and nobler cares, 42. 

to do and loves good he does, 720. 
Love-sick air, wantons with the, 133. 
Loving to my mother, so, 200. 
Low laid in my grave, would I were, 348. 
Lower, he that is down can fall no, 347. 
Lowering element scowls. 494. 
Lowest deep, a lower deep in the, 390. 

of your thi'ong, 813. 
Lowing herd winds o'er the lea, .305. 
Lowliness yonng ambition's ladder, 799. 
Lowly born, better to be, .347. 
Lucent syi-ops tinct with cimiamon, 179. 
Lucifer, falls like, 321. 
Luclc about the house, there's nae, 246. 

in odd numbers says Ilory O More, 
197. 
Lunatic lover and the poet, 806. 
Lungs began to crow, 810. 
Lus in man, no charm can tame, 811. 

of gold, ring out the narrowing, 752. 



U^ 



& 



r fl' * 



1048 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



n 



Lustre, shine with such, as the tear, SOS- 
Lute, lascivious pleasing of a, 5il. 
Luve of life's young day, 212. 
Luve's like a red red rose, 23i. 

like the melodie, 234. 
Luxury curst by Heaven's decrees, 690. 

of doing good, learn the, 398. 
Lydi.in airs, lap me in soft, 7S6. 

measures, softly sweet in, 772. 
Lvrc, employed her h.eaven-taught', 806. 

the living, waked to ecstasy, 308. 

Macbeth does murder sleep, 883. 
Macdulf , lay on, damned be him, 540. 
JIad, an undevout astronomer is, 403. 
Madden to crime, melt into sorrow, 451. 
Madding crowd's ignoble strife, 303. 
Made glorious summer, winter, 641. 
Madness, that fine, he did retain, 933. 

gi-eat wits to, near ElUed, 909. 

lies that way, 348. 

melancholy and moon-struck, 346. 

moody, laughing wild, £99. 

to defer, be wise to-day 'tis, 748. 
Madrigals, melodious birds sing, 157. 
Magic casements, charmed, 317. 

numbers and persuasive sound, 809. 

of a name, power of grace the, 810. 

of the mind, 813. 

potent over sun and star, 203. 
Magnificent and awful cause, 575. 
Magnificently stern array, battle's, 512. 
Maid, sweetest garland to sweetest, 134. 

music heavenly, was young, 773. 

music sphere-descended, 774. 

of Athens ere we part, 234. 

sidelong kiss snatched from, 672. 

who modestly conceals, 795. 

whom there were, none to praise, 104. 
Maid-pale peace, complexion of her, 541. 
Maiden meditation fancy free, in, 820. 

of bashful fifteen, here's to the, 131. 

orbed, with white fire laden, 822. 

shame, her blush of, 494. 

with the meek brown eyes, 104. 

young heart of a, is stolen, 205. 
Maidens, fairer than smiles of other, 138. 

like moths are caught by glare, 215. 
Maids, fairest of the i-ural, 130. 

in modesty say no, 795. 
Main, sidms along the, 806. 
Majesty of loveliness, confess the, 720. 

rayleas, night in, 491. 

rising in clouded, 413. 

this earth of, 603. 

want love's, rudely stamped and, 938. 

with obSEquious, approved, 209. 
Make the angels weep, tricks as, 813. 
Maker, adores the, loves his work, 135. 
Makes one kind, fellow-feeling, 804. 
Making beautiful old rhyme, beauty, 122. 

the green— one red, 883. 
Maladye, knew the cause of every, 809. 
Malice domestic, foreign levy, 311. 

set down aught in, nor, 724. 

to conceal, couched with revenge, 
896. 
Mammon, the least erected spirit, 803. 

wins his v.'ay, 215. 
Man, ambition of a private, fill the, 575. 

apparel oft proclaims the, 722. 

as a dying, to dying men, 395. 

as just a, thou art e'en. 111. 

assurance of a, to give the world, 731. 

before your mother, strive to be, 107. 

better spared a better, 313. 

breathes there the, with soul so dead, 
663. 

broken with the storms of state, 346. 

child is father of the, 432. 

childhood shows the, 107. 

complete, hero and tlie, 539. 

dai-e do all that may become a, 800. 

delights not me nor woman, 340. 

despised old, poor weak, 346. 

diapason closing full in, 775. 

die Detter, how can, 567. 

drest in a little brief authority, 813. 

dull ear of a drowsy, vexing the, 799. 

dying, to dying men, 395. 

extremes in, to general use, 799. 

fittest place where, can die, 602. 

gently scan youi- brother, 784. 

good easy, when he thinks, 321. 

good great, 739. 

goodliest, of men since born, 712. 

half part of a blessed, 333. 

happy, is without a shirt, 347. 

liighest style of. Christian is the, 399. 

honest and a perfect, 793. 

honest, the noblest work of God, 780. 

how poor a thing is, 808. 

I am cros.sed with adversity, 345. 

impious in a good, to be sad, 348. 

in the bush with God may meet, 744. 

in wit a, .simplicity a child, 724. 

is liis own star, 793. 



Man is one world, and hath another, 792. 

is the gowd for a' that, 341. 

is v-le, only, 395. 

let no such, be trusted, 776. 

life of, is less than a span, 330. 

like to a little kingdom, state of, 900. 

lust in, no charm can tame, 811. 

made her such a, wished heaven, 145. 

made the town, 672. 

makes his own stature, 398. 

marks the earth with ruin, 607. 

may range the court, 796. 

mind's the standard of the, 808. 

never is but always to bo blest, 801. 

of mettle, grasp it like a, 800. 

of wisdom is the man of years, 794. 

of wit and social eloquence, 940. 

pendulum 'twixt smile and tear, 792. 

plays many parts in his time, 711. 

press not a falling, too far, 345. 

proud, drest in brief authority, 813. 

recovered of the bite, 949. 

remote from, with God, 399. 

sadder and a wiser, 860. 

scene of, expatiate o'er this, 793. 

60 bisy a, as he, 697. 

so various that he seemed to be, 909. 

sorrows of a poor old, 340. 

spirit of, is divine, 451. 

struggling in the storms of fate, 602. 

study of maidcind is, 793. 

take him for all in all, he was a, 721. 

that hails you Ti,m or Jack, 121. 

that hath a tongue is no man, 133. 

that hath no music in himself, 776. 

that is not passion's slave, 113. 

that meddles with cold iron, 640. 

the hermit sighed, 304. 

this is the state of, 321. 

to all the country dear, 688. 

to dying men, preached as dying, 395. 

to mend, never made work for, 671. 

vile, that mourns, 394. 

wants but little, 139, 794. 

ways of God to, 807. 

well-bred, will not affront me, 780. 

what can an old, do but die, 322. 

where he dies for, fittest place is, 602. 

where is the, who has not tried, ."95. 

while, is growing life is in decrease, 
308. 

whose wish and care, happy the, 225. 

with soul so dead, 563. 

without woman, is but half, 232. 

worth makes the, 781. 
Man's best things are nearest, 741. 

erring judgment, blind, 799. 

first disobedience and the fi-uit,395. 

illusion given, fleeting show for, 399. 

ingratitude, not so uiilcind as, 316. 

inhumanity to man, 332. 

love is of life a thing apart, 795. 

most dark extremity, M8. 

true touchstone, calamity is, S43. 

unconquerable mind, 922. 

wickedness, method in, 395. 
Mane, laid my hand upon thy, 607. 

rampant shakes his brinded, 496. 
Manhood better than his verse, 56. 
Manldnd, all, is one of these two cow- 
ards, 900. 

all think their little set, 812. 

proper study of, is man, 792. 

seduces all, 'tis woman that, 79.5. 

subdues, surpasses or, 812. 

wisest bi-ightest meanest of, 938. 
Mankind's concern, charity, 39S. 

epitome, not one but all, 909. 

wonder, she's my delight all, 134. 
Manliness of grief, silent, 690. 
Manly foe, give me the, 121. 
Manna, though his tongue dropped, 734. 
Manner born, to the, 814. 
Manners, catch, living as they rise, 807. 

in the face, saw the, 940. 

of, gentle of affections mild, 734. 

with fortunes humors with climes, 
814. 
Mantle, o'er the dark her silver, 413. 
Many made for one, faith of, 397. 

who depend on, 131. 
Many-colored life, each change of, 905. 
Many-headed monster, 804, 813. 
Mar what's well, striving to better, 802. 
Marathon looks on the sea, 580. 

mountains look on, 580. 
Marble, sleep in dull cold, 321. 

wastes the statue grows, 809. 

with his name, never mark, 797. 
Marbles, mossy, rest on lips he prest, 323. 
Mai'cellus exiled feels more joy, 781. 
March, beware the Ides of, 899, 

droghte of, 695. 

is o'er the mountain waves, 629. 

life's, when my bosom was yoimg, 529. 

stormy, has come, 492. 

truth's majestic, 602. 



Mai-ch winds of, with beauty take, 495. 
Marches, our dreadful, 541. ■ 

funeral, to the grave, 770. 
Mariners of England, that guard, 639. 
Mark, death loves a shining, 309. 

the archer little meant, 803. 

the marble with his name, 797. 
Marmion, last words of, 510. 
Marriage of true minds, impediments to 

the, 208. 
Marriage-bell, all went meri-y as a, 511. 
Married in haste repent at leisure, 214. 

to immortal verse, 7S6, 806. 
Marrowless, thy bones are, 868. 
Marry, proper time to, 215. 
Mai-s, eye like, to tlireaten, 721. 

this seat of, 603. 
Marshall'st me the way, 883. 
Martial cloak around him, with his, 920. 

swashing and a, outside, 722. 
Martyr, fall'st a blessed, 323. 
Mary-buds, winking, begin to ope, 474. 

yet so shadowy, 493. 
Mast, bends the gallant, 626. 

drunken sailor on a, like a, 722. 
Master a grief, every one can, 345. 

sure the eternal, found , 395. 
Master-passion in the breast, 799. 
Master-piece, confusion made h s, 900. 

natui-e's chief is writing well, 806. 
Mastei's, men are, of their fates, 793. 
Mate, when Eve was given for a, 232. 

man walked there without a, 813. 
Mated by the lion, hind, 242. 
Matin bell knells us back, 308. 

.chows the, to be near, 490. 
Matter and copy of the father, 107. 

Berkeley said there was no, 808. 

wrecks of, and crush of worlds, 759. 
Maturest counsels perplex and dash, 734. 
Man, blessed his, 899. 
Maxim in the schools, 'tis an old, 810. 
Maxims, with a little hoard of, 256. 
Mnj, firet pledge of blithesome, 495. 

flowery meads in, 193. 

I be there to see, 963. 

merry month of, 480, 492. 

of life is fallen mto the sear,'794. 

propitious, 496. 

queen o' the, I'm to be, 327. 

wol have no slogardie, 492. 
Maying, life went a, 108. 
May-time and the cheerful dawn, 138. 
Maze; mighty, not without a p an, 792. 

mirthful, children through the, 2.32, 
Mazes, in wand 'ring, lost, 808. 
Meadows biown and sear, 466. 

trim with daisies pied, 785. 

unseen, newly mown, 807. 
Meads in May, flowery, 193. 
Mean, holds fa;-t the golden, 815. 
Meaner beauties of the night, 124. 
Meanest flower that blows can give, 759. 

floweret of the vale, 489. 

of mankind, wisest brightest, 939. 

thing that feels, soitow of the, 662. 
Means appliances and to boot, 76.3. 

greatness and goodness not, 739. 

to do ill deeds, sight of, 815. 

unto an end, life is but a, 743. 

whereby I live, you do take the, 347. 
Measu]-e your mind's height, 808. 
Measured by my soul, I must be, 803. 

]5hrase, choice word and, 807. 
Measures, marches to delightful, 541. 

in short, life may perfect be, 729. 

Lydian, softly sweet in, 772. 

not men my mai-k, 813. 
Meat, God sendcth both mouth and, 394. 

I cahnot eat but little, 946. 

mak the, it feeds on, 207. 
■^or arink, one's poison, another's, 815. 
Meccas of the mind, 917. 
Mechanic slaves with greasy aprons, 722. 
Meddles with cold iron, man th.at, 540. 
Mede, floures in the, 462. 
Medicinalegum, Arabian trees their, 735. 
Medicine, misei-.nble have no other, 347. 
Meditation, maiden, fancy free, 836. 
Meiiium knows, friencishipno cold, 130. 
Meek nature's evening comment, 491. 
Meek-eyed Morn mother of dews, 490. 
Meet in lier aspect and her eyes, 130. 

thee like a pleasant thought, 495. 

nurse for a poetic child, 575. 
Meets the ear, more is meant than, 787. 
Melancholy days are come, 466. 

green and yellow, 351. 

Kindly mood of, 725. 

mai'ked him for her own, 307. 

moping, moon-struck madness, S46. 

most musical most, 786. 

sweetest, 315. 

waste, ocean's gray and, 307. 
Mellow, indeed is too, for nie, 205. 
Mellowed to that tender light, 130. 
Melodye, smale fowles maken, 695. 



U- 



^ 



[& 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



--a 



1049 



Melodies, heard, are sweet, 718. 

of morn, 109. 

thou.sand, unheard before, 213. 
Melodious birds sing madrigals, 157. 

sound, eftsoons they heard, 829. 
Melrose, fair, if thou would'st view, 675. 
Meltand dispvlye spectre doubts, 713. 

that this too solid flesk would, 311. 
Melted into thin air, 867. 
Melting mood, albeit unused to the, 725. 
Melts the mind to love, pity, 772. 
Memory, dear sou of, heir of fame, 903. 

fantasies throng into my, 830. 

fond, brings the light, 318. 

from the table of my, 801. 

graves of, wet with unseen tears, il6. 

holds a seat in this globe, 801. 

leaves of, seemed to make, 801. 

like a drop wore my heart, 218. 

made such a sinner of his, 797. 

meek Walton's heavenly, 903. 

music vibrates in the, 776. 

pluck from, a rooted sorrow, Si7. 

silent shore of, deposited upon, SOI. 

wakes the bitter, of what he was, S96. 
Men, all honorable, 875. 

and women merely players, 711. 

are April when they woo, 21i. 

best of, was a sufferer, 723. 

busy hum of, 786. 

but children of larger growth, 107. 

callen daisies in our town, 462. 

cradled into poetry by wrong, 806. 

crowd of common, death calls to, 303. 

e■^^l that, do lives after them, 87d. 

friendless bodies of unburied,495. 
from cheerful ways of, cut oS, i07. 
Jiappy breed of, 603. 
have lost their reason, 876. 
impious, bear sway, 601. 
in busy companies of, 719. 
justify the ways of God to, 395. 
like butterflies, 121. 
lives of gi-eat, all x-emind us, 770. 
masters of their fates, 793. 
may come and men may go, 466. 
measures not, been my mark, 813. 
met each other with erected look, 725. 
must work women must Aveep, 621. 
my brothers men the workers, 253. 
of other minds, 632. 
of wit condescend to take a bit, 810. 
onlv disagi-ee of creatures rational, 

roach of ordinary, above the, 807. 

rich, r.ilo the law, 809. 

rise oil stepping stones of selves, 399. 

roll of commo;i, I am not in the, 812. 

rule of, entirely great, 805. 

Echeme,=! of mice and, best laid, 468. 

Ehame to, devil with devil, 815. 

such, are dangerous, 722. 

suspect your tale untrue, 805. 

talk only to conceal their mind, 804 

tastes of, such and so various, 814. 

this blunder, in, 813. 

tidi3 in the affairs of, 802. 

tongues of dying, enforce, 310. 

twelve honest, have decided, 810. 

two strong, not, could raise, 794. 

ways of, far from cities and, 489. 

■were deceivers ever, 271. 

who their duties know, 599. 
Men's office to speak patience, 345. 
Mended, little said is soonest, 803. 
Mends their morals, 107. 
Menial, pampered, drove mo, 340. 
Mentions hell to ears polite, never, 396 
Mercie unto others show, 398 
Mercury can rise, Venus sets ere, 805. 

like feathered, rise. 671. 

station like the herald, 721 
Mercy ever hope to have, can he, 393 

I to others show, show to me, 370. 

13 nobility's true badge, 798. 

quality of, is not strained, 798. . 

lovelier things have, shown, 267 

of a rude stream, 321. 

seasons justice, 798. 

shut the gates of, on mankind, 30G 
temper justice with, 394. 
Meridian of my glory, that full, 346. 
Merit raised to that bad eminence 722 

spurns that patient, takes, 297 

wins the soul, 203. 
Merits, careless their, or their faults to 
scan, 688. 
to disclose, no farther seek his, 307 
Mermaid, things done at the, 939. 
Meri-y as a marriage-bell, all M'ent, 511. 
as the day is long, 724. 
I am not, but I do beguile, 347 
let's be, care will kill a cat, 816. 
meetings, alarums changed to, 541. 
month of May, 480, 492. 
when I hear sweet music, 775 
Message of despair, waft home the, 397 



Messes, herbs and other country, 785. 
Metal more attractive, here's, 133. 

sonorous, blowing martial sounds, 

72''> 



Metaphysic w't, high as, can fly, 808. 
Meteor flag of England, 629. 

shone like a, streaming to the wind, 
725. 
Method in man's -ivickedness, 39.5. 
Metre ballad-mongers, one of these, 807. 
Mettle, grasp it like a man of, 800. 
Mew, rather be a kitten and cry, 807. 
Mice, best-laid schemes of, and men, 468. 

feet like little, stole in and out, 211, 

fisheimen appear like, 445. 
Middle age on his bold visage, 670. 

vast and, of the night, 491. 
Midnight air, cool cisterns of the, 416. 

brought on the dusky hour, 816. 

dances, and the public show, 313. 

dead or, noon of thought, 431. 

oU, toil o'er books consumed, 804. 

revels, faery elves whose, 491. 

stars of, shall be dea-, 103. 
Midwife, she is the fairies, 836. 
Mien, vice a monster of so frightful, 395. 
Mightiest in the mightiest, mercy, 798. 
Mighty dead, hold high converse with 
the, 806. 

maze but not -without a plan, 792. 

minds of old, 806. 

shrine of the, can it be, 581. 
Mildness, ethereal, gentle Spring, 492. 
Jlilk and water, mirth and innocence, 

of human kindness, full o' the, 724. 
of ParacUse. drunk the, 835. 
Milk-white rose, raise aloft the, 495 
Milky way, far as solar walk or, 3D9 
Miller, there was a jnlly, once, 659. 
Milliner, he was perfumed like a, 506. 
Milhons of spiritual creatures walk, 808 

yet to be, thanks of, 683. 
Mills of God gi'ind slowly, 747 
Milton held, faith and morals, 602. 

some mute inglorious, 306. 
Mmd alone that keeps men free, 602. 

built his, of such a height, 808 
Mmd, bring sad thoughts to the, 492. 
dagger of the, 882. 
disclose her, think and not, 723 
diseased, minister to a, 847 
diseased of its own beauty,' 867 
education forms the, 'tis, 804 
farewell the tranquil, 722. 
forbids to crave, still my 729 
general, thoughts that live in 70 
glance of the, how fleet, 739 
haunts the guilty, suspicion, 725 
m the victor's, tempering each 

other, 539. 
infirmity of noble, that last, 813. 
IS its own place, 799. 
is the standard of the man, 808 
leafless desert of the, 816. 
love looks with the, 203. 
magic of the, power of thought 812 
Meccas of the, 917. ^ ' 

misguide the, conspire to 799 
nobler in the, to suffer, 297 
philosophic, years that bring, 759 
pity melts the, to love, 772 
poets, vex not the, 806. 
she had a frugal. 959. 
smooth and steadfast, 141 
sway from mood to mood the will- 

mg, 72. 
talk only to conceal the, 804 
that builds for aye, trusts the, 489 
to me a kingdom is, 729. 
to mind, heart to heart and 203 
torture of the, 311. 
unconquerable, love and man's 9'"> 
umncorporate, 794. ' "■ 

untutored, sees God in clouds, 399 
vacant, 688, 815. 
Mind's eye Horatio, in my 867 

height, measure by the .shade, 808. 
Minds, balm of hurt, great nature's 
second course, 883. 
cement of two, friendship, 120 
innocent and quiet, take, 147 
marriage of true, 208. 
,^. 01 old, mighty, 805. 
Mmds, powers which our, impress, 397. 
Mme be the breezy hill that skirts 493 
what IS yours is, mine is yours, 205! 
Mingles war's rattle with groans, 540. 
Minister, one fair spirit for my, 206 
the patient must, to himself, 347. 
thou flaming, if I quench thee, 900 
to a mind diseased, 347. 
Ministering angel, thou, 509. 
Minor pants for twenty-one, 793. 
Minutes, what damned, tells he o'er, 207 
Mirror, jidmircd, glory of our isle, 938. 
glonous, where the Almighty 607 



Mirror, to a gaping age, hold its 

warped, 804. 
Jlirth and fun fast and furious, 848. 
and innocence, milk and water, 108. 
into folly glide, folly into sin, 395. 
of its December, 108. 
present, has present laughter, 122. 
within the limit of becoming, 724 
Mischief, for idle hand.s to do, 108 
Miserable have no other medicine 347 
Miseries, bound in shallows and in, 8(« 
Misery had worn him to the bones, 809. 
he gave to, all he hsid, a teai-, 307. 
IS at hand, when, .346. 
steeped to the lips in, 345. 
Misfortune made throne her seat 347. 
Misfortune's book, writ in sour, 345 
Mishke me not for my complexion. 722. 
Misquote, just enough learning to,'804. 
Mist, mortal, is gathering, 540. 

resembles the rain, 813. 
Mistletoe hung in the castle hall, 891. 
Mistress of herself tho' china fall, 231. 
Misty mountain-tops, jocund day on, 490. 
Mixed, the company is, 814. 
Mixture of earth's mould, mortal, 726 
Mixtures of more happy days, 108. 
Moan of doves in immemorial ehns, 493. 
Moat defensive to a house, 603. 
Mock the meat it feeds on, 207. 
Mockei-y of woe, bear about the, 312. 

unreal, hence horrible shadow, 868. 
Mocks the tear it forced to flow, 899. 
Model of the barren eai-th, small, 310 

thy transports, 206. 
Modern instances, wise saws and, 711. 
Modes of faith, let zealots fight for, 397. 
Modest pride and amorous delay, 711 

stillness and humility, 563. 
Modesty, bounds of, stepping o'er, 723 
Moment, to face some awful, ,539. 

whence may date henceforward, 493. 
Momentary bliss bestow, 108. 
Moments make the year, trifles life, 815. 
Moment's ornament, sent to be a, 128. 
Monarch of all I survey, I am. 738. 
Monarch of mountains, Mt. Blanc, 493 
becomes the throned, bettor than, 
his crown, 798. 
Money, so much as 'twill bring, 803. 
Mongrel puppy whelp and hound, 949. 
Monie a blunder free us. frae, 486. 
Monster, green-eyed, jealousy the, 207. 

many-headed, 804, 813. 
,,^ vice IS a, of so frightful mien, 395. 
Mt. Blanc msnarch of mountains, 493. 
Month, a little, 207. 

in the merry, of May, 480, 492. 
leafy, of June, 858. 
Monument, patience on a, smiling, 251 
Monumental alabaster, smooth as, 72L 
Monuments, arms hung up for, 541. 
Mood, blessed, in which the burden, 404. 
m that sweet, when pleasant 

thoughts, 492. 
of melancholy, 725. 
unused to the melting, 725. 
Moody madness laughing wild, 899. 
Moon, as the ample, 867. 
close by the, a star, 492. 
course of one revolving-, 909. 
had filled her horn, 491. 
hunter's, hangs above the sea, 719. 
inconstant, swear not by the, 207 
is an arrant thief, 489. 
looks on many brooks, 4S1. 
orbed maiden mortals call the, 822. 
pale-faced, pluck honor from, 070 
sits arbitress, overhead the, 491 
sweet regent of the sky, 491. 
takes up tho wondrou.s (ale. .370 
this fair, solemn bird and, 4S1. 
wandering, to behold the, 787. 
Moonbeams play above their ranks 491. 
Moonlight, visit it by tho pak-, 075. 

sleeps upon this bank, 775. 
Moons wasted, till now some nine 145 
Moon-s-truck madness, 346. 
Moping melancholy and madr.ess, .346. 
Moral evil and of good, 494. 

to point a, or adorn a tale, 909. 
Moralize my song, faithful loves, 670. 
Morals hold which Milton held, 603. 

mends their, 107. 
Mordre thou biwrayest, alway, 900. 

wol out, 900. 
More meant than meets tho ear, 787 
than km, and less than kind, 734. 
the marble wastes, statue grows, 809. 
things m heaven and earth, 80S. 
Morn, blushing like the, I led her, 209. 
bieath of, sweet is the, 206. 
dawning of, sorrow returned, 529. 
eyelids of the, opening, 490. 
fair laughs the, 108. 



greets the dappled, 671. 
er rosy stei>s advancing, 490. 



# 



[& 



1050 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



Si 



Morn, incense-breathing, call of, 305. 

meek-eyed, motiier of dews, 490. 

melodies of, i09. 

not waking till she sings, i95. 

of toil, nor night of waiting, 530. 

to noon he fell, 735. 

trumpet to the, cock that is, 868. 

with rosy hand unbarred, 490. 
Morning, chaste as, dew, 106. 

dew, as the sun the, 309. 

fair came with pilgrim steps, 490. 

life, how pleasant is thy, 108. 

like the spirit of a youth, 490. 

never, wore to evening, 345. 

noon and night, 493. 

shows the day, childhood the man 
as, 107. 

star, charm to stay the, 376. 
Morrow, give not a rainy, 271. 

good-night till it be, 241. 
Mortal coil, shuffled oflc this, 297. 

crisis doth portend, with, 309. 

frame, quit O quit this, 365. 

he raised a, to the skies, 772. 

instruments, genius and the, 900. 

mixture of earth's mould, 726. 

resting-place so fair, 869. 

spirit of, be proud, 302. 
Mortality's strong hand, 309. 

too weak to bear them long, 347. 
Mortals call the moon, maiden, 822. 

to command success, not in, 802. 
Moss-covered bucket that hung, 100. 
Mossy marbles rest on the Up^, 323. 
Most musical most melancholy, 786. 

unkindest cut of all, 876. 
Motes that people the sunbeams, 786. 
Mother, so loving to my, 206. 

man before your, strive to be a, 107. 

meets on high the babe she lost, 309. 

of arts and eloquence, Athens, 719. 

of dead empires, lone, 720. 

of dews, morn, 490. 

tongue, Chatham's language his, 575. 

who'd give her booby, 232. 
Mother's, he is all the, 107. 

love, pure and tender flame, 232. 
Mother-wit, old, and nature, 939. 
Moths, maidens like, caught by glare, 

215. 
Motion, in his, like an angel sings, 775. 

of a hidden flre that trembles, 398. 
Motions, looks and eyes inteiTjret, 811. 

of his spirit dull as night, 77-8. 
Motley's the only wear, 810. 
Mould, fragile, 309. 

mortal mixture of earth's, 726. 

of form, glass of fashion, 722. 

rose above the, 327. 
Mouldering urn. Spring visit the, 737. 
Moulds another's weakness, 812. 
Mountain in its azure hue, robes, 248. 

like the dew on the, 283. 

melancholy, yawns, 720. 

small sands the, 815. 

tops, jocund day on the misty, 490. 

waves, her march Is o'er the, 629. 
Mountains, from Greenland's icy, 395. 

high, are a feeling, 493. 

look on Marathon, 580. 
Mounting in hot haste, there was, 512. 
Mourn, crime to, for any overmuch, 114. 

lacks time to, lacks time to mend, 348. 

makes countless thousands, 332. 

they truly, that mourn withSut a 
witness, 312. 
Mourned constant, o'er the dead, 312. 

the, the loved the lost, 271. 
Mournful midnight hours, 348. 

numbers, tell me not in, 769. 

mstling in the dark, 801. 
Mournings for the dead, 272. 
Mourns, nothing dies but something, 414. 

the dead who lives as they desire, 312. 
Mouth and the meat, God sendeth, 394. 

and thou'lt, I'll rant as well, 804. 
Mouth-honor breath in their stead, 794. 
Mouths of wisest censure, 811. 
Move easiest who learned to dance, 806. 
Moving accidents by flood and field, 145. 
Much may be said on both sides, 803. 

too much, more than little is by, 815. 
M-iiddy, ill-seeming, thick, 725. 
Multitudinous seas incarnadine, 883. 
Murder thousands, a specious name, 541. 

most sacrilegious, broke ope, 900. 

one, a villain, millions a hero, 541. 

one to desti-oy is, 541. 

though hath- no, tongue will speak, 
900. 
Murderers, fix revengeful eyes on, 700. 
Murders, mortal,, on their crowns, 868. 
Murmuring fled, 490. 

of innumerable bees, 493. 
Murmurs,in hollow, died- away, 773. 
MusBj heaven-bred happy, 938. 

his chaste, employed her. lyre, 806. 



Muse of flre, O for a, 867. 

Music be the food of love, play on, 808. 

beat his, out, 397. 

breathing from her face, 133. 

dwells lingering, where, 809. 

hath charms to soothe, 809. 

heavenly maid was young, 773. 

in the nightingale, there is no, 134. 

man that hath no, in himself, 776. 

merry when I hear sweet, never, 77.5. 

night shall be filled with, 816. 

no, in a voice still the same, 271. 

of humanity, still sad, 404. 

slumbers in the shell, soul of, 213. 

soul of, through Tara's halls, 577. 

sounds of, creep into our ears, 775. 

sphere-descended maid, 774. 

when soft voices die, vibrates, 776. 

with its voluptuous swell, arose, 611. 

with the enamel'd stones, makes, 493. 
Music's golden tongue, flattered, 17B. 
Musical m its immensities, 726. 

most, most melancholy, 786. 
Musing on companions gone, 248. 
Musk-roses, sweet, and eglantine, 495. 
Muskets kick their owners over, 671. 
Mute inglorious Milton, some, 306. 
My only books were woman's looks, 204. 
Myriad, codeless, of precedent, 810. 
Myriads of daisies have shone, 495. 

of rivulets hurrying, 493. 
Myrtles, shade a grove of, made, 480. 
Mysterious cement of the soul, 120. 
Mystery, burden of the, 404. 

of mysteries, in that volume, 397. 
Mystical lore, sunset of life gives, 574. 

Nae luck about the house, 246. 
Nag, gait of a shuffling, 807. 
Naiad or a Grace, Nymph, a, 721. 
Nail, care adds a, to our coffln, 798. 

to the mast that holy flag, 020. 
Naked beauties more at' mire, 814. 

every day he clad, the, 948. 

in December snow, wallow, 346. 

new-born child on parents' knees, 78. 

though locked up m steel, 796. 

to mine enemies, left me, 322. 

villany, thus I clothe my, 396. 
Name at which the world grew pale, 909. 

filches from me my good, 811. 

great in mouths of wisest censure 811. 

local habitation and a, 867. 

magic of a, power of grace the, 810. 

mark the marble with his, 797. 

of action, lose the, 297. 

of Faith's Defender, 602. 

to every fixed star, 804. 

well spelt, happy whose, 811. 

whistling of a, ravished with, 939. 

wounded, Horatio what a, 811. 
Named thee but to praise, none, 937. 
Nameless unremembered acts, 404. 
Names, forget men's, new-made honor 
doth, 812. 

he loved to hear, 323. 

one of the few immortal, 583. 
Narcissa, last words poor, spoke, 779. 
Narrow compass, yet there dwelt, 125. 
Nation boils, scum that rises when, 813. 

made and preserved us a, 593. 

other, courts of the, 395. 
Nation's eyes, read history in a, 306. 
Nations, make enemies of, 594. 

Niobe of Rome, 720. 
Native and to the manner born, 814. 

charm to me more dear, one, 689. 

hue of resolution is sicklied o'er, 297. 

land good night, 238. 

shore fades o'er the waters blue, 288. 

wilds impart every good, 603. 

wood-notes wild, warble his, 786. 
Naturalists observe a flea, 396. 
Nature, accuse not, she hath done, 795. 

bid the world repose, 490. 

binding, fa?t in fate, 370. 

broke the die moulding Sheridan,940. 

cannot miss, art may err but, 489. 

commonplace of unassuming, 495. 

compunctious visitings of, 900. 

course of, is the art of God, 489. 

debt to, quickly paid, 309. 

extremes in, good produce, 799. 

formed but one such man, 940. 

from her seat gave signs of woe, 899. 

I do fear thy, 724. 

in hir corages, 695. 

in the eye of, he has lived, 489. 

is but art unknown to thee, 489. 

is subdued to what it works in, 722. 

'tis their, to, 108. 

looks through, to Nature's God, 808. 

made thee to temper man, 133. 

never did betray the heart, 404. 

never lends the smallest scruple, 797. 

never made, death which, 310. 

of an insurrection, suffers the, 900. 



Nature, one touch of, 811. 

passing through, to eternity, 308. 
prodigality of, framed in the, 721. 
sink in years, 759. 
solid ground of, trusts to the, 489. 
swears the lovely dears, 191. 
the vicar of the Lord, 489. 
to advantage dressed, wit is, 807. 
tone of languid, restore, 493. 
voice of, cries from the tomb, 306. 
who can paint like, 489. 
whose body, is and God the soul, 489. 
workes of, lord of all, 489. ■ 
Nature's masterpiece is writing well, 806. 
child, meek, 940. 

end of language is declined, 804. 
evening comment on the shows, 491. 
God, through nature up to, 808. 
heart beats strong amid, hills, 489. 
heart in tune, we with, 243. 
human, daily food, 128. 
kindly law, behold the child by, 107. 
noble of, own creating, 812. 
own sweet cunning hand, 122. 
jiitying, 804. 

second course chief nourisher, 883. 
soft nurse, O gentle sleep, 762. 
sweet restorer, balmy sleep, 816. 
teachings, list to, 307. 
walks, eye, short folly, 807. 
Naught a trifle, think, 815. 

but grief and pain for joy, 468. 
falling into, borrow of, 759. 
in this life sweet, 315. 
is everything everything naught,808. 
Naughty world, good deed in a, 797. 
Navies are stranded, as waves when, 518. 
Neasi'a's hair, tangles of, 203. 
Near, too, that comes to be denied, 231. 
Nearer my God to thee, 373. 
Neat, still to be, still to be drest, 713. 
Neat-handed Phillis dresses, 785. 
Necessary harmless cat, 495. 
Necessite, maken vertue of, 803. 
Necessity, from a, beautiful, 394. 
the tyrant's plea, 601. 
turns to glorious gain, 539. 
Neck that made the white robe wan, 721. 
Need, deserted at his utmost, 771. 

of blessing, I had the most, 883. 
Needle and thread, hinders, 338. 

true as the, to the pole, 796. 
Needless Alexandrine drags, 806. 
Needy hollow-eyed wretch, 722. 
Neglect, such sweet, more taketh me, 713. 
Neighbor's shame, publishing our, 810. 
Net, all's fish they get cometh to, 672. 
Nettle danger, out of this, 671. 

tenderhanded stroke a, 800. 
Never ending still beginning, 772. 
loved sae kindly, liad we, 23.3. 
mind the pain, 107. 
stand to doubt, attempt the end, 800. 
to hope again, falls, 321. 
too late for delight, 20.5. 
wedding ever wooing, 144. 
Never-failing friends are they, 806. 
Nevermore, quoth the raven, 853. 
New, look amaist as well's the, 385. 

world which is the new, 175. 
New-fledged offspring, tempt its, 688. 
New-made honor doth forget, 812. 
New-spangled ore, flames with, 490. 
Newest kind of ways, oldest sins the, 395. 
News, bringer of unwelcome, 346. 
Next doth ride abroad, when he, 962. 
Nice of no vile hold to stay him up, 798. 

sharp quillets of the law, 810. 
Nicely sanded floor, 689. 
Night, by, an atheist half believes, 491. 
and storm and darkness, 686. 
azure robe of, tore the, 592. 
bed by, 273. 

chaos and old, reign of, 725. 
cheek of, beauty hangs upon, 721. 
congenial with the, 941. 
danger's troubled, depart, 629. 
darkens the streets, 558. 
dull as, motions of his spirit are, 776. 
dun, veiled the solemn view, 940. 
empty-vaulted, float through, 726. 
endless, closed his eyes in, 939. 
garments of the. 416. 
has a thousand eyes, 135. 
how beautiful is, 491. 
is the time to weep, 416. 
joint-laborer with the day, 559. 
lightning in the collied, 250. 
lovely as a Lapland, 311. 
meaner beauties of the, 124. 
of cloudless climes, 130. 
of sorrow, fore-spent, 193. 
of the grave, dawn on the, 737. 
of waking, morn of toil nor, 530. 
oft in the stilly, 318. 
sable godess, from ebon throne, 491. 
shades of, fled the, 490. 



ta 



^ 



[& 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1061 



"Qi 



Night shall be filled with music, 816. 

silver lining on the, 491. 

stars in empty, nor sink those, Hi. 

steal a few nours from, 205. 

train of, last in the, 36X 

vast and middle of the, 491. 

wings of, darkness falls from, 490. 

witching time of, now the very, 491. 

womb of uncreated, 794. 

world will be in love with, 134. 

wrongs ofi 489. 
Night's black arch, keystane a', 848. 

candles are burnt out, 490. 
Nightingale, all but the wakeful, 413. 

no better a musician, 496. 

no music in the, 134. 

thatwarblest eve, 496. 

the ravished, 495. 

the wakeful, 413. 
Nightingale's song in the grove, 737. 
Nightly pitch my moving tent, 389. 

to the listening earth repeats, 376. 
Nights are wholesome, 397. 

have no profit of their shining, 804. 

short as the, vain delights as, 315. 

winding up, with sleep, 559. 
Night-shriek, quailed to hear a, 900. 
Nile, outvenoms all the worms of, 811. 
Nimbly, capers in a lady's chamber, 541. 
Niobe, like, all tears, 723. 

of nations, there she stands, 720. 
Nipping and an eager air, 491. 
No matter Berkeley said there was, 808. 

more of that, let me shun that, 348. 

sorrow in thy song, 471. 
Nobility, betwixt the wind and his, 508. 

leave our old, 812. 
Nobility's true badge, sweet mercy, 798. 
Noble and approved good masters, 145. 

by heritage generous and free, 143. 

of nature's own creating, 812. 

to be good, 'tis only, 268. 
Nobleness that lies in other men, 796. 
Nobler in the mind to suffer, 297. 

loves and nobler cares, 42. 
Noblest work of God, honest man, 780. 
Nobody, I care for, no not 1, 816. 
Nod, affects to, assumes the god, 771. 

ready with every, to tuinble, 722. 
Nodding violet grows, ox-lips and, 495. 
Nods becks and wreathed smiles, 785. 
Noise and giddiness, 108. 

like of a hidden brook, 858. 

of conflict, dire was the. 500. 

of folly, shunn'st the, 786. 
Noiseless root of time, inaudible, 791. 

falls the foot of time, 117. 

tenor of their way, 306. 
None but the brave deserve the fair, 771. 

knew thee but to love thee, 937. 

like pretty Sally, 198. 

tliink the great unhappy, 347. 

without hope e'er loved, 204. 
Nook, O for a seat in some poetic, 489. 
Nooks to he and read in, 493. 
Noon, dark amid the blaze of, 321. 

of thought, dead of midnight, 431. 

sun has not attained his, 464. 

to devfy eve he fell, 725. 
Norman blood, simple faith than, 268. 
North-wind's breath, wither at the, 308. 
Northward born, fairest creature, 722. 
Norval, my name is, 650. 
Nose, assert the, upon his face, 724. 

course down his innocent, 496. 

entuned in hir, 696. 

spectacles on, and pouch on side, 711. 
Noses, athwart men's, as they sleep, 836. 
Not of an age but for all time, 906. 

to know me argues youi-selves, 812. 
Note, deed of dreadful, 900. 

deserving, a winning wave, 713. 

of preparation, give dreadful, 540. 

of time, we take no, 747. 

swells the, of praise, 306. 

that swells the gale, 489. 

youth that means to be of, 490. 
Notes by distance made sweet, 773. 

chiel's amang ye takin', 805. 

thy liquid, portend success, 498. 

trills her thick-warbled, 720. 

with many a winding bout, 786. 
Nothing before but sky and ocean, 631. 

but well and fair, 794. 

can touch him further, 311. 

can we call our own but death, 310. 

either good or bad, 808. 

extenuate, 724. 

having, yet hath all, 737. 

hei'e for tears, nothing to wail, 794. 

if not critical, 723. 

ill can dwell in such a temple, 133. 

in his life became him, 309. 

is so hard but search will find, 800. 

so sweet as love's young dream, 262. 
Nothing long, everything by starts, 909. 

of him that doth fade, 869. 



Nothing to him falls early or too late, 
798. 

true but heaven, 399. 
Nothingness, first dark day of, 303. 

it will never pa.ss into, 675. 
Noting-books, stufft, 808. 
Nourisher in life's feast, chief, 883. 
Now, an eternal, does always last, 793. 

came still evening on, 413. 

1 lay me down to sleep, 107. 

I know it, thought so once but, 792. 

is the day now's the hour, 573. 
Nowher so bisy a man, 697. 
Noyance or unrest, smacked of, 831. 
Number, heavenly blessings ivithout, 76. 
Numbei-s, golden add to golden, 550. 

harmonious, thoughts move, 407. 

lisped in, for the numbers came, 107. 

luck in odd, says Rory O'More, 197. 

magic, and persuasive sound, 809. 

mournful, tell me not in, 769. 

sanctified the crime, 541. 
Nuptial bower, to the, I led her, 209. 

knot I never tied, 271. 
Nurse a fiame, and if you, 205. 

nature's soft, O gentle sleep. 762. 

of young desire, hope thou, 800. 
Nursed a dear gazelle, 1 never, 251. 
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm, 847. 
Nut-brown ale, then to the spicy, 785. 
Nymph a Naiad or a Grace, 721. 

haste thee, and bring with thee, 785. 

wanton ambling, 938. 
Nympholepsy of some fond despair, 869. 

O for a lodge, 593. 

wad some power the glf tie gie us, 486. 
Oak, bend a knotted, soften rocks, 809. 

brave old, song to the oak the, 454. 

hardest-timbered, hew and fell, 801. 

hearts of, are our men, 631. 

hollow, our palace is a, 626. 

unwedgeable and gnarled, 813. 
Oaks, branch-charmed by the stars, 494. 

from little acorns grow, 107. 
Oar, suspended, drip of the, 685. 
Oai'S, falling, keep the time with, 626. 
Oaths, full of strange, 711. 
Obadias David Josias were pious, 397. 
Obligation to posterity, 793. 
Obliging, so, he ne'er obliged, 910. 
Oblivion, alms for, 792. 

mere, second childishness and, 711. 

razure of, tooth of time and, 811. 
Oblivious antidote, sweet, 347. 
Obscure grave, an, 346. 
Obscurely good, content to be, 601. 
Observation, places crammed with, 803. 
Observations which we maJce, 799. 
Observers, observed of all, 721. 
Obstinate questionings of sense, 7.59. 
Occasion, courage mounteth with, 541. 

needs but fan them, 539. 
Occupation, absence of, not rest, 815. 
Occupation's gone, Othello's, 722. 
Ocean, ambitious, 631. 

deep bosom of the, buried. 541. 

dread, undulating wide, 631. 

frasp the, with my .span, 808. 
have loved thee, 607. 

leans against the land, 632. 

on life's vast, diversely we sail, 792. 

roll on deep and dark blue, 607. 

upon a painted, painted ship, 855. 

wave, a life on the, 630. 
Ocean's mane, hand upon the, 919. 

gray and melancholy waste, 307. 
Odd numbers, there's luck in, 197. 
Odds, facing fearful, die better than, 567, 
Odious in woolen, 779. 

she and comparisons are, 795. 
Odor of the skies is in it, 204. 

stealing and giving, 495. 

sweet and wholesome, gives it a, 492, 
Odors crushed are sweeter still, 348. 

from the spicy shrub, flung, 209. 

when sweet violets sicken, 776. 
Off with his head, 899. 
Offence, forgave the, 206. 

is rank, it smells to heaven, 900. 

what dire, from amorous causes, 815. 
Offender, hugged the, 206. 
Offendmg, head and front of my, 145. 
Office and affairs of love, 121. 

hath been so clear in his great, 900. 

hath but a losing, 346. 

insolence of, 297. 

to speak patience, 'tis all men's. 345. 
Officer, thief fears each bush an, 725. 
Offices of prayer and praise, 399. 
Offspring, tempt its new fledged, 688. 

mingles both their graces, 214. 

of heaven's first born, 407. 
Oft in the stilly night, 318. 
Oil. midnight, o'er books consumed, 804. 
Old age serene and bright, 311. 

aim-chair, I love that, 101. 



Old books to read, 118. 

familiar faces, aL are gone, 274. ^ 

friends like old swords, 121. 

friends to talk, 118. 

in the brave days of, 570. 

love for new, that they change, 207 

man, infirm weak and despised, 346. 

man eloquent, that, 939. 

mighty minds of, 806. 

oaken bucket iron-bound bucket, 100. 

"Time is still a-flylng, 754. 

wine to drink, 118. 

wood to burn, 118. 
Oldest sins, the newest kind of ways, 396. 
Omittance is no guittance, 145. 
On Stanley on, 510. 

with the dance, let joy, 511. 

ye brave who rush to glory, 613. 
Once, thought so, now I know it, 793. 

in doubt is to be resolved, 207. 

more unto the breach dear friends, 
503. 

more upon the waters, 631. 
One as the sea, distinct as billows, 608. 

more unfortunate, .335. 

touch of nature, 811. 
Onward, bear up and steer right, 73.5. 
Ooze and bottom of the sea, 632. 
Ope the purple testament of war, 541. 

the sacred source of tears, 939. 
Open as day for melting charity, 724. 
Opening bud to heaven conveyed, 107. 

paradise, to him are, 489. 
Opinions, golden, I have bought, 810. 

stiff in, always in the wrong, 909. 
Oppression and deceit, rumor of, 693. , 
Oppressor's wrong, 297. 
Oracle within an empty cask, 724. 

of God, fast by the, 399. 
Orator, I am no, as Brutus is, 876. 
Oratoi'S repair, thence to famous, 804. ■, 
Orb of one particular tear, small, 204. j 
Orbed maiden with fire laden, 823. 
Order in variety we see, 816. 

is Heaven's first law, 813. 
Orders, the Almighty's, to perform, 539. 
Ore, new-spangled, flames with, 490. 
Organ, speak with miraculous, 900. 
Orient beams, spreads his, 490. 

pearl, a double row of, 123. 

pearl, sowed the, earth with, 490. ) 

pearls, round and, 494. 
Original and end, motive guide, 394. 
Ormus and of Ind, wealth of, 722. 
Ornament, foreign aid of, 795. 

of beauty is suspect, 722. ^ 

Ornaments, hide with, want of art, 807. 
Orphans of the heart, 720. 
Orpheus, bid the soul of, sing, 787. 
Orthodox, prove their doctrine, 387. 
Othello's occupation's gone, 722. 
Others apart sat on a hill retired, 808. v 

we know not of, 297. 
Oursels, to see, as ithers see, 486. | 

Out out brief candle, 792. 
Outrageous fortune, arrows of, 297. 
Outside, swashing and a martial, 721. , 

what a goodly, lalsehood hath, 797. ' 
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile, 811. .; 
Over the hills and far away, 493. 
Overcome but half his foe, 815. 

what is else not to be, 640. ■, 

Overthrow, linger out a purposed, 271. 
Over-violent or over-civil, so, 909. 
Owed, throw away dearest thing he, 309. 
Owl that shrieked, fatal bellman, 882. 
Owlet Atheism, portentous sight, 395. 
Owners, bear wide and kick their, 671. 
Oxenforde, Gierke ther was of, 696. 
Oxlips and nodding violet, 495. 
Oyster, twas a fat. Live in peace, adieu, 
810. 

Pace, creeps In this petty, 792. 

two, of the vilest earth, 310. 
Pagan horn. Pan lends to Moses, 396. 

suckled in a creed outworn, 408. 
Pageant, like this insubstantial, 867. 
Paid well that is well satisfied, 802. 
Pain and anguish wring the brow, ,509. 

doomed to go in company with, 639. 

feeling that is not akin to, 813. 

it is that pain to miss, 204. 

keep the, change the place but, 799. 

labor we delight in physics, 569. 

mighty, to love it is, 204. 

never mind the, 107. 

sigh yet feel no, 816. 

smile in, frown at pleasure and, 799. 

stranger yet to, 108. 

sweet is pleasure after, 771. 
Painful vigils keep, pensive poets, 807. 
Pains, for my, a world of sighs, 145. 

grow sharp and sickness rages, 756. 

of love be sweeter far, 145. 

pleasure in poetic, 806. 
Paint like Nature, who can, 489. 



[&- 



5" 



[& 



1052 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



-a 



Paint the lily, 726. 

Painted ocean, painted ship upon a, 855. 

ship, idle as a, 855. 
Painting, kindest and happiest, 215. 

more than, can express, 131. 

of your fear, the very, 868. 
Palaces, mid pleasures and, 225. 
Pale cast of thought, sicklied with, 297. 

grew thy cheek and cold, 211. 

his uneft'ectual fire, 'gins to, 490. 

passion loves, places which, S16. 
Pale-faced moon, honor from the, 670. 
Pall Mali, sweet shady side of, 811. 

sceptred, come sweeping by, 787. 
Pallas, perched upon a bust of, 852. 
Palm, condemned to have an itching, 

797. 
Palmer's weed, sad votarist in, 830. 
Palpable and familiar, clothing the, 490. 
Palter with us in a double sense, 345. 
Pampered menial di'ove me, 310. 
Pang as great, finds a, 310. 

that rends the heart, every, 347. 
Pangs and fears, more, than wars, 321. 

the wretched find, keenest, 816. 
Pansies, that's for thoughts, 495. 
Pansy freak'd with jet, 494. 
Pantaloon, lean and slippered, 711. 
Pants for twenty-one, the minor, 793. 
Paper, certain portion of uncertain, 811. 
Papers in ea<'h hand, they rave, 805. 
Pai'adise, beautiful beyond compare, 
399. 

below, marriage gives a, 226. 

blissful, of God tho garden was, 719. 

drunk the milk of, 83,5. 

heavenly, is that place, 123. 

how gi'ows in, our store, 120. 

must I thus leave thee, 321. 

of our despair, the unreached, 867. 

only bliss of, survived the fall, 232. 

sun air skies to him are opening, 489. 

thought would destroy their, 108. 

to what we fear of death, 347. 
Paragons description, maid that, 722. 
Parallel, none but himself his, 812. 
Paramours, sung to call forth, 492. 
Pard, bearded like the, 711. 
Pardon, ne'er, who have done "^^Tong, 

798. 
Parent knees, a new-bom child on, 78. 

cf good these are thy worlcs, 363. 
Parents passed into the sides, son of, 93. 
Pailit gentil knyght, 696. 
Parish church, plain as way to, 803. 
Parisshe wjd was his, 607. 
Parliament, sad breaking of that, 939. 
Parlous boy, 107. 

Paimaceti for an inward bruise, 506. 
Parson, O for a power forty, 809. > 

owned his skill in arguing, 688. ■ 
Part of beuig, liath a, 813. 

send down and take my, 794. 

shake hands and, 241. 

so he plays his, 711. 
Partake the gale, 911. 
Parted, when we two, in silence, 241. 
Parthenon, eaith proudly wears, 736. 
Partial, we grow more, 799. 
Parting day dies like the dolphin, 4S0. 

(j'aest, speed the, 121. 

is sucli sweet sorrow, 241. 

the way he went at. 248. 
Partitions, thin, 801, 909. 
Partly may compute v.hat's done, 7S4. 
Parts, all his gi-acious, 107. 

all the, so equal perfect are, 939.' 

if allure think how Baccn shined, 038. 

one man plays many, 711. 

■well-adjusted, soon conjoined, 493. 

ye proud of, 798. 
Pass by me as the idle -wind, 797. 

into nothingness, it will never, 675. 
Passe, maugre the will, or dy, 540. 
Passeth show, that within which, 295. 
Passing fair,- is she not, 133. 

rich with forty pounds a year, 688. 

strange, 'twas, 145. 

sweet is solitude, how, 120. 

thought, she fled like a, 309. 

tribute of a sigh, implores the, 306. 
Passion, cataract haunted me like a, 404. 

heaven each, sends, 799. 

imprints the patriot, 603. 

is the gale, 792. 

places which pale, loves, 206. 

revel, bids every, 809. 

ruling, 780, 799. 

towering, put me into a, 725. 

vows witli so much, 204. 
Passion's slave, man that is not, 112. 

wayward birth, 2.33. 
Passionate intuition, faith become, 397. 
Passions build up our human soul, 490. 
Passiveness, feed in a wise, 397. 
Past, best of prophets of Future, 793, 

heaven has not power upon the, 792. 



Past, let the dead, bury its dead, 770. 

unsighed for, the future sure, 206. 
Paste and cover to our bones, 310. 
Pastime and happiness will grow, 805. 

of a drowsy summer day, 70. 
Pastors, as some ungracious, do, 809. 
Patch grief >\-ith provei'bs, 312. 
Patches set upon a little breach, 815. 
Path, motive guide original end, 394. 

of sorrow lead that path alone, 348. 

penury's barren, 802. 

primrose, of dalliance treads, 809. 
Pathless groves, fountain-heads, 316. 

woods, pleasure in the, 607. 
Paths lead to woman's love, of all, 204. 

of glory lead but to the grave, 306. 

of joy and woe, its checkered, 226. 
Patience, drop of, in my soul, 725. 

flour of wifly, 231. 

God takes a text and preacheth, 364. 

on a monument smiling at grief, 251. 

'tis all men's office to speak, 345. 

'tis the soul of peace, 723. 
Patient merit of unworthy taJves, 297. 

must minister to himself, 347. 

search and vigil long, 899. 

though sorely tried, 345. 

when favors are denied, 226. 
Patines of bright gold, thick inlaid, 775. 
Patriarch, venerable, guileless held, 794. 
Patriot's boast, such is the, 229. 
Patriots, spai k which fires soul of, 601. 
Pattern, cunningest, of excelling nature, 

900. 
Pauper whom nobody owns, 341. 
Pause, must give us, 297. 
Pauses, hollow, of the storm, 632.'' 
Pavement, riches of heaven's, 803.' 
Pawing to get free, the tawny lion, 496. 
Peace, Adam could find no solid, 232. 

and competence, health, 815. 

and quiet, join with thee calm, 786. 

and rest can never dwell, 347. 

carry gentle, in thy right hand, 322. 

central, subsisting at the heart, 631. 

gathering all the fruits of, 541. 

hath her victories, 909. 

inglorious arts of, 539. 

long, nurses dangerous humors, '539. 

maid-pale, complexion of her, 641. 

makes a solitude and calls it, 541. 

of the vesper sides, 604. 

sent to, to gain our peace, Sll. 

slept in, 311. 

soft phrase of, 145. 

soul of, patience the, 723. 

source and soul of social life, 541. 

star of, return, 6S9. 

thousand years of, ring in the, 752. 

was slain, thrice my, 491. 

weak and piping time of, 938. 

your valor won, 603. 
Peak m Darien, silent upon a, 805. 

to peak, far along from, 686. 
Pealing anthem swells the note, 306. 
Pearl and gold, showers barbaric, 722. 

if all their sand were, 215. 

in every cowslip's ear, 809. 

orient, 123, 4C0. 

threw a, away like the Indian, 724. 
Pearls at random strung, orient, 807. 

morning, dropped in the lily, 796. 

that were his eyes, those are, 869. 
Peasant, some belated, sees, 491. 
Peasantry, bold, country's pride, 687. 
Pedigree, lass wi' a lang, 200. 
Peep, into glory, 274. 
Peevish boy, 'tis but a, 144. 
Pegasus, turn and wind a, fiery, 671. 
Pellucid streams, an ampler ether, 399. 
Pelop's line, presenting Thebes or, 787. 
Pelting of this pitiless storm, 494. 
Pembroke's mother, Sidney's sister, 907. 
Pen and ink, meagre profits from, 940. 

is mightier than the sword, 805. 

make thee glorious by my, 150. 
Penalties of idleness, pains and, 724. 
Pendent world in bigness as a star, 492. 
Pendulum betwixt a smile and tear, 792. 
Penned it down, so 1, 805. 
Penniless lass wi' a lang pedigree, 200. 
Pens, quirks of blazonmg, excels the, 

722. 
Pensioner on bounties of an hour, 747. 
Pensive discontent, waste nights in, ^04. 

poets painful vigils keep, 807. 

through a happy place, 206. 
Pent, here in the body, 389. 
Penury and imprisonmen , age ache, 347. 

chill, repressed their noble rage, 306. 
Penury's barren path, 802. 
People, all sorts of, 810. 

of the skies, ye common, 124. 

the sunbeams, motes that, 786. 
Perchance to dream, to sleep, 297. 
Perched and sat and nothing more, 852. 
Perfect ■woman nobly planned, 128. 



Perfect whole, 406. 

Perfection true, seasoned to their, 496. 
Perfections, with sweete, caught, 904. 
Perfume on the violet, throw a,, 726. 
Perfumed like a milliner, he -was, 606. 
Perilous edge of battle, on the, 540. 

stuff, cleanse the bosom of that, 347. 
Perils do envu-on the man, -what, 640. 

doe enfold, how many, 395. 
Perjuries, lovers', Jove laughs at, 207. 
Pei-ked ujj in a glistering grief, 347. 
Permit to heaven, how long, 794. 
Pernicious weed whose scent, 558. 
Perpetual benediction, doth breed, 758. 
Perplexed in faith but pure in deeds, 
397. 

in the extreme, 724. 
Persuasion ripened into faith, 397. 
Persuasive accent thus began, with, 724. 

sound, magic numbers and, 809. 
Perturbed spirit, rest, 311. 
Perverts the prophets, 397. 
Petard, scolding the c. njugal, 215. 
Peter denyed his Lord and cryed,397. 
Peter's dome, hand that rounded, 736. 

keys, some Jove adorn, 396. 
Petrifies the feehng, 396. 
Petticoat, feet beneath her, 211. 

tempestuous, deserving note in, 713. 
Petty pace, creeps in th s, 792. 
Phantasir.a. interim is like a, 900. 
Phantom of delight, she ■» as a, 128. 
Phidias brought his awful Jove, 735. 
Philip and Mary on a shilUng, 205. 

my king, 75. 
Phillis, herbs neat-handed, dresses, 785. 
Philosopher and friend, guide, 911. 
Philosophers, cheered with saymgs of, 
347. 

stood banding factions, 808. 
Philosophic mind, years that bring, 759. 
Philosophi-e, all be that he -vvas a, 636. 
Philosophy, dreamt of in yoi.r, 808. 

divine, should be procuress, 397. 

false, vain "wisdom and, 803. 

I ask not proud, to teach me, 494. 

sweets of sweet, 804. 

will clip an angel's wings, 808. 
Phisik, gold in, is a cordial, 809. 

ther was a doctour of. 809. 

to speke of, and of surgery, 809. 
Phoebus 'gins arise, 474. 

s^weats in the eye of, 559. 

wain, hindmost wheels of, 830. 

what a name, O Amos Cottle, 640. 
Pho phor, sweet, bring the day, 4f,9. 
Phrase, measured, choice woz'd and, 807. 

of peace, soft, 145. 
Physic pomp, take, 802. 
Physics pain, labor we delight in, 559. 
Picture, look here upon this, 721. 
Pictured urn, scatters from her, £67. 
Pictures, my eyes make, when shut, S07. 

out of doors, 723. 

that hang on memory's wall, 89. 
Pierian spring, taste not the, 805. 
Pilgrim gray, honor conies a, 563. 

steps in amice gi-ay, 490. 
Pilgrimage, overtaketh m his, 493. 
Piigrimages, folk to goon on, 695. 

rest for weary, 794. 
Pilgrim-shrines, such graves are,B17. 
Pillow hai'd. sloth finds the down, 810. 
Pilot 'tis a fearful night, 632. 

of my proper woe, careful, 223. 

that weathered the storm, 632. 
Pin, with a litt;e. bores, 308. 
Pine with feare and sorrow, 204. 
Pined in thought, 251. 
Pine-flame crackling bright, 868. 
Pines, fires proud tops ot eastern, 719. 

risen from thy s lent sea of, 376. 

smote his thunder-harp of, 493. 
Pink of courtesy, I am the very, 724. 
Pinks that gro'w, on wlio^e tops the, 26.3. 
Pious actions we do fugar o'er,396. 

frauds and holy shifts, 396. 
Pipe but as the linnets sing, 807. 

for Fortune's finger, not a, 112. 

glorious in a, divine in hookas, 814. 

to the spirit ditties of no tone, 718. 
Pipes and whistles in his sound, 711. 
Piping time of peace, this weak, 938. 
Pit, many-hended monster of the, 864. 
Pitch my moving tent, yet nigiitly, 389. 
Pith and moment, enterprises ot, 297. 

seven years', these arms had, 146. 
Pitiful, 'twas wondrous, W.'i. 
Pitiless storm, pelting of this, 494. 
Pity, dumb may challenge double, 204. 

gave ere charity began, 688. 

he hath a tear for, and a hand. 724. 

straightest of all the paths, 2&i. 

melts the mind to love, 772. 

swells the tide of love, 794. 

the sorrows of a poor old man, 340. 
Place and wealth, get, with grace, 803. 



!& 



— ff 



\B 



INDEX OP POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1053 



-a 



Place, bounds of, and time, 939. 

change the, but keep the pain, 799. 

diarnifled by the doer's deed, 813. 

Oolly;, in times of old, GOl. 

no, like home, 225. 

of rest, where to choose their, 321. 

pensive though a happy. 206. 

stands upon a sUppery, 798. 

statesmen out of, 811. 

sunshine in the shady, 828. 

with pleasures dignitted, 193. 
Places which pale passion loves, 316. 
Plague the inventor, bloody instruc- 
tions, 800. 
Plag'ues, but of all, good heaven, 121. 

'that haunt the rich maa's door, 815. 
Plain as way to parish church, 803. 

Camilla scours the, when swift, 80G. 

knight pricking on the, 827. 

livmg and high thinking, 811. 

nodding o'er the yellow, 192. 

stretched upon the, struck eagle, 800. 
Plan, mighty maze not without a, 792. 
Planets, then no, strike, 397. 
Plant, a rare old, is the Ivy green,, 466. 
Plants, aromatic, no fragrance, 348. 

suck in the earth, 191. 
Plato thou j-easonest we 1, 759. 
Plato's retirement. Academe, 720. 
Play, boyhood's painless, 99. 

in the plighted clouds, 869. 

the Devil, seem a saint and, 396. 

the fool, ^vise enough to, 798. 

the woman, forced me to, 321. 

the woman with mine eyes, 315. 

to you is death to us, 108. 
Play's the thing, 804. 
Played at bo-peep, as if they, 721. 

familiar with hoary locks, 919. 
Players, men and women merely, 711. 
Playing holidays, the year were, 108. 
Playmates, I have had, 274. 
Plays round the head, 781. 

such fantastic tricks, 813. 
Playthings, princes have great, 541. 
Plead like angels, his virtues, 900. 

their ca;ise, I will, 804. 
Pleasant in thy morning, O life how, 108. 

to see one's name in i rint, 805. 

thought, we meet thee, like a, 495. 

too, to think on, 133. 
Please, sweetest empire is to, 128. 
Pleased to the ;ast, crops flowery, 406. 

with rattle, tickled with straw, 107. 
Pleasing dreadful thought, eternity, 759. 

dreams and slumbers light, 816. 

shade, ah happy hills, ah, 108. 
Pleasure after p.dn, sweet is, 771. 

at the helm, youth on the prow, 108. 

frov/n .It, and smile in pain, 799. 

in poetic pains only poets know, 806. 

in the pathless woods, 607. 

little, in the house, 216. 

never to blend our, or our pride, 663. 

of the game from afar to view, 730. 

praise his, prayer his business, 399. 

reason's whole, 815. 

she was bent, though on, 959. 

shock of, to the frame, 770. 
Pleasure-dome, a stately, decree, 834. 
Pleasures and palaces, 225. 

are like poppies spread, 848. 

doubling his, cares dividing, 212. 

of the present day. 794. 

pretty, might we move, 158. 

prove, we will all the, 157. 
Pledge, I naint never signed no, 558. 
Plenty, hatches, for ensuing spring, 720. 

o'er a smiling land, scatter, 306. 
Plighted clouds, play in the, 869. 
Fodders continual, small ever won, 804. 
Plot, this blessed, this earth, 603. 
Ploughman homeward plods, 305. 
Ploughshare, by the unwilling, 495. 

.stern Ruin's, drive •; elate, 463. 
Plover, muskets aimed at duck or, 671. 
Pluck bright honor from the moon, G'.30. 

from the memory, 317. 

this flower safety from danger, 671. 

up drowned honor by the locks, 670. 
Plucked his gown to share the smile, 638. 
Plume of amber snutt-box, 799. 
Plumes in the gay wind dancing, 539. 
Plunged in accoutred as I was, 670. 
Pluto's cheek, iron tears down, 787. 
Poem round and perfect as a star, 807. 
Poesy, sacred and soul-moving, 806. 
Poet in a golden clime was born, 807. 
Poet's b' am, possess a, 93S. 

eye in fine frenzy rolling, 722. 

mi -.d, vex not the, 806. 

pen turns them to shapes, 807. 
Poetic child, meet nurse for a, 575. 

fields encompass me, 807. 

nook, .scat in s ^me, 4S9. 

pains, there's a p;easure in, 806. 
Poetry, cradled into, by Avrong, 806. 



Pcfetry, mincing, 807. 

of earth is never dead, 4S5. 

tender charm of, and love, 495. 
Poets like painters thus unskilled, 807. 

lose half the praise, 806. 

three, in three distant ages, 907. 

who have made us heirs, 42. 

youthful, 131, 786. 
Point a moral or adorn a tale, 909. 

his slow unmoving finger, 72.5. 

highest, all my greatness, 346. 

of liis own fancy, 310. 

swim to yonder. 670. 
Points out a hereafter, 'tis heaven, 759. 

kindred, of heaven and, home, 474. 
Poison of misused wine, sweet, .558, 

one man's, is another's meat, 815. 
Poisoned chalice to our own lips, 800. 
Poisoning of a dart apt before to kill, 795. 
Poke, drew a dial from his, 791. 
Pole to pole, spread the truth from, 376. 

trae as the needle to the, 796. 

were I so tall to reach the, 808. 
Policy, kings are tyrants from, 383. 

turn him to any cause of, 723. 
Pomp and circumstance of war, 722. 

and .glory of this world, .321. 

contingencies of, they become, 867. 

give lettered, to teeth of time, 915. 

tick absurd, let candied tongue. 111. 

of power, boast of heraldry the, 306. 
Pomps to those who need 'em, 602. 
Ponderous woe, though a, 312. 
Poor but honest, my friends were, 796. 

have cried Csasar hath wept, 875. 

laws grind the, 809. 

make no new friends, 292. 

makes me, indeed, 811. 

naked wretches that bide, 494. 

old man, pity sorrows of a, 340. 

pensioner on bounties, 747. 

short and simple annals of the, 306. 

the offering be, though, 795. 

thou found'st me, 690. 

to do him reverence, none so, 876. 

without Thee, we are, 394. 
Poppies, pleasures are like, 848. 
Porcelain of human clay, precious, 309. 
Porcupine, fiui lis upon the fretful, 725. 
Port, pride in their, 603. 
Portal we call death, life whose 272. 
Poi tance in my travels, 145. 
Portion, w'alesa, with judicious care, 386. 

of that around me, I become, 493. 

of uncertain paper, certain, 811. 

that best, of good man's life, 404. 
Posies, thousand f ragi-ant, 157. 
Possess a poet's brain, madness, 938. 
Possessed, I die but first I have, 207. 

less pleasing when, 79.3. 

with inward light, deep sounds, 822. 
Possession,virtue,would not show us,801. 
Post of honor is a private station, 601. 
Posterity done for us, what has, 793. 

obligation to, 793. 
Posy of a ring, prologue or the, 207. 
Potent grave and reverend signioi-s, 145. 
Pounds, rich with forty, a year, 083. 

six hundred, a year, 121. 
Poverty, distrest by, no more, 802. 

lighten half thy, 231. 

steeped me in, to the very lips, 725. 
Poverty's unconquerable bar, 812. 
I'owder, keep your, dry, 602. 
Power, God's dear, 807. 

intellectual, went soimdiug on, 808. 

not now in fortune's, ,347. 

O for a forty parson, 809. 

of grace, magic of a name, 810. 

of thought, magic of the mind, 812. 

taught by i hat, that pities, 1,39. 

that hath led his chosen, 602. 

that hath made us a nation, 593. 

that sways the breast, 809. 

the giftie gie us, wad some, 486. 

to charm, nor witch hath, 397. 
Powers that will work for thee, 922. 

which our minds impress, 397. 
Practice taught, wisdom such as, 798. 
Practised falsehood, 396. 

what he preached, 809. 
Practisour, a verrey parflght, 809. 
Praise, all his pleasure, 399. 

blame love kisses tears, 128. 

damn with faint, 910. 

dispraised of whom no small, 811. 

love of, howe'er concealed, 810. 

none named thee but to, 937. 

or infamy leave that to fate, 803. 

poets lose half the, 806. 

seller's, belongs to things of sale, 810. 

strongest, take on trust, 810. 

undeserved is scand.i 1,811. 

were none to, maid there, 104. 
Praising, the rose that all nre, 205. 

makes remembrance dear, 312. 
Pray, remained to, came to scoff, 688. 



Prayer all his business, 399. 

by thine agony of, 358. 

for others' weal availed, 238. 

homes of silent, his eyes are, 399. 

is the soul's sincere desire, 398. 

swears a, or two, 836. 
Prayeth best who loveth best, 860. 

well who loveth well, 860. 
Preached as never to preach, 395. 

practised what he, 809. 
Preacheth patience, takes text and, 364. 
Precedent, codeless myriad of, 810, 

to precedent, 603. 
Precincts of the cheerful day, 306. 
Precious jewel in his head, wears a, 34^. 

seeing to the eye, adds a, 203. 
Precipice, wave- worn, 720. 
Pregnant hinges of the knee. 111. 
'Prentice han' she tried on man, 191. 
Preparation, dreadful n: te of, 540. 
Presence, lord of thy, and no land be- 
side, 346. 

of the deity, the felt, 491. 
Present good or ill the joy or curse, 800. 

mirth has present laughter, 122. 
Presentment, counterfeit, 721. 
Press not a falling man too far, 345. 
Prest oughte ensample for to give, 809, 
Presume not God to scan, 792. 
Pretty Fanny's way, call it only, 134. 

flowret's eyes, 494. 

in amber to observe, 815. 

though a plague, 242. 

to walk with, she is, 134. 
Prey, flea has fleas that on nim, 490. 
Preys upon higli adventure, 798. 
Price for knowledge, too high the, 911. 
Prick the sides of my intent, 798. 
Pricking on the plaine, a knight, 827. 
Pride, blend our pleasui-e or our, 662. 

builds among the stars, 799. 

fell with my fortunes, 347. 

in reasoning, our error lies, 799. 

in their port, defiance in eye, 603. 

modest, and amorous delays, 711. 

my high-blown, broke under me, 321. 

of former days, so sleeps the, 577. 

pomp and circumstance, 722. 

rank, and haughtiness of soul, 799. 

spite of, one tiuth i - clear, 4S9. 

that apes humility, .396, 949. 

that licks the dust, 910. 

the never-failing vice of fools, 799. 
Prijnal duties shine aloft, 398. 

it hath the, eldest cui-se upon it, 900. 
Prime wisdom, to know is the. 798. 
Primeval, this is the, forest, 453. 
Primrose, biing the rathe, 494. 

by a river's bi im, 495, 

path of dalliance treads, 809. 

sweet as the, peeps, 690. 
Primroses that die unmarried, 495. 
Prince can make a belted knight, 341. 
Princes and lords may flourish, 687. 

but the breath of kings, 386. 

find few real fi-iends, 795. 

have great playthings, 541. 

sweet aspect of, and their ruin, 321. 

were privileged to kill,. 541. 
Princes' favors, man that hangs on, 32L 
Principles, oftener changed their, 347. 

with times, 814. 
Prison, palace and a, on each hand, 720. 

stone walls do not a, make, 147. 
Prison-house, secrets of my, 725. 
Prithee why so pale and wan, 263. 
Private griefs they have, 876. 
Prize not to the worth, 801. 
Probability keep in view, 805. 
Proceed ad infinitum, and so, 496. 
Process of the suns, widened with, 257. 

such was the, 115. 
Procrastination thief of time, 748. 
Procuress to the Lords of Hell. 397. 
Prodigality of nature, framed in, 721. 
Proflierer const: ue ay, 796. 
Profit of their shining nights, 804. 

no, grows where no pleasure, 804. 
Profits, meagre, from pen and ink, 940. 
Progressive virtue, useful life, 214. 
Prologue, ffr the posy of a ring, 207. 
Promethean fire, the right, 133. 

heat, where is that, 900. 
Promise, broke no, seiwed no private 
end, 120. 

keep the word of, to our ear, .345. 

of celetial worth, there buds, 398. 
Promised on a time, 938. 
Promises, fails where most it, 801. 
Proof, whose sweetness yieldeth, 809. 
Proofs of holy writ, strong as, 207. 
Prop that doth sustain, my house, 347. 
Proper study of mankind, is man, 792. 

stuflf, 868. 

time to marry, 215. 
Prophet's word, voice like a, 583. 
Prophetic ray, tints to-morrow with, 131, 



tl— 



^ 



fl- 



1054 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



^a 



Prophetic strain, attain to something 

like, 787. 
Prophets of the future, Past best of, 793. 

perverts tlie, purloins psalms, 397. 
Proportion, curtail'd of this fair, 938. 

In small, we just beauties see, 729. 
Proportions, by heart its eloquent, 726. 
Propose, why don't the men, 21i. 
Prose or rhyme, unattempted in, 917. 
Prospect, eye and, of his soul, 801. 

pleases, though every, 395. 
Pi-ospeets brightening to the last, 687. 

distant, please us, 801. 
Prosper, treason doth pever, 812. 
Protest too much, the lady doth, 307. 
Proteus rising from the sea, 403. 
Proud, ever fair and never, 723. 

his name, high tho' his titles, 563. 

man's contumely, 297. 

of parts, 798. 

philosophy, I ask not, i9i. 

setter-up of kings, 938. 

spirit of moi'tal be, 302. 

world, good-bye, I'm going, 311. 
Proud-pied April, dressed in trim, 492. 
Prove their doctrine orthodox, 387. 
Proved true before proved false, 809. 
Proverbs, patch grief with, 313. 
Providence alone secures, 394. 

foreknowledge will and fate, 888. 

may assert eternal, 395. 

their guide, 331. 
Provoke, odious 'twould, a saint, 779. 
Prow, youth on the, 108. 
Prunella, leather or, 781. 
Psalms, purloins the, 397. 
Public feasts, wedlock compared to,'231. 

haunt, our life exempt trom, 189.' 

rout, feasts where meet a, 231. 

show, midnight dances and, 312. 

speak in, on the stage, 107. 
Publishing our neighbor's shame, 811. 
Pudding, an added, solemnized, 803. 
Puller-down of kings, 938. 
Pure by being shone upon, 120. 
Purity of grace, the light of love, 133. 
Purloins the psalms, 397. 
Purple all the ground with flowers, 494. 
light of love, young desii-e and, 205. 
testament or war, 541. 
•with love's wound, 836. 
Purpose, flighty, never is o'ertook, 797. 
mflrm of, 883. 
one increasing, runs, 257. 
shake my fell, 900. 
Purposes, execute their airy, 868. 
Purpureal gleams, invested with, 399. 
Purse, who steals my, steals trash, 811. 
Pursue the triumph, partake the gale, 

Push us from our stools, 868. 
Put out the light and tlien— 900. 
Puts on his pretty looks, 107. 
Puzzles the will, 297. 
Pygmies are pygmies still, 398. 
Pygmy body, fretted the, to decay, 908. 
Pyramid, star-y-pointing, 906. 
Pyramids are pyramids in vales, 398. 

\'irtue outbuilds the, 398. 
Pyri-hic dance, you have the, 581. 

phalanx gone, where is the, 581. 

Quality of mercy is not strained, 798. 

true-flxed and resting, 492. 
Quantum o' the sin, waive the, 396. 
Quarrel, beware of entrance to a, 540. 

hath his, just, 796. 

Sddden and quick in, 711. 
Quean, flaunting, extravagant, 131. 
Queen Bess, image of good, 802. 

Mab hath been with you, 836. 

o' the May, I'm to be, 327. 

of the world, Columbia, 586. 
Question of despair, hurried, 309. 

that is the, to be or not to be, 297. 
Questionings of sense, obstinate, 759. 
Quickly, well it were done, 900. 
Quickness, with too much, 804. 
Quicksands, life hath, 104. 
Quiet, calm peace and, 786. 
Quietus make with a bare bodkin, 297. 
Quillets of the law, nice sharp 810 
Quills upon the fretful porcupine, 725 
Quips ana cranks and wanton wiles, 785. 
Quirks of blazoning pens, 722 
Quit O quit this mortal frame, 365. 
Quiver's choice, devil in all his, 204. 

Race, boast a generous, 813. 

I might all forget the human, 306. 

of man is found like leaves, 792. 

.she shall re.ar ray dusky, 257. 
Rack behind, leave not a, 867. 

of a too easy chair, stretched on, 724. 

of this tough world, 346. 

the value, why then we, 801. 
Rage, could swell the soul to, 772. 



Rage, heaven has no, 207. 

of the vulture, love of turtle, 451. 

strong without, 723. 

which war alone can purge, 539. 
Raggedness, looped and windowed, 494. 
Railer, Boreas blustering, 628. 
Rain, as mist resembles the, 813. 

driving, dashing, 493. 

droppeth as gentle, from heaven, 798. 

m the aire from earth to skie, 489. 

influence, whose bright eyes, 786. 

it raineth every day, 494. 

sweetest, makes not fresh, 346. 

thirsty earth soaks up the, 494. 
Rainbow, add a hue unto the, 726. 

colors of the, 869. 

to the storms of life, be thou, 134. 
Raise and support what is low, 395. 
Raised a mortal to the skies, 772. 
Ram, snow-white, on a grassy bank, 494. 
Random, shaft at, sent, 803. 

word at, spoken, 803. 
Range -ivith humble livers, 347. 
Ranging for revenge, 539. 
Rank is but the g-uinea's stamp, .341. 

my offence is, it smells to heaven. 

Ranks and squadrons, fought in, 899 

love levels all, 203. 
Rant as well as thou, I'll, 804. 
Rapt inspired, filled with fury, 773. 

soul sitting in thine eyes, 786. 
Rapture on the lonely shore, 607. 

to the dreary void, pangs are, 816. 
Rapture-smitten frame, owned with, 

Rare are solitaiy woes, 315. 

as a day in June, what is so, 434. 
Beaumont, 939. 
Ben Joiison, 939. 
Rarity of Christian charity, 335. 
Rash, I am not, splenetive and, 72.3. 
Rashly importunate, gone to death, 335 
Rathe primrose, bring tlie, 494. 
Rattle his bones over the stones, 341. 

pleased with a, 107. 
Ravelled sleave of care, 883. 
Raven, quoth the, nevermore, 853. 
Raven dovm of dai-kness, smoothing. 
736. ^' 

Ravens feed, he that doth the, 394. 
R"vished nightingale, 195. 
Ravishment, divine enchanting, 726. 
Ray serene, gem of purest, 306. 

tints to-moiTow with prophetic, 134. 
whose unclouded, 232. 
Rays, hide your diminished, 797. 

ten thousand de-svy, plays in, 731. 
Raze out the written troubles, 317. 
Razor, satire like a polished, 806. 
Razors, cried, up and down, 954. 
Razure of oblivion, tooth of time, 811. 
Reach, above the, of ordinary men, 807. 
Read, aught that ever I could, 250. 
to douOt or read to scorn, 397. 
Ready with every nod to tumble, 723. 
Reaper whose name is Death, 276. 
Reaping, ever, something new, 256. 
Rear my dusky race, she shall, 257. 

the tender thought, 107, 214. 
Rearward of a conquered woe, 271. 
Reason, beast that wants, discourse, 733. 
feast of, and flow of soul, 811. 
firm the temperate will, 128. 
my rhyme, promised to have, 938. 
godlike, capability and, 808. 
men have lost their, 876. 
my pleaded, approved, 209. 
noble and most sovereign, 807. 
received nor rhyme nor, 938. 
ruling passion conquers, still 799 
smiles from, flow, 204. 
the card, passion is the gale, 792. 
worse appear the better, 724. 
would despair, love hope where, 204. 
Reason's whole pleasure, 815. 
Reasons why we smile and sigh, 309. 
Receives, who much, nothing gives, 797. 
Recesses of a lowly spirit, ,375. 
Reck the rede, may you better, 796. 
Reckless libertine, puffed and, 809. 
Reckoning, O weary, 348. 
Recks not his own rede, 809. 
Recollection, fond, 100. 
Record, weep to, blush to give it in, 395. 
Recorded time, syllable of, 792 
Records, wipe away all trivial fond, 801. 
Red as a rose is she, 854. 

black to, began to turn, 490. 
her lips were, and one was thin, 211. 
red rose, my love's Uke a. 234. 
Rec'e, may you better reck the, 796. 
recks not his own, 809. 
ye tent it, 805. 
Redress, a pretty, in his lip, 145. 
Refreshes in the breeze, 489. 
Regent, moon sweet, of the sky, 491 



Reign in hell, better to, 799. 

of chaos and aid night, 725. 
Related, to whom, by whom begot, 311. 
Relic of departed worth, 581. 
Religion breathing household laws, 814. 

stands on tiptoe, 395. 
Religious light, casting a dim. 787. 
Relish of salvation in it, no, 395. 
Reluctant amorous delay, 711. 
Remainder biscuit, dry as the, 803. 
Remained to pray, came to scoff, 688. 
Remains, be kind to my, 120. 

of thee, this is all, 582. 
Remedies oft in ourselves do Tie, 793. 
Remedy, things -without all, 793. 
Remember an apothecary, I do, 809. 
I cannot but, such things were, 313. 
I remember, 93, 108. 
thee 1 yea from my memory, 801. 
Remembered kisses after death, dear as. 
315. 
knolling a departed friend, 346. 
sorrows sweeten joy, 346. 
Remembering happier things, 255. 
Remembers his gracious parts, 107. 
Remembrance and reflection, allied, 801. 
of things past, I summon up, 115. 
praising what's lost makes the, dear, 

312. 
rosemai-y, that's for, 195. 
Remorse, access and passage to, 900. 
farewell, 395. 

keen, with blood defiled, 899. 
Remote from man. with God, 399. 
Remove, drags at each, 318. 
Rends thy constant heart, sigh that, 140. 
Renown, fair examples of, 318. 

some for, 801. 
Renowned Spenser, lie more nigh, 939. 
Rent is sorrow, her income tears, 211. 
see what a, the envious Casca, 876. 
Repast and calm repose, sweet, 232. 
Repent at leisure, married in haste, 214. 
Repentance, fierce, rears her crest, 799. 
Report me and my cause aright, 811. 
Repose, sweet repast and calm, 233. 
Repressing ill, crowning good, 599. 
Reproof on her lip, smile m her eye, 197. 
Reproved each dull delay, 688. 
Reputation dies at evei-y word, 811. 

seeking the bubble, 711. 
Researches, no deep, vex the brain, 805. 
Resemblance hold, though no, 720. 
Resentment glows, with one, 120. 
Reserve thy .ludgment, 815. 
Resignation gently slopes, 687. 
Resigned when ills betide, 226. 
Resistless eloquence, ancient whose, 801. 
Resolutlon,native hue,is sicklied o'er,297. 

soldier armed with, 204. 
Resolve itself into a dew, thaw and, 31L 
Resolved, once to be, 207. 
to ruin or to rule, 601. 
Respect upon the world, too much, 803. 
Rest rest perturbed s-pirit, 311. 
Restless ecstasy, to lie in, 311. 
Restores the weak, 809. 
Restreine thy tonge, 398. 
Resty sloth finds pillow hard, 816. 
Retired leisure, add to these, 786. 
Retirement rural quiet friendship, 214. 

short, urges sweet return, 814. 
Retreat, loopholes of, 810. 
Return, I thought she bade me, 332. 

retirement urges sweet, 815. 
Revel, bids every passion, 809. 
Revelry, sound of, by night. 611. 
Revels, midnight, faei-y elves whose, 491. 

now are ended, our, 867. 
Revenge, falsehood couched -with, 396. 
feed my, if nothing else, 899. 
ranging for, 539. 
study of, immortal hate, .540. 
sweet is, especially to women, 167. 
Revengeful eyes on murderers, 900. 
Reverence, none so poor to do him, 867. 
Reverse of wrong, mistook for right. 

808. 
Revolt when truth would set free, 601. 
Reward, a sure, though late succeeds, 

398. 
Rewards, Fortune's buffet.*; and, 113. 
Rhetoric, ope his mouth for. 804. 
Rhetorician's rules teach nothing, 804. 
Rhine, dwelleth by the castled, 494. 

what power shall wath the river, 954. 
wide and winding, 446. 
Rhyme, blot out the epic's stately, 915. 
making beautiful old, 122. 
nor reason, 938. 
one for, one for sense, 807. 
reason for my, 938. 
the rudder is of verses, 807. 
those that write in, 807. 
turn o'er some idle, 816. 
Ribbon bound, give me what this, 125. 
Rich and rare the gems she wore, 721. 



^ 



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e- 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1055 



fl] 



Eich and strange, into something, 869. 

from want of wealth, 559. 

in having sucli a jewel, 315. 

men rule the law, 809. 

not gaudy, 722. 

the treasui-e, sweet the pleasure, 771. 

with forty pounds a year, 688. 

with the spoils of tinie, 306. 
Eichai'd is himself again, 5il. 

the soul of, 541, 868. 
Riclier than all his tribe, 72i. 
Riches, inflnite, in a little room, 726. 

of heaven's pavement, 803. 
Ride abroad, when he next doth, 962. 
Rider, steed that knows its, 631. 
Rides in the whirlwind, 539. 

upon the storm, 633. 
Right by chance, fool now and then, 780. 

I see the, and I approve it too, 395. 

onward, bear up and steer, 735. 
Right there is none to dispute, my, 738. 

whatever is. is, 489. 
Rights, know their, and knowing dare 

maintain, 599. 
Rill, sunshine broken in the, 848. 
Rills, dance of a thousand, 604. 
Ring in the Christ that is to be, 753. 

in the valiant man and free, 702. 

on her wand she bore, 721. 

out old shapes of foul disease, 752. 

out the darkness of the land, 752. 

out wild bells 752. 

posy of a, prologue or the, 207. 
Ringlets, blowing, trom the braid, 721. 
Ripe and ripe, hour to hour we, 791. 

scholar and a, and good one, 723. 
Ripest fruit first falls. 309. 
Rise, created half to, half to fall, 792. 

with the lark, 495. 
Rival in the wrong, 799. 
River at my garden's end, 121. 

Dee, jolly miller lived on the, 559. 

glideth at his own sweet will, 678. 

like the foam on the, 283. 

of his thoughts, ocean to the, 765. 

snow fall in the, 848. 
Rivers, by shallow, to whose falls, 1.57. 

cannot quench, fire suffered, 815. 

mn to seas, brooks make rivers, 493. 
Rivets, busy hammers closing up, 540. 
Rivulets dance their wayward round,103. 

myriads of, hurrying, 493. 
Road, along a rough a weary, 345. 

lonesome, like one that on a, 858. 
Roam, they are fools who, 226. 

where'er I, what realms to see, 248. 
Roast beef of old England, 575. 
Robe, dew on his thin, was heavy, 578. 

of clouds, in a, 493. 

of night, tore the azure, 592. 
Robes and f ui'red gowns, 802. 

flaunting, of sin, 813. 

loosely flowing h.air as free, 713. 

riche or fithele, 696. 
Robin-redbreast, call for the, 495. 

tunes his throat, 495. 
Robs the vast sea, sun's a thief and, 489. 
Rock shall fly from its firm base, 655. 

weed flung from the, I am as a, 631. 
Rock-bound coast, on a stern and, 587. 
Rocks, throne of, in a robe of clouds, 493. 

pure gold, water nectar and the, 215. 

to soften, music hath charms, 809. 
Rod a chief a, wit's a feather and, 780. 

of empire might have swayed, 306. 

spare the, and spoil the child, 108. 
Roderick, where was, then, 511. 
Roll of common men, not in the, 812. 

on deep and dark blue ocean, 607. 
Rolling year is full of thee, 417. 
Roman holiday, butchered to make, 681. 

senate long debate, can a, 570. 
Romans call it stoicism, 799. 

countrymen, friends, 875. 
Romantic, if folly grow, 805. 
Rome, city of the soul, 720. 

move the stones of, to rise, 877. 

when, falls— the world, 682. 
Room, grief fills, of my absent child, 107. 

inflnite riches in a little, 726. 
Root of age, worm is at the, 308. 
Rooted sorrow, pluck from memoi-y, 347. 
Rose above the mould, 327 

flung odors from spicy shrub, 209. 

go lovely, 125. 

happy is the, distilled, 495. 

is tairest when 'tis budding new, 204. 

is sweetest washed with dew, 304, 

'tis the last, of summer, 464. 

milk-white, raise aloft the, 49.5. 

offend thy sight, if this fair, 123. 

red as a, is she, 854. 

red, red, my luve's like a, 234. 

should shut and be a bud again, 179. 
Rose that all are praising, 205. 

that lives its little hour, 309. 
Rosebud garden of girls, 153. 



Rosebud set with thorns, 721. 
Rosebuds filled with snow, 123. 

gather ye, while ye may, 754. 
Rosemary that's for remembrance, 495. 
Roses and white lilies blow, 123. 

in December, as soon seek, 806. 

make thee beds of, I will, 157. 

scent of the, hang round it still, 240. 
Rosy red, celestial, love's proper hue, 203. 
Rot and rot from hour to hour, 791. 
Rotten at the heart, goodly apple, 797. 
Rough quarries rocks and hiUs, 145. 

with bleak winds, 032. 
Rough-hew them how we will, 793. 
Round and orient pearls, 494. 

and top of sovereignty, 75. 

attains the upmost, 799. 

the slight waist, 814. 

travelled Ufe's dull, 121. 

unvarnished tale deliver, 145. 
Rounded with a sleep, little life is, 867. 
Rout on rout, ruin upon ruin, 725. 

where meet a pubUc, 231. 
Routed aU his foes, thrice he, 771. 
Rub, to dream ay there's the, 297. 
Rubies, fairy favors those be, 869. 

grew where the, 134. 
Rudder, rhyme the, is of verses, 807. 
Rude am I m my speech, 145. 

forefathers of the hamlet sleep, 305. 

may no, hand deface it, 311. 
Ruin, beauteous, lovely in death, 794. 

or to i-ule the state, 601. 

upon ruin rout on rout, 725. 
Ruin's ploughshare drives elate, 463. 
Rule Biitannia rules the waves, 576. 

of men entirely great, beneath, 805. 

the state, to ruin or to, 601. 
Ruler of the inverted year, winter, 492. 
Rules, if she, him never shows she, 215. 
Ruling by obeying Nature's powers, 541. 

passion, 780, 799. 
Rumor of oppression and deceit, 593. 
Run amuck and tilt at all I meet, 806. 
Runs away, he who fights aJid, 540. 

he that, may read, 398. 

the great circuit, 810. 
Rupert of debate, 723. 
Rural quiet friendship, books, 214. 

sights alone but rural sounds, 493. 
Rush into the skies, 799. 

to glory or the grave, 513. 
Rushes, hews oaks with, 813. 
Rustic moralist, teach the, to die, 306. 
Rustics, gazing, ranged around, 688. 
Rustling in the dark, mournful, 801. 
Rye, comin' through' the, 187. 

Sabbath appeared, smiled when a, 738. 

he who ordained the, 347. 
Sable cloud turn her silver lining, 491. 
Sabler tints of woe, chastised by, 346. 
Sabrina fair listen, 869. 
Sacred shade and solitude, 491. 
Sacrifice, turn delight into a, 364. 
Sacrilegious murder broke ope, 900. 
Sad as angels for good man's sm, 395. 

by fits by starts 'twas wild, 773. 

cheerless being sole and, 271. 

music of humanity, still, 404. 

stories of the death of kings, 310. 

vicissitudes of things, 559. 

words of tongue or pen, 159. 
Sadder and a wiser man, 860. 
Sadness and longing, feeling of, 813. 

mixed with no unpleasing, 867. 
Safety, pluck this flower, 671. 
Sage advices, monie lengthened, 247. 

he thought as a, 737. 
Sages have seen in thy face, 738. 

in all times assert, 347. 

of ancient time, 806. 
Said, much may be, on both sides, 803. 
SaU, diversely we, on life's ocean, 792. 

set evei-y threadbare, 620. 

shall my bark attendant, 911. 
Sailed on, how slow his soul, 241. 
Sailing like a stately ship, 631. 

on obscene ^vings, 395. 
Sailor, lives like a drunken, 722. 
Sails, behold the threaden, 631. 

filled, streamers waving, 631. 
Saint in crape twice a saint in la^vn, 812. 

'twould a, provoke, 779. 

seem a, when I play the devil, 396. 

weakest, upon his knees, 398. 
Saintly chastity, so dear is, 796. 

shew, falsehood under, 396. 
Saints, his soul is with the, 539. 

in your injuries, 723. 

who taught and led the way, 910. 
Sally, there's none like pretty, 198. 
Saltpetre, pity this villanous, 506. 
Salvation, no relish of, in it, 395. 

tools of working out, 396. 
Same, you're all the, 371. 
Samphire, hangs one that gathers, 445. 



Sand and the wild uproar, 40G. 

were pearl, if all their, 215. 
Sands, come unto these yellow, 869. 

of time, footpiints on the, 770. 

small, the mountain, 815. 
Sans taste sans evei-ything, 711. 

teeth sans eyes, 711. 
Sapphire blaze, living throne the, 939. 
Sapphires, glowed with living, 413. 
Sappho loved and sung, burnuig, .580. 
Satan exalted sat by merit raised, 732. 

finds some mischief still, 108. 

is wiser than of yore, 803. 

trembles when he sees, 398. 
Satchel, school-boy with his, 107, 711. 
Satire be my song, let, 806. 

is my weapon, 806. 

like a polished razor keen, 806. 

or sense, can Sporus feel, 909. 
Satisfied that is well paid, 802. 
Saucy doubts and fears, 800. 
Savage woman, I will take some, 257. 
Saviour's birth is celebrated, 397. 
Saws, full of wise, and instances, 711. 
Say not good night, 304. 
Sayings of philosophers, 347. 
Says, never, a foohsh thing, 940. 
Scabbard, my sword glued to my, 641. 
Scaffold high or in the battle's van, 602. 
Scan, gently, j'our brother man, 784. 
Scandal in disguise, praise undeserved 

is, 811. 
Scandals, immortal, on eagle's wings,811. 

scant this breathing courtesy. 131. 
Scarfs of mixed embroidery, rival, 725. 
Scars, he jests at^ that never felt, 345. 
Scatter all his spices on the stream, 632, 

plenty o'er smiling land, 306. 
Scene, cunning of the, 804. 

last, of all, 711. 

of man, all this, 792. 
Scenes, gay gilded, 807. 

like this, live and die in, 238. 
Scent of odorous perfume, 631. 

of the roses hang round it still, 240. 

the fair annoys, weed whose, 558. 

the morning air, methinks 1, 489. 
Sceptre, a barren, in my gripe, 345. 

leaden, stretches forth her, 491. 
Sceptred sway, mercy is above this, 468. 
Schemes o' mice and men, 498. 
Scholar and a ripe and good one, 723. 
School, creeping unwillingly to, 711. 
School-boy, then the whinmg, 711. 

with his satchel, 107. 
School-boy's tale, 792. 
School-boys, frisk away like, 108. 
School-days, in my, when I lost, 803. 

in my joyful, 274. 
Schools, 'tis an old maxim in the, 810. 
Science f rowTied not, fair, 307. 

glare of false, betrayed by the, 737. 

proud, never taught to stray, 399. 

star-eyed, 397. 

the hardest, to forget, 248. 
Scoffe, fools who came to. 688. 
Scolding, the conjugal petard, 215. 
Scole of Stratford-atte-Bowe,696. 
Scorn delights, live laborous days, 812. 

dowered with the, of scorn, 807. 

figure for time of, to point at, 725. 

laugh a siege to, 540. 

laughed his word to, 396. 

thrice in spite of, 346. 
Scorns of time, whips and, 297. 
Scornful jest, mcst bitter is a, 345. 
Scotia's grandeur springs, 386. 
Scourge inexorable, 396. 
Scraps of learning dote, on, 804. 
Screw courage to the sticking-place, 802. 
Scripture authentic uncorrupt, 489. 

elder, writ by God's own hand, 489. 

devil can cite, for his puipose, 797. 
Scruple of her excellence, 797. 
SculUon, fie upon't, foh, 725. 
Scum rises when the nation boils, 813. 
Sea, alone on a wide wide, 856. 

dark blue sea, 626. 

down to a sunless, 834. 

footsteps in tlie, plants his, 683. 

heritage the, our, 626. 

I'm on the, 625. 

into that silent, first that burst, 855. 

inviolate, composed by the, C32. 

is a thief, 489. 

loved the great, more and more, 625. 

my bark is on the, 920. 

of glory, many summers in a 321. 

of pines, risen from thy silent, 376. 

of troubles, take aims against a, 297. 

one as the, 608. 

one foot in, and one on shore, 271. 

ooze and bottom of the, 632. 

Proteus rising from the, 403. 

robs the vast, sun's a tliief and, 489. 

Bet in the silver, precious stone, 603. 

sight of that immortal, 759. 



a 



-ff 



s 



1056 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



^a 



Sea, society by the deep. C07. 

summer, calm as a, 631. 

Bwelling of tlie voiceful, 823. 

tlie open sea, 62.5. 

union with, its native, C31. 

■wave o' the, I wish j'ou a, 134. 

wet sheet and a flowing, 620. 

whether in, or fire, 863. 

wliose every flexible wave, 631. 
Sea-born treasures, fetched my, i08. 
Sea-change, suffer a, 809. 
Seal, evei-y god did seem to set his, 721. 
Seals of love but sealed hi vain, 263. 
Sear the yellow leaf, 794. 
Search not his bottom, 720. 

patient, and vigil long, 899. 

will And it out, 800. 
Seas, dangers of the, 632. 

foam of perilous, opening on the, 317. 

gang dry, till a' the, 234. 

multitudinous, incarnadine, 883. 

such a jewel as twenty, 215. 

two boundless, isthmus 'twixt, 793. 
Season, ever 'gainst that, comes, 397. 
Seasoned timber never gives, 302. 
Seasons and their change, all, 206. 

death thou hast all, 308. 

of the year, so issued forth the, 492. 

return, thus with the year, 407. 
Seat, this castlt.hath a pleasant, 720. 

in some poetic nook, O for a, 489. 

nature from her, gave signs, 899. 
Seats beneath the shade, OSO. 
Seclusion, in, and remote from men, 940. 
Second childishness and oblivion, 711. 
Secret sympathy tne silver link, 203. 
Secrets of my prison-house, 725. 
Sect, slave to no, 808. 
Sedge, gentle kiss to every, 493. 
Seduces all mankind, woman, 795. 
See ere thou go, 214. 

her was to love her, 233, 242. 

oursel's as itliers see us, 486. 

the right .-.nd I approve it too, 395. 

thee d— d first, give sixpence! I'll, 953. 
Seed-time and harvest, 493. 
Seeing, adds a precious, to the eye, 203. 
Seem a saint, play the devil, 396. 
Seeming estranged, providence, 335. 

evil still educing good, from, 418. 

otherwise, beguilo thing I am, 347. 
Seems madam nay it is, 295. 
Seen better days, we have, 347. 

needs but to be, to be hated, 395, 398. 
Self, smote the chord of, 255. 

to thine own, be true, 797. 
Self-sacriflce, give me the spirit of, 797. 
Self -slaughter, canon 'gainst, 311. 
Self-withdrawn into bomidless depth, 

807. 
Seller's praise to things of sale, 810. 
Selves, from our own, our joys, 226. 
Sempronius, we'll do more, 802. 
Senate at his heels, Csesarwitha, 781. 

can a Roman, long debate, 570. 

gives his little, laws, 002, 910. 
Senates, applause of listening, 305. 
Senators, green-robed, of woods, 494. 
Sensations felt in the blood, 403. 
Sense, all the joys of, 815. 

echo to the sound, 806. 

from thought divide. 801. 

much fruit of, is rarely found, 803. 

of death in apprehension, 310. 

one lor, one for i-hyme, 807. 

song charms the, 808. 

subUme of something, 404. 

want of, want of decency, 805. 
Senses, steep my, in forgetfulness, 7G2. 

unto our gentle, 720. 
Sensible to feeling as to sight, 882. 
Sentenc3 is for open war, my, 539. 
Sentenced to toil as punishment, 559. 
Sentinel stars set their %vatch, 529. 
Sequestered vale, 794, 306. 

stag, 490. 
Seraph, rapt, that adores and bums, 394. 
Seraphic arms and trophies, 725. 
Seraphs might despair, where, 215. 
Seraph-wings of ecstasy, 039. 
Serene gem of purest ray, 300. 

of heaven, breaks the, 491. 
Serenely full, epicure would say, 1013. 
Serjeant death, this fell, 309. 
Sermon, verso find him who, flies, 304. 
Sermons in stone, 489. 
Serpent, like Aaron's, 799. 

trail of the, is over them all, 390. 
Serpent's tooth, sharper than, 348. 
Servant of God well done, 395. 
Serve in heaven, reign in hell than, 799. 

they also, who stand and wait, 368. 
Servcth not another's will, 738. 
Service dyvyne she soonge, 696. 

small, is true service, 89. 

weary and old with, 321. 
Seson priketh every gentil herte, 492. 



Setting, I haste now to my, 346. 

in western skies, behold him, 490. 
Seven ages, his acts being, 711. 
Seven years' pith, these arms had, 145. 
Severe, lively to, grave to gay, 911. 
Several praise bestows on several parts, 

721. 
Severn, Avon to the, runs, 939. 
Sex, spirits can either, assume, 858. 

to the last, 200. 

whose presence civilizes, 558. 
Shade, ah pleasin<^, 108. 

and solitude, this sacred, 491. 

beneath the quivering, 672. 

boundless contiguity of, 593. 

checkered, dancing in the, 785. 

more welcome, fairer spirit or, 910. 

seats beneath the, bush with, GS6. 

sitting in a pleasant, 480. 

softening into shade, 417. 

spot with Amaryllis in the, 203. 

that follows wealth or fame, 139. 

through sun and, fled fast, 721. 

unperceived, 417. 
Shades, of night, and with him fled the, 
490. 

soon as the evening, 370. 

these happy walks and, 321. 
Shadow, float double swan and, 493. 

horrible, unreal mockery, 868. 

in the sun, see my, 938. 

life is but a walking, 792. 
Shadows, beckoning, dire, 830. 

conieUke, so depart, 808. 

coming events cast their, before, 574. 

lengthening as vapors rise, 490. 

not substantial things, glories, 301. 

that walk by us still, 797. 

thousand go, face o'er which a, 721. 

to-night struck more terror, 868. 
Shady place, sunshine in the, 828. 

side of Pail-Mall, give me sweet, 814. 
Shaft at random sent, many a, 80.3. 

flew thrice, thrice my peace v.'as 
slain, 491. 

that made him die, 134. 

when I had lost one, 802. 

wmged the, that quivered, 800. 
Shake my fell purpose, 900. 

never, thy gory locks at me, 868. 

seems to, the spheres, 771. 
Shakespeare, make room for, 939. 

sweetest, fancy's child, 786. 

tongue that, spake, 602. 
Shaking, fruit that can fall without, 205. 
Shall I wasting in despair, 193. 
Shallow broolcs and rivers wide, 785. 

spir.t of judgment, I have some, 810. 
Shallows, bound in, and in miseries, 802. 
Shame, blush of maiden, 494. 

each deed of, beneath our feet, 399. 

erring sister's, 267. 

honor and, from no condition, 781. 

the devil, tell truth and, 398. 

to men devil with devil damned, 815. 

where is thy blush, 395. 
Shames, thousand innocent, 723. 
Sh.ank, hose too wide for his shrunk, 711. 
Shape, air and harmony of, 721. 

power to assume a pleasing, 396. 
Shapes, calling, fantasies of, 830. 

of foul disease, 752. 

that come not at an earthly call, 868. 

turns them to, poet's pen, 867. 
Sharp and sulphurous boit, 813. 

misery had worn him, 309. 
Sharper than a serpent's tooth, 347. 
Sharp-lookmg wretch, 722. 
Shatter the vase, break you may, 240. 
She drew an angel down, 772. 

for God in him, 711. 

never told her love, 2.51. 

that not, impossible, 192. 

unexpressive, fair chaste and, 134. 

will, if she will do't, 795. 
Shears, fury with the abhorred, 812. 
Shed their selectest influence, 209. 
Sheer o'er the crystal battlements, 725. 
Shell, convolutions of a, 631. 

music slumbers in the, 213. 

take ye each a, 810. 
Shepherd, star that bids the, fold, 491. 

tells his tale, and every, 785. 
Shepherd's tongue, truth in every, 158. 
Shepherds all and maidens fair, 409. 
Slieridan, broke the die moulding, 940. 
Shew, falsehood, under saintly, 398. 
Shift from side to side, 799. 
Shifts, holy, are dispensations, 396. 
Shillmg, Philip and Mary on a, 205. 
Shines, so, a good deed, 797. 
Shining, deatli loves a, mark, 309. 

morning face, school-boy with, 711. 
Ship, idle as a painted, 855. 

of State, sail on 0, 576. 
Ships, hearts of oak a' e our, 631. 

they steer their courses, 807. 



Shirt, happy man's without a, 347. 

oftener changed principles than, 343", 
Shoal of time, bank and, 900. 
Shoals of honor, depths and, 322. 
Shock of pleasure to the frame, 770. 
Shocks that flesh is heir to, 297. 
Shoe has power to wound, 133. 
Shoe-string, careless, in whose tie, 713. 
Shone like a meteor, streaming, 725. 
Shook the arsenal, 804. 
Shoot, teach young idea how to, 214. 
Shop, in his needy, 809. 
Shore, fades o'er the waters blue, 238. 

fast by their native, 612. 

landing on some silent, 309. 

my boat is on the, 920. 

my native, adieu, 238. 

never on the dull tame, 625. 

of memory, silent, 801. 

rapture on the lonely, 607. 

them unhappy folks on, 630. 

unknown and silent, 285. 

usurps the, 632. 

wild and willowed, 494. 
Shores, undreamed, unpathed waters, 

802. 
Short and far between, 396. 

and simple annals of the poor, 306. 

as are the nights, vain delights, 315. 
Shot forth peculiar graces, 203. 

my arrow o'er the hi use, 121. 
Should auld acquaintance be forgot, 118. 
Shouldered his crutch, 688. 
Shoulders, heads grow beneath, 145. 
Shoures, Aprille with his, 695. 
Shout that tore hell's concave, 725. 
Shovel and tongs to each other belongs, 

200. 
Show his eyes, grieve his heart, 868. 

jublic, midnight dances and, 312. 

terrible, judges all ranged a, 722. 

that within which passeth, 295. 

us how divine a thing, 444. 

world is all a fleeting, 399. 
Showed how fields were won, 688. 
Showers, suck the honied, 494. 

Sydneian, of sweet discourse, 193. 
Shows, comment on the, 491. 
Shriek, solitary, the bubbling c! y, 632. 
Shrill trumpet sounds, 541. 
Shrine of the mighty, 581. 
Shrines to no code or creed, 917. 
Shrunk shank, too wide for his, 711. 
Shuffled off this mortal coil, 297. 
Shuffling nag, foi'ced gait of a, 807. 
Shut shut the door, 805. 

the gates of mercy, 306. 
Sick, say I'm, I'm dead, 805. 
Sicklied o'er with cast of thought, 297. 
Sickness makes her pale and wan, 792. 
Sides of my intent, spur to prick, 798. 

much may be said on both, 803. 
Sidelong looks of love, 687. 

maid, kiss from the, 672. 
Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother, 907. 
Siege to scorn, laugh a, 510. 
Sigh no more, ladies, 271. 

passing tribute of a, 308. 

pei'haps will cost a, a tear, 304. 

that rends thy heart, 139. 

the absent claims, 801. 

to those who love me, 920. 

yet feel no pain, 815. 
Sighed and looked, 204, 772. 

to many, loved but one, 131. 
Sighing, farewell goes out, 792. 

like furnace, the lover, 711. 
Sighs and tears, all made of, 204. 

in Venice, on the bridge of, 720. 

west-wind's summer, 719. 

world of, for my pains a, 145. 
Sight, charms stiike the, 203. 

entrancing, 539. 

faints into dimness, 720. 

friends out of, we lose, ISO. 

internal, the cell of fancy, 309. 

'twas a lonely, to see, 721. 

loved not at flist, who loved thJit, 203L 

of means to do ill deeds, 815. 

of that immortal sea, 759. 

of vernal bloom, 407. 

spare my aching, 868. 

splendid, to see, 725. 
Sights, rural, alone but rural sounds, 493. 
Sign of gratulation, eai th gave, 209. 
Signet sage, pressed his, 670. 
Significant and budge, 724. 
Signifying nothing, 792. 
Signiors, grave and reverend, 145. 
Signs of woe. Nature gave, 899. 
Silence accompanied, 413. 

and eternal sleep, 311. 

and slow time, foster-child of, 718. 

and tears, parted i , 241. 

envious tongues, 322. 

expressive, muse his praise, 418. 

in love bewrays more woe, 201. 



O- 



^ 



[& 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1057 



ft 



Silenco, tsnaWs in your, let it be, 815. 
wag pleased, 413. 
v.-ing-s cf , lloat upon the, 726. 
Silent catai'acts, 377. 

linger points to heaven, 393. 
in a last embrace, 255. 
man can prize, who the, 724. 
manliness of grief, 690. 
prayer, liomes of, 399. 
sea of pines, 376. 
shore, landing on some, 309. 
thought, sessions of sweet, 115. 
upon a peak in Darien, 805. 
Silently as a dream, 493. 
Silk attire, walk in, 155. 
Silken tie, silver link the, 203. 
Silks, enrobe the waters with my, C32. 
Siloa's brook that flowed, 399. 
Silver bowers leave, 373. 
lining on the night, 491. 
Imk the silken tie, 203. 
mantle threw, 413. 
Simile that solitary shines, 807. 
Simple wiles, transient sorrows, 128. 
Sim'jlicity a grace, 713. 

truth miscalled, 398. 
Sin, ambrosial. 166. 

and death abound, 399. 
angels fell by that, 322. 
blossoms of my, cut off in, 310. 
could blight, ere, 107. 
darling, is pride that apes, 396. 
favorite, is pride that apes, 949. 
flaunting robes of, 813. 
for me to sit and grin, 323. 
quantum o' the, I waive, 396. 
tney, who tell us, 206. 
to covet honor, if it be, 811. 
what, dipped me in ink, 805. 
Sincerity, bashful, and comely love, 204. 

vyrought in a sad, 735. 
Sinews bought and sold, 694. 
slac'cen with the fright, 725. 
stiffen the, 503. 
Sin": and that I hey love, 399. 

because I must, 807. 
Singing as they slime, 376. 
Single blessedness, lives in, 495. 
life, O fle upon this, 232. 
talent well employed, 395. 
Sings yet so does wail, 495. 
Sinking, in thy last long sleep, 78. 
Sinner it or saint it, 805. 

of his memory, made such a, 797. 
Sins, compound for, 387. 

oldest, commit, the newest ways. 395. 
Sion hill delight thee more, 399. 
Sires, green graves of your, 502. 
Sister spirit come away, 365. 
Sister's, erring, shame, 207. 
Sit attentive to his own applause, 910. 

here will we, 775. 
Sitting in a pleasant shade, 480. 
Sixpence I give thee, 953. 
Skies, common people of the, 124. 
milky baldric of the, 592. 
looks commercing vrith the, 786, 
odor of the, is in it, 204. 
raised a mortil to the, 772. 
rush into the, 799. 
setting in his western, 490. 
watcher of the, 80.5. 
Skill in arguing, owned his, 683. 
SIvilled in gestic lore, 232. 
Skirt the eternal frost, 377. 
Sky, admitted to that equal, 399. 
banner in the 620. 
blue ethereal, 376. 
canopied by the blue, 765. 
fated, gives us free scope, 793. 
forehead of the morning, 490. 
girdled with the, 491. 
is changed and such a change, 686. 
regent of the moon, sweet, 491. 
stars set their watch in the, 529. 
tears of the, 491. 
under the open, go forth, 307. 
witchery of the soft blue, 490. 
yon rich, they die in, 440. 
Slain, thrice lie slew the, 771. 
Slander sharper than the sword, 811. 
Slaughter, wade througli, to throne, 305. 
Slaughterous thoughts, 900. 
Slave, born to be a, 601. 

passion's, that is not, 112. 
to no sect, 803. 
to thousands, 811. 
to till iuy ground, 594. 
Slavery or death which to choose. 570. 
Slaves, Britons never shall be, 576^ 
cannot breathe in England, 594. 
mechanic, with greasy aprons, 722. 
that crawl where monarchs lead, 602. 
Sleave of eare, knits up the ravelled, 883. 
bleep and a forgetting, birth is a, 758. 
care-charming, 816. 
death is but the sounder, 310. 



Sleep, hour friendliest to, and silence, 
816. 
how, the Ijrave, 563. 
in dull cold marble. 321. 
in, a king, 240. 
is a death, 310. 
It is a gentle thing, 857. 
lav me down to take my, 107. 
life is rounded with a, 867. 
Macbeth does murder, 883. 
nature's sweet restorer balmy, 816. 
no more, a voice cry, 883. 
no more, to die to, 297. 
O gentle, nature's soft nurse, 762. 
of death, in that, 297. 
or die, indifferent to, 310. 
silence or eternal, 311. 
sinking in thy last long, 78. 
some must, some must watch, 671. 
that knows not breaking, 530. 
the friend of woe, 816. 
the innocent, 883. 
third of life passed in, 310. 
was aery-light, 490. 
Sleepless themselves, 807. 
Sleeps, the pride of former days, 577. 

upon this bank, 775. 
Sleet of arrowy shower, 540. 
Slepe, out of his, to .sterte, 492. 
Slepen al the night, 695. 
Slept in peace, 311. 
Slew the slain, thrice he, 771. 
Slings and arrows of fortune, 297. 
Slippered Pantaloon, lean and, 711. 
Slippers thrust upon contrary feet, 722 
Slips, greyhounds in the, 503. 
Slits the thin-spun life, 812. 
Slogardie a^night, no, 492. 
Sloping into brooks, 493. 
Sloth, resty, finds the pillow hard, 816. 
Slovenly unhandsome corse, 5U6. 
Slow, too swift tai-dy as too, 815. 
Sluggard, 'tis the voice of the, 815. 
Slumber, lie still and 76. 
Slumbering ages, wakens the, 812. 
Slumber's chain has bound me, 318. 
Slumbers in the shell, 213. 
hght, dreams and, 816. 
Smacked of noyance or unrest, 83L 
Small beer, to chronicle, 723. 
Latin and less Greek, 905. 
sands the mountain, 815. 
service is true service, 89. 
vices do appear, 802. 
Smallest worm will turn, 798. 
Smart, of all the girls that are so, 198. 
Smell of bread and butter, always, 107. 

sweet, actions of the just, 301. 
Smelleth the battle afar off, 613. 
Smells to heaven, 226, 900. 

wooingly, heaven's breath, 720. 
Smels sweete al around, 494. 
Smile and be a villain, 722. 

and tear, pendulum betwixt a, 792. 
from partial beauty won, 795. 
ghastly, death grinned a, 899. 
good man's, to share the, 688. 
in her eye, reproof on her lips, 197. 
in pain, frown at pleasure, 799. 
on her lips, a tear in her eye, 176. 
social, the sympathetic teai-, 232. 
tear followed by a, 464. 
that glowed celestial rosy red, 203. 
that was cliildlike and bland, 987. 
to those who hate, 920. 
vain tribute of a, 810. 
we would aspire to, 321. 
Smiled, all around thee, 78. 

when a sabbath appeared, 738. 
Smiles at the drawn dagger, 759. 
for sickness and for age, 804. 
from reason flow, 204. 
his emptiness betray, 910. 
of joy, the tears of woe, 399. 
of other maidens, 128. 
the clouds away, beam that, 134. 
welcome ever, 792. 
wreathed, nods and becks and, 785. 
Smiling at grief, patience, 251. 
Smith stand with his hammer, 722. 
Smoke, awful guide in, and flame, 372. 
hall of, 814. 

that so gracefully curled, 228. 
Smokes along the sounding plain, 493. 
Smooth at a distance. 204. 

runs the water, 724. 
Smoothing the raven down, 726. 
Smooth-lipped shell, 631. 
Smoothness, the torrent's, 494. 
Smote the chord of self, 2.55. 
Snail, creeping like, unwillingly, 7U, 
Snailes, feet like, did creep, 721. 
Snake, like a wounded, 807. 
Snapper-up of trifles, 724. 
Sneer, teach the rest to, 910. 
Snore upon the flint, 816. 
Snow, December, wallows in, 346, 



Snow, hide those hills of, 263. 

kindle Are with, 203. 

rosebuds filled with, 123. 

shall be their winding sheet, 513. 
Snowden's height, solemn scenes on, 868. 
Snow-fall in the river, 848. 
Snow-flakes, as still as, 604. 
Snow-white ram on grassy bank, 494. 
Snuff within the flame of love, 271. 
Snug little island, it's a, 602. 
Soaks up the rain, thir.sty earth, 494:. 
Soap, washing with iuvi^ ible, 724. 
Society is all but rude, 719. 

solder of, friendship, 120. 

solitude is sometimes best, 814. 

where none intrudes, 007. 
Society's chief joys, unfriendly to, 558. 
Soft as her clime, 721. 

eyes looked love to eyes, 611. 

is tlie strain, 806. 

the zephyr blows, 108. 
Softening into fhade. shade so, 417. 
Softly bodied forth, 869. 
Soil, plant that giows on mortal, 812. 

where first they trod, 587. 
Soiled with all ignoble use, 797. 
Solar walk or milky way, 399. 
Solder of society, sweetner cf life, 120. 
Soldier armed with resolution, 204. 

full of strange oaths, 711. 

himself have been a, 506. 
Soldier's sepulchre, turf shail be a, 513. 
Soldiers bore dead be dies Ly, 506. 

substance of ten thousand, £68. 
Sole and sad, 271. 

judge of truth, 792. 
Solemn fop, 724. 

temples, £67. 
Solid flesh would melt, 311. 

happiness we pi ize, 226. 
Solitaiy shriek, the bubbling cry, 633. 

to wander, then, 813. 
Solitude, bliss cf, that inward eye, 813. 

he mades a, and calls it peace, 541. 

how passing swett is, 120. 

sometimes Is best sccitty, 814. 

tills delicious, 719. 

when we are least alone, 813. 

where are the charms. 738. 
Some we've left behind us, 228. 
Somebody to hew and hack, £07. 
Something after death, dread of, 297. 

dangerous within ii.e, 723. 

rich and strange, £69. 
Sometimes counsel take, 814. 
Son of parents passed into the skies, 93. 
Song, burden of his, 816. 

burden of my, 141. 

charms the tense, £08. 

govern thou my, Uiania, £.07. 

moralize my, warres and loves, 670. 

no sorrow in thy, 472. 

rounded fitness of his, 56. 

satire be my. fC6. 

what they teach in, f C6. 

whose breath may lend to death,639. 
Songes make and wel eneiite, 676. 
Sonne, up rose the, 490. 
Sonorous irictal bloving martial, 725. 
Sons of BeLal wander lorth, 668. 

of reason valor libei ty, 812. 

of the morning, best of the, 397. 
Sooner lost and won, 215. 
Soonge, ful weel she, 696. 
Soothe a savage bieast, 509. 

distraction almost despair, 809. 
Soothed his soul to pleasures, 772. 

with the sound, 771. 
Sore labor's bath, 883. 
Sorrow, bread in, ate, 348. 

calls no time that's gone, 346. 

earth no, heaven cannot heal, 348. 

fade, ere sin could blight or, 107. 

give, words, 312. 

hang, eare will kill a cat, 816. 

hath 'scaped this, 271. 

heart an anvil unto, £99. 

her rent is, her income tears, 214. 

in thy song, no, 472. 

is held inti usive, 348. 

is in vain, thy, 138. 

is unknown, land where, 348. 

my couch in, steep, 346. 

nae, there Jean, 296. 

never comes too late, lOS. 
now melt into, 461. 
of the meanest thing, 662. 
parting is such ^^veet 241. 
path of. and that path alone, 348. 
pine with feare and. 204. 
resembles, as the mist the rain, 813, 
returned with the moin, 529. 
looted, pluck a, ,347. 
under the load of, wring, 345. 
wear a goldc n, 347. 
without the door let, lie, 816. 
Sorrowing, goeth a, 347. 



B^ 



^ 



fl- 



1058 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



--fh 



Sorrow's crown of sorrow, 255. 

keenest wind, shrink from, 398. 
Sorrows come not single spies, 3i5. 

here I and, sit, 3i5. 

of a poor old man, pity the, 340. 

remembered, sweeten joy, 3i6. 

transient, simple %vile9, 128. 
Sots, what can ennoble, 781. 
Soul, body form doth take of the, 730. 

bruised with adversity, Sib. 

cement of the, friendship, 130. 

city of the, Rome, 720. 

condense thy, 736. 

crowd not on my, 868. 

eloquence charms the, 808. 

eye was in itself a, 133. 

faculty abides within the, 867. 

flery, working out its way, 908. 

flow of, feast of reason and, 814. 

fret thy, with crosses, 204. 

further than our eyes can see, 348. 

genial current of the, 306. 

grapple them to thy, 121. 

hardiness of, 603. 

harrow up thy, 735. 

has gone aloft, 629. 

haughtiness of, 'tis pride and, 799. 

is dead tliat slumbers, 769. 

is form and doth the body make, 730. 

is in arms, and eager, §41. 

is wanting there, 303. 

is with the saints, 539. 

limned, 399. 

measured by my, 808. 

meeting, may pierce, 786. 

merit wins the, 203. 

most offending, I ani the, 811. 

of goodness in things evil, 802. 

of harmony, tie the hidden, 786. 

of music shed, 577. 

of music slumbers, 313. 

of Orpheus sing, 787. 

of peace, patience the, 733. 

of Richard, 541, 868. 

of social life, peace thou, 541. 

of the age, 905. 

of wit, brevity is the, 803. 

overflowed the, stream which, 801. 

passions that build our human, 490. 

prospect of his, eye and, 801. 

rapt, sitting in thine eyes, 786. 

secured in her existence, 759. 

sincere, 120, .307. 

so dead, man with, 563. 

struck so to the, 804. 

swell the, to rage, 773. 

sweet and vertuous, 302. 

through my lips, my whole, 205. 

to dare, the will to do, 670. 

to keep, pray the Lord my, 107. 

tumult of the, 206. 

uneasy and confined from home, 801. 

was like a star, 907. 

why shrinks, back on herself, 759. 

wings the, 725. 

within her eyes, 721. 
Soul's calm sunshine, 796. 

dai-k cottage, 754. 

sincere desire, prayer the, 398. 
Souls as free, thoughts as boundless, 626. 

immediate jewel of then-, 811. 

of fearful adversaries, 541. 

sit silently within, 203. 

such harmony is in immortal, 775. 

to souls can never teach, 781. 

two, with a single thought, 205. 

whose sudden visitations, 813. 
Sound and fury, full of, 792. 

born of murmuring, 103. 

doleful, from the tombs a, 310. 

filled the solitude with, 940. 

most melodious, 829. 

must echo sense, 806. 

of a knell, never sighed at the, 738. 

of hamnier or of saw, 493. 

of revelry by night, 511. 

of the church-going bell, 738. 

persuasive, magic numbers and, 809. 

. soothed with the, 771. 

sweet is every, 493. 
Sounding cataract haunted me, 404. 
Sounds as a silent bell, 346. 

concord of sweet, 776. 

of music, sit and let the, 775. 

rural siglits and, 493. 
Source of all my bliss, 690. 

of sympathetic tears, 939. 
South and south-west side, 945. 

full of the warm, 316. 
like the sweet, 495. 
Sovereign, here lies our, 940. 

reason, noble and most, 808. 
Sovereignest thing on earth, 506. 
Sovereigns, dead but, sceptred, 681. 
Sovereignty, round and top of, 7.5. 
Space and time, annihilate but, 205. 
Spacious fii'maiiient on high, 376. 



Spake much as our tongue can say, 938. 
Span, life is but a, 308. 

life of man less than a, 320. 
Spangled heavens a shining frame, 376, 
Spare Fast with gods doth diet, 786. 

my aching sight, 868. 

the rod and spoil the child, 108. 
Spared, better, a better man, 312. 
Spark, vital, of heavenly flame, 365. 

which tires the soul of patriots, 601. 
Sparkled was exhaled, 106. 
Sparkling with a brook, 489. 
Sparks ot fire, eyes glow like, 134. 

that kindle fiery war, 539. 
Sparrow, fall, hero perish or, 394. 

providently caters for the, 394. 
Speak in public on the stage, 107. 

me fair in death, 312. 

of me as I am, 724. ♦ 

right on, I only, 676. 

something good, the worst, 364. 

too coldly, thou thinkest 1,121. 
Speaker, other, of my living actions, 811. 
Spectacles on nose, 711. 
Spectre-doubts, dispel ye, 743. 
Speculation in those eyes, 868. 
Speech is truth, 108. 

rude am I in my, 145. 

thought is, 108. 

wed itself with, thought could, 803. 
Speed the parting guest, 121. 

to-day, put back to-moi-row, 204. 
Spend, to, to give to want, 204. 
Spenser, divinest, 938. 

lie a little nearer, 939. 
Sperit, all is I never drink no, 553. 
Sphere-descended maid, music, 774. 
Spheres, eyes like stars from their, 725. 

seems to shake the, 771. 
Spice of Ufe, variety's the very, 815. 
Spices, scatter all her, 632. 
Spicy nut-brown ale, 785. 
Spiderlike feel the tenderest touch, 303. 
Spider's touch, how fine, 496. 
Spies, sorrows come not single, 345. 
Spires whose silent finger, 896. 
Spii-it, clear, doth raise, 812. 

ditties of no tone, 718. 

drew his, as sun the dew, 309. 

extravagant and erring, 868. 

fairer, or more welcome shade, 910. 

hies to his confine, 868. 

humble tranquil, 723. 

ill, have so fair a house, 133. 

motions of his, 776. 

no, dare stir abroad, 397. 

of a youth, morning like the, 490. 

of man is divine, all save, 451. 

of mortal be proud, 302. 

of my dream, 765. 

of self -sacrifice, 797. 

of youth in everything, 492. 

recesses of a lowly, 375. 

rest perturbed, 311. 

strongest and fiercest, 348. 

that fought in heaven, 348. 

the least erected, that fell, 803. 

yet a woman too, 128. 
Spii'its are not finely touched, 797. 

either sex assume, 868. 

from the vasty deep, 813. 

of great events stride on before, 800. 

only show to gentle eyes, 869. 

twain have crossed with me, 393. 
Spiritual creatures, millions of, 868. 
Spite, in erring reason's, 489. 

in learned doctor's, 814. 

of spites, 868. 
Spleen about thee, mirth and, 724. 
Splendid sight to see, 725. 
Splendor, far-sinking into, 867. 
Splenetive and rash, I am not, 723. 
Spoil the child, spare the rod and, 108. 
Spoils of time, rich with the, 306. 

treasons stratagems and, 776. 
Sport an hour with beauty's chain, 816. 

of mocking friends, 558. 

that wrinkled care derides, 785. 

with Amaryllis in the shade, 303. 

would be tedious as work, 198. 
Sports, no man their, must eye, 868. 
Spoi'us feel, satire or sense can, 909, 
Spot is curst, 661. 
Spots of sunny openings, 493. 
Spreads his light wings, love, 215. 
Spring, come gentle, 492. 

companions of the, 473. 

full of sweet dayes, 302. 

lusty, 492. 

of love, 492, 857. 

Pierian, taste not the, 805. 

visit the mouldering urn, 737. 
Spur, fame is the, 813. 

to prick the sides of ray intent, 798. 
Spurned by the young, 803. 
Spurs the lated traveller, 491. 
Stabbed with white wench's bl'k eye,721. 



Stag, a poor sequestered, 496. 
Stage, all the world's a, 711. 

frets his hour upon the, 793. 

poor degraded, nolds its mirror, 804. 

speak in public on the, 107. 

the earth a, 792. 

then to the well-trod, anon, 786. 

veteran on the, lags, 804. 

where man must play a part, 804. 

wonder of our, applause delight the, 
:05. 
Stagers, I've heard old cunning, 803. 
Stain my man's cheeks, water-drops, 346. 
Stale flat and unprofitable, 346. 
Stalked off reluctant, 396. 
Stand and wait, serve who only, 366. 
Standard of the man, mind's the, 808. 
Standing with reluctant feet, 104. 
Stands upon a slippery place, 798. 
Stanley, on, 510. 
Star, bright particular, 242. 

fair as a, when only one, 105. 

give a name to every fixed, 804. 

in bigness as a, 492. 

influence of malignant, 811. 

man is his own, 793. 

of peace return, 629. 

of smallest magnitude, 493. 

of the unconquered will, 808. 

soul was like a, 907. 

stay the morning, charm to, 376. 

that bids the shepherd folds, 491. 

that ushers in the even, 491. 
Starers, whole years of stupid, 781. 
Star-eyed science, 397. 
Starlight, glittering, 206. 
Star-like eyes, or from, doth seek, 141. 
Starry Galileo with his woes, 938. 
Star-spangled banner, .593. 
Stai's, and set the, of glory there, 593. 

battlements that bore, 867. 

beauty of a thousand, clad in, 134. 

cut him out in little, 134. 

doubt thou the, ai-e fire, 206. 

fairest of, 363. 

fault is not in our, 793. 

glows in the, 489. 

hide their diminished heads, 719. 

hide your diminished rays, 797. 

in empty night, nor sink those, 114. 

of midnight shall be dear, 103. 

pride builds among the, 799. 

sentinel, set their watch, 539. 

shall fade away, 759. 

shooting, attend thee, 134. 

start from their spheres, 72.5. 
Start, straining upon the, like grey- 
hounds, 503. 
Started like a guilty thing, 868. 
Startles at destruction, the soul, 759. 
Starts, by, 'twas wild, 773. 

everything by, nothing long, 909. 
Star-y-polnting pyramid, 906. 
State broken with the storms of, 346. 

falling with a falling, 602. 

ruin or rule the, 601. 

what constitutes a, 599. 



Statesman and buffoon, fiddler, 909. 

yet friend to truth, 120. 
Statesmen out of place, 814. 
Station, private, post of honor is a, 601. 
Statue grows, the more the, 809. 
Steal a few hours from the night, 205. 

away your hearts, 876. 

from the world, 325. 
Stealing and giving odors, 495. 
Steals, who, my purse steals trash, 811. 
Stealth, do good by, 797. 
Steam, unconquered, soon thy arm, 803. 
Steed, farewell the neighing, 722. 

that knows his rider, 631. 
Steeds, instead ot mounting bai-bed, 541. 

to water, at those springs, 414. 
Steel, foemen worthy of their, 655. 

grapple with hoops of, 131. 

heart of, 724. 

in complete, 796. 

stu-red his courage with the, 671. 
Steep and thorny way to heaven. 809. 

my senses in forgetfulness, 763. 

where fame's proud temple, 813. 
Steeped me in poverty to the lips, 725. 

to the lips in misery, 345. 
Steer, happily to, 911. 
Stemming it with hearts of controversy, 

671. 
Stenches, counted two-and-seventy, 954. 
Step aside is human, 784. 

more true, foot more light a, 721. 
Stepping o'er the bounds, 72.3. 
Steps, beware of desperate, 793. 

grace was in all her, 309. 

morn her rosy, advancing, 490. 

with wandering, and slow, 321. 
Stern and rock-bound coast, 587. 



^ 



a- 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1059 



■a 



stern joy which ■n'an-iors feel, 655. 

Ruin's ploughshare, 463. 
Sternest good-night, gives the, 882. 
Sterte, out of his slepe to, 492. 
Stieking-place, sci-ew courage to the, 802. 
Stiff in opinions always in wrong, 909. 
Stiffen the sinews, 503. 
Still achieving stUl pursuing, 770. 

an angel appear to each iover, 1S5. 

beginning never ending, 772. 

destroying flghting still, 772. 

the wonder grew, 688. 

to be neat, still to bo drest, 713. 
Stile, sitting on the, Mai-y, 292. 
Stillness and the night, 775. 

modest, and humility, 503. 
Sting, death where is thy, 365. 
Stings of falsehood, 899. 
Stinks well-defined and several, 954. 
Stir as life where in't, 900. 

fretful, unprofitable, 404. 

of the great Babel, see the, 810. 
Stirred his courage vrith the steel, 071. 
Stirring, not a creature was, 90. 
Stirs the feeling infinite, 813. 
Stoics, let's be no, nor stocks, 804. 
Stoicism, the Romans call it, 799. 
Stolen, the heart of a maiden is, 205. 
Stomach, my, is not good, 946. 
Stone to beauty grow, conscious, 736. 

set in the silver sea, 603. 

tell where I lie, not a, 225. 

underneath this, doth lie, 907. 

unhewn and cold, 809. 

violet by a mossy, 105. 

walls do not a prison make, 147. 
Stones of Rome to rise in mutinj', 877. 
Stones piled, labor of an age in, 906. 

prate of my whereabout, 882. 

sermons in, good in everything, 489. 

the enameded, music with, 493. 
Stools, push us from our, 868. 
Stoops to folly, when lovely woman, 336. 
Stop, to sound what, she please, 112. 
Store, increase his, constant care to, 650. 
Stores, prepare thy slender watery, 672. 
Storied urn or animated bust, 306. 

windows richly dight, 787. 
Stories of the death of kings, 310. 
Storm, dii-ects the, 539. 

hollow pauses of the, 632. 

pelting of this pitiless, 494. 

pilot that weathered the, 633. 

rides upon the, 632. 
Storme-bett vessell safely ryde, 311. 
Stoi-ms of fate, brave man in the, 602. 

of Ufe, rainbow to the, 1:34. 

of state, broken with the, 346. 

unwonted, 632. 
Stormy March has come, 493. 

winds do blow, when the, 629. 
Story being done, my, 145. 

God bless you I've none to tell, 953. 

of Cambuscan bold, 787. 

of her birth, repeats the, 370. 

of my life, questioned me the, 145. 

of our days, shuts up the, 745. 

teach him how to tell my, 145. 
Stout Cortez, when with eagle eyes, 805. 
Strain of strutting chanticleer, 869. 

prophetic, something like, 787. 

soft is the, when zephyr blows, 806. 

that, again it had a dying fall, 808. 

to read among the hills, 910. 

unpremeditated, 940. 
Strains and heaves, after many, 671. 
Strand, pass to the, American, 395. 

India's coral, 395. 

wandering on a foreign, 663. 
Strange, but this is wondrous, 808. 

but true, truth is always strange, 805. 

cozenage, 793. 

eventful history, ends this, 711. 

'twas passing strange, 145. 

sometning, sea-change into, 869. 
Stranger than Action, truth is, 805. 

yet to pain, 108. 
Stratagems and spoils, treason's, 776. 
Stratford-atte-bowe, scole of, 696. 
Straw, tickled with a, 107. 
Stream, summer eves by haunted, 785. 

in smoother numbers flows, 806. 

thy, my great example, 723. 

which overflowed the soul, 801. 
Streaming to the wind, like meteor, 725. 
Streams from little fountains flow, 107. 

more pellucid, 399. 

shallow, run dimpling, 910. 
Strength, excellent to have a giant's, 813. 

king's name is a tower of, 722. 

lovely in your, as is the hght, 685. 
of nei-ve or sinew, 203. 

our castle's, will laugh to scorn, 540. 
Stretched on the rack, 724. 

upon the plain, the struck eagle, 800. 
Strife, no, to heal, 206. 
Strike, afraid to, willing to wound, 910. 



Strike for your altars and your fires, 582. 
mine eyes but not my heart, 713. 
themselves must, the Wow, 581. 
Strings, harp of a thousand, 794. 
Striving to better oft we mar, 803. 
Stroke a nettle tender handed, 800. 

speak of some distressful, 145. 
Strokes, many, with a little axe, 802. 
Strong as flesh and blood, 805. 

'stablishes the, restores the weak, 809. 
In death, ruling passion, 780. 
nor'wester's blowing Bill, 630. 
suffer and be, how subhme to, 343. 
without rage, 723. 
Stronger by weakness, 754. 
Struck eagle, so the, stretched, 800. 
Strucken deer go weep, let the, 671. 
Struggling in the storms of fate, 602. 
Struts and frets his hour, 792. 
Stubble land at harvest home, 506. 
Studied in his death, 309. 
Studious let me sit, 806. 
Study of imagination, creep into his, 801. 

of mankind is man, the proper, 792. 
of I'evenge immortal hate, MO. 
what you most affect, 804. 
Stuff as dreams are made on, 867. 
made of sterner, ambition, 875. 

O proper, 868. 

perilous, cleanse bosom of that, 347. 
Stuffs out his vacant garments, 107. 
Stufft noting books, 808. 
Stupid starers and loud huzzas, 781. 
Style of man, Christian the highest, 399. 

refines, how the, 812. 

struck more men dumb, 938. 
Subdued to what it works in, 722. 
Subdues mankind, who surpas.ses or, 812. 
Subject of all verse, lies the, 907. 

such duty as the, owes the prince, 215. 
Sublime a thing it is to suffer, 348. 

tobacco, 814. 
Submission, yielded vnth. coy, 711. 
Substance of ten thousand soldiers, 868. 
Substantial things, glories are shadows 

not, 301. 
Suburb of the life elysian, 272. 
Success, not in mortals to command, 802. 

with his surcease, catch, 900. 
Successive rise, fall successive and, 792. 
Succour dawns from heaven, 348. 

us that succour want, 373. 
Suck the sweets of philosophy, 804. 
Suckle fools, chronicle small beer, 723. 
Suckled in a creed outworn, 403. 
Suffer a sea-change, 868. 

and be strong, how sublime to, 348. 

wet damnation run through 'em, S58. 
Sufferance, in corporal, finds pang, 310. 

is the badge of^ all our tribe, 346. 
Suffering, child of, 347. 

learn in, what they teach, 806. 

sad humanity, 345. 
Sufficiency, an elegant, 214. 
Sugar o'er the devil himself, 396. 
Suits of woe, trappin^-s and, 295. 
Sullen dame, where sits our sulky, 847. 
Summer day, eternal, 134, 680. 

even, stillness of a, 867. 

friends, like, 121. 

f riendsnip, 120. 

Indian, fades too soon, 719. 

last rose of, left blooming alone, 465. 

made glorious, by sun of York, 541. 

pastime of a drowsy, 70. 

sea, calm and unruffled as a, 631. 

since, first was leafy, 271. 

sweet as, 723. 

thy eternal, shall not fade, 134. 

then came the jolly, 492. 
Summer's day, all way to heaven, 724. 

fantastic heat, thinking on, 346. 

noontide air, still as, 493. 

ripening breath, 492. 
Summer-blooms, all the prouder, 495. 
Summers, this many, 321. 
Sv.mmon up remembrance of things 
past, 115. 

up the blood, 503. 
Summons thee to heaven or to hell, 882. 

upon a fearful, like guilty thing, 808. 

wnen thy, comes, 307. 
Sun, and shade, fled fast through, 721. 

and summer gale, 939. 

as a dial to the, 796. 

benighted walks under midday, 796. 

burmshed livery of the, 722. 
■ clouds round the setting, 759. 

common, the air, the skies, 489. 

doubt that the, doth move, 206. 

early, has not attained his noon, 464. 

goes round, all the rest the, 125. 

grow dim with age, 759. 

hold glimmei-ing tapers to the, 805. 

impearls on leaf and flower, 492. 

in the lap of Thetis taken his nap, 490. 

is a thief, 489. 



Sun, logs of the, tears for the, 491. 
low descending, day whose, 398. 
of the stately day, 604. 
of York, this, 541. 
pay no worship to the garish, 134. 
pleasant the, 490. 
shadow in the, see my, 938. 
slilne sweetly on my grave, 493. 
snatches from the, the moon, 489. 
upon an Easter-day, no, 211. 
upon the upland lawn, to meet, 306. 
warms in the, 489. 
weary of the, 'gin to be a, 346. 
world without a, man a, 795. 
Sunbeams, motes that people the, 786. 
Sunday from week does not divide, 569. 
Sunflower turns to her god, 174. 
Sung to call forth paramours, 492. 
Sunium's marble steep, place me on, 681. 
Sunless land, sunshine to the, 309. 

treasuries, 632. 
Sunlight, as, drinketh new, 205. 
Sunneshme, flies of estate and, 121. 
Sunny as her skies, 721. 
Smis, dwelling is the light of setting, 404. 

widened with the process of, 257. 
Sunset, blackest night at, 720. 

of life gives mystical lore, 574. 
Sunshine broken in the rill, 348. 

in the shady place, 828. 

of the breast, 793. 

settles on its head, eternal. 688. 

soul's calm, and heartfelt joy, 796. 

to the sunless land, 309. 
Superfluous lags the veteran, 804. 
Supped full with horrors, 900. 
Support, raise and, what is low, 395. 
Surcease, catch with his, success, 900. 
Sure and firm-set earth, thou, 882. 

assurance doubly, I'll make, 793. 
Surge may sweep, where'er the, 631. 

most swoln that met him, 672. 

whose liquid, resolves the moon,4«9. 
Surges lash the sounding shore, 805. 
Surpasses or subdues mankind, 812. 
Sui-render, to make a foe, 603. 
Survey, I am monarch of all 1, 738. 

our empii-e and behold our home, 636. 
Suspects yet strongly loves, 207. 
Suspended oar, light drip of the, 686. 
Suspicion haunts the guilty mind, 725. 
Swain, frugal, whose constant cares, 650. 
Swallow, that come before the, 495. 
Swallow's wings, hope flies with, 800. 
Swan and shadow, float double, 493. 

of Avon, sweet, 906. 

on still St. Mary's lake, 493. 
Swan-like let me sing and die, 581. 
Swashing and a martial outside, 723. 
Sway, mercy is above this sceptered, 798, 

of magic potent over sun and star. 
203. 

prevailed with double, 688. 

required with gentle, 711. 

the willing mind, who refuse thy, 
'scape thy anger, 73. 
Swear not by the inconstant moon, 207. 
Swears a prayer or two and sleeps, 836. 

if he, he'll certainly deceive, 232. 

with so much grace, 204. 
Sweat, a cold, thrills my limbs, 725. 

grunt and, under a weai\y life, 297. 
Swelling of the voiceful sea, 822. 
Sweeping whirlwind's ^way, 108. 
Sweet and bitter fancy, cud of, 813. 

and vertuous soul, only a. 302. 

and voluble his discoui'se, 723. 

are the uses of adversity, 348. 

as English air could make, 721. 

as summer, 723. 

as the jjrimrose peeps, 690. 

attractive grace, softness and, 711. 

bells jangled out of tune, 808. 

childish days that were as long, 108. 

day so cool so calm, 301. 

dayes and roses, full of, 302. 

discourse, showers of, 193. 

how passing, is solitude, 120. 

is pleasure after pain, 771. 

is revenge to women, 167. 

is the breath of morn, 490. 

little cherub sits up aloft, 614. 

moonlight sleeps upon this bank,775. 

nothing half so, in life, 262. 

Phosphor bring the day, 489. 

reluctant amorous delay, 711. 

repast and calm repose, 232. 

shady side of Pall Mall, 814. 

silent thought, sessions of, 115. 

south, came o'er my ear like, 808. 

swan of Avon, 906. 

sway allow obedience, 794. 

will, river glideth at his own, 678. 
Sweet-and-twenty, kiss ine, 122. 
Sweete smels al around, 494. 

perfections, caught with his, 904. 
Sweeten present joy, sorrows, 346. 



[&- 



-ff 



t& 



1060 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



a 



Sweeter for thee despairing, 134. 

pains of love be, 145. 
Sweetest garland to sweetest maid, 134. 
Sweeting, ah my sweet, 123. 
Sweetly she bade me adieu, 241. 
Sweet'ner of lite, 120. 

of hut and of hall, 604. 
Sweetness linked, long drawn out, 780. 

loathe the taste of, 815. 

wanton, witchingly instill a, 831. 

waste its, on the cesert air, 306. 
Sweets compacted lie, box where, 303. 

lost in the, fly that sips treacle, 205. 

of Burn-mill meadow, 493. 

of forgetfulness prove, 737. 

the year's best, 940. 

to the sweet, 311. 
Swell, music with its voluptuous, 511. 
Swelling and limitless billows, 631. 

of the voicef ul sea, rise to the, 822. 
Swells from the vale, tall cliff, 688. 

pealing anthem, note of praise, 306. 

the gale, simplest note that, 489. 
Swift, too, tardy as too slow, 815. 

true hope is, 800. 
Swift-winged arrows of light, 739. 
Swim to yonder point, 670. 
Swimmer in his agony, strong, 632. 
Swims with fins of lead, 813. 
Swoop, at one fell, 309. 
Sword, famous by my, 150. 

glued to my scabbard, 541. 
is good, is rust, 539. 

may pierce the beaver, 602. 

pen is mightier than the, 805. 

slander's edge sharper than the, 811. 

take away the, 541. 
Swords, old friends like old, 121. 

sheathed their, 503. 
Sydneian showers, 193. 
Syllable men's names, tongues that, 830. 

of recorded time, tho' last, 792. 
Sylvia, except I be by, 134. 
Sympathetic tear, the social smile, 232. 

tears, sacred source of, 939. 
Sympathy, secret, 203. 
Symptom of ■a mind in health, 232. 
Syrops, lucent, 179. 

Table of my memory, SOL 

Tables, my tables, 722. 

Tackle trim, bravery on and, 631. 

Tail and mane used instead of rein, 671. 

Tailor's news, swallowing a, 722. 

Taint of earth the odar of the skies, 204. 

Tainted wether of the flock, 348. 

Take away the sword, 541. 

each man's eensiu-e, 815. 

her up tenderly, 335. 

him for all in all, 721. 

O boatman thrice thy fee, 292. 

O ta.'.ce those lips away, 3S3. 

physic pomp, 802. 

the good the gods provide, 772. 

ye each a shell, 810. 
Taldn' notes, a chiel amang ye, 805. 
Tale, adorn a, point a moral or, 909. 

an honest, speeds best. 803. 

every shepherd tells his 7S5. 

hope tells a flattering, 271. 

lest men suspect your, untrue, 805. 

of Troy divine, 787. 

round unvarnish'd, deliver, 145. 

school-boy's, wonder of an houi-,792. 

that I relate, Misses thee, 215. 

thereby hangs a, 791. 

told by au idiot, fall of sound, 792. 

told his soft a thriving wooer, 204. 

twice-told, tedious as a, 799. 

unfold, I could a, 725. 

wondrous, takes up the, 376. 
Talent, his single, well-employed, S95. 
Tales, aged ears play truant at his, 723. 

wave still tells its bubbling, 720. 
Talk only to conceal the mind, men, 804. 

spent an hour's, withal, 724. 

who never think, they always, 803. 

with, witty to, 134. 
Talking age and whispering lovers. 685. 
Tall oa'.cs from little acoi'ns grow, 107. 

the wise the reverend head, 308. 
Tarn was glorious, 848. 
Tamer of the human breast, 345. 
Tangles of Netera's hair, 203. 
Tapers, hold their, to the sun, 805. 
Tara's halls, hai-p that through, 577. 
Taok, delightful, 107, 214. 
Task-master's eye. In my great, 395. 
Taste of sweetness, loathe the, 815. 

they never, who always drink, 803. 

whose mirtal, 395. 
Tastes of men, various are, 814. 
Tattered clothes, vices tlirough, 802. 

ensi<rn down, tear her, 620. 
Taught, by that power that iJities, 139. 

us how to die, 911. 

us how to live, 911, 



Taughte, afterward he, 697. 
Tawny lion, now half appeared the, 496. 
Tea, counsel take and sometimes, 814. 
Teach in song, what they, 806. 

me to feel another's woe, 370. 

souls to souls can never, 731. 

the rest to sneer, 910. 

the young idea how to shoot, 214. 
Team of little atomies, 836. 

heavenly-harnessed, 816. 
Tear, betwixt smile and, pendulum, 792. 

each others' eyes, 107. 

every woe a, can claim, 267. 

for pity, he hath a, 724. 

forgot as soon as shed, 793. 

her tattered eni-igu down, 620. 

in her eye, 176, 204. 

lids unsullied with a, 816. 

mocks the, it forced to flow, 899. 

small orb of one particular, 204. 

sympathetic, 232. 

that is wiped with address, 464. 

to misery all he had a, 307. 
Tears, beguile her of hei-, 145. 

big round, in piteous chase, 496. 

choke me with joy, 725. 

crimson, will follow yet, 602. 

flattered to, 176. 

from soms divine despair, 315. 

idle tears, 315. 

if you have, prepare to shed, 875. 

iron, down Pluto's cheek, 787. 

like Niobe all, 723. 

love is loveliest embalmed in, 204. 

moon into salt, resolves, 489. 

must stop for evei-y droj), 338. 

nothing is hei'e for, 794. 

of boyhood's years, 318. 

of the sky for loss of the sun, 491. 

of woe, the smiles of joy, 399. 

some natural, they shed, 321. 

source of sympathetic, 939. 

such as angels weep, .346. 

that speak, 804. 

their own disgrace bewail, 494. 

thoughts that lie too deep for, 759. 

vale of, beyond this, 399. 

wronged orphans', 541. 
Teche, and gladly, 697. 
Tedious as a twice-told tale, 799. 
Teeth, drunkard clasp his, 558. 

of time, give lettered pomp to, 915. 
Temper, bles ed with, 232. 

justice with mercy, 394. 

whose unclouded ray, 232. 
Temperance, health consists with, 815. 
Temperate will, 128. 
Tempest of debate, 215. 
Temi^est's bi-eath prevail, 631. 

Tempests, glasses itself in, 607. 

roar, uoi-, 309. 
Tempestuous petticoat, 713. 
Temple, broke ope Lord's anointed, 900. 

can dwell in such a, 133. 

the groves were Gt d's fli'st, 452. 
Temples, for the, of his gods, 567. 

the solemn, 867. 
Tempted her with word too large, 204. 
'I empts by making rich, 80.3. 
Ten winters more, freshly ran on, 309. 
Tenable in your silence, 815. 
Tendance, touched by her fair, 205. 
Tenderly, take her up, 335. 
Tendrils strong as flesh and blood, 805. 
Tenement of clay, 908. 
Tenets, faith in some nice, 398. 

with books, principles with times, 
814. 
Tenor of his way, 794. 

of their way, 306. 
Tent, pitch my moving, 389. 
Tented field, action in the, 145. 
Tenth transmitter of a foolish face, 812. 
Tents, fold their, Uke the Arabs, 816. 
Terror, no, in your threats, 797. 

shadows have sti'uck more, 868. 
Testament of bleeding war, 541. 

ope the purple, come to, 541. 
Tetchy and wayward, 
Text, God takes a, 364. 

manv a holy, around she strews, 305. 
Thais sits beside thee, 772. 
Thames, most loved of Ocean's sons, 720. 

with no allaying, 147. 
Thauk thee Jew, 804. 

whom none can, 707. 
Thanked enough, when I'm not, 797. 
Thankless child, to have a, 348. 
Thanks and use, both, 797. 

of millions yet to be, are heard, 583. 

imtraced to lips unknown, 807. 
That is the question, 297. 
Thaw and i-esolve itself into a dew, 311. 
Theatre, the world's a, 792. 
Thebes or Pelops' line, tragedy present- 
ing, 787. 
Thee, no Uvtng with, nor without, 724. 



Theirs but to do and die, 517. 

not to make reply, 517. 

not to reason why, 517. 
Theme, fools are my, satire my song, 806. 

my great example as it is my, 723. 
Themes, our wonted, transcend, 274. 
There is reaper whose name is Death,276. 

is no death, 272. 
There's nae sorrow there, John, 296. 

the rub. 297. 
Thereby hangs a tale, 791. 
These ai-e thy glorious works, 363. 
Thetis, lap of, sun in the, 490. 
Thick and thin, through, 671. 

as autumnal leaves, 494. 

inlaid with patines of gold, 775. 
Thief doth fear each bush an oflicer, 725. 

each thing's a, 489. 

in either eye, 146. 

of time, procrastination is the, 748. 

the moon's an arrant, 489. 

the sea's a, 489. 

the sun's a, 4S9. 
Thievery, I'll example you with, 489. 
TMeves, beauty provoketh, 133. 
Thighs, his cuisses on his, 671. 
Thing, acting of a dreadful, 90O. 

each, of sin and guilt, 796. 

fearful, to see soul take wing, 705. 

highest, truth is the, 398. 

how divine a, woman, 723. 

how poor a, is man, 808. 

never says a foolish, 940. 

of beauty is a joy forever, 675. 

simple fireside, 215. 

sorrow of the meanest, feels, 663. 

started like a guilty, 868. 

the play's the, 804. 

to one, constant never, 271. 

trembled like guilty, surprised, 759. 

undisputed, thou sayst an, 485. 

we Uke, we figure to ourselves, 867. 

■winsome wee, she is a, 216. 
Things are not what they seem , 769. 

bitterness of, thought that springs 
from, 348. 

contests rise from trivial, 815. 

done at the Mei maid, 939. 

evil, some goodness in, 802. 

great lord of all, 792. 

sighed and looked unutterable, 204. 
Things, loveliest of lovely, are they, 309. 

man's best, are nearest him, 741. 

more, in heaven and earth, 808. 

of sale seller's ijraise belongs to, 810. 

3-evoIves the sad vicissitudes of, 559. 

three, a wise man will not trust, 271. 

tidings of invisible, 631. 

unattempted in prose or rhyme, 947. 

without all remedy, 792. 
Think and not disclose her mind, 723. 

dares one thing, and another tell, 797 

him so because I think, 723. 

may sigh to. he still has found, 121. 

naught a ti'itte tho' it small appear, 
815. 

of it dissolute man. 335. 

they talk who never, 803. 

those that, must govern, 812, 
Thinking an idle waste of thought, 808. 

nothmg good or bad but, makes it so, 
808. 

of the days that are no more, 315. 

too much, to have common tho't, 804. 
Thinks most lives most, who, 742. 

too much, he, 722. 
Thin-spun Ufe, Fury slits the, 812. 
Thorn, milk-white, beneath the, 385. 

withering on the, 495. 
Thorns, set with little wilful, 721. 

that in her bosom lodge, 395. 

which I have reaped, 800, 
Those evening bells, how many tale, 716. 

graceful acts, 795. 

that think must govern, 812. 
Thou canst not say 1 did it, 868. 
Though deep ytt clear, 723, 

last not least in love, 120, 
Thought, as a sage, he felt as a man, 737. 

could wed it.-elf with speech, ere, 803. 

flung forward is the prophecy, 602. 

1 thought he thought I slept, 186. 

is deeper than all speech , 731, 

is speech and speech is truth, 108. 

is the slave of life, 792. 

is tired of wandering, 867. 

leaped out to wed with thought, 803. 

like a passing, she fled, 309. 

like a peasant, meet thee, 495. 

noon of, this dead of midnight, 431. 

of our past years doth breed, 7.58. 

pale cast of, sicklied o'er with, 297. 

pleasing dreadful, eternity thou, 759, 

power of, magic of the mind, 818. 

rear the tender, 214. 

sessions, of , sweet silent, 115. 

she pined in, 851. 



B- 



W 



fi- 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1061 



■a 



Thought so once and now I know it, 792. 

strength of some diffusive, C03. 

sweetly solemn, one, 375. 

thinking an idle waste of, 808. 

thou wert a beautiful, 809. 

thy wish was father to that, 800. 

to have common, 801. 

two souls with but a sing-lc, 205. 

vain or shallow, not from a, 735. 

T.'hat oft was, ne'er well exprest, 807. 

whose armor is Ms honest, 735. 

would destroy their paradise, 108. 
Thoughts as boundless, souls as free, G2C. 

calm, love light and, 739. 

downward bent, were always, 803. 

dwelling of his, SOS. 

great, gi'cat feelings came, 710. 

in, more elevate, 808. 

of men are v>-idened, 257. 

on hospitable, intent, 232, 

pleasant, bring sad, 492. 

river of Iiis, she was ocean to the, 765. 

slaughterous, 900. 

strange, transcend wonted themes, 
271. 

that : jreathe and words that burn, 807. 

that lie too deep for tears, 759. 

that shall live in general mind, 70. 

that shall not die. precious, 801. 

that voluntary move, 407. 

that wander thro' eternitj', 791. 

whose very sweetness, 809. 
Thousand blushing apparitions, 723. 

decencies that daily flow, 795. 

fragrant posies, 157. 

innocent shames in angel whiteness, 
723. 

lines, dry desert of a, 807. 

liveried angels lacky her, 796. 

melodies unheard before, 213. 
Thousands, slave to, 'tis his has been, 811. 
Thread, feels at each, 496. 
Threadbare sail, set every, 620. 
Threats, no terror in your, 797. 
Three poets in three nges, 907. 

treasures love and liglit,739. 

years' ch Id, listens like a, 103. 
Threescore, beneath the burden of, 332. 
Thrice he as.-ayed, 316. 

he routed all his foes, 771. 

he slew tho slain, 771. 

is he armed, 796. 

my pea e was slain, 491. 

thy shaft flew and thrice, 491. 
Thrift may follow fawning. 111. 
Tlu'oat, Amen stuck in my, 883. 

lofty and shrill-sounding, 868. 
Throne, here my, bid kings come bow,S15. 

liviig, the sapphu-e blaze, 939. 

night from her ebon, 491. 

no brother u - ar the. 910. 

of rocks in a robe of clouds, 493. 

of I'oyal state, high on a, 722. 
Throng, a tlu;t:ring smiling jilting, 271. 

lowest of yoxir, 812. 
Thumping on your back, proves by, 121. 
Thunder, could great men, 813. 

leaps live, rattling crags among, 686. 
Thunder-harp of pines, smote his, 493. 
Thus let nrs live, unseen, unknown, 225. 
Thyme, where tno wild, blows, 495. 
Tickled with a straw, 107. 
Tide in the affairs of men, 802. 

of love, pity swells the, 791. 
Tidings as they roll, confirm the, 376. 

dismal, when he frowned, 633. 

of invisi'olo things, 631. 
Tie, linked in one heavenly, 203. 

love endures no, 207. 

silver link the silken, 203. 

up the knocker, say I'm sick, 805. 
Tiger, imitate the action of tlie, 503. 

rouse the, for the fallow-deer, 73i. 
Tight little island, 602. 
Tiles and chimney-pots, 630. 
Tilt at ah I meet, too discreet to, 803. 
Timber, like seasoned, never gives, 392. 
Time 'gainst the tooth of, 811. 

and the hour runs, 791. 

and Thought, daughters of, 601. 

bid, return, 792. 

brings increase to her trath, 215. 

even such is, 715. 

flies, death urges, knells call, 395. 

flieth and never claps lier wings, 791. 

flight of, beyond the. 111. 

footprints on the sands of, 770. 

foster-child of silence and slow, 718. 

hath a wallet at his back, 792. 

he that lacks, to mourn, 313. 

he was not of an age but for all, 905. 

how noiseless falls^the foot of, 117. 

how small a jiai-t of, they sliai-e 125. 

inaudible and noiseless foot of, 791. 

is fleeting, 770. 

is like a fashionable host, 792. 

I was promised on a, 933. 



Time kept the, with falling oai-s they, 626. 

Idll the, their only laboi-, 816. 

laid hand gently on my heart, 794. 

last syllable of reeorded, 792. 

of scorn to point at, 725. 

old, is still a-flying, 751. 

old, makes these decay, 141. 

panting, toil'd after him in vain, 905. 

procrastination is the thief of, 748. 

I'ich with the spoils of, 300. 

rolls his ceaseless course, 791. 

sages of ancient, 806. 

sent before my, 938. 

shall think to rob us, 215. 

shall throw a dart at the, 907. 

so hallowed and so gracious, S97. 

stretched forefinger of all, 807. 

taught by, 316. 

teeth of, give lettered pomp to, 915. 

to mourn, he that lacks, SIS. 

transported, vvilh envy, 215. 

upon thi-f bank and shoal of, 900. 

what will not, subdue, 918. 

we should count, by heart-throbs ,743. 

we take no note of, 747. 

whips and scorns of, bear the, 297. 

with thee conversing I forget, 206. 

■writes no wiinkle on thy brow, 607. 
Time's deformed hand, 799. 

fool, lite, 792. 

noblest offspring is the last, 587. 
Times have been, 868. 

of old, jolly place said ho in. 661. 

principles with, tenets with books, 
814. 
Timothy learnt sin to fly, young, 397. 
Tinct with cinnamon, lucent syi'ops, 179. 
Tipple in the deep, fishes that, 147. 
Tiptoe, jocund day stands, 490. 

religion stands on, 395. 
Tired natui-e's sweet restorer, sleep, 816. 
Title, who gained no, lost no friend, 120. 
Titles, high though his, 563. 
To all to each a lair good night, 810. 

be or not to be, 297. 

see her was to love her, 233. 
Toad, ugly and venomous. 313. 
Toast pass, let the, drinlc to the lass, 

them together, let us e'en, 131, 
Tobacco, sublime, which cheers, Cll. 

thus think and smoke, 814. 
To-day I have lived, do thy worst, 793. 

to-morrow already walks in, 800. 
Toe, on the light fantastic, 785. 

top to, 107. 
Toil and trouble, war he sung is, 772. 

became the solace of his woes, 559. 

from, ho wins his spirits light, 559. 

govern those that, those that think, 
812. 

morn of, nor night of waking, 530. 

of gathering eiiergies, 807. 

o'er books consumed midnight oil, 
801. 

verse sweetens, however rude, 659. 

winding up days with, 559. 
Toils are sweet with thee, 206. 
Toiled, all forgot for which ho, 510. 
Toledo trusty, trenchant blade, 507. 
Toll for the brave, 612. 
Tomb, beauty awakes from the, 737. 

nature cries from the, 306. 

nearer to thee, cradles rock us, SOS. 

threefold fourfold, 939. 
Tombs, hark from the, 310. 
To-mon-o w already walks in to-day, COO. 

and to-morrow, 792. 

cheerful as to-day, 2.32. 

defer not til', to be wise, 703. 

do thy worst I have lived to-day, 793. 

is falser than the lormer day, 793. 

live till the darkest day, 793. 

tints, with prophetic ray, 131. 

to be put back, to speed to-day, 204. 

will be dying. 751. 

will repay, trust on and think, 79.3. 
To-morrow's sun may never rise, 792. 
To-morrows, man of confident 793. 
Tone of languid nature, restore the, 493. 
Tongue, braggart with my, .340. 

dropped manna, though his, 734. 

in every wound of Cfesar, 877. 

let the candied, lick pomp. 111. 

man that hath a, 133. 

music's golden, flattered to tears, 176. 

nor heart conceive nor name , 900. 

of fire and heart of steel, 721. 

that Shakespeare S])ake, 602. 

though it have no, murder, 900. 

understanding but no, 815. 

win a woman with his, 133. 
Tongues, riry, that syllable names, 830. 

in trees, books in running brooks, 

live upon their, be their talk, 811. 

of dying men, 310. 

silence envious, gentle peaoe to, 822. 
Too lato I stayed, forgivo tho crino, 117. 



Too solid flesh would melt, 311. 
Tools, nothing but to name his, 803. 

ot vrorkmg out salvation, 390. 
Tooth of time razuro cl oblivion. Ell. 

sharper than a sei pent's, S48. 
Top, round and, of sovereignty, 75. 

to toe, 107. 
Tops of tho eastern pines, flres tho, 719. 
Torrent and the Vv'hirlwind'.'i rear. C03. 

is heard on the hill, naught but the, 
737. 
Torrent's smoothness ere it dash, 494. 
Torrents, motionless, 377. 

solid, 494. 
Torture ot the mind to lie, 311. 
Torturing hour, scourge and, £45, 396. 
Toss him to my breast, 395. 
Touch, feel tenderest, sp der-like, 203. 

hath saved her boy, 796. 

of a vanished hand, O for the, 315. 

of love, the inly, 203. 

of nature makes the world kin, 811. 

that dares not put it to ihc, 150. 

wound with a , scarcelj- felt, 806. 
Torch the liighest point, 346. 
Touches of sweet harmony, 775. 
Touchstone, calamity is man's true, 34S. 
Touchy testy pleasant fellow, 724. 
Tower of strength, king's name is a, 723. 
Towered cities please us then, 786. 
Towering passion, into a, 725. 
Towers along the Etecp, no, 629. 

and battlements it sees, 78.5. 

cloud-capped, gorgeous palaces, 867. 
Town, man made the, 673. 
Toy, a foolish thing was but a,4S4. 
Toj'le, troublous, 311. 
Tragedy, somctune let, 787. 
Trail of the serpent, 3£6. 
Trailing clouds of gloiy, 758. 
Train of night, last m the, 463. 

starry, gems of heaven her, 391. 
Traitors, our doubts are, 800. 
Trammel up the conseguenee, 900. 
Trample on my days, light doth, 274. 
Tranquillit v, heaven was aU, 264. 
Ti'ansient chaste as morning dew, 106. 
Transition, what seems so is, 273. 
Translucent wave, glassy cool,8C9. 
Transmitter of a, loolish face, 812. 
Transmutes, bereaves of influence, 539. 
Transports, thJ^ moderate, 20C. 
Trappings and the suits ot woe, 295. 
Travel on life's common way, 907. 
Travelled life's duil roi nd, 121. 
Traveller leajiing o'er those bounds, 805. 

spurs the lated, apace, 491. 
Travel's history, portance in my, 145. 
Tray, Blanch, and Sweetheart, 310. 
Treacle, the fly that sips, 205. 
Tread each otnei''s heel, woes, 345. 
Treason can but peep, to what it would, 
722. 

doth never prosper, 813. 

hai'bors, in Lis simple show, 724. 

has done his worst, 311. 

here lurks no, 311. 

none dare call it, if it prosper, 812. 
Treasons, is fit for, 770. 
Treasuie, lich the, 771. 
Treasures of the deep, 619. 

sea-born, fetchea nij', ICS. 

up a wrong, £99. 
Treasuries, sunless, 632. 
Treatise, rouse and stir at a difnnal, 900. 
Treble, turning towaid childish, 711. 
Tree, fruit of Uiat forbidden, 395. 

hale green, 454. 

of deepest root is found, 756. 

thorns of the, I planted, 80O. 

under tho greenwood, 633. 

woodman spare that, ]01. 
Trees ijiclined, as twig is bent, 804. 
Trees, blossoms m the, 489. 

bosomed high in tufted, 785. 

di'op tears fast as Ai-abian, 725. 

just hid with, 189. 

tongues in, books in brooks, 489. 

venerable brotheihood of, 194. 
Tremble, a slave to. i\ hen I wake, 591. 
Tremblers, boding, karned to trace, 688. 
Trenchant blade Tcjledo trusly, C07. 
Tiibe, a pearl licher than all liis, 721. 

the badge of all our, suffeiance, 316. 
Tri'cs that slumber in its bosom. 307. 
Tribute, the i:assing, of a sigh, SCO. 

vain, of a smile, 811. 
Trick of his frown, 107. 
Tricks in plain and simple faith, 206. 

plays such fantastic, 813 

that aie vain, 987. 
Tride without consent bin, 232. 
Tried each art. repr<.ved delay, 688. 

to blame who has teen, ,321. 

to live without him, 312. 
Trifle, as 'twere a careless, 309. 

think naugl'.t a, 815. 



& 



tf 



r& 



1062 



INDEX OP POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



n 



Trifles, light as air, 207. 

snapper-up of unconsidered, 724. 

win us with honest, 396. 
Tripping, catcli hini, 724. 
Triton blow his wreathed horn, 403. 
Ti'iumph, pursue the, 911. 
Triumphal arch that flll'st the sky, 494. 
Trivial fond records, 801. 
Trod the water, 672. 
Troop, farewell the plumed, 722. 
Troops of friends, 794. 
Trope, out there new a, 804. 
Trouble, joyful, 659. 
Troubles of the brain, the written, 347. 

take arras against a sea of, 297. 
Troy divine, the tale of, 787. 

fired another, another Helen, 772. 
Truant, aged ears play, 723. 

husband should return, 215. 
True as the dial to the sun, 795. 

as the needle to the pole, 796. 

hope is swift, 800. 

I have married her, 145. 

love, the course of, 250. 

perfection, seasoned to, 496. 

to thine own self be, 797. 
Truly loved never forgets, 174. 
Trump, shrill, farewell the, 722. 
Trumpery, with all their, 397. 
Trumpet, to the morn, cock that Is, 868. 
Trumpet-tongued, angels, 900. 
Trust, somehow good the ^oal of ill, 392. 

soothed by an unfaltering, 308. 

take the strongest praise on, 810. 
Trusted, let no such man be, 776. 
Truth beauty is, truth beauty, 719. 

crushed to earth, 534. 

denies all eloquence, 348. 

doubt, to be a liar, 206. 

from his lips prevailed, 688. 

from pole to pole, spread the, 376. 

has such a face and mien, 398. 

heirs of, 42. 

held it, with him who sings, 399. 

highest thing man may keep, 398. 

in every shepherd's tongue, 158. 

is beauty, beauty truth, 718. 

light of, let me live in the, 797. 

made siimer of memory unto, 797. 

makes free, freeman whom, 600. 

simple, miscalled simplicity, 398. 

sole judge of, in error hurled, 792. 

speech is, thought is speech, 108. 

statesman, yet friend to, 120. 

stranger than fiction, 805. 

teacher's doctrine sanctified by, 939. 

tell, and shame the devU, 398. 

the poet smgs. 255. 

they breathe that breathe in pain, 
310. 

time brings increase to her, 215. 

well known to most, 802. 
Truth's majestic march, 602. 
Truths refined as Athens heard, 809. 

that wake to perish never, 759. 
Try me with affliction, 725. 
Tufted grove, 491. 
Tug of war, then was the, 541. 
Tulips, ladies like variegated, 723. 
TuUy's golden tongue, 938. 
Tumult, aerial, 631. 

of the soul, 206. 
Tune, street bells jangled out of, 808. 
Turf beneath their feet, 513. 

bless the, that wraps their clay, 563. 

gi-een be the, above thee, 937. 

green grassy, is all I crave, 493. 
Turk, bear like the, no rival, 910. 
Turraoyle, wearisome, 311. 
Turn, the smallest worm will, 798. 
Turtle, love of the^ 451. 
Tutoress of arts and sciences, 108. 
Twelve, apostles, Cristes lore and, 697. 

honest men have decided, 810. 
Twenty mortal murders on their crowns, 

868. 
Twice-told tale, tedious as a, 799. 
Twig is bent, just as the, 804. 
Twifight gray, in her sober livery ,413. 
'Twixt two boundless seas, 793. 
Two eternities, the past the future, 793. 

hands upon the breast, 295. 

paradises are in one, 813. 

souls with but a single thought, 205. 

voices are there, 493. 
Twofold image, we saw, 494. 
Type of the wise, who soar, 474. 
Tyrant, custom made the flinty, 539. 
Tyrant, fantastic, of the amorous heart, 
204. 

plea, necessity the, 601. 

Unadorned, adorned the most when, 795. 
Unaneled, unhouseled, disappointed , 310. 
Unassuming commonplace of nature, 

495. 
Unattempted yet in prose or rhyme, 947. 



Unblemished let me live or die, 811. 
Unborn ages crowd not in my soul, 868. 
Unborrowed from the eye, interest, 404. 
Uncertain gloi-y of an April day, 492. 
Unconquered steam, soon thy arm, 802. 
Unconsidered trifles, snapper-up of, 724. 
Under the greenwood tree, 638. 

the hawthorn in the dale, 785. 

the yaller-pines I house, 493. 

which king Bezonian, 640. 
Undei-lings, fault is that we are, 793. 
Underneath this sable hearse, 907. 

this stone doth lye, 907. 
Understanding,giveit,butnotongue,815. 
Undevout astronomer is mad, 492. 
Undiscovered country, that, 297. 
Undisputed things thou say'st an, 485. 
Undone, love agam and be again, 796. 

widow upon mine arm, 541. 
Undreamed shores, 802. 
Uneasy lies the head that wears, 762. 
Uneffectual fire, pale his, 490. 
Unexpressive she, fail- chaste, 134. 
Unfaltering trust, soothed by an, 308. 
Unfed sides, houseless heads and, 494. 
Unfinished window, must remain, 940. 
Unfortunate, one more, 335. 
Ungalled play, the hart, 671. 
Ungracious pastors, as some, do, 809. 
Unhappy folKS on shore now, 630. 

none could be but the great, 347. 
Unheeded flew the hours, 117. 
Unhonored and unsung, unwept, 563. 
Unhouseled disappointed unaneled, 310. 
Unintelligible world, weight of this, 404. 
Union liere of hearts, there is no, 114. 

mysterious, with its native sea, 631. 
Unlcindest cut of all, the most, 876. 
Unkindness, hard, 899. 
Unknell'd uncoSRn'd and uiiknown, 607. 
Unknown and silent shore, gone, 285. 

argues yourselves, not to know me, 
812. 

let me live unseen unknown, 225. 

she lived, and few could know, 105. 
Unlamented let me die, thus, 225. 
Unltneal hand, wrenched with an, 345. 
Unlooked for if at all, she comes, 811. 
Unlovely as thou seem'st, 492. 
Unpathed watera, undreamed shores, 

802. 
Unperceived decay, melts with, 794. 
Unpitied and unknown, 812. 
Unpleasing sadness mixed, 867. 
Unpremeditated strain, 940, 
Unprofitable, stale, flat and, 346. 
Unreal mockery hence, 868. 
Unrelenting foe to love, 205. 
Unremembered acts, little nameless, 404. 
Unreturning brave, grieving over, 512. 
Unseen, walk the earth, 868. 
TJnsought be won, not, 209. 

is better, love given, 205. 
Untaught knaves, called them, 506. 
Untimely grave, 309. 
Unto dymg eyes casement grows, 315. 
Untrodden ways, she dwelt among, 104. 
Untwisting all the chains, 786. 
Unused to the melting mood, 725. 
Unutterable things, looked, 204. 
Unvarnished tale, a round. 145. 
Unveiled her jjeerless light, 413. 
Unwashed artificer, another lean, 722. 
Unwedgable and gnarled oak, 813. 
Unwept unhonored and unsung, 563. 
Unwilling ploughshare, 495. 
Up and doing, let us be, 770. 

rose the sonne up rose Emelie, 490, 
Upon this hint I spa!ke, 146. 
Urania govern thou my song, 807. 
Urges sweet return, retirement, 814. 
Urn, storied, or animated bust, 300. 

from her pictured, scatters, 867. 

loud hissing, bubbling and, 810. 

mouldering, spring visit the, 737. 
Urs, those dreadful, 803. 
Use, beyond all, 899. 
Useless to excel, 133. 
Uses of adversity, sweet are the, 348. 

of this world, 346. 
Uttered or unexpressed, 398. 

Vacant mind, laugh that spoke the, 688. 
Vacation, conscience have, 395. 
Vain as the leaf upon the stream, 

pomp and gloi'y of this world, 321. 

wisdom all and false philosophy, 808. 
Vale, meanest floweret of the, 489. 

of tears, beyond this, 399. 

sequestered, 306, 794. 
Vales, pyramids in, 298. 
Valeria, dear, 493. 
Valiant taste of death but once, 310. 

that dares die, he's not, 900. 
Valleys low on whose fresh lap, 494. 
Valor, contemplation and, formed, 711. 

shows but a bastard, 900. 



Value, being lost, we rack the, 801. 
Vanished hand, touch of a, 315. 
Vanities of earth, fuming, 491. 
Vanity, man's heai't by, drawn in, 799. 

of worldly stuft", 814. 
Vanquished, e'en though, 688. 
Vantage, coigne of, 720, 
Vapors, congregation of, 114. 

melt into morn, 490. 
Varied God, these are but the, 417, 
Variety's custom stale her iunnite, 712. 

order in, we see, 815, 

the very spice of life. 815. 
Vase, you may shatter the, 240. 
Vastness which grows to harmonize, 726. 
Vault, long drawn aisle and fretted, 306. 

mere lees is left this, 346. 
Vaulting ambition o'erleaps itself, 798. 
Vehemence of youth, fiery, 670. 
A^enerate himself as man, 603. 
Vengeance, with an immortal's, 726. 

to God alone belongs, 899. 
Venice, on the Bridge of Sighs, 720. 

sate in state, throned, 720. 
Vents in mangled forms, 803. 
Venture life and limb, 602. 
Venus sets ere Mercury can rise, 805. 
Verge of heaven, quite in the, 309. 

of the ehui-cnyard mould, 802. 
Vernal bloom, sight of, 407. 
Verse, cheered himself with ends of, ,S47. 

cursed be the, 781. 

hoarse rough, should roar, 806. 

lies the subject of all, 907. 

love first invented, 204. 

Lydian airs married to, 786, 805. 

manhood better than his, 56. 

may find him who sermon flies, .364. 

one, for .sense f ne for I'hyme, 807. 

one, for the other's sake, 807, 

sweetens toil, however rude, 559. 

wanting the accomplishment of, 766. 
Verses, rhyme the rudder is of, 807. 
Vertu of necessite, maken, 802. 

the first, if thou wilt lere, 398. 
Vesture of decay, this muddy, 775. 
Veteran, superfluous lags the, 804. 

whose last act on the stage, 804. 
Vex not his ghost, 346. 

not then the poet's mind, 806. 
Vexing dull ear of a drowsy man, 799. 
Vibrates in the memory, 776. 
Vicai- of the almiglitie Lord, 489. 
Vice a monster of so frightful mien, 395. 

of fools, pride the, 799. 

prevails, when, 601. 
Vices, frame a ladder of our, 399. 

small, do appear, 802. 
Vicissitudes, circling joys of dear, 559. 

of things, sad, 559. 
Victor, great world-victor's, 940. 
Victories, after a thousand, 540. 

peace hath her, 909. 
Victorious o'er the the ills o' life, 848. 
Victory, O grave where is thy, 365. 

it was a famous, 538. 
View, landscape tire the, 444. 

dont, me with a critic's eye, 107. 
Vigils, poets painful, keep, 807. 
Vile, and only man is, 395. 

guns, but for these, 506. 

in durance, 346. 

in, man that mourns, 394. 

that was your garland, 813. 
Village bells, some Hampden, 306. 
Villain;-. a hungi-y lean-faced, 722. 

c ' nrder made a, 541. 

( . ...~y smile and be a, 722. 

,., ith a smiling cheek, 797. 
Villanous saltpetre digged, 5C6. 
Villany, clothe my naked, 396. 
Vindicate the ways of God to man, 807. 
Vine, gadding, o'er grown, 495. 
Violence, affictions, 348., 
Violent delights have violent ends, 815. 
Violet by a mossy stone, 105. 

bank where the nodding, grows, 495. 

glowing, 494. 

of his native land, 311. 

the forward, 122. 

throw a pertume on the, 726. 
Violets, bank of, breathes upon, 495. 

dim but sweeter, 495. 

plucked, 138, 346. 

odors when sweet, sicken, 776. 

spring from her fair flesh, 311. 
Virgil's verse and Tully's truth, 791. 
Virgin thorn, rose withering on thd, 495. 
Virgins are soft as the roses, 451. 
Virtue alone is happiness below, 398. 

alone outbuilds the pyramids, 398. 

ambition, ware that make, 722. 

assume a, if you have it not, 396. 

filled the space between, 797. 

her own, be her counsel, 193. 

in her shape how lovely, 398. 

is to gold as gold to silver, 803. 



t& 



■ff 



\B 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1063 



Virtue, let, follow if she will, 803. 
lives when beauty dies, 125. 
moi'e, than doth live, 907. V 

no man's, 815. 

only makes our bliss below, 398. 
possession would not showus, 801. 
she finds too painful an endeavor. 
232. 
Virtue's land, Fortune's ico prefers to 
798. 
side, failings lean to, 688. 
Virtues did not go forth of us, 797. 
nearest to heaven of the, 723. 
■\vill plead like angels. 900. 
Virtuous actions ai-e but born, 811. 
Virtuousest, discreetest, best, 209. 
Visage, devotion's, sugar o'er, 396. 

on his bold, middle age, 670. 
Vision and the faculty diviiip, 766. 
baseless fabric of this, 867. 
beatific, 803. 

I took it for a faery, 869. 
sensible to feeling as to sight, 882. 
Visions of glory spare my sight, 686. 
Visit her face too roughly, 206. 

pays where fortune smiles, 816. 
Visitations, sudden, daze the world, 812, 
Visitings of nature, compunctious, 960 
Visits, like angels, 347, 396. 
Voice, big manly, 711. 
cry sleep no more, SS.?. 
dear woman's ehiettes charm, 795. 
each a mighty, i93. 
in my dreaming ear melted, 529. 
more safe I sing with moi-tal, 3i8. 
my is still for war, 570. 
of the sluggard, 815. 
of nature cries from the tomb, 306. 
soft like solitude's, 317. 
sounds like a prophet's word, 583. 
that is still, sound of a, 315. 
wandering, 472. 
was ever gentle and low, 723. 
you cannot hear the, I hear, 311. 
Voices, ancestral, prophesying war, 834. 
earth with her thousand, 377. 
two, are there, 493. 
Voiceful sea, swelling of the, 822. 
Voluble in his discourse, so sweet is 723 
Volume of my brain, books and, 801. 

within that awful, lies, 397. 
Votarist, like sad, in palmer's weed, 830 
Votaress, imperial, passed on, 836. 
Vote that shakes the turrets, 589. 
Vows, much in our, 351. 

with so much passion, 204. 
wreck of sober, 558. 
Voyage, remainder biscuit after a, 803. 

of their life, 802. 
Vulgar by no means, 121. 
Vulture, ra^ of the, 451. 

Wad some power the gif tie gie us, 486. 
Wade through slaughter, 3U6. 
Waft me from distraction, 685. 

thy name beyond the sky, 238. 
Wag, could not, without a fee. 809. 
Wagers use arguments for, 803. 
Wags, how the world, 791. 
Walling winds and naked woods, 466 
Waist, round the slight, 814. 
Wait, serve who only stand and, 366. 
Wake and call me early, 327. 
Waked me too soon, you have, 815 
Wakeful nightingale, 413. 
Wakens the slumbermg ages, 812. 
Wakes the bitter memory, 39" 
Waking bliss, certainty of 

no such matter, 240. 
Wales a portion with judicious, are, 385 

nmible-footed madcap Prince of , 793. 
W^alk, by moon or glittering star, 206 

tar as the solar, or milky way 399 

in silk attire, 155. 

privileged beyond the common, 309. 

the earth unseen, 808. 

with, she is pretty to, 134. 
Walking in an air of glory, 274. 

shadow, life's but a, 792 
Walks abroad, whene'er I take mv 398 

studious, and shades, 720 ■" • 

these happy, and shades, 321. 

to-morrow in to-day already, 800. 
Wall serves it in the office of a, 603 
w .yli'tewashed, tha sanded floor, 689. 
WaUs, banners on the outward, 540 
„. stone, do not a prison make, 147. 
Wamuts and the wine, 814 
Walton's heavenly memory, 908. 
Wand, bright gold ring on her, 721. 
Wander everywhere, fd, 869 

solitary there, 843. 
Wn^H™"!'^ eternity, thoughts that, 794 
Wandered east, wandered west, 242 
Wanderer, reclaims the, 809. 
Wanderers o'ei- eternity, there are, 397 
Wandering mazes lost, iii, 808. 



Wandering on loath to die, linirerini? 
and, 809. 

steps and slow, hand in hand, 321. 

voice, call the bird or but a, 472. 
Wanton sweetness, instil a, 831. 

wiles, quips and cranks and, 785. 
Wantoned with thy breakers, 607. 
Wantonness kindles in clothes a, 713 
Wantons with the love-sick air, 133 
Wants, all thy, are well supplied, 76. 

that pinch the poor, 815. ' 

War, blast of, blows in our ears, 503. 

circumstance of glorious, 722. 

even to the knife, 539. 

ez f er, I call it murder, 541. 

fleiT, sparks that kindle, 5.39. 

flinty and steel couch of, 539. 

furious elemental, 494. 

game kings would not play at, 541. 

frira-visaged, hath smoothed, 541. 
e sung is toil and trouble, 772. 
is still the cry, 511. 
its thousands slays, 639. 
let slip the dogs of, 539. 
my sentence is for open, 639. 
my voice is still for, 570. 
of elements, unhurt amidst the, 759. 
right form of, squadrons and, 899. 
testament of bleeding, 541. 
through adventurous, 539. 
tug of, then was the, 641. 
War's glorious art, 641. 

red techstone, rang true metal on, 

Warble his native wood-notes wild, 786. 
Warbled to the string, such notes, 787. 
Warlike numbers heroicke sound, 938. 
Warmest welcome at an inn, 121. 
Warms in the sun, 489. 
Warmth, dear as vital, that feeds, 206 
Warning expected, school-boys at, 108. 
Warrior dead, home they brought '>9'' 
famoused for fight, 540. ' 

taking his rest, lay like a, 920. 
Warriors, fierce fiery, fought, 899. 
Wars, more pangs and fears than, 321. 

plumed troop and the big, 722 
Wash her guilt away, what art can, 336. 
Washed with morning dew, 204. 
Washing his hands, seemed, 724. 
Waste of feelings unemployed, 816. 
of thought, thinking an idle, 808. 
Wasteful and ridiculous excess, 726 
Wastes and wilds of man, 808. 
Wasting in despair, shall 1, 19.3. 
■Watch, idler is a, that wants hands, 724 
some must, some must sleep, 671 
the hour, if we do but, 899. 
Watch-dog's honest bark, 166. 

voice tliat bayed the wind, 688 
Watcher of the skies, felt Uke some, 805 
Watches, \vith judgments as our, 799. 
Watchful night, the day of woe the, 309 

weary tedious nights, 204. 
Water, conscience, saw its God and 
blushed, 362. 
drops, women's weapons, 346 
everywhere nor any drop to drink 

85o. 
imperceptible, wasMng hands in 724 
111 the rough rude sea, 722. 
nectar and the rocks pure gold 215 
smooth runs the, where brook is 

deep, 724. 
to give a cup of, little thing. 770 
trod the, 672. 
Waters blue, fades o'er the, 238. 
gurgle longingly, 631. 
hell of, where they howl, 720. 
meet, vale in whose bosom the, 116 
once more upon the, 631. 
o'er the glad, of theblue sea, 626 
roar of, 720. 

unpathed, undreamed shores, 802. 
wild went o'er his child, 339. 
world of, dark and deep. 407. 
Wave and whirlwind, wrestle with, 631 
glassy cool translucent, 869. 
long may it, 593. 
ocean, a life on the, 630. 
o' th' sea, I wish you a, 134. 
winning, a deserving note, 713 
Waved her lily hand, 235. 
Waves, battermg implacable, 948 
bound beneath me, 631. 
of ebbing day, 719. 
the breaking, dashed high, 687. 
who trusts himself to, 271 
Way, dim and perilous, 808. 

God moves in a mysterious, 632 
I see them on their winding 491 
kept the noiseless tenor of their,' 306. 
led the, to heaven, 910. 
hfe's common, so didst travel, 907 
marshall'st me the, I was going, 882 
milky, solar walk or, 399. 
O she dances such a, 211. 



Way, pretty Fanny's, we call it only, 134. 
steep and thorny, to heaven, 809. 
tenor of his, guileless held the, 794. 
that, madness lies, 348. 
that out of hell leads to light, 395. 
through Eden took theii-, 321 
the breaking, dances such a, 211. 
to dusty death, lighted fools the, 792. 
to heaven, all the, 724. 
to parish church, plain as, 803. 
ways, cheerful, of men, cut ofl:, 407 
dwelt among the untrodden, 104 
newest kind of, oldest sins the, 395. 
of glory, Wolsey that trod the, 322. 
©f God to man, vindicate the, 607. 
of God to men, justify the, 395. 
of men, far from the, 489. 
that are dark, tricks that are vain. 
987. ' 

JJ^'^ak, flue by degrees delicately, 723. 
Weakness, moulds another's, 812. 
perfect in, 642. 

stronger by, wiser men become, 754. 
,?r*''^Jl,^°"'*^st prayer for other's, 236. 
Wealth accumulates, where, 687. 
by any means get, 803. 
commerce, laws and learning, 812. 
and place, get, 803. 
loss of, is loss of dirt, 347. 
of Ornius and of Ind, 722. 
partake but never waste thy, 231 
rich from the very want of, 559. 
that smews bought have earned, 594. 
Wealthy curled darlings, 722. 
Weapon, satire's my, 8U6. 

stillassnowflakes onthosod,604. 
Weapons, women's, water drops, 346. 
Wear a golden sorrow, 347. 
motley's the only, SIO. 
not much the worse for, 961. 
Weariness can snore upon pillow, 816 

may toss him to my breast, 395 
Wears a precious jewel in his head, 318. 
Weary and old with service, 321 . 
are at reast, 339. 
of breath, 335. 
of conjectures, 769. 
of the sun, I 'gin to be a', 346. 
stale, flat, unprofitable, 316 
tedious nights, watchful, 204. 
Weathered, through cloudy, 304. 
Weathered the storm, pilot that 632 
Web, from their own entrails spin, 203 

like the stained, 120. 
™- S^f '^f^l'*? 'S of a mingled yarn, 792. 
Wed Itself with speech, 803. 

•mth thought, 803. 
Wedding, never, ever wooing, 144. 
Wedlock compared to feasts, 231 
Weed flung from the rock, 631. 

pernicious, whose scent annoys, 558. 
Weeds, of glorious feature, 489. 

wiped away the, and foam, 400. 
Week, divide the Sunday from the, 559 

of all the days that's in the, 198. 
Weep a people inurned, 561. 
away the life of care, 317. 
night is the time to, 416. 
no more lady, 138. 
smile while all around thee, 78. 
such tricks as make the angels, 813. 
there is a calm for those who, 794 
to record, and blush, 395. 
who would not, if Atticus, 910. 
Weeping thou sat'st, 78. 

upon his bed has sate, 343. 
Welcome, bay deep-mouthed, 106. 
ever smUes, 792. 
peaceful evening in, 810. 
pure-eyed Faith, white-handed Hope 



^ 



shade, fairer spirit or more, 910. 
I the commg guest, to our house, 121. 

the warmest, at an inn, 121. 
Welkm dome, stars have Ut the, 592. 
Well, of English undefyled, 938. 

last drop in the, 920. 

loved not wisely but too, 724. 

paid that is well satisfied, 802. 

to know her own, 209. 
Well-bred man, moral sensible, 7R0. 
Well-dissembled fly, 672. 
Well-spring of pleasure, babe in a house, 

Well-trod stage, 786. 

Weltering in his blood, 771. 

Wench's black eye, stabbed with r.,721. 

Wept o'er liis wounds, 688. 

Western flower, fell upon a little, 836. 

star, lovers love the, 491. 
Westminster, we thrive at, on fools, 810. 
Westward the course of empire 687. 
Westwind purr contented, 493. 
West-wind's summer sighs, 719. 
Wet damnation, 568. 
-„ f.he^t and a flowing sea, 626. 
Wether of the flock, tainted, 348. 



^ 



fi-t 



1064 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



-ac' 



Whalo, bobbed for, G72. 
Wliat a fail v.-as there, 87G. 

can an old mcui do but die, 322. 

can ennoble sots cr cowards, 781. 

care I how fair she be, 193. 

constitutes a state, 590. 

has been has been, 702. 

has posterity done for us, 793. ' 

he Imew what's, EOS. 

is done is done, 792. 

makes all doctrines clear, SCO. 

is more misei-able than discontent, 
799. 

is what he Irnew, 80S. 

perils do environ, 510. 

stronger brcascplatc, 708. 

vi'C have we prize not, 801. 
What's her history, 251. 

in a name, 81. 

one man's poison, 815. 

mine is j'ours, 205. 

yours is mine, 205. 
Whatever is, is ricjht, 489. 

realms I see, 213. 
Wlieedling arts, by her first taught, 795. 
Wheel, butterfly upcn a, breaks a, 900. 

the sola round, 810. 
Wheels, madding, ot brazen chariots, 

of v.'cary life itood still, 300. 

of Fhoibua' Avain, the hindmost, 830. 
When I:?racl cf tlie Lord beloved, 372. 

lovciy v/oman stoops to folly, S3G. 

we two parted in S-lence and tears, 
211. 
Whence is thy learning, 801. 
Whene'er I t^I:e my \f. ll-:s abroad, 398. 
Where my Julia's lips do smile, 134. 

none adrairo useless to excel, 133. 

the bee sucks there suck I, 809. 

was Roderick then, 511. 
Where's my child, 809. 
Whereabout, stones prate of my, 882. 
Where'er I roam, 213. 
While stands tlie Coliseum Kome shall 
stand, 082. 

there is life there's hope, 791. 
Whining school-boy witli satchel, 711. 
WMpped the otf ending Adam out, 395. 
Whipping, tutoress of arts, 108. 
Whips and scorns of time, 297. 
Whirlwind, rides in the, 539. 
Whirlwind's roar, torrent and, 603. 

sway, sweeping, 108. 
Whisper, busy, circling round, 688. 

hai-k they, angels say, 365. 
Whispered it to tlie woods, 209. 
Whispering for lovers made, 686. 

humbleness, bated breath and, 724. 

I will ne'er consent consented, 205. 

tongues can poison truth, 116. 

"ivind, watch-dog's bark bayed, 6S8. 

with white lips, the foe ! 512. 
Whispers of shades and wanton winds, 
494. 

the o'erfraught heart, 312. 
Whist, the wild waves, 869. 
Whistles, pipes and, 711. 
Whistling aloud to bear courage up, 107. 

the foolish, of a name, 939. 
White black and gray, 397. 

is not so white, 805. 

nor, so very white, 805. 

radiance of eternity, 540. 

wench's black eye, stabbed, 721. 

"whose red and. 122. 
White handed Hope, 830. 
Whiter than the driven snow, 703. 
Wliitewashed wall, sanded floor, 689. 
Who a sermon flies, verse may find, 364. 

breaks a buttei fly on a wheel, 909. 

builds a church to God, 797. 

dares do more isnone,800. 

love too much, hate, 207. 

never mentions hell to ears polite, 
S96. 

sha.! decide when doctors, 803. 

sLeals my purse steals ti-ash, 811. 

would not weep if Atticus, 910. 
Whoe'er she be, 192. 
Whole of life to live, not the, 311. 

parts of one stupendous, 287. 

perfect, 406. 

world kin makes, 811. 
Wholesome, the nights are, 397. 
Whom the gods love die young, 107. 
Why don't the men propose, 214. 

IS plain as way to church, 803. 

so pale and wan fond lo-ser,2C3. 
Wick, within the ilame of love, 271. 
Wiclced cease from troubling, 330. 
Wickedness, method in man's, 395. 
WicklifCe's dust shall spread, 939. 
Widow of fifty, 131. 

some undone, sits on mine arm, 541. 
Wielded at will fierce democratic, 804. 
Wife and children, 1 nets of love, 282. 

dearer than the bride, 215. 



Wife, man directed by a, 232. 

■\ i^ight, slie vv-as a, if ever such, were, 723. 

Wild ambition loves to slide, 798. 

in their attire so withered and so. 8CS. 

thyme blows, bank where the, 495. 

With all regret, 315. 
Wilderness, lodge in some vast, 593. 

bird of the, 473. 

of building, 867. 

of single instances, law that, 810. 
Wiles, more unexpert, boast not of, 539. 

simple transient sorrows, 128. 

waiiton, quips and cranks and, 785. 
AVill, and fate free will fixed fate, 808. 

bethere a, wisdom finds away, 798. 

complies against his, 803. 

if she, do't she will, 795. 

left free the human, 370. 

or won't dedend on't, a woman, 795. 

puzzles the, 297. 

river glideth at his own sweet, 678. 

served not another's, 730. 

star of the unconqucred, 802. 

temperate, the reason firm the, 12S. 

to do, the soul to dare, 670. 

unconquerable, study of revenge, 540. 
Willie \¥inkie, wee, 83. 
Willing to wound afraid to strike, 910. 
Tv'iHow-ed shore, wild and, 4S4. 
Wills to do or say seems wisest, 209. 
Wm us to our harm, tell us truths to, 396. 

with honest ti'illes to betray, S96. 
Wind and his nobility, betwixt the, 506. 

blow, come wi'ack, 641. 

blow thou wintei-, 316. 

breathing of the common, 922. 

hollow-murmuring, 816. 

hope constancy in, corn in chaS, 806. 

ill, turn ■ none to good, 802. 

invisible and creeping, 631. 

large a charter as the, 602. 

pass me by as the idle, 797. 

stands as never it stood, 802, 

streaming to, imperial ensign, 725. 

that follows fast, 626. 

that grand old harper, 493. 
Wmding bout, with many a, 786. 

way, I sec them on their, 491, 
Window, unfinished, in Aladdin's tower, 

910. 
Windowed raggedness, looped and, 494. 
■(.Vindows ricidy dight, storied, 787. 
Winds, ask of the, 614. 

blow, crack your cheeks, 494. 

beteemthe, of heaven, 206. 

courted by all the, 631. 

happy, upon her played, 721. 

posting, rides on the, 811. 

rough with black, 632. 

stormy, do blow, 629. 

wailing and nalced woods, 466. 
Wine, I'll not look for, 125. 

of life is drawn, mere lees is left, 345. 

old, to drink, 118. 

poison of misused, crushed sweet,558. 
Wine, across the wahiutsanu the, Sil. 
Wing, quiet sail as a noiseless, 685. 

dropped from an angel's, 90S. 

see the human soul take, 705. 
Winged hours of bliss, 347. 

the shaft, his own feather, 800. 
Wings, hope flies with swallow's, 800. 

hovering angel with golden, 830. 

lend fend your, 365. 

love-^nreads his light, 215. 

of nigjit, falls from the, 490. 

of silence, float upon the, 726. 

the soul, 725. 
Winking Mary -buds, begin, 474. 
Winkle, wee Willie, 83. 
Winsome wee tiring, she is a, 216. 
Winter in thy year, no, 472. 

of our discontent, 541. 

ruler of tlie inverted year, 492. 

when the dismal rain, in, 493. 
Winter's fury, long w ithstood the, 948. 
Wiped away the weeds and foam, 406. 
Wisdom, vain false philosophy, 808. 

at one entrance quite shut out, 407. 

calls seek virtue first, 803. 

man of, man of years, 794. 

married to immortal verse, 806. 

mounts her zenith with stars, 431. 

nearer when we stoop, 798. 

of a thousand years, 602. 

such as practice taught, 798. 

vain, all, and false philosophy, 808. 

will not enter, nor true power, 348. 
Wisdom's aid, music, 774. 

part, this is, 226. 
Wise, be not worldly, 798. 

enough to play the fool, 798. 

exceeding fair spoken, 723. 

for cure depend on exercise, 671. 

folly t J be, where ignorance is bliss, 
108. 

passiveness, 397. 



Wise saws and modern instances, 711. 

the only, wretched arc the, 739. 

type of the, who soar, 47-4. 

who are a little, 798. 

with speed, 793. 
Wisely, loved not, but too well, 724. 

worldly, be, 798. 
Wiser, X am no, than a dnw, 810. 
Wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind. 
938. 

censure in mouths of, £11. 

virtuousest, discrectest, best, 209. 
Wish fled from her, 723. 

was father to that thought, COO. 
Wished she had not heard it, lis. 

often that I had clear, 121. 
Wishes in idle, fools supinely stay, 7C3. 

sober, never learned to stray, SCfi. ' 
Wishing of all employments worst, 801. 
Wit, a man in, simplicity a child, 721. 

able enough to justify the town, 939. 

and social eloquence, 940. 

brevity is the soul of, ECS. 

brightens, how the, 812. 

courage is as little as his, 140. 

craves kind of, to do that well, 798. 

high as metaphysic, can fly, E08. 

in the combat gentle as bright, 940. 

invites by his looks to come, EOS. 

is a feather, and a chief a red, 7S0. 

men of, will condescend, 810. 

put his whole, in a jest, ES9. 

she hath without desire, 140. 

that can creep, 910. 

to mortify a, there still remains, £04. 

true, is nature dressed, 807. 

ye'll iind nae otherwhere, 343. 
Wit's deep quintessence, 938. 
Witch hath power to charm, 397. 

the world with horsemanship, 671. 
Witchcraft, what a hell of, lies 204. 

this only is the, I have used, 145. 
Witchery of the soft blue sky, 4C0. 
Witching time of night, the very, 491. 
Withered and so wild in attire, iiis 
Withering on the virgin thorn, 495. 
Within, I have that, passetli show, 225. 

that awful volume lies, 397. 
Without Thee we are poor, 394. 
Witness of all-judging Jove, 811. 
Wits, keen encounter ot our, 804. 

to madness near aided, 9C9. 
Witty, though but downright fools, 938. 

though ne'er so, words, 204. 

to talk with, 134. 
Woe, laughing wild, amid severest, £S9. 

bewrays more, silence in icve, 204. 

careful pilot of my proper, 223. 

day of, the watchful night, 309. 

deepest notes of thrill the, 204. 

eloquence to, ti-uth denies, 343. 

every, a tear can claim, SG7. 

heritage of, lord of himnelf that, 
346. 

mockery of, bear about the, 312. 

Nature gave signs of, £1)9. 

new scenes of, 539. 

one, upon another's heel. 345. 

ponderous, bear it calmly tho a, 312. 

i-earwaid of a conquered, 271. 

sabler tints of, chastised by, 346. 

sleep the friend of, 816. 

teach me to feel another's, 370. 

tears of, the smiles of jcy, 3B9. 

trappings and the suits of, 295. 

voiceless, 720. 

weary, S16. 
Woes at midnight rise, 402. 

cluster lare and solitary, 345. 

easer of all, 816. 

Galileo with his, 938. 

shall serve for sweet discourses, 241. 
Wolf on the fold, came down like, 600. 
Woman is at best a contradiction, 795. 

believea, oran epitaph, £06. 

could play the, with mine eyes, 346. 

dark eye in, light of a, 686. 

destructive, dam.nable, deceitful, 
795. 

excellent thing in, soft voice an, 723. 

frailty thy name is, 207. 

how divine a thing, may be, 273. 
Woman, a perfect, nobly planned, 128. 

in her first i;assion, 796. 

in oiu" hours of ease, 509. 

in this humour wooed Iv^n], 796. 

lovely woman, 133. 

loves her lover, 796. 

man is but half without, 232. 

moved like a fountain troubled, 725. 

nature made thee to temper man, 133. 

one thfit was a, 309. 

perfected, earth's noblest thing, 733. 

play the, 321. 

scorned, like a, 207. 

she is a, therefore to be woi), 795. 

smiled, till, 204. 



[& 



^ 



e- 



INDEX OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 



1065 



fl] 



Woman, still be a, for you, 18d. 

stoops to folly, when lovely, 336. 

such duty owetli to her husband, 215. 

take an elder, let the, 215. 

take some savage, 257. 

that deliberates is lost, 796. 

'tis, that seduces all mankind, 795. 

■what mighty iUs done by, 795. 

■who trusts himself to, 271. 

■will or won't, depend on't, 795. 

win a, with his tongue, 133. 
Woman's eyes, light that lies in, 203. 

gentle brain, 795. 

looks, my only books, 204. 

love, brief as, 207. 

reason, no other but a, 723. 

whole existence, love is, 796. 
Womanhood and childhood, 104. 
Womb of uncreated night, 794. 
Women, alas the love of, 203. 

and brave men, 511. 

frail as glasses, 232. 

framed to make false, 207. 

like princes find few friends, 795. 
Women's weapons, water-drops, 346. 
Won, if haply, perhaps a hapless gain, 
204. 

not unsought be, 209. 

she is a woman therefore to be, 795. 

showed how fields were, 688. 
Wonder all mankind, 134. 

grew, still the, 688. 

how the devil they got there, 815. 

of an hour, school boy's tale the, 792. 

of our stage, 905. 
Wonderfiil is death, 714. 
Wonders to perform, 632. 
Wondrous kind, fellow feeling makes, 
804. 

pitiful, 'twas, 145. 

strange, but this is, 808. 

sweet and fair, 125. 
Wonted fires, in our ashes live their, 306. 
Woo, April when they, 214. 

her, my story, and that would, 145. 

was not made to, 795. 
Wood, deep and gloomy, 404. 

old, to burn, 118. 

one impulse from a vernal, 494. 
Woodbine, luscious, over-canopied, 495. 

weU-attired, 494. 
Woodman spare that tree, 101. 
Wood-notes, native, wild, 786. 
Woods against a stormy sky, 587. 

green-robed senators of mighty, 494. 

pleasure in the pathless, 607. 

whispered it to the, 209. 
Wooed, beautiful therefore to be, 795. 

that would be, 209. 

we should be, 795. 
Wooer, was a thriving, 204. 
Wooing in my boys, I'll go, 215. 

the caress, 814. 
Woolen, odious in, 779. 
Word as faiL no such, 802. 

a reputation dies at every, 811. 

Farewell ! a, that must be, 241. 

for teaching me that, 803. 

He was the, that spake it, 398. 

many a, at random spoken, 803. 

no man relies on, 940. 

of Csesar might have stood, 876. 

of promise to our ear, 345. 

sweet in every whispered, 491. 

tempted her with, too large, 204. 

whose lightest, 725. 

worn-out, so idly spoken, 813. 
Wordes, finden, newe, 3. 

fearen babes, 540. 
Words, apt and gracious, 723. 

are like leaves, 803. 

give sorrow, 312. 

immodest, admit of no defence, 805. 

move slow, 806. 

must appear in other ways than, 121. 

of all sad, of tongue or pen, 159. 

of learned men, 688. 

that bm-n, thoughts that breathe, 
867. 

that weep and tears that speak, 804. 
Work for man to mend, 671. 

her noblest, she classes 0, 191. 

honest man's noblest, of God, 780. 

like madness in the brain, 116. 

to sport as tedious as to, 108. 
Working out salvation, tools of, 396. 
Works, these are thy glorious, 417. 
World, anywhere out of the, 335. 

bank-note, 677. 

blows and buffets of the, 347. 

books are a, 805. 



World but two nations bear, 796. 
contagion to tills, 491. 
daffed the, aside, 793. 
dissolves, when all the, 396. 
Columbia queen of the, 588. 
falls when Rome falls, 682. 
fever of the, 404. 
gave his honors to the, 311. 

glory, jest, and riddle of the, 792. 
ow the wags, 791. 

humanized a, 806. 

I have not loved the, 271. 

I hold the, but as the, 804. 

if aU the, and love were young, 158. 

in a naughty, 797. 

in love with night, 134. 

inhabit this bleak, alone, 465. 

into this breathing, 938. 

is all a fleeting show, 399. 

is too much with us, 403. 

Ught awakes the, 490. 

man is one, and hath another, 792. 

might have stood against the, 876. 

name at which the, grew pale, 909. 

new, which is the old, 175. 

of death, back to a, 308. 

of sighs, for my pains a, 14.5. 

of waters dark and deep, 407. 

proud, good bye, 311. 

rack of this tough, stretch him out, 
346. 

sink, let the, 398. 

so fair, God hath made, 399. 

steal from the, 225. 

so shines good deed in naughty, 797. 

sudden visitations daze the, 812. 

the whole, kin, 811. 

this work-day, 215. 

this runs the, away, 671. 

to darkness and to me, leave the, 304. 

to spite the, 347. 

too much respect upon the, 803. 

too wide, 711. 

uses of this, 346. 

vain pomp and glory of this, 321. 

was all before them where to choose, 
331. 

was sad till woman smiled, 204. 

weight of this unintelligible, 404. 

witch the, with horsemanship, 671. 

without a, sun within our arms, 206. 
Woi-ld's a bubble, 320. 

a stage, all the, 711. 

a theatre, 792. 
Worldly wise, be not, 798. 
Worlds, allured to brighter, 688. 

exhausted, and imagined new, 905. 

moving about in, not realized, 759. 

should conquer twenty, 308. 

wrecks of matter and the crash of, 
759. 
Worm in the bud, like a, 251. 

is in the bud of youth, 308. 

needlessly sets foot upon a, 782. 

the canker and the grief, 250. 

the smallest, vrill tm-n, 798. 
Worms and epitaphs, let's talk of, 310. 

of Nile, outvenoms the, 811. 
Worn out with eating time, a clock, 309. 
Worn-out word, alone, 813. 
Worse appear the better reason, 724. 

change for, 207. 

for wear, not much the, 959. 

gives greater feeling to the, 345. 
Worship, give me, and quietness, 541. 

of the great of old, 681. 
Worst, the, speak something good, 364. 

this is the, .346. 
Worth, afflicted, retire to peace, 804. 

a thousand men, .511. 

celestial, promise of, 398. 

in anything, what is, 803. 

makes the man, 781. 

prize not to the, 801. 

sad relic of departed, 581. 

vu'tue and the conscience of her, 209. 
Worthy of your love, he will seem, 205. 
Wot not what they are, 804. 
Wound, earth felt the, 899. 

tongue in every, of Ca3.sar, 877. 

with a touch scarcely felt, 806. 
Wounds, bind up my, 540. 

wept o'er his, 688. 
Wraps their clay, turf that, 563. 
Wrath, infinite, infinite despair, 396. 

nursing her, to keep it warm, 847. 
Wreathed smiles, 785. 
Wreaths, with victorious, 541. 
Wreck of sober vows, 558. 
Wrecks of matter, 759. 
Wren will flght against the owl, 232. 



Wretch condemned with life to part, 
347. 

friend to the, whom every friend 
forsakes, 311. 

hollow-eyed, sharp-looking, 722. 

once conscious of the joy, 800. 
Wretched are the wise, 730. 
Wretchedness, hug all, 243. 

in his conception, 320. 
Wretches hang- jurymen may dine, 810. 

poor naked, 494. 
Wrinkle, time writes no, 607. 
Wrinkled Care derides. Sport that, 785. 

Wrinkles, the d d democrats, won't 

flatter, 794. 
Writ by God's o-\vn hand, 489. 

stolen forth of holy, 396. 

strong as proofs of holy, 207. 
Write as funny as I can, 976. 

those that, in rhyme, 807. 
Writing, ease in, conies from art, 806. 
Wrong, always in the, 909. 

can't be, whose life is right, 397. 

condemn the, 395. 

ne'er pardon who have done the, 798. 

once, will need be always so, 798. 

rival in the, 799. 

reverse of, mistook for right, 808. 

treasures up a, 899. 

we are both in the, 121. 
Wronged orphans' tears, 541, 
Wrongs of night, repay the, 489. 
Wroth with one we love, 116. 
Wroghte, afterwards he taught, 697. 
Wrote, what he, was all his own, 939. 
Wrought in a sad sincerity, 736. 
Wut's words to them, 539. 
Wyd was his parisshe, 697. 

Xerxes did die and so must I, 397. 

Taller-pines, under the, 493. 

Yarn, web of our life is a mingled, 792. 

Yawn, heard thy everlasting,confess,724. 

Ye mariners of England, 629. 

Year by year we lose friends, 120. 

heaven's eternal, 311. 

if aU the, were playing holidays, 108. 

Inverted, ruler of the, 492. 

melancholy days the saddest of the, 
466. 

moments make the, 815. 

rolhng, is full of the, 417. 
Years, flight of, unmeasured by, 399. 

eternal, of God, 534. 

thought of our past, 758. 

we live in deeds not, 742. 
Yellow melancholy, 251. 

pi-imrose was to him, 495. 
Yesterday, O call back, 792. 
Yesterdays, cheerful, and confident to- 
morrows, 793. 

have lighted fools to death, 792. 

look backwards, 792. 
Yielded her heart in dots and under- 
lines, 254. 

with coy submission, 711. 
Yoke, how hard thy, cruel thy dart, 204, 
Yore, race of, 308. 
York, tills sun of, 541. 
Yorkish tui-n again, 123. 
You meaner beauties of the night, 124. 
Young and so fair, 335. 

both were, one was beautiful, 764. 

desire, hope thou, nurse of, 800. 

Fancy's rays, 108. 

idea now to shoot, 214. 

man's fancy, 254. 

Obadias, David, Josias, 397. 

to be was very heaven, 490. 

when my bosom was, 529. 

whom the gods love die, 107. 
Youth, bud of worm is in, 308. 

flourish in immortal, 759. 

had been friends in, 116. 

is vain, 116. 

in the lexicon of, 802. 

of labor, 687. 

on the prow pleasure at helm 108. 

perpetual, 602. 

sheltered me in, 101. 

spirit of, 490, 492. 

steals from her, 215. 

unknown to fame, 307. 
Youthful poets dreams, 786. 

poets fancy when they love, 134; 

Zaccheus he did climb the tree, 397. 
Zealots, let graceless fight, 397. 
Zekle crep' up quite unbeknown, 993. 
Zenith, dropt from, like falling star, 725. 



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